Honors and Non-Honors Student Engagement: A Model of Student, Curricular, and Institutional Characteristics

Honors administrators may ask whether honors experiences facilitate student growth and whether honors students are inherently smarter than non-honors students and hence more able to seize these opportunities for growth. Although these questions will never fully be answered, we designed the current study to address the underlying topics of student characteristics and engagement in honors within the larger university. Students’ motivation, their willingness to extend beyond the minimal level, significantly influences engagement. Honors students are engaged in experiences, curricular and extracurricular, that promote development, and the types of additional opportunities available to honors students and the feedback they receive affect participation. The interaction between honors students and their instructional environment may encourage them to engage with available resources more fully than non-honors students do

Honors and Non-Honors Student Engagement: A Model of Student, Curricular, and Institutional Characteristics

Honors administrators may ask whether honors experiences facilitate student growth and whether honors students are inherently smarter than non-honors students and hence more able to seize these opportunities for growth. Although these questions will never fully be answered, we designed the current study to address the underlying topics of student characteristics and engagement in honors within the larger university. Students’ motivation, their willingness to extend beyond the minimal level, significantly influences engagement. Honors students are engaged in experiences, curricular and extracurricular, that promote development, and the types of additional opportunities available to honors students and the feedback they receive affect participation. The interaction between honors students and their instructional environment may encourage them to engage with available resources more fully than non-honors students do

Honors and Non-Honors Student Engagement: A Model of Student, Curricular, and Institutional Characteristics

Honors administrators may ask whether honors experiences facilitate student growth and whether honors students are inherently smarter than non-honors students and hence more able to seize these opportunities for growth. Although these questions will never fully be answered, we designed the current study to address the underlying topics of student characteristics and engagement in honors within the larger university. Students’ motivation, their willingness to extend beyond the minimal level, significantly influences engagement. Honors students are engaged in experiences, curricular and extracurricular, that promote development, and the types of additional opportunities available to honors students and the feedback they receive affect participation. The interaction between honors students and their instructional environment may encourage them to engage with available resources more fully than non-honors students do

Using Innovation-Corps (I-Corps™) methods to adapt a mobile health (mHealth) obesity treatment for community mental health settings

BACKGROUND: We employed Innovation Corps (I-Corps™) methods to adaptation of a mobile health (mHealth) short-message-system (SMS) -based interactive obesity treatment approach (iOTA) for adults with severe mentall illness receiving care in community settings. METHODS: We hypothesized jobs to be done in three broad stakeholder groups: decision makers (DM = state and community clinic administrators), clinician consumers (CC = case managers, peer supports, nurses, prescribers) and service consumers (SC = patients, peers and family members). Semistructured interviews ( RESULTS: Four themes emerged across groups: education, inertia, resources and ownership. Sub-themes in education and ownership differed between DM and CC groups on implementation ownership, intersecting with professional development, suggesting the importance of training and supervision in scalability. Sub-themes in resources and intertia differed between CC and SC groups, suggesting illness severity and access to healthy food as major barriers to engagement, whereas the SC group identified the need for enhanced emotional support, in addition to pragmatic skills like menu planning and cooking, to promote health behavior change. Although SMS was percieved as a viable education and support tool, CC and DM groups had limited familiarity with use in clinical care delivery. CONCLUSIONS: Based on customer discovery, the characteristics of a minimum viable iOTA for implementation, scalability and sustainability include population- and context-specific adaptations to treatment content, interventionist training and delivery mechanism. Successful implementation of an SMS-based intervention will likely require micro-adaptations to fit specific clinical settings

Use of an interactive obesity treatment approach in individuals with severe mental illness: Feasibility, acceptability, and proposed engagement criteria

BACKGROUND: Digital and mobile health interventions are increasingly being used to support healthy lifestyle change, including in certain high-risk populations such as those with severe mental illnesses (SMIs). Life expectancy in this population lags 15 years behind counterparts in the general population, primarily due to obesity-related health conditions. OBJECTIVE: We tested the feasibility and usability of a 12-week interactive obesity treatment approach (iOTA) to adults with chronic SMIs (depression, bipolar disorder and schizophrenia spectrum disorder) receiving treatment in community settings. The iOTA incorporates short message service (SMS) text messages to supplement monthly in-person health coaching. METHODS: Factors hypothesized to be associated with weight change were illness severity and treatment engagement. Severe psychiatric symptoms were defined as baseline Clinical Global Impression severity score of \u3e5. Criterion engagement was defined as a text messaging response rate \u3e80% during the first 4 weeks of treatment. Disordered eating, assessed with the Loss of Control Over Eating Scores, was also evaluated. Participants provided qualitative data, further informing assessment of intervention feasibility, usability, and acceptability. RESULTS: A total of 26 participants were enrolled. The mean age was 48.5 (SD 15.67) years; 40% (10/26) were Black and 60% (15/26) female. Participants with lower symptom severity and adequate engagement demonstrated significantly decreased weight (F CONCLUSIONS: These results demonstrate the feasibility of delivering an adapted iOTA to SMI patients receiving care in community settings and suggest testable criteria for defining sufficient treatment engagement and psychiatric symptom severity, two factors known to impact weight loss outcomes. These important findings suggest specific adaptations may be needed for optimal treatment outcomes in individuals with SMI

Identification of complex health interventions suitable for evaluation: development and validation of the 8-step scoping framework

Background: There is extensive literature on the methodology of evaluation research and the development and evaluation of complex interventions but little guidance on the formative stages before evaluation and how to work with partner organizations that wish to have their provision evaluated. It is important to be able to identify suitable projects for evaluation from a range of provision and describe the steps required, often with academic institutions working in partnership with external organizations, in order to set up an evaluation. However, research evaluating programs or interventions rarely discusses these stages. Objective: This study aimed to extend work on evaluability assessment and pre-evaluation planning by proposing an 8-Step Scoping Framework to enable the appraisal of multiple programs in order to identify interventions suitable for evaluation. We aimed to add to the literature on evaluability assessment and more recent evaluation guidance by describing the processes involved in working with partner organizations. Methods: This paper documents the steps required to identify multiple complex interventions suitable for process and outcome evaluation. The steps were developed using an iterative approach by working alongside staff in a local government organization, to build an evidence base to demonstrate which interventions improve children’s outcomes. The process of identifying suitable programs for evaluation, thereby establishing the pre-evaluation steps, was tested using all Flying Start provision. Results: The 8-Step Scoping Framework was described using the example of the local government organization Flying Start to illustrate how each step contributes to finding projects suitable for process and outcome evaluation: (1) formulating overarching key questions that encompass all programs offered by an organization, (2) gaining an in-depth understanding of the work and provision of an organization and engaging staff, (3) completing a data template per project/program offered, (4) assessing the robustness/validity of data across all programs, (5) deciding on projects suitable for evaluation and those requiring additional data, (6) negotiating with chosen project leads, both within and outside the organization, (7) developing individual project evaluation protocols, and (8) applying for ethical approval from the university and partner organization. Conclusions: This paper describes the processes involved in identifying suitable projects for evaluation. It adds to the existing literature on the assessment of specific programs suitable for evaluation and guidance for conducting evaluations by establishing the formative steps required to identify suitable programs from a range of provision. This scoping framework particularly relates to academic partners and organizations tasked with delivering evidence-based services designed to meet local needs. The steps identified have been described in the context of early years provision but can be applied to a range of community-based evaluations, or more generally, to cases where an academic partner is working with external stakeholders to identify projects suitable for academic evaluation

Adaptation of a mobile interactive obesity treatment approach for early severe mental illness: Protocol for a mixed methods implementation and pilot randomized controlled trial

BACKGROUND: Obesity is common in individuals with severe mental illness (SMI), contributing to a significantly shortened lifespan when compared to the general population. Available weight loss treatments have attenuated efficacy in this population, underscoring the importance of prevention and early intervention. OBJECTIVE: Here, we describe a type 1 hybrid study design for adapting and pilot-testing an existing mobile health intervention for obesity prevention in individuals with early SMI and Class I or early-stage obesity, defined as a BMI of 30-35. METHODS: An existing, evidence-based interactive obesity treatment approach using low-cost, semiautomated SMS text messaging was selected for adaptation. Community mental health clinics and Clubhouse settings in Eastern Missouri and South Florida were identified to participate. This study has the following 3 aims. First, using the Enhanced Framework for Reporting Adaptations and Modifications to Evidence-based interventions, contextual aspects of the clinical and digital treatment environments are identified for adaptation, considering 5 main stakeholder groups (clinical administrators, prescribing clinicians, case managers, nurses, and patients). Following a 2-week trial of unadapted SMS text messaging, Innovation Corps methods are used to discover needed intervention adaptations by stakeholder group and clinical setting. Second, adaptations to digital functionality and intervention content will be made based on themes identified in aim 1, followed by rapid usability testing with key stakeholders. A process for iterative treatment adaptation will be developed for making unplanned modifications during the aim 3 implementation pilot study. Individuals working in partner community mental health clinics and Clubhouse settings will be trained in intervention delivery. Third, in a randomized pilot and feasibility trial, adults with 5 years or less of treatment for an SMI diagnosis will be randomized 2:1 to 6 months of an adapted interactive obesity treatment approach or to an attentional control condition, followed by a 3-month extension phase of SMS text messages only. Changes in weight, BMI, and behavioral outcomes, as well as implementation challenges, will be evaluated at 6 and 9 months. RESULTS: Institutional review board approval for aims 1 and 2 was granted on August 12, 2018, with 72 focus group participants enrolled; institutional review board approval for aim 3 was granted on May 6, 2020. To date, 52 participants have been enrolled in the study protocol. CONCLUSIONS: In this type 1 hybrid study design, we apply an evidence-based treatment adaptation framework to plan, adapt, and feasibility test a mobile health intervention in real-world treatment settings. Resting at the intersection of community mental health treatment and physical health promotion, this study aims to advance the use of simple technology for obesity prevention in individuals with early-stage mental illness. TRIAL REGISTRATION: ClinicalTrials.gov NCT03980743; https://clinicaltrials.gov/ct2/show/NCT03980743. INTERNATIONAL REGISTERED REPORT IDENTIFIER (IRRID): DERR1-10.2196/42114

Netrin-1 Peptide Is a Chemorepellent in \u3cem\u3eTetrahymena thermophila\u3c/em\u3e

Netrin-1 is a highly conserved, pleiotropic signaling molecule that can serve as a neuronal chemorepellent during vertebrate development. In vertebrates, chemorepellent signaling is mediated through the tyrosine kinase, src-1, and the tyrosine phosphatase, shp-2. Tetrahymena thermophila has been used as a model system for chemorepellent signaling because its avoidance response is easily characterized under a light microscope. Our experiments showed that netrin-1 peptide is a chemorepellent in T. thermophila at micromolar concentrations. T. thermophila adapts to netrin-1 over a time course of about 10 minutes. Netrin-adapted cells still avoid GTP, PACAP-38, and nociceptin, suggesting that netrin does not use the same signaling machinery as any of these other repellents. Avoidance of netrin-1 peptide was effectively eliminated by the addition of the tyrosine kinase inhibitor, genistein, to the assay buffer; however, immunostaining using an anti-phosphotyrosine antibody showed similar fluorescence levels in control and netrin-1 exposed cells, suggesting that tyrosine phosphorylation i s not required for signaling to occur. In addition, ELISA indicates that a netrin-like peptide is present in both whole cell extract and secreted protein obtained from Tetrahymena thermophila. Further study will be required in order to fully elucidate the signaling mechanism of netrin-1 peptide in this organism

Intramyocellular Lipid and Insulin Resistance: Differential Relationships in European and African Americans

Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/93716/1/oby.2011.45.pd

Systematic review: Effective Home Support in Dementia Care, components and impacts – Stage 2, effectiveness of home support interventions.

Aim: To explicate the outcomes of home support interventions for older people with dementia and/or their carers to inform clinical practice, policy and research. Background: Most people with dementia receive support at home. However, components and effectiveness of home support interventions have been little explored. Design: Systematic review with narrative summary. Data sources: Electronic searches of published studies in English using PubMed, Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials, PsychINFO, CINAHL, Applied Social Science Index and CSA Social Services Abstracts. Databases and sources were searched from inception to April 2014 with no date restrictions to locate studies. Review methods: The PRISMA statement was followed and established systematic review methods used. Using 14 components of care for people with dementia and their carers, identified previously, data across studies were synthesized. Interventions were grouped and described and effectiveness ratings applied. Qualitative studies were synthesized using key themes. Results: Seventy studies (four qualitative) were included. Most were directed to carers and of high quality. Seven interventions for carers and two for people with dementia were identified, covering 81% of studies. Those relating to daily living, cognitive training and physical activity for people with dementia were absent. Measures of effectiveness were influenced mainly by the intensity (duration and frequency) of interventions. Those containing education, social support and behaviour management appeared most effective. Conclusion: These interventions reflect emergent patterns of home support. Research is required to identify effective interventions linked to the stage of dementia, which can be applied as part of routine clinical care