Engines of liberation

women;technological change

Regulatory incentives and financial reporting quality in public healthcare organisations

English National Health Service Foundation Trusts are subject to a regulatory regime in which the level of monitoring and intervention is determined by performance against two key performance metrics: a ‘financial risk rating’, based on a number of performance metrics, such as the reported surplus margin and return on assets, and a ‘prudential borrowing limit’. In this paper, we investigate the variation in financial reporting quality, proxied by discretionary accruals, with the incentives introduced by this regime. We find: first, that discretionary accruals are managed to report small surpluses; second, that, consistent with the avoidance of regulatory intervention in both the short and medium term, discretionary accruals are more positive when pre-managed performance is below intervention triggering thresholds and more negative when well above threshold; third, that, despite a move away from financial breakeven as the primary performance objective, there remains an aversion to small loss reporting. We further find that the level of discretionary accruals is driven by two metrics of strategic significance: the surplus margin (a measure of retained earnings) and the prudential borrowing limit (a measure of borrowing capacity)

How Useful are High-Precision Delta ?17O Data in Defining the Asteroidal Sources of Meteorites?: Evidence from Main-Group Pallasites, Primitive and Differentiated Achondrites

High-precision oxygen isotope analysis is capable of revealing important information about the relationship between different meteorite groups. New data confirm that the main-group pallasites are from a distinct source to either the HEDs or mesosiderites

Study of high altitude plume impingement

Computer program has been developed as analytical tool to predict severity of effects of exhaust of rocket engines on adjacent spacecraft surfaces. Program computes forces, moments, pressures, and heating rates on surfaces immersed in or subjected to exhaust plume environments. Predictions will be useful in design of systems where such problems are anticipated

Accelerating vaccine development and deployment: report of a Royal Society satellite meeting.

The Royal Society convened a meeting on the 17th and 18th November 2010 to review the current ways in which vaccines are developed and deployed, and to make recommendations as to how each of these processes might be accelerated. The meeting brought together academics, industry representatives, research sponsors, regulators, government advisors and representatives of international public health agencies from a broad geographical background. Discussions were held under Chatham House rules. High-throughput screening of new vaccine antigens and candidates was seen as a driving force for vaccine discovery. Multi-stakeholder, small-scale manufacturing facilities capable of rapid production of clinical grade vaccines are currently too few and need to be expanded. In both the human and veterinary areas, there is a need for tiered regulatory standards, differentially tailored for experimental and commercial vaccines, to allow accelerated vaccine efficacy testing. Improved cross-fertilization of knowledge between industry and academia, and between human and veterinary vaccine developers, could lead to more rapid application of promising approaches and technologies to new product development. Identification of best-practices and development of checklists for product development plans and implementation programmes were seen as low-cost opportunities to shorten the timeline for vaccine progression from the laboratory bench to the people who need it

Parents’ communication to primary school-aged children about mental health and ill-health: a grounded theory study

Purpose – Stigma around mental health problems is known to emerge in middle childhood and persist into adulthood, yet almost nothing is known about the role of parents in this process. This paper aims to develop a model of parental communication to primary school-aged children around mental health and ill-health, to increase understanding about how stigma develops. Design/methodology/approach – Semi-structured interviews were performed with ten UK-based parents of children aged 7-11 years. Analysis followed an exploratory grounded theory approach, incorporating quality assurance checks. Findings – Parents’ communications are governed by the extent to which they view a particular issue as related to “Them” (mental ill-health) or to “Us” (mental health). In contrast to communication about “Us”, parental communication about mental “illness” is characterized by avoidance and contradiction, and driven by largely unconscious processes of taboo and stigma. Originality/value – This study was the first to explore parents’ communications to their 7-11 year old children about mental health and mental illness, and proposes a preliminary theoretical model that may offer insight into the development of stigma in childhood and the intergenerational transmission of stigmatized attitudes

Communications to children about mental illness and their role in stigma development: an integrative review

Background Limited literature on the stigma of mental illness has examined the socio-cultural processes involved in the development of stigma around mental health in children, which emerges in middle childhood (7-11 years). Greater understanding might inform preventative interventions. Aims This review aims to integrate disparate theoretical and empirical research to provide an overview of social communications to children aged 7-11 years about mental illness across four key socio-cultural contexts (the media, school, peers, parents) of relevance to children’s development, and to consider their role in the development of stigmatized views. Method Systematic literature searches were conducted within electronic databases and abstracts were scanned to identify relevant studies. Fifteen papers were selected for the review. Results The review found few studies have directly examined communications about mental illness to children. Available evidence suggests messages across children’s socio-cultural contexts are characterized by silence and stigma, which may shape children’s developing views. Specific theoretical frameworks are lacking; possible mechanisms of transmission are discussed. Conclusions This review suggests overcoming stigma will require efforts targeting young children, explicitly tackling mental illness, and spanning multiple social spheres: further research is warranted

Could Stannern-trend eucrites be crustal-contaminated melts?

In this paper, we show that the composition of Stannern trend eucrites can be satisfactorily explained by contamination of normal main group eucrites by a crustal partial melt

DIRECT FORCE MEASUREMENT OF THE VAULT TAKE OFF IN GYMNASTICS

INTRODUCTION The inverse dynamic approach to force measurement of. high speed human movement is susceptible to large second derivative errors, caused by the high sampling rate required to avoid aliasing. In gymnastics vaulting the springboard contact phase has a duration of approximately 0.11 s, Dillman et al (1985). The purpose of the study was to investigate the nature of the forces involved in the springboard take off in vaulting. Kistler Piezo electric load cells (Model 9134a) were selected for direct force measurement of the processes taking place during the take off. Ta work efficiently, load cells must be pre loaded in a mounting jig to provide an inelastic structure through which the forces are transmitted. These jigs were inserted between the upper surface of the springboard (Gymnova Model B219) and the spring and also under the foot at the rear of the board, as can be seen in the figure below.The subjects were eight male gymnasts (mean mass 47.5Kg) who were all members of the Under 15 British gymnastics squad. Following habituation, the gymnasts performed five handspring vaults, replicating competition conditions. The four load cells were preloaded to 10,OOON and attached to the springboard, which was bolted onto a rigid steel plate. The whole structure was bolted to a force platform. Force data was captured at approximately 800Hz on an IBM PC, from immediately prior to contact with the springboard through to several seconds after take off. Each trial was also filmed at 250pps, using a Kodak Ektapro High Speed Video system. Each of the three data channels were smoothed using a 3 point moving average before analysis. RESULTS The figure displays a typical force trace. CONCLUSIONS The mean peak ground reaction force (G.R.F) across all trials was equivalent to 10.6 times body mass (5053N). The mean contact time for all trials was 0 133s, which was in agreement with other published work. The data from Cell 1+2 (summation of front load cells) displayed the double oscillation of the upper surface of the board visible from the video tape, but with an apparaent forward time shift. All three traces revealed a secondary peak in many trials which was attributed to the start of the knee and ankle extension. REFERENCES Dillman.C, Cheetham.P & Smith.S (1985) A Kinematic Analysis Of Men's Olympic Long Horse Vaulting, International Journal Of Sports Biomechanics, 1, pp96-11 O