What if I Get Busted? Deception, Choice, and Decision-Making in Social Interaction

Deception is an essentially social act, yet little is known about how social consequences affect the decision to deceive. In this study, participants played a computerized game of deception without constraints on whether or when to attempt to deceive their opponent. Participants were questioned by an opponent outside the scanner about their knowledge of the content of a display. Importantly, questions were posed so that, in some conditions, it was possible to be deceptive, while in other conditions it was not. To simulate a realistic interaction, participants could be confronted about their claims by the opponent. This design, therefore, creates a context in which a deceptive participant runs the risk of being punished if their deception is detected. Our results show that participants were slower to give honest than to give deceptive responses when they knew more about the display and could use this knowledge for their own benefit. The condition in which confrontation was not possible was associated with increased activity in subgenual anterior cingulate cortex. The processing of a question which allows a deceptive response was associated with activation in right caudate and inferior frontal gyrus. Our findings suggest the decision to deceive is affected by the potential risk of social confrontation rather than the claim itself

Multi-annual droughts in the English Lowlands: a review of their characteristics and climate drivers in the winter half-year

The English Lowlands is a relatively dry, densely populated region in the south-east of the UK in which water is used intensively. Consequently, parts of the region are water-stressed and face growing water resource pressures. The region is heavily dependent on groundwater and particularly vulnerable to long, multi-annual droughts primarily associated with dry winters. Despite this vulnerability, the atmospheric drivers of multi-annual droughts in the region are poorly understood, an obstacle to developing appropriate drought management strategies, including monitoring and early warning systems. To advance our understanding, we assess known key climate drivers in the winter half-year (October–March) and their likely relationships with multi-annual droughts in the region. We characterise historic multi-annual drought episodes back to 1910 for the English Lowlands using various meteorological and hydrological data sets. Multi-annual droughts are identified using a gridded precipitation series for the entire region, and refined using the Standardized Precipitation Index (SPI), Standardized Streamflow Index (SSI) and Standardized Groundwater level Index (SGI) applied to regional-scale river flow and groundwater time series. We explore linkages between a range of potential climatic driving factors and precipitation, river flow and groundwater level indicators in the English Lowlands for the winter half-year. The drivers or forcings include El Niño–Southern Oscillation (ENSO), the North Atlantic tripole sea surface temperature (SST) pattern, the Quasi-Biennial Oscillation (QBO), solar and volcanic forcing and the Atlantic Multi-decadal Oscillation (AMO). As expected, no single driver convincingly explains the occurrence of any multi-annual drought in the historical record. However, we demonstrate, for the first time, an association between La Niña episodes and winter rainfall deficits in some major multi-annual drought episodes in the English Lowlands. We also show significant (albeit relatively weak) links between ENSO and drought indicators applied to river flow and groundwater levels. We also show that some of the other drivers listed above are likely to influence English Lowlands rainfall. We conclude by signposting a direction for this future research effort

Structure, Deformations and Gravitational Wave Emission of Magnetars

Neutron stars can have, in some phases of their life, extremely strong magnetic fields, up to 10^15-10^16 G. These objects, named magnetars, could be powerful sources of gravitational waves, since their magnetic field could determine large deformations. We discuss the structure of the magnetic field of magnetars, and the deformation induced by this field. Finally, we discuss the perspective of detection of the gravitational waves emitted by these stars.Comment: 11 pages, 2 figures, prepared for 19th International Conference on General Relativity and Gravitation (GR19), Mexico City, Mexico, July 5-9, 201

Microplastics in Ghanaian coastal lagoon sediments: Their occurrence and spatial distribution

This is the author accepted manuscript.Each year millions of tonnes of plastic are produced worldwide and around 8 million tons are deposited into our marine environment. Rivers comprise the major conduit for plastic transport with their deltas, estuaries and coastal lagoons being the key interface between lotic aquatic and the oceanic environment. However, we have very little knowledge of the role of coastal lagoons in the plastic pollution pathways. We present the spatial and temporal distribution and abundance of microplastics in sediments from two coastal lagoons in Ghana, West Africa. Sediment cores were taken from Mukwei Lagoon, Kpeshie Lagoon and from the mangroves at Kpeshie Lagoon; areas approximately 5-15km East from the centre of Accra. Microplastics were detected in all samples with a decreasing trend recorded from West to East. All three sites recorded a similar depth profile for plastics: after an initial increase from the surface samples, there was a significant decrease in microplastic concentrations with depth.Academy of Medical Science

Improving inpatient postnatal services: midwives views and perspectives of engagement in a quality improvement initiative

Background: despite major policy initiatives in the United Kingdom to enhance women's experiences of maternity care, improving in-patient postnatal care remains a low priority, although it is an aspect of care consistently rated as poor by women. As part of a systems and process approach to improving care at one maternity unit in the South of England, the views and perspectives of midwives responsible for implementing change were sought. Methods: a Continuous Quality Improvement (CQI) approach was adopted to support a systems and process change to in-patient care and care on transfer home in a large district general hospital with around 6000 births a year. The CQI approach included an initial assessment to identify where revisions to routine systems and processes were required, developing, implementing and evaluating revisions to the content and documentation of care in hospital and on transfer home, and training workshops for midwives and other maternity staff responsible for implementing changes. To assess midwifery views of the quality improvement process and their engagement with this, questionnaires were sent to those who had participated at the outset. Results: questionnaires were received from 68 (46%) of the estimated 149 midwives eligible to complete the questionnaire. All midwives were aware of the revisions introduced, and two-thirds felt these were more appropriate to meet the women's physical and emotional health, information and support needs. Some midwives considered that the introduction of new maternal postnatal records increased their workload, mainly as a consequence of colleagues not completing documentation as required. Conclusions: this was the first UK study to undertake a review of in-patient postnatal services. Involvement of midwives at the outset was essential to the success of the initiative. Midwives play a lead role in the planning and organisation of in-patient postnatal care and it was important to obtain their feedback on whether revisions were pragmatic and achieved anticipated improvements in care quality. Their initial involvement ensured priority areas for change were identified and implemented. Their subsequent feedback highlighted further important areas to address as part of CQI to ensure best quality care continues to be implemented. Our findings could support other maternity service organisations to optimise in-patient postnatal services

Area-level deprivation and adiposity in children: is the relationship linear?

OBJECTIVE: It has been suggested that childhood obesity is inversely associated with deprivation, such that the prevalence is higher in more deprived groups. However, comparatively few studies actually use an area-level measure of deprivation, limiting the scope to assess trends in the association with obesity for this indicator. Furthermore, most assume a linear relationship. Therefore, the aim of this study was to investigate associations between area-level deprivation and three measures of adiposity in children: body mass index (BMI), waist circumference (WC) and waist-to-height ratio (WHtR). DESIGN: This is a cross-sectional study in which data were collected on three occasions a year apart (2005-2007). SUBJECTS: Data were available for 13,333 children, typically aged 11-12 years, from 37 schools and 542 lower super-output areas (LSOAs). MEASURES: Stature, mass and WC. Obesity was defined as a BMI and WC exceeding the 95th centile according to British reference data. WHtR exceeding 0.5 defined obesity. The Index of Multiple Deprivation affecting children (IDACI) was used to determine area-level deprivation. RESULTS: Considerable differences in the prevalence of obesity exist between the three different measures. However, for all measures of adiposity the highest probability of being classified as obese is in the middle of the IDACI range. This relationship is more marked in girls, such that the probability of being obese for girls living in areas at the two extremes of deprivation is around half that at the peak, occurring in the middle. CONCLUSION: These data confirm the high prevalence of obesity in children and suggest that the relationship between obesity and residential area-level deprivation is not linear. This is contrary to the 'deprivation theory' and questions the current understanding and interpretation of the relationship between obesity and deprivation in children. These results could help make informed decisions at the local level

The origin of intergalactic thermonuclear supernovae

The population synthesis method is used to study the possibility of explaining the appreciable fraction (20^+12_15%) of the intergalactic (no-host) type Ia supernovae observed in galaxy clusters (Gal-Yam ete al. 2003) by binary whote dwarf merginngs in the cores of globular clusters. In a typical globular cluster, the number of merging double white dwarfs is fount to be smaller than 10^{-13} per year per average cluster star during the entire evolution of the cluster, which is a factor of 3 higher than in a Milky-Way-type galaxy. From 5 to 30% of the merging white dwarfs are dynamically expelled from the cluster with barycenter velocities up to 150 km/s. SN Ia explosions during the mergers of binary white dwarfs in dense star clusters may account for \sim 1% of the total rate of SN Ia in the central parts of galaxy clusters if the baryon mass fraction in such star clusters is \sim 0.3%.Comment: 8 pages, 3 figs. Astronomy Letters (in press

LOTUS: a low-cost, ultraviolet spectrograph

We describe the design, construction and commissioning of a simple, low-cost long-slit spectrograph for the Liverpool Telescope. The design is optimized for near-UV and visible wavelengths and uses all transmitting optics. It exploits the instrument focal plane field curvature to partially correct axial chromatic aberration. A stepped slit provides narrow (2.5 × 95 arcsec) and wide (5 × 25 arcsec) options that are optimized for spectral resolution and flux calibration, respectively. On sky testing shows a wavelength range of 3200–6300 Å with a peak system throughput (including detector quantum efficiency) of 15 per cent and wavelength dependent spectral resolution of R = 225–430. By repeated observations of the symbiotic emission line star AG Peg, we demonstrate the wavelength stability of the system is <2 Å rms and is limited by the positioning of the object in the slit. The spectrograph is now in routine operation monitoring the activity of comet 67P/Churyumov-Gerasimenko during its current post-perihelion apparition

Study protocol : improving newborn survival in rural southern Tanzania : a cluster-randomised trial to evaluate the impact of a scaleable package of interventions at community level with health system strengthening

Child mortality has declined substantially in many countries including Tanzania, but newborn mortality remains high and around 3 million babies die every year in the first 28 days of life. Community-based approaches with home visits in the first week of life have shown great potential to reduce newborn mortality. INSIST aimed1 to develop, implement and evaluate an integrated, two-part strategy that combines interventions at community level with health system strengthening in rural Southern Tanzania to reduce newborn mortality. The community intervention focused around interpersonal communication through home visits in pregnancy and the early neonatal period by a village-based "agent of change". Key messages focused on hygiene during delivery, immediate and exclusive breastfeeding, and identification and extra care for babies born small because of low birth weight or prematurity. Extra care for babies born small included skin-to-skin care for small babies and referral to hospital for very small babies. The community intervention was implemented in six poor rural districts in Southern Tanzania, with 65 of the 132 wards within these districts randomized to receive the community intervention. In addition, a health system quality-improvement package was implemented in all health facilities of one district. Data collection for the evaluation included i) a baseline household survey in 2007 of all 243,000 households in 5 of the 6 study districts to estimate baseline mortality and prevalence of newborn care behaviours, ii) an adequacy survey in 2011 in a representative sample of 5,000 households to estimate coverage of home visits and prevalence of newborn care behaviours, and iii) an endline household survey in 2013 in a representative sample of 200,000 households to estimate newborn and maternal mortality and prevalence of newborn care behaviours. The final analysis was based on "intention to treat", comparing newbor