Aboriginal Participation in Tourism Planning in British Columbia

Tourism has been identified as a strategy for Indigenous communities worldwide to adopt in order to stimulate economic and social development. The goal of this research was to evaluate Aboriginal participation in tourism and the role it plays in economic and social development of Aboriginal communities. This research also addressed Aboriginal participation within the context of a mega-event, the 2010 Winter Olympic Games. The need for this research came from the common acceptance that tourism can be an effective development strategy for Aboriginal communities. However existing literature is often case-specific with limited research focusing on Canada. Additionally, limited research had addressed Aboriginal participation in Olympic planning and hosting. The goal of this research was met by examining Aboriginal tourism development in British Columbia (BC), Canada, ultimately addressing the aforementioned gaps in the literature. This research used a qualitative approach to investigate Aboriginal participation in tourism planning in British Columbia, Canada. The objectives guiding this research are as follows: (1) To identify the types of involvement; (2) To evaluate the extent of involvement; (3) To explore the relationship between Aboriginal and Non-Aboriginal tourism-related businesses, associations and institutions; and (4) To identify the significance of Aboriginal tourism to the Aboriginal community, British Columbia and Canada. The findings of this research indicate that although Aboriginal tourism in BC has evolved considerably in recent years to establish a place in Non-Aboriginal tourism, it requires more support to grow the sector. As well, the Aboriginal Tourism Association of British Columbia (AtBC) appears to be guiding the future of the sector through the continued implementation of the ‘Blueprint Strategy’. This research revealed that there are still considerable barriers that inhibit Aboriginal participation in tourism. Until these barriers are addressed, an increase in Aboriginal participation in tourism, particularly in ownership and management capacities, is limited. Participants reported that Aboriginal involvement in the 2010 Winter Olympic Games was an once-in-a-lifetime opportunity to showcase Canada’s Aboriginal culture on an international stage. It also highlighted the collaborative relationships between Aboriginal and Non-Aboriginal. Participants also reported that tourism could help increase cross-cultural understanding, while diversifying Aboriginal communities. Future research should be directed towards understanding the effects of increased Aboriginal participation in tourism; the role tourism can play in capacity building; and finally, the economic contributions Aboriginal tourism can make to the tourism sector. The main conclusion drawn from this study is that BC has been able to encourage and support Aboriginal participation in tourism. Although there is much opportunity to grow the sector and increase participation in ownership and management capacities, the Aboriginal tourism sector is currently being guided towards a successful future. There are many Aboriginal tourism successes happening in BC that could be used as models for other regions in Canada and around the world

Improving understanding of adolescents' perceptions of their relationships with their parents.

Adolescents' perceptions of their relationships with their parents predict the quality of these relationships as well as adolescent psychosocial outcomes. Despite this, adolescent attitudes are under-researched in past literature due to an over-emphasis on parent reports and cohort-level estimates, and the poor availability of non-self-report assessment tools. In three studies, this thesis explored adolescents' unique perceptions of their relationships with their parents and how these perspectives are related to adolescent psychosocial outcomes. Study 1 attempted to address methodological limitations of past research by using an individual participant data meta-analytic approach and gold standard statistical methods (including polynomial regression) to comprehensively test hypothesized links between adolescent-parent report discordance and developmental outcomes, with a large sample. Individual participant data from 26 datasets, including 12,127 adolescents (M age = 14.16; 53.34% female) and their parents (14,319 dyads; 77.96% mothers) was used in order to conduct a one-stage and two-stage analysis of interaction effects and the possible moderating effect of parenting dimension, outcome dimension, age, gender (adolescent and parent), and country. Our findings showed a non-significant relationship between the adolescent-parent report interaction term and adolescent outcomes using the one-stage and two-stage approach. Despite finding significant moderator effects, subgroup analyses showed that there was a non-significant relationship between the adolescent-parent report interaction term and adolescent outcomes across parenting and outcome dimensions, and demographic variables. Study 2 evaluated a novel method of coding adolescents' 3-minute speech samples regarding their affective attitudes (e.g. thoughts and feelings) towards their parent. A community sample of 72 adolescents (M age = 16 years) completed a 3-minute speech sample and several questionnaire measures of the quality of the parent-teen relationship and psychosocial outcomes. Speech samples were coded for critical and warm affective attitudes toward the parent using the Family Affective Attitude Rating Scale (FAARS). FAARS negative relational schemas (NRS) and positive relational schemas (PRS) scales showed good reliability. When included in the same model, adolescents' NRS and PRS were associated with adolescent outcomes over and above existing questionnaire measures of relationship quality. Results suggest that the FAARS coding scheme can reliably assess adolescents' affective attitudes towards their parents and that this information is relevant to understanding adolescents' psychosocial outcomes. Study 3 involved qualitatively analyzing adolescent narratives regarding the overall quality of their relationships with their parents. Speech samples collected during study 2 were examined using thematic analysis to understand key themes in adolescent-parent relationships from adolescents' perspectives. Contrary to past findings from quantitative research, the overall tone of the speech samples was positive. Adolescents valued closeness and emotional support from their parents, and generally respected their authority. They also looked to parents to role model valued traits, such as caring and hard-working. Mentions of conflict were mostly absent from the speech samples and disagreements were often justified as normal and therefore not serious. Overall, these results significantly advance current understanding of adolescents' attitudes and beliefs of their relationships with their parents. Adolescent perspectives are under-researched as compared to parents, yet the results of this thesis suggest that adolescents and parents have varying perspectives on their relationships, that adolescents' attitudes towards parents are linked to adolescent well-being, and that adolescents may have a more positive view of parents than has been suggested by quantitative research

Safety and efficacy of vismodegib in patients aged ≥65 years with advanced basal cell carcinoma.

Because many patients with unresectable basal cell carcinoma (BCC) are aged ≥65 years, this study explores the efficacy and safety of vismodegib in these patients with locally advanced (la) or metastatic (m) basal cell carcinoma (BCC) in the ERIVANCE BCC trial and the expanded access study (EAS).We compared patients aged ≥65 years to patients aged <65 years taking vismodegib 150 mg/day, using descriptive statistics for response and safety. Patients aged ≥65 years (laBCC/mBCC) were enrolled in ERIVANCE BCC (33/14) and EAS (27/26). Investigator-assessed best overall response rate in patients ≥65 and <65 years was 46.7%/35.7% and 72.7%/52.6% (laBCC/mBCC), respectively, in ERIVANCE BCC and 45.8%/33.3% and 46.9%/28.6%, respectively, in EAS. These differences were not clinically meaningful. Safety was similar in both groups, although those aged ≥65 years had a higher percentage of grade 3-5 adverse events than those aged <65 years. Vismodegib demonstrated similar clinical activity and adverse events regardless of age

Can practice make perfect (models)? Incorporating social practice theory into quantitative energy demand models

Demand response could be increasingly valuable in coping with the intermittency of a future renewables-dominated electricity grid. There is a growing body of work being done specifically on understanding demand response from a people and practices point of view. This paper will start by introducing some of the recent research in this area and will present social practice theory (SPT) as a useful way of looking at the flexibility and timing of energy-use practices. However, for the insights gained from SPT to have value for the electricity supply industry it is important to be able to represent this flexibility in quantitative energy demand models. This requires an interdisciplinary conversation that allows SPT and modelling concepts to be mapped together. This paper presents an initial step in trying to achieve this. Drawing on empirical data from a recent SPT study into flexible energy-use practices, it will experiment with modelling flexible demand in such a way as to take account of the complexity of practices; not just their ‘stuff’ but also some of the images and skills involved in their competent performance. There are several reasons this is a useful enterprise. It encourages interdisciplinary insights which are valuable both to social practice theory and to energy demand modelling, it highlights new ways of intervening in flexible demand and it establishes a research agenda for social practice theorists and modellers which will eventually result in a set of requirements that can be used to build an energy demand model based on practice theory. This area of research is in its early stages and so the conceptual mapping is necessarily speculative but, hopefully, also stimulating

Convergence of Indigenous Science and Western Science Impacts Student\u27s Interest in STEM and Identity as a Scientist

Within the context of North American Indigenous culture, certain Elders are respected gatekeepers to Indigenous science, also known as traditional knowledge. Yet, while North American born minorities such as Black Americans, Amerindians, and Latin Americans may hail from cultures with a similar appreciation of their own Indigenous science Elders, these minority groups are especially underrepresented in Western science, technology, engineering, and math (STEM)—both in academia and in the workforce. North American underrepresented minorities experience high attrition rates in academia generally, and in STEM specifically. Canada’s Truth and Reconciliation Commission makes a call to action to Indigenize education to benefit all students. Herein lies an opportunity to investigate the impact of Indigenization of a Western science biochemistry course to assess the impact upon university students, both minority (non-White) and non-minority (White) in Anglophone North America (Canada and USA). The aim of the study is to investigate the impact of an Indigenized Western science online course upon student interest in STEM, student perception of the relevance of Elder co-instructors, and student identity as a scientist. A pedagogical quasiexperiment was conducted at North American tribal colleges and mainstream research-intensive universities, regarding an online science course taught either with or without Elder co-educators alongside PhD STEM-trained instructors. Student perceptions of the value of Elder co-educators did not differ across groups and remained unchanged after course delivery. Findings also show that after taking the course co-taught by Indigenous science Elder co-educators, students have significantly greater interest in STEM than those students not exposed to Elders’ teachings. Non-White students reported significantly less self-identification as a scientist than did White students at pre-course, but reported similar identity as a scientist to White students post-course. We attribute these findings to the impact of culturally competent course content to minority students especially. This work establishes the relevance of using online technology to Indigenize a Western science course taught internationally, and suggests the need for more investigative work toward the convergence of Indigenous science and Western science in academia

Promoting co-production in the generation and use of research evidence to improve service provision in special care dentistry

Special care dentistry (SCD) provides holistic oral service provision for people with complex health and care needs. These can include physical, sensory, intellectual, mental, medical, emotional or social impairment or disability or, more often, a combination of these factors. The level of disability within these population groups can vary, and a proportion of people will have multiple and overlapping impairments and/or medical conditions. This paper explores a number of possible research methods that may better reflect the diversity and challenges of this population group, where the emphasis is placed on co-production and co-design