Family identification: a beneficial process for young adults who grow up in homes affected by parental intimate partner violence

peer-reviewedExposure to parental intimate partner violence (parental IPV) is a complex trauma. Research within social psychology establishes that identification with social groups impacts positively on how we appraise, respond to and recover from traumatic events. IPV is also a highly stigmatized social phenomenon and social isolation is a major factor for families affected by IPV, yet strong identification with the family group may act as a beneficial psychological resource to young people who grew up in homes affected by IPV. The current study, an online survey of 355 students (M-age = 20, 70% female), investigated if a psychosocial process, specifically identification with the family, may influence the relationship between the predictor, exposure to parental IPV, and outcomes, global self-esteem and state anxiety. Mediation analysis suggests that identification with the family has a positive influence on the relationship between exposure to parental IPV and psychological outcomes; exposure to parental IPV results in reduced family identification, but when family identification is strong it results in both reduced anxiety and increased self-esteem for young people. The findings highlight the importance of having a strong sense of belonging to the extended family for young people who were exposed to parental IPV, thus has implications for prevention, intervention, and social policy.PUBLISHEDpeer-reviewe

A commentary on the effects of identification with a support group on the mental health of people with multiple sclerosis

peer-reviewedno abstract availableACCEPTEDpeer-reviewe

Computational Topology Techniques for Characterizing Time-Series Data

Topological data analysis (TDA), while abstract, allows a characterization of time-series data obtained from nonlinear and complex dynamical systems. Though it is surprising that such an abstract measure of structure - counting pieces and holes - could be useful for real-world data, TDA lets us compare different systems, and even do membership testing or change-point detection. However, TDA is computationally expensive and involves a number of free parameters. This complexity can be obviated by coarse-graining, using a construct called the witness complex. The parametric dependence gives rise to the concept of persistent homology: how shape changes with scale. Its results allow us to distinguish time-series data from different systems - e.g., the same note played on different musical instruments.Comment: 12 pages, 6 Figures, 1 Table, The Sixteenth International Symposium on Intelligent Data Analysis (IDA 2017

Towards Attaining Sustainable Retail Property Locations: The Relationships between Supply, Demand, and Accessibility of Retail Spaces

This study explored retail location performance of cities by investigating relationships between changes in retail property stock (supply), changes in retail rental value (demand), and spatial accessibility (retail consumer movement) across three UK cities, namely, Leeds, Newcastle, and York. This is to understand how retail locations and assets can be managed sustainably. In this sense, sustainability was considered through a dual focus in this paper: (1) the efficient use of retail property assets for economic purposes and (2) the impact of these physical retail assets on the local environment in terms of carbon footprint. The study relied on space syntax ideology in computing spatial accessibility index and adopted business rate datasets in computing changes in retail rental value and stock. Findings showed that spatial accessibility across retail locations could predict the performance of retail rental value (but not stock) across the sampled cities. The study further showed that extent of city analysis (scale) is significant in estimating retail location performance and understanding the influence of accessibility. This evidence has the potential to facilitate better decision-making concerning the planning, design, and management of retail locations and spaces. The study is significant because it can serve as a reference for promoting an urban sustainability agenda, especially in ensuring that urban land and properties are used optimally to maximise their social, economic, and environmental values

Adolescents' views of food and eating: Identifying barriers to healthy eating

This is a postprint version of the article. The official published version can be accessed from the link below - © 2006 The Association for Professionals in Services for Adolescents Published by Elsevier Ltd.Contemporary Western society has encouraged an obesogenic culture of eating amongst youth. Multiple factors may influence an adolescent's susceptibility to this eating culture, and thus act as a barrier to healthy eating. Given the increasing prevalence of obesity amongst adolescents, the need to reduce these barriers has become a necessity. Twelve focus group discussions of single-sex groups of boys or girls ranging from early to-mid adolescence (N = 73) were employed to identify key perceptions of, and influences upon, healthy eating behaviour. Thematic analysis identified four key factors as barriers to healthy eating. These factors were: physical and psychological reinforcement of eating behaviour; perceptions of food and eating behaviour; perceptions of contradictory food-related social pressures; Q perceptions of the concept of healthy eating itself. Overall, healthy eating as a goal in its own right is notably absent from the data and would appear to be elided by competing pressures to eat unhealthily and to lose weight. This insight should inform the development of future food-related communications to adolescents. (c) 2006 The Association for Professionals in Services for Adolescents.Funding from Safefood: the food safety promotion board is acknowledged

Spatial Light Modulators for the Manipulation of Individual Atoms

We propose a novel dipole trapping scheme using spatial light modulators (SLM) for the manipulation of individual atoms. The scheme uses a high numerical aperture microscope to map the intensity distribution of a SLM onto a cloud of cold atoms. The regions of high intensity act as optical dipole force traps. With a SLM fast enough to modify the trapping potential in real time, this technique is well suited for the controlled addressing and manipulation of arbitrarily selected atoms.Comment: 9 pages, 5 figure