The Williams Scale of Attitude toward Paganism: development and application among British Pagans

This article builds on the tradition of attitudinal measures of religiosity established by Leslie Francis and colleagues with the Francis Scale of Attitude toward Christianity (and reflected in the Sahin-Francis Scale of Attitude toward Islam, the Katz-Francis Scale of Attitude toward Judaism, and the Santosh-Francis Scale of Attitude toward Hinduism) by introducing a new measure to assess the attitudinal disposition of Pagans. A battery of items was completed by 75 members of a Pagan Summer Camp. These items were reduced to produce a 21-item scale that measured aspects of Paganism concerned with: the God/Goddess, worshipping, prayer, and coven. The scale recorded an alpha coefficient of 0.93. Construct validity of the Williams Scale of Attitude toward Paganism was demonstrated by the clear association with measures of participation in private rituals

Religion and health : the application of a cognitive-behavioural framework

The empirical examination of the relationship between religion and health has often lacked theoretical direction. The aim of the study was to examine the relationship between dimensions of religiosity and health within the context of James and Wells’ cognitive-behavioural framework of religion. A community sample of 177 UK adults completed measures of religious orientation, religious coping, and prayer activity alongside the SF-36 Health Survey. Consistent with the cognitive-behavioural framework of religion, intrinsic religiosity and meditative prayer scores accounted for unique variance in both physical and mental health scores over a number of religious measures. These findings suggest the potential usefulness and importance of a cognitive-behavioural framework to understand the relationship between religion (as measured by meditative prayer and intrinsic religiosity) and health

Sterol regulatory element binding proteins: their role in the hypoxic response of cancer cells and their regulation by the Akt/mTORC1 pathway

Sterol regulatory element binding proteins (SREBPs) are transcription factors that regulate the expression of genes involved in fatty acid and cholesterol biosynthesis. It has been established that SREBPs are regulated downstream of the PI3-Kinase/Akt/ mTORC1 signalling axis, a pathway that is frequently hyper-activated in cancer. SREBP target genes are upregulated in some forms of human cancer and a role for lipid metabolism in tumourigenesis has been suggested. Glioblastoma multiforme (GBM) is a cancer type that is associated with hyperactivation of the PI3-kinase/Akt signalling pathway and frequently displays poorly oxygenated (hypoxic) regions. SREBP1 has been implicated in the tumourigenic potential of this cancer type. However, the exact role of SREBPs in tumourigenesis is not known. In oder to investigate the SREBP-transcriptional response in cancer cells, a gene expression microarry analysis was carried out. It was found that SREBPs regulate genes involved in a variety of cellular processes including lipid metabolism, cell cycle regulation, redox regulation and cellular stress response. In addition, the role of SREBPs in lipid metabolism in hypoxia was investigated. It was found that hypoxia leads to distinct changes in the expression of different SREBP isoforms and their target genes and is associated with a decrease in pyruvate-dependent lipid synthesis and increased lipid storage. SREBPs are regulated downstream of the Akt/mTORC1 pathway, although the exact mechanism of this regulation remains to be elucidated. Possible mechanisms by which Akt and mTORC1 regulate SREBPs were investigated. It was found that inhibition of mTORC1 differentially affects the expression of individual SREBP isoforms. The results described in this thesis also show that mTORC1 modulates the transcriptional activity of mature SREBP and may regulate its stability in a GSK3-independent manner

Fibrinogen E fragment selectively disrupts the vasculature and inhibits the growth of tumours in a syngeneic murine model

We recently demonstrated that a fragment of human fibrinogen, fibrinogen E fragment, inhibits the migration and differentiation of human endothelial cells in vitro. Here we show that it exerts similar effects on murine endothelial cells in vitro, and selectively disrupts tumour endothelium in vivo, causing widespread intravascular thrombosis and retarding the growth of CT26 tumours in a syngeneic murine model

Brain rhythms define distinct interaction networks with differential dependence on anatomy

Cognitive functions are subserved by rhythmic neuronal synchronization across widely distributed brain areas. In 105 area pairs, we investigated functional connectivity (FC) through coherence, power correlation, and Granger causality (GC) in the theta, beta, high-beta, and gamma rhythms. Between rhythms, spatial FC patterns were largely independent. Thus, the rhythms defined distinct interaction networks. Importantly, networks of coherence and GC were not explained by the spatial distributions of the strengths of the rhythms. Those networks, particularly the GC networks, contained clear modules, with typically one dominant rhythm per module. To understand how this distinctiveness and modularity arises on a common anatomical backbone, we correlated, across 91 area pairs, the metrics of functional interaction with those of anatomical projection strength. Anatomy was primarily related to coherence and GC, with the largest effect sizes for GC. The correlation differed markedly between rhythms, being less pronounced for the beta and strongest for the gamma rhythm

Christianity, paranormal belief and personality: a study among 13- to 16-year-old pupils in England and Wales

Studies concerning the changing landscapes of religiosity and spirituality in the lives of young people in England and Wales draw attention to decline in traditional religiosity and to growth in alternative spiritualities. The present study examined whether such alternative spiritualities occupy the same personality space as traditional religiosity. A sample of 2,950 13- to 16-year-old pupils attending 11 secondary schools in England and Wales completed the Francis Scale of Attitude toward Christianity and an index of paranormal belief, alongside the abbreviated-form Junior Eysenck Personality Questionnaire Revised. The data demonstrated that these two forms of belief were related in different ways to Eysenck's dimensional model of personality space. While attitude toward Christianity occupied the space defined by low psychoticism scores (tendermindedness) and high lie scale scores (social conformity), paranormal belief was related to high psychoticism scores (toughmindedness) and was independent of lie scale scores. These findings support the view that alternative spiritualities may be associated with different personalities

Evaluating the robustness of objective pilling classification with the two-dimensional discrete wavelet transform

Previously, we proposed a new method of frequency domain analysis based on the two-dimensional discrete wavelet transform to objectively measure pilling intensity in sample fabric images. We have further evaluated this method, and our results indicate that it is robust to small horizontal and/or vertical translations and to significant variations in the brightness of the image under analysis, and is sensitive to rotation and to dilation of the image. These results suggest that as long as precautions are taken to ensure fabric test samples are imaged under consistent conditions of weave/knit pattern alignment (rotation) and apparent interyarn pitch (dilation), the method will yield repeatable results. <br /