Investigating the Portrayal and Influence of Sustainability Claims in an Environmental Advertising Context

The ability of consumer judges to identify sustainable messages in environmental advertising and the effect of these messages is explored. A content analysis provides insight into these judges’ perceptions of the depth of environmental advertising messages. An experiment investigates the influence of sustainable messages and includes collection of cognitive response data to evaluate the cognitive dimension of sustainability messages. Content analysis results suggest that sustainability messages may influence how environmental advertisements are perceived. These findings are supported by the cognitive response data, which shows cognitive differences across advertisements, and the experimental manipulation that suggests sustainable ads may be more involving to consumers

A self administered reliable questionnaire to assess lower bowel symptoms

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Bowel symptoms are considered indicators of the presence of colorectal cancer and other bowel diseases. Self administered questionnaires that elicit information about lower bowel symptoms have not been assessed for reliability, although this has been done for upper bowel symptoms. Our aim was to develop a self administered questionnaire for eliciting the presence, nature and severity of lower bowel symptoms potentially related to colorectal cancer, and assess its reliability.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>Immediately before consulting a gastroenterologist or colorectal surgeon, 263 patients likely to have a colonoscopy completed the questionnaire. Reliability was assessed in two ways: by assessing agreement between patient responses and (a) responses given by the doctor at the consultation; and (b) responses given by patients two weeks later.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>There was more than 75% agreement for 78% of the questions for the patient-doctor comparison and for 92% of the questions for the patient-patient comparison. Agreement for the length of time a symptom was present, its severity, duration, frequency of occurrence and whether or not medical consultation had been sought, all had agreement of greater than 70%. Over all questions, the chance corrected agreement for the patient-doctor comparison had a median kappa of 65% (which represents substantial agreement), interquartile range 57–72%. The patient-patient comparison also showed substantial agreement with a median kappa of 75%, interquartile range 68–81%.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>This self administered questionnaire about lower bowel symptoms is a useful way of eliciting details of bowel symptoms. It is a reliable instrument that is acceptable to patients and easily completed. Its use could guide the clinical consultation, allowing a more efficient, comprehensive and useful interaction, ensuring that all symptoms are assessed. It will also be a useful tool in research studies on bowel symptoms and their predictive value for colorectal cancer and other diseases. Studies assessing whether bowel symptoms predict the presence of colorectal cancer should provide estimates of the reliability of the symptom elicitation.</p

Health, education, and social care provision after diagnosis of childhood visual disability

Aim: To investigate the health, education, and social care provision for children newly diagnosed with visual disability.Method: This was a national prospective study, the British Childhood Visual Impairment and Blindness Study 2 (BCVIS2), ascertaining new diagnoses of visual impairment or severe visual impairment and blindness (SVIBL), or equivalent vi-sion. Data collection was performed by managing clinicians up to 1-year follow-up, and included health and developmental needs, and health, education, and social care provision.Results: BCVIS2 identified 784 children newly diagnosed with visual impairment/SVIBL (313 with visual impairment, 471 with SVIBL). Most children had associated systemic disorders (559 [71%], 167 [54%] with visual impairment, and 392 [84%] with SVIBL). Care from multidisciplinary teams was provided for 549 children (70%). Two-thirds (515) had not received an Education, Health, and Care Plan (EHCP). Fewer children with visual impairment had seen a specialist teacher (SVIBL 35%, visual impairment 28%, χ2p < 0.001), or had an EHCP (11% vs 7%, χ2p < 0 . 01).Interpretation: Families need additional support from managing clinicians to access recommended complex interventions such as the use of multidisciplinary teams and educational support. This need is pressing, as the population of children with visual impairment/SVIBL is expected to grow in size and complexity.This is an open access article under the terms of the Creative Commons Attribution License, which permits use, distribution and reproduction in any medium, provided the original work is properly cited

Abdominal aortic aneurysm is associated with a variant in low-density lipoprotein receptor-related protein 1

Abdominal aortic aneurysm (AAA) is a common cause of morbidity and mortality and has a significant heritability. We carried out a genome-wide association discovery study of 1866 patients with AAA and 5435 controls and replication of promising signals (lead SNP with a p value &lt; 1 × 10-5) in 2871 additional cases and 32,687 controls and performed further follow-up in 1491 AAA and 11,060 controls. In the discovery study, nine loci demonstrated association with AAA (p &lt; 1 × 10-5). In the replication sample, the lead SNP at one of these loci, rs1466535, located within intron 1 of low-density-lipoprotein receptor-related protein 1 (LRP1) demonstrated significant association (p = 0.0042). We confirmed the association of rs1466535 and AAA in our follow-up study (p = 0.035). In a combined analysis (6228 AAA and 49182 controls), rs1466535 had a consistent effect size and direction in all sample sets (combined p = 4.52 × 10-10, odds ratio 1.15 [1.10-1.21]). No associations were seen for either rs1466535 or the 12q13.3 locus in independent association studies of coronary artery disease, blood pressure, diabetes, or hyperlipidaemia, suggesting that this locus is specific to AAA. Gene-expression studies demonstrated a trend toward increased LRP1 expression for the rs1466535 CC genotype in arterial tissues; there was a significant (p = 0.029) 1.19-fold (1.04-1.36) increase in LRP1 expression in CC homozygotes compared to TT homozygotes in aortic adventitia. Functional studies demonstrated that rs1466535 might alter a SREBP-1 binding site and influence enhancer activity at the locus. In conclusion, this study has identified a biologically plausible genetic variant associated specifically with AAA, and we suggest that this variant has a possible functional role in LRP1 expression

An ultra-wide bandwidth (704 to 4 032 MHz) receiver for the Parkes radio telescope

We describe an ultra-wide-bandwidth, low-frequency receiver recently installed on the Parkes radio telescope. The receiver system provides continuous frequency coverage from 704 to 4032 MHz. For much of the band ( ${∼}60$ ), the system temperature is approximately 22 K and the receiver system remains in a linear regime even in the presence of strong mobile phone transmissions. We discuss the scientific and technical aspects of the new receiver, including its astronomical objectives, as well as the feed, receiver, digitiser, and signal processor design. We describe the pipeline routines that form the archive-ready data products and how those data files can be accessed from the archives. The system performance is quantified, including the system noise and linearity, beam shape, antenna efficiency, polarisation calibration, and timing stability

Fatigue Behavior of the Equine Third Metacarpus: Mechanical Property Analysis

This is the first in a series of experiments to study the fatigue properties of equine cannon (third metacarpal) bone specimens from Throughbred racehorses. Monotonic and fatigue tests to failure were performed in four-point bending on diaphyseal specimens in a 37°C saline bath to answer three initial questions. (a) Will a linear variable differential transducer yield the same elastic modulus as strain gauges? (b) Will fatigue results depend on whether the periosteal or endosteal side of the beam is in tension? (c) Are there regional variations in the monotonic and fatigue properties of the cannon bone midshaft? Eighteen left-right pairs of specimens from six horses were used. One beam of each pair was fitted with strain gauges. Fatigue tests were conducted on 24 specimens under load control at 2 Hz; an initial range of 0-10,000 microstrain was used so as to produce failure in a reasonable period of time. There were no left-right differences in the fatigue or monotonic properties, and the presence of a gauge had no effect on modulus measured by a linear variable differential transducer. However, gauge-measured moduli were about 1 GPa less than transducer-measured values. Fatigue life was independent of which side of the beam was in tension, and there were significant variations in mechanical properties around the cortex. The lateral region was stiffer than the dorsal region but the latter had a longer fatigue life. The fixed cylindrical supports used in this experimental eventually produced slight wear grooves, causing artifactual stiffening at the end of the load cycle in some specimens. A second experiment using roller supports confirmed the reason for this stiffening. It also showed that fatigue life was shorter when roller supports were used but regional differences were similar