COVID-19: Impact on United Kingdom Horse Owners

COVID-19 was declared a global pandemic on 11 March 2020; the United Kingdom (UK) implemented quarantine measures shortly afterward, resulting in rapid changes in how owners managed and interacted with their horses. This study provides a rapid analysis of the initial impact of the COVID-19 outbreak on the management of UK leisure and competition horses. A 17 question online survey was distributed via equestrian social media sites to ascertain the impact of COVID-19 on horse and yard management and on human–horse interactions. Frequency analysis combined with Chi-squared and thematic analyses identified the impact of COVID-19 on UK horse owners. Major changes within horse management and horse–human interactions were reported for the majority of horse owners (>65%), regardless of the establishment type or region. Social distancing and visiting restrictions were implemented at most yards, but nearly half were not providing hand sanitization or disinfection protocols for the shared areas/equipment to prevent cross-contamination between users. The financial impact of the pandemic combined with restricted access to veterinary professionals resulted in owners expressing concerns that horse health and welfare may be compromised as a result. Horse owners also felt that the reduced opportunities for horse–human interactions were negatively affecting their mental health and wellbeing

Societal and personal concerns, their associations with stress, and the implications for progress and the future

A survey of more than 2000 people in four countries examined levels of concern across 19 personal and 23 societal issues. On average, 49% were moderately or seriously concerned about the personal issues, with health, wellbeing and financial concerns topping the ranking. Country differences were small, but generational differences were substantial. An average of 58% of Generation Y were moderately or seriously concerned, compared to 35% of Pre-boomers, with significant differences for 14 of the 19 issues. In terms of societal issues, an average of 41% were moderately or seriously concerned, with social and moral issues ranking ahead of economic and environmental matters. Americans were the most concerned with societal issues and Australians the least. Societal concerns increased with age. Both sets of concerns, but especially personal, were predictors of perceived personal stress, although specific concerns were both positively and negatively associated with stress. The ranking of societal concerns, country differences, age differences, and the relationship between concerns and stress are discussed. Findings provide insights into the relationships between social conditions, personal circumstances and wellbeing, supporting an argument that researchers need to pay more attention to the psychosocial dynamics of contemporary life in assessing human progress as a pathway to the future

What can agencies do to increase foster carer satisfaction?

Stable, long-term foster care homes are critical to ensuring a safe and nurturing childhood for many children worldwide. Greater foster carer satisfaction is associated with increased carer retention and is therefore critical in securing such stable homes for children. The purpose of this study is to determine which factors associated with foster care agencies contribute to higher levels of foster carer satisfaction. Results from a longitudinal study of 137 foster carers indicate that perceived adequacy of agency support, preplacement training, money to cover placement expenses, and a good match between the carer and the child are predictive of higher foster carer satisfaction. A mediation model further points to the provision of preplacement training as key to ensuring higher levels of satisfaction. Results offer new insights into factors related to foster carer retention and provide guidance to foster care agencies about actions that they can take to maximize the retention of foster carers

Carer Factors Associated with Foster-Placement Success and Breakdown

The characteristics of carers in successful foster placements are identified to enable targeting them through customised marketing and recruitment campaigns. A longitudinal study with seventy-five carers was conducted over twenty months. Eleven instances of placement breakdown were compared to placements that did not break down. Several personal and family factors were identified as increasing the likelihood of foster-placement success, including higher cognitive empathy of the carer, a high level of social support from family, a high-quality carer-partner relationship, higher levels of care-giving and role-carer demand satisfaction, and a good match, fewer conflicts and better relationship between the carer and foster child. Conflicts between the carer and the child mediate the association between carer-partner relationship quality and carer satisfaction with role demands. Findings have important practical implications: additional evaluations should be conducted during screening processes with a focus on the key markers of placement success identified in this study; more emphasis should be placed on developing support networks amongst carers\u27 friends and family; and greater involvement of carer partners in screening and training processes is of key importance

Pushing Typists Back on the Learning Curve: Memory Chunking Improves Retrieval of Prior Typing Episodes

The file attached to this record is the author's final peer reviewed version. The Publisher's final version can be found by following the DOI link.Hierarchical control of skilled performance depends on chunking of several lower-level units into a single higher-level unit. The present study examined the relationship between chunking and recognition of trained materials in the context of typewriting. In 3 experiments, participants were trained with typing nonwords and were later tested on their recognition of the trained materials. In Experiment 1, participants typed the same words or nonwords in 5 consecutive trials while performing a concurrent memory task. In Experiment 2, participants typed the materials with lags between repetitions without a concurrent memory task. In both experiments, recognition of typing materials was associated with better chunking of the materials. Experiment 3 used the remember-know procedure to test the recollection and familiarity components of recognition. Remember judgments were associated with better chunking than know judgments or nonrecognition. These results indicate that chunking is associated with explicit recollection of prior typing episodes. The relevance of the existing memory models to chunking in typewriting was considered, and it is proposed that memory chunking improves retrieval of trained typing materials by integrating contextual cues into the memory traces

Effect of adding fat to feedlot rations

Fat is added to commercial feedlot rations as a concentrated energy source and to reduce dustiness and wear of feed processing machinery. We added fat at varying levels ( 0 to 6% of the ration) to study effects from fat and the influence of a surface-active additive. Two hundred 700-pound steers were allotted to 40 pens of 5 each all fed 135 days on the rations show in Table 12, according to the schedule shown in Table 13

Children\u27s implicit recall of junk food, alcohol and gambling sponsorship in Australian sport

BACKGROUND: In Australia, sport is saturated by the promotion of junk food, alcohol and gambling products. This is particularly evident on player jerseys. The effect of this advertising on children, who are exposed to these messages while watching sport, has not been thoroughly investigated. The aim of this research study was to investigate: (1) the extent to which children implicitly recalled shirt sponsors with the correct sporting team; (2) whether children associated some types of sponsors with certain sporting codes more than others; and (3) whether age of the children influenced the correct recall of sponsoring brands and teams. METHOD: This experimental study conducted in New South Wales, Australia used projective techniques to measure the implicit recall of team sponsorship relationships of 85 children aged 5-12 years. Participants were asked to arrange two sets of magnets - one which contained sporting teams and one which contained brand logos - in the manner deemed most appropriate by them. Children were not given any prompts relating to sporting sponsorship relationships. RESULTS: Three quarters (77 %) of the children were able to identify at least one correct shirt sponsor. Children associated alcohol and gambling brands more highly with the more popular sporting code, the National Rugby League compared to the Australian Football League sporting code. Results showed that age had an effect on number of shirt sponsors correctly recalled with 9-12 year olds being significantly more likely than 5-8 year olds to correctly identify team sponsors. CONCLUSIONS: Given children\u27s ability to implicitly recall shirt sponsors in a sporting context, Australian sporting codes should examine their current sponsorship relationships to reduce the number of unhealthy commodity shirt sponsors. While there is some regulation that protects children from the marketing of unhealthy commodity products, these findings suggest that children are still exposed to and recall these sponsorship relationships. Results suggest that the promotion of unhealthy commodity products during sporting matches is contributing to increased awareness amongst children of unhealthy commodity brands. Further investigation is required to examine the extent and impact of marketing initiatives during televised sporting matches on children