Psychological and psychosocial responses of women seeking pregnancy counseling to HIV antibody testing

The purpose of this descriptive investigation was to study the reactions of women, specifically women who were seeking pregnancy counseling, to the psychological and psychosocial impact of HIV antibody testing. A questionnaire was developed that surveyed women on HIV knowledge, behaviors associated with HIV infection, and locus of control issues related to the disease. Additionally, questions regarding the stigma and discrimination associated with the disease were posed that may have acted as barriers to taking the HIV antibody test. Finally, supplemental questions related to HIV and the issue of abortion were also presented.;The sample for this research consisted entirely of women who were new or returning clients of Planned Parenthood. Four sites from Planned Parenthood in the Hampton Roads area of Virginia were utilized. One hundred and four women completed the survey. The ages of women sampled ranged from 12 to above 50. Median age range for this sample was 21-25 years of age. Other demographic information presented a composite of mostly white, lower socioeconomic status, high school to college educated women.;Eighty four women indicated that they would take the HIV antibody test; twelve indicated that they would decline taking it. However, many of the women who said that they would take the HIV antibody test had not taken the test at the time the survey was conducted. It was concluded that the majority of women had sufficient knowledge regarding the disease, although over half of the women surveyed did not know that HIV could be spread by an HIV infected mother who breast feed her newborn. A majority of women also demonstrated an internal locus of control with regards to HIV infection. Using a Likert Scale, ninety-six women answered the question posed about HIV infection as it pertained to the option of abortion. Twenty-one women (21.8%) strongly agreed to aborting their fetus if they were HIV infected, while seventeen participants (17.7%) agreed. However, forty-three women (44.7%) were uncertain as to their decision to abort their fetus; seven women (7.2%) disagreed and eight (8.3%) strongly disagreed to having an abortion as a result of being infected with HIV.;Further study is needed in this area which would demonstrate a more diversified sample of women in order to increase the external validity of the findings of this study. as research into the disease continues to divulge new methodologies for using established drugs to combat HIV, such as the preliminary revelation that AZT significantly cuts the risk of HIV transmission from mother to fetus, questions arise that deal with new psychological consequences and conflicts for the female population

Essaying Place: Time and Landscape in the Essay Film

This practice as research thesis explores the representation of place in the essay film. Place and landscape are frequent subjects of the essay film, films that often form through, and in response to, encounters with the spaces of the world. This thesis seeks to shed light onto the essayistic representation of place through exploring the structures, make-up and experience of places and landscapes and through the application of theory from the field of geography. I establish what I call an essaying of place in order to describe the processes and outcomes of an approach to cities and landscapes through the essay film, one in which the complexities and multiplicities of place come to the fore. Central to the thesis is a focus on temporality in a consideration of place and in developing an understanding of the relationship between place and the essay film. I produced two film works that both take an essayistic form in an approach to representing place and landscape, embodying the theoretical research and expanding this research through creative production. My practice approaches the spaces of England through the essay film, where travelling acts as a film production device, as a research tool and as a method of putting into practice an essaying of place. The process oriented nature of a practice as research project positions filmmaking as a key element in understanding my work as a practitioner alongside the wider research into the essay form

The effect of personality on collaborative task performance and interaction

Collocated, multi-user technologies, which support group-work are becoming increasingly popular. Examples include MERL's Diamondtouch and Microsoft's Surface, both of which have evolved from research prototypes to commercial products. Many applications have been developed for such technologies which support the work and entertainment needs of small groups of people. None of these applications however, have been studied in terms of the interactions and performances of their users with regards to their personality. In this paper, we address this research gap by conducting a series of user studies involving dyads working on a number of multi-user applications on the DiamondTouch tabletop device

Testing the existence and direction of "spill-over" of mussel recruits beyond the boundaries of marine protected areas

Landscape ecology helps in predicting the influence of habitat fragmentation on populations. Marine protected areas (MPAs) are expected to create areas of good quality patches and so improve connectivity among shores. MPAs are believed not only to protect adult populations, but also to enhance recruitment both within MPAs and on surrounding exploited shores, therefore improving their ability to recover from overexploitation. As such, MPAs are a preferred management tool for the conservation of natural populations. Although MPAs have been demonstrated to enhance adult abundances, little work has been done on their ability to provide so called "spill-over" of recruits nor has the generality of the influence of MPAs been investigated in a single region with multiple control sites. The Transkei region, on the east coast of South Africa, and the intertidal mussel, Perna perna, offer an ideal system to test the generality of the influence of MPAs on surrounding shores, due to the presence of multiple MPAs and exploited control sites. Patterns of adult abundance were surveyed at four MPAs and two comparably sized exploited control sites. Adult abundances were, in general, found to be higher within MPAs than at exploited control sites, with adult abundances decreasing towards the edge of MPAs and decreasing even more on the outside shores. To simplify the sorting procedure for samples of mussel recruits, a new method using fractionated elutriation was devised and tested. This new method was found to be more accurate, although not statistically significant but also substantially more time consuming. The increase in accuracy although not statistically significant could be biologically significant, especially when looking at low numbers. This new method could, therefore, be very useful especially when [...] is low. Recruitment was estimated over three months during the main reproductive season at two of the MPAs and at appropriate control sites. I predicted that recruitment patterns would mirror the patterns found in adult abundances and that there would be directionality in patterns of recruitment, with northern sites having greater recruitment due to the direction of near-shore ocean currents. Contrary to this, there were no correlations between adult abundance and recruitment for any of the months or sites, with no clear spatial pattern of recruitment in any of the three months. There was, however, a slight trend of greater recruitment at northern sites. To explain the lack of consistency in recruitment and adult abundances, wind data were used to examine the near-shore surface currents in this area, with theoretical surface currents showing similar patterns to those observed for recruitment. From a landscape perspective, the good patches created by MPAs supply recruits to the surrounding matrix but the low quality of habitat in the matrix prevents rehabilitation. The quality of the matrix must therefore be first improved by reseeding these shores. These results emphasise that while MPAs may function in protecting adult abundances, their influence on supplying recruits and hence recovery of near-by exploited shores may be overestimated. This lack of influence on near-by exploited shores highlights the need for reseeding of shores in conjunction with suitable management plans

Applying Health in All Policies to obesity in South Australia

Author version made available here in accordance with publisher policy.Public policy strategies impact on population health by acting on the effectiveness, availability and distribution of the social determinants of health. Reducing obesity and promoting healthy weight is a key focus of governments, health promoters and researchers and can benefit from a systems approach with 'upstream' policy action beyond the health sector. Although the literature identifies many areas for hypothetical non-health policy action, and in particular relating to food and activity environments, few have identified practical, politically viable and relatively cost-free processes by which non-health sectors would want to commit to such action. This paper details how the Government of South Australia used the Health in All Policies (HiAP) approach in the SA HiAP Healthy Weight Project. This mapped the core business and policy directions of 44 state departments against research on 'what works' to address obesity. Negotiations then developed high-level policy commitments to address factors promoting healthy weight which predominantly changed ways of working rather than requiring new expenditure, and also assisted departments in meeting their own goals; departmental chief executives endorsed the commitments. By starting from departmental documents, and not restricting the project to departments with more 'obvious' obesity prevention potential, we gained commitment to a broader range of policy actions than identified elsewhere; for example for prisons, environment and botanic gardens, housing and vocational education. The SA HiAP Healthy Weight Project provides one example of a workable, evidence-based systems approach to increase commitment to practical and politically viable opportunities across government to address the non-health environments supporting healthy weight