131 research outputs found
Losing Parasocial Friendships over Celebrity Politics: A Cognitive Discrepancies Approach
The present study examines 4 cognitive discrepancy management strategies that media users can use in response to a celebrity making a political statement that runs contrary to their beliefs. The experiment (N = 382) replicates the results using 3 celebrities and 2 attitude object contexts. Exposure to a celebrity making political statements that the media user disagrees with resulted in weaker parasocial relationships with the celebrity and attribution of lesser importance to that issue. Viewers who particularly liked the celebrity prior to the study were more likely to decouple the actor from their line of work to continue enjoying the actor’s media content despite their political disagreement. These findings illuminate the potential consequences of celebrity politics for both the media figures’ stardom and the citizens’ political participation. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2022 APA, all rights reserved) Impact Statement
Entertainment celebrities often voice their stance on various social issues. The study examines the consequences of this practice, showing that although entertainers can leverage their celebrity status to attenuate public opinion, it might come at the cost of their popularity. These findings can inform efforts to maximize the impact of political advocacy, enhance celebrity management practices, and promote political participation
Investigating the discriminative value of Early Warning Scores in patients with respiratory disease using a retrospective cohort analysis of admissions to Nottingham University Hospitals Trust over a 2-year period
Objective: Early Warning Scores (EWSs) are used to monitor patients for signs of imminent deterioration. Although used in respiratory disease, EWSs have not been well studied in this population, despite the underlying cardiopulmonary pathophysiology often present. We examined the performance of two scoring systems in patients with respiratory disease.Design: Retrospective cohort analysis of vital signs observations of all patients admitted to a respiratory unit over a 2-year period. Scores were linked to outcome data to establish the performance of the National EWS (NEWS) compared results to a locally adapted EWS.Setting: Nottingham University Hospitals National Health Service Trust respiratory wards. Data were collected from an integrated electronic observation and task allocation system employing a local EWS, also generating mandatory referrals to clinical staff at set scoring thresholds.Outcome measures: Projected workload, and sensitivity and specificity of the scores in predicting mortality based on outcome within 24 hours of a score being recorded.Results: 8812 individual patient episodes occurred during the study period. Overall, mortality was 5.9%. Applying NEWS retrospectively (vs local EWS) generated an eightfold increase in mandatory escalations, but had higher sensitivity in predicting mortality at the protocol cut points.Conclusions: This study highlights issues surrounding use of scoring systems in patients with respiratory disease. NEWS demonstrated higher sensitivity for predicting death within 24 hours, offset by reduced specificity. The consequent workload generated may compromise the ability of the clinical team to respond to patients needing immediate input. The locally adapted EWS has higher specificity but lower sensitivity. Statistical evaluation suggests this may lead to missed opportunities for intervention, however, this does not account for clinical concern independent of the scores, nor ability to respond to alerts based on workload. Further research into the role of warning scores and the impact of chronic pathophysiology is urgently needed
A co-production approach guided by the behaviour change wheel to develop an intervention for reducing sedentary behaviour after stroke
Background
Stroke survivors are highly sedentary; thus, breaking up long uninterrupted bouts of sedentary behaviour could have substantial health benefit. However, there are no intervention strategies specifically aimed at reducing sedentary behaviour tailored for stroke survivors. The purpose of this study was to use co-production approaches to develop an intervention to reduce sedentary behaviour after stroke.
Methods
A series of five co-production workshops with stroke survivors, their caregivers, stroke service staff, exercise professionals, and researchers were conducted in parallel in two-stroke services (England and Scotland). Workshop format was informed by the behaviour change wheel (BCW) framework for developing interventions and incorporated systematic review and empirical evidence. Taking an iterative approach, data from activities and audio recordings were analysed following each workshop and findings used to inform subsequent workshops, to inform both the activities of the next workshop and ongoing intervention development.
Findings
Co-production workshop participants (n = 43) included 17 staff, 14 stroke survivors, six caregivers and six researchers. The target behaviour for stroke survivors is to increase standing and moving, and the target behaviour for caregivers and staff is to support and encourage stroke survivors to increase standing and moving. The developed intervention is primarily based on co-produced solutions to barriers to achieving the target behaviour. The developed intervention includes 34 behaviour change techniques. The intervention is to be delivered through stroke services, commencing in the inpatient setting and following through discharge into the community. Participants reported that taking part in intervention development was a positive experience.
Conclusions
To our knowledge, this is the first study that has combined the use of co-production and the BCW to develop an intervention for use in stroke care. In-depth reporting of how a co-production approach was combined with the BCW framework, including the design of bespoke materials for workshop activities, should prove useful to other researchers and practitioners involved in intervention development in stroke
Diversity of woody-host infecting Phytophthora species in public parks and botanic gardens as revealed by metabarcoding, and opportunities for mitigation through best practice
The diversity of Phytophthora species in soils collected from 14 highly disturbed sites in northern Britain, including botanic gardens, arboreta, public parks and other amenity woodland sites, was analysed using a molecular technique known as DNA metabarcoding. This technique enables the identification of multiple species present in a single environmental sample based on a DNA ‘barcode’ unique to each species. The genus Phytophthora was targeted in this study due to its increasing impact on Britain’s forests and woodlands over thelast 20 years. The introduction and spread of new Phytophthora species into Britain has been strongly associated with the movement of traded containerised plants, with a number of Phytophthora outbreaks reported on host trees located in public gardens and parks that had recently undergone planting or landscape regeneration schemes. This study was undertaken to assess the extent to which these highly disturbed sites with extensive planting regimes act as harbours for woody-host infecting Phytophthora species. A total of 23 Phytophthora species, the majority of which are known to be pathogens of woody hosts, were detected across the 14 sites sampled. These included four quarantine-regulated pathogens and four species notpreviously recorded in Britain. Also detected were three as-yet undescribed Phytophthora species and nine oomycete sequences with no clear match to any known genus. There was no effect of geographical location, elevation, underlying soil type, host family or host health status on the Phytophthora assemblages at each site, suggesting that the Phytophthora communities detected are likely to comprise introduced species associated with planting programmes. P. austrocedri and P. pseudosyringae were two of the most abundant Phytophthoraspecies detected, both of which cause serious damage to trees and are regarded as fairly recent introductions to Britain. The practical implications of the findings in terms of mitigating Phytophthora introduction, spread and impact at botanic gardens, arboreta and urban parks are discussed
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The validation of a computer-based food record for older adults: the Novel Assessment of Nutrition and Ageing (NANA) method
Dietary assessment in older adults can be challenging. The Novel Assessment of Nutrition and Ageing (NANA) method is a touch-screen
computer-based food record that enables older adults to record their dietary intakes. The objective of the present study was to assess
the relative validity of the NANA method for dietary assessment in older adults. For this purpose, three studies were conducted in which a
total of ninety-four older adults (aged 65–89 years) used the NANA method of dietary assessment. On a separate occasion, participants
completed a 4 d estimated food diary. Blood and 24 h urine samples were also collected from seventy-six of the volunteers for the analysis
of biomarkers of nutrient intake. The results from all the three studies were combined, and nutrient intake data collected using the NANA
method were compared against the 4 d estimated food diary and biomarkers of nutrient intake. Bland–Altman analysis showed
a reasonable agreement between the dietary assessment methods for energy and macronutrient intake; however, there were small, but
significant, differences for energy and protein intake, reflecting the tendency for the NANA method to record marginally lower energy intakes.
Significant positive correlations were observed between urinary urea and dietary protein intake using both the NANA and the 4 d estimated
food diary methods, and between plasma ascorbic acid and dietary vitamin C intake using the NANA method. The results demonstrate the
feasibility of computer-based dietary assessment in older adults, and suggest that the NANA method is comparable to the 4 d estimated
food diary, and could be used as an alternative to the food diary for the short-term assessment of an individual’s dietary intake
Metabarcoding reveals a high diversity of woody host-associated Phytophthora spp. in soils at public gardens and amenity woodlands in Britain
This work was supported by Forestry Commission Scotland (grant number SLA-14/15-034), the Living With Environmental Change Phase 3 project ‘Phyto-Threats’ as part of the Tree Health and Plant Biosecurity Initiative (grant number BB/N023463/1) and the European Union’s Horizon 2020 research and innovation programme POnTE (Pest Organisms Threatening Europe) (grant number 635646). David E.L. Cooke, Pete E. Hedley, Leighton Pritchard, Peter Thorpe also received funding from the Scottish GovernmentForests and woodlands worldwide are being severely impacted by invasive Phytophthora species, with initial outbreaks in some cases occurring on host trees located in public parks and gardens. These highly disturbed sites with diverse planting practices may indeed act as harbours for invasive Phytophthora pathogens which are particularly well adapted to surviving in soil. High throughput Illumina sequencing was used to analyse Phytophthora species diversity in soil samples collected from 14 public garden/amenity woodland sites in northern Britain. Bioinformatic analyses revealed some limitations to using internal transcribed spacer as the barcode region; namely reporting of false positives and ambiguous species matches. Taking this into account, 35 distinct sequences were amplified across the sites, corresponding to 23 known Phytophthora species as well as twelve oomycete sequences with no match to any known Phytophthora species. Phytophthora pseudosyringae and P. austrocedri, both of which cause serious damage to trees and are regarded as fairly recent introductions to Britain, were the two most abundant Phytophthora species detected. There was no evidence that any of the detected Phytophthora species were more associated with any one type of host, healthy or otherwise. This study has demonstrated the ubiquity and diversity of Phytophthora species endemic in highly managed, extensively planted soil environments in Britain. Suggested improvements to the methodology and the practical implications of the findings in terms of mitigating Phytophthora spread and impact are discussed.Publisher PDFPeer reviewe
Animal-related factors associated with moderate-to-severe diarrhea in children younger than five years in western Kenya: A matched case-control study
Background Diarrheal disease remains among the leading causes of global mortality in children younger than 5 years. Exposure to domestic animals may be a risk factor for diarrheal disease. The objectives of this study were to identify animal-related exposures associated with cases of moderate-to-severe diarrhea (MSD) in children in rural western Kenya, and to identify the major zoonotic enteric pathogens present in domestic animals residing in the homesteads of case and control children. Methodology/Principal findings We characterized animal-related exposures in a subset of case and control children (n = 73 pairs matched on age, sex and location) with reported animal presence at home enrolled in the Global Enteric Multicenter Study in western Kenya, and analysed these for an association with MSD. We identified potentially zoonotic enteric pathogens in pooled fecal specimens collected from domestic animals resident at children’s homesteads. Variables that were associated with decreased risk of MSD were washing hands after animal contact (matched odds ratio [MOR] = 0.2; 95% CI 0.08–0.7), and presence of adult sheep that were not confined in a pen overnight (MOR = 0.1; 0.02–0.5). Variables that were associated with increased risk of MSD were increasing number of sheep owned (MOR = 1.2; 1.0–1.5), frequent observation of fresh rodent excreta (feces/urine) outside the house (MOR = 7.5; 1.5–37.2), and participation of the child in providing water to chickens (MOR = 3.8; 1.2–12.2). Of 691 pooled specimens collected from 2,174 domestic animals, 159 pools (23%) tested positive for one or more potentially zoonotic enteric pathogens (Campylobacter jejuni, C. coli, non-typhoidal Salmonella, diarrheagenic E. coli, Giardia, Cryptosporidium, or rotavirus). We did not find any association between the presence of particular pathogens in household animals, and MSD in children. Conclusions and significance Public health agencies should continue to promote frequent hand washing, including after animal contact, to reduce the risk of MSD. Future studies should address specific causal relations of MSD with sheep and chicken husbandry practices, and with the presence of rodents
Context specificity of post-error and post-conflict cognitive control adjustments
There has been accumulating evidence that cognitive control can be adaptively regulated by monitoring for processing conflict as an index of online control demands. However, it is not yet known whether top-down control mechanisms respond to processing conflict in a manner specific to the operative task context or confer a more generalized benefit. While previous studies have examined the taskset-specificity of conflict adaptation effects, yielding inconsistent results, controlrelated performance adjustments following errors have been largely overlooked. This gap in the literature underscores recent debate as to whether post-error performance represents a strategic, control-mediated mechanism or a nonstrategic consequence of attentional orienting. In the present study, evidence of generalized control following both high conflict correct trials and errors was explored in a task-switching paradigm. Conflict adaptation effects were not found to generalize across tasksets, despite a shared response set. In contrast, post-error slowing effects were found to extend to the inactive taskset and were predictive of enhanced post-error accuracy. In addition, post-error performance adjustments were found to persist for several trials and across multiple task switches, a finding inconsistent with attentional orienting accounts of post-error slowing. These findings indicate that error-related control adjustments confer a generalized performance benefit and suggest dissociable mechanisms of post-conflict and post-error control. © 2014 Forster, Cho
Methodological issues associated with collecting sensitive information over the telephone - experience from an Australian non-suicidal self-injury (NSSI) prevalence study
<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Collecting population data on sensitive issues such as non-suicidal self-injury (NSSI) is problematic. Case note audits or hospital/clinic based presentations only record severe cases and do not distinguish between suicidal and non-suicidal intent. Community surveys have largely been limited to school and university students, resulting in little much needed population-based data on NSSI. Collecting these data via a large scale population survey presents challenges to survey methodologists. This paper addresses the methodological issues associated with collecting this type of data via CATI.</p> <p>Methods</p> <p>An Australia-wide population survey was funded by the Australian Government to determine prevalence estimates of NSSI and associations, predictors, relationships to suicide attempts and suicide ideation, and outcomes. Computer assisted telephone interviewing (CATI) on a random sample of the Australian population aged 10+ years of age from randomly selected households, was undertaken.</p> <p>Results</p> <p>Overall, from 31,216 eligible households, 12,006 interviews were undertaken (response rate 38.5%). The 4-week prevalence of NSSI was 1.1% (95% ci 0.9-1.3%) and lifetime prevalence was 8.1% (95% ci 7.6-8.6).</p> <p>Methodological concerns and challenges in regard to collection of these data included extensive interviewer training and post interview counselling. Ethical considerations, especially with children as young as 10 years of age being asked sensitive questions, were addressed prior to data collection. The solution required a large amount of information to be sent to each selected household prior to the telephone interview which contributed to a lower than expected response rate. Non-coverage error caused by the population of interest being highly mobile, homeless or institutionalised was also a suspected issue in this low prevalence condition. In many circumstances the numbers missing from the sampling frame are small enough to not cause worry, especially when compared with the population as a whole, but within the population of interest to us, we believe that the most likely direction of bias is towards an underestimation of our prevalence estimates.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>Collecting valid and reliable data is a paramount concern of health researchers and survey research methodologists. The challenge is to design cost-effective studies especially those associated with low-prevalence issues, and to balance time and convenience against validity, reliability, sampling, coverage, non-response and measurement error issues.</p
The Ontogenetic Osteohistology of Tenontosaurus tilletti
Tenontosaurus tilletti is an ornithopod dinosaur known from the Early Cretaceous (Aptian-Albian) Cloverly and Antlers formations of the Western United States. It is represented by a large number of specimens spanning a number of ontogenetic stages, and these specimens have been collected across a wide geographic range (from central Montana to southern Oklahoma). Here I describe the long bone histology of T. tilletti and discuss histological variation at the individual, ontogenetic and geographic levels. The ontogenetic pattern of bone histology in T. tilletti is similar to that of other dinosaurs, reflecting extremely rapid growth early in life, and sustained rapid growth through sub-adult ontogeny. But unlike other iguanodontians, this dinosaur shows an extended multi-year period of slow growth as skeletal maturity approached. Evidence of termination of growth (e.g., an external fundamental system) is observed in only the largest individuals, although other histological signals in only slightly smaller specimens suggest a substantial slowing of growth later in life. Histological differences in the amount of remodeling and the number of lines of arrested growth varied among elements within individuals, but bone histology was conservative across sampled individuals of the species, despite known paleoenvironmental differences between the Antlers and Cloverly formations. The bone histology of T. tilletti indicates a much slower growth trajectory than observed for other iguanodontians (e.g., hadrosaurids), suggesting that those taxa reached much larger sizes than Tenontosaurus in a shorter time
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