Data set for COVID-19 Vaccine Uptake and Hesitancy Survey in Northern Ireland and Republic of Ireland: Applying the Theory of Planned Behaviour

Despite mass progress in COVID-19 vaccination uptake, vaccine hesitancy or anti-vax information has been reported that can delay public acceptance of a vaccine. An online cross-sectional survey (n=439) assessed COVID-19 vaccine uptake and hesitancy in adults in Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland. Participants completed an adapted version of the Theory of Planned Behaviour Vaccine Questionnaire, the Vaccine Attitudes Scale (VAX), Vaccine Confidence Scale, and questions on previous experience of COVID-19

Well-Being and Coping of UK Nurses. Midwives and AHPS- a cross sectional study

Dataset relating to the above study is available here

Let the power of live projects combine

This paper proposes a method by which schools of architecture and design can engage with the development of their surrounding contexts in a meaningful and practical way. This method will be illustrated using a case study of a five-day environmental design event that brought together small groups of architecture students, from Queen’s University Belfast, with eleven clients from East Belfast. Working in collaboration, they created architectural responses to a variety of client-identified spatial issues. The research and design was undertaken in a pop-up laboratory situated in a formerly empty retail space and in the very neighbourhood where all eleven projects were situated. This location became a space where multiple stakeholders could both express their aspirations for the locality and experiment with giving these ambitions form through creative conversations with the students. By externalising their thoughts, in the shared context of the laboratory, the clients revealed a variety of other perspectives about the future of the area. The individual projects acted as props to talk through, while the overall event acted as both a platform for initiating dialogue between multiple interested parties and as an instrument for the cultivation of new understandings about the area of the city under study. In addition, as a meaningful pedagogical experience, it provided students the opportunity to work with real clients and real projects in real time. Thus, this case study offers a promising method for other schools of architecture and design to contribute to the development of their city

Cross-sectoral interviews with crowdfunding platform designers and owners, 2015

Interviews on crowdfunding in the UK across domains of activity such as creative, investment and social-innovation, to elicit insights into the role of online trust and empathy in individual project success. Hereby success is defined as those projects that attract the founders' stated financial goal. This dataset consists of an interview with the senior marketing manager behind a major crowdfunding/peer-to-peer platform in the UK, to learn of their experiences, motivations and design choices as platforms owners; and an interview with two designers currently running a crowdfunding campaign in the UK. The proposed research aims to comprehensively scope the UK online crowdfunding field and develop a 'taxonomy of UK crowdfunding'. This will map out current activities across domains (e.g. investment, reward-driven, philanthropy), economic scale, geographic location and economic 'reach' etc. to create a clear picture of the heterogeneity of the developing online crowdfunding sector in the UK. It will do this through a systematic search and review of existing crowdfunding platforms and related literature from across academic publications, crowdfunding practitioner reports, policy, reports produced by the charitable economic innovation and development sectors (e.g. NESTA) and business reports. A 'taxonomy of crowdfunding' will be developed which identifies and defines domains of activity against, for example, funders' motivations, to develop an understanding of the success factors in bringing projects to fruition. Following this, qualitative analyses will explore communicative exchanges within the social networks that are generated on crowdfunding platforms around particular projects, among and between project 'founders' and project 'funders'. Preliminary empirical research on Kickstarter by Briggs (2013), and analyses elsewhere of the 'success signals' of funded projects on this platform (Mollick, 2013) suggest that communication and building of a sense of community by project founders, with and among funders plays an important role in project success. In this context success is measured as a project idea presented on the site attracting enough backers to reach its stated funding goal and go forward to realisation. Building on this, and drawing from media and visual communications theories around mediated forms of representation, and marketing theories on trust signaling and commercial value networks, the research will examine if and in what ways trust is built by project founders within project networks and any potential impact on funders' behaviour, including buying and investment decisions. The proposed research will also explore the potential affective role of audio visual media, particularly in relation to empathy; and examine if and how founders signal 'pitch trustworthiness' in promoting their projects to potential funders using mediated forms e.g. video. The research will focus on UK-based platforms, and to a lesser extent international sites that enable use by UK-based founders. The proposed research aims to develop greater understanding around the potential of the crowdfunding model: from economic, social and cultural perspectives, while identifying its limitations and specific pitfalls for particular sectors and domains.</p

Two-Frequency Oscillating Water Column: Reference Design August 1983

This report describes the optimisation of the power conversion chain and the engineering design considerations of a two-frequency oscillating water column wave power device which would form part of a 2 GW power station. Novel features of the principal device described include the multi resonant concept, which considerably widens the frequency bandwidth response, and the use of the simple efficient ·Wells self rectifying air turbine in the secondary power conversion stage. It is concluded that using estabiished technology wave power stations comprising sea bed mounted reinforced concrete structures could be constructed to produce power for 8p perkillowatt-hour during the first 25 years and for as little as l.3p per kilowatt-hour thereafter

Psychometric Properties of the Mental Toughness Questionnaire 48 (MTQ48) in Elite, Amateur and Non-athletes

The purpose of this study was to assess the psychometric properties of the Mental Toughness Questionnaire 48 (MTQ48) and assess the measurement invariance across elite, amateur and non-athletes. In total, 1096 participants aged between 18 and 58 years with a range of athletic experience - elite (n = 181), amateur (n = 577) and non-athletes (n = 338) - from various sports completed the MTQ48. The internal consistency of the scale was gauged through Omega for the total and relevant subscales. Factorial validity was assessed using exploratory structural equation modeling in order to provide a comprehensive estimation of the scales dimensionality. Overall, results offered support for the scales reliability with acceptable internal consistency reported at the total and subscale level. However, the validity of the MTQ48 for the use with athletes of different levels may be questioned. The MTQ48’s hypothesised four-factor model did not fit the data well, whereas the six-factor model produced acceptable levels of fit with large degrees of misspecification in the factor structures across elite, amateur and non-athletes. The results caution the use of the scale with elite athletes and call for refinement of the measure at the subscale level

When is Outgroup Inclusion a Deviant Act: The Role of Agent and Participant Group Status, 2022-2023

We examine the conditions in which children aged 4-11 judge an objectively positive act – inclusion - relatively negatively (i.e., when violating group norms, and when performed by individuals of differing group status). Because asking children to make prosocial choices under conditions of perceived social risk is an ethical challenge, we instead asked children to evaluate the prosocial choices of third parties. We also focused on risk arising from intergroup relations. Participants heard a vignette about two fictional groups of children (minimal categories: children from the purple school, children from the yellow school), which were presented alongside a storyboard. Participants were assigned to one of two conditions: normative inclusion (low risk) or normative exclusion (high risk). In each condition, children learned about a story character who behaves prosocially towards an outgroup member. In the high risk condition, children will be informed there is a pervasive norm of division between the fictional groups. In this context, behaving prosocially towards an outgroup member may be viewed as violating an ingroup norm, which could risk reprisal from the ingroup. Conversely, in the low risk condition, no norm of division (and by extension, no salient risk) is present. Of interest, first, is if children evaluate third party prosocial behavior more negatively when it violates an ingroup norm; qualitative justifications will be obtained to shed light on the reasoning underpinning evaluations. Though existing studies demonstrate that children negatively evaluate ‘deviant’ group members - those who break ingroup norms - those studies have typically examined amoral behaviors (e.g., lying/stealing/cheating). By negatively evaluating and potentially punishing amoral, deviant group members, the group stands to protect its reputation. Yet, the novel aspect of this study would be demonstrating that children also evaluate prosocial behaviors negatively, when they conflict with an ingroup norm. A second, complementary, set of questions will assess the extent to which children expect ingroup reprisal (and the types which they might expect) as a consequence of this norm violation. Evidence that children expect the ‘outgroup prosocial’ character to face social reprisal will demonstrate they have knowledge that outgroup inclusion may be a prosocial risk, under conditions of intergroup division. Evidencing this understanding will pave the way for future studies to examine how individual differences in prosociality and risk taking might interact, to predict children’s own outgroup inclusive behaviors. Prosocial behaviour is behaviour which is performed to benefit other people (e.g. sharing, helping, comforting). Performing prosocial behaviour has positive effects within individuals (e.g. mental wellbeing), between individuals (e.g. bullying reduction), between groups (e.g. conflict reduction) and at a societal level (e.g. tolerance and collective action). Different sub-types of prosocial behaviour are associated with different antecedents and outcomes, and so it is important for researchers to consider these individually, if they are to influence their occurrence. Yet, one newly proposed type of prosocial behaviour has been largely ignored: prosocial risk taking (PSRT). That is, helping other individuals at a potential risk to oneself (Do et al., 2017). Clear examples of PSRT have been seen in recent world events (e.g. the Covid-19 pandemic and the conflict in Ukraine), and other every-day examples can be brought to mind (e.g. a child defending a friend from a bully). Given that PSRT can be seen all around us, it is surprising that very few studies have examined this construct or proposed a method to capture it. This was the focus of my PhD research, in which I developed a behavioural task to measure children's willingness to take a prosocial risk. Children could play a game that guaranteed they would win a good prize but that a peer won a bad prize, or could choose another game giving each child a 50/50 chance of winning a good/bad prize (Corbett et al., 2021). The first aim of the fellowship is to disseminate what I have already learned about children's PSRT by publishing further work from my PhD, and presenting at leading conferences in the field. New research will generate knowledge regarding the social implications of PSRT by examining it as a predictor of social inclusion. Groups tend to differ in power and status; regarding inclusion, lower status group members risk rejection from higher status group members, while the latter risk reputation damage through association with the former. Individuals who are highly prosocial in other domains (e.g. sharing) may not include in this context (i.e. across a group boundary) because they are relatively risk averse; thus, what may be required is an interaction between prosocial and risk taking traits. Thus, PSRT may be an unexplored antecedent of social inclusion - a persistent social problem globally. Northern Ireland and Queen's University Belfast is the ideal setting to carry out this research given the presence of two salient ethnic groups (Catholics and Protestants), who remain largely segregated from one another. By considering the social implications for real groups, we address an important limitation of many existing studies of prosocial behaviour (Taylor, 2020). A further aim is to forge links with an extensive network of researchers, which will be achieved by leveraging my mentors' existing networks. I will collaborate on secondary data to develop hard skills: (i) advanced statistical analysis, and (ii) manuscript development, which will be accelerated due to existing available data and my prior knowledge of the subject area. Impact and public engagement activities will also be a key part of this fellowship; these activities will provide an opportunity to achieve impact from my findings by establishing two-way communication with the local community, benefiting my personal development, the quality of research, and the public. I will develop a local advisory council representing different stakeholders, e.g. youth, educators, NGOs. I will develop future funding proposals from findings across my PhD and this fellowship, which would allow me to carry out an independent program of research around prosocial development, with a particular focus on prosocial risk taking, given its largely neglected status and potential for societal impact

Underpinning data: CO-free Enantioselective Hydroformylation of Functionalised Alkenes: Using a Dual Catalyst System to give Improved Selectivity and yield

NMR dat