Springfield and Greene County, Missouri Census Information, 1836-2010

According to the Missouri State Archives, the earliest census taken in Missouri was actually of the Missouri Territory in the years 1814 and 1817, and only free white males were counted. In the year 1821, Missouri was granted statehood, and a state census was taken that year. Then, from 1824 and every four years after that through 1876 (except for 1872), a state census was taken throughout Missouri. Meanwhile, the decennial federal census, which began in 1790, did not begin in Missouri until 1830, but neither Springfield nor Greene County was listed until the 1840 census. Greene County was legally formed in 1833, and Springfield, the county seat, was incorporated in 1838. Boundaries were to change for both political units over the years, with the original Greene County parceled out to form other counties until the 1860 census which generally reflects present-day boundaries. Springfield and North Springfield, two separate entities, were united as Springfield in 1887, and there have been other annexations since then to the present day

Missouri State Censuses: 1821-1876

Between 1821 and 1876, there were 14 state censuses authorized by the State of Missouri. Either constitutional or statutory law mandated that these censuses were to be taken. After the initial census of 1821, the year Missouri attained statehood, a state census was taken every four years from 1824 until 1876, with the exception of 1872. These censuses were usually printed as a fold-out sheet in the Missouri House or Senate Journals, and it is my attempt here to explain why the censuses were taken and some of the more interesting facts about the census counts

Child Adult Relationship Enhancement in Primary Care (PriCARE): Study design/protocol for a randomized trial of a primary care-based group parenting intervention to prevent child maltreatment

BACKGROUND: Child maltreatment (CM) is a pervasive public health problem and there is a critical need for brief, effective, scalable prevention programs. Problematic parent-child relationships lie at the heart of CM. Parents who maltreat their children are more likely to have punitive parenting styles characterized by high rates of negative interaction and ineffective discipline strategies with over-reliance on punishment. Thus, parenting interventions that strengthen parent-child relationships, teach positive discipline techniques, decrease harsh parenting, and decrease child behavioral problems hold promise as CM prevention strategies. Challenges in engaging parents, particularly low-income and minority parents, and a lack of knowledge regarding effective implementation strategies, however, have greatly limited the reach and impact of parenting interventions. Child Adult Relationship Enhancement in Primary Care (PriCARE)/Criando Niños con CARIÑO is a 6-session group parenting intervention that holds promise in addressing these challenges because PriCARE/CARIÑO was (1) developed and iteratively adapted with input from racially and ethnically diverse families, including low-income families and (2) designed specifically for implementation in primary care with inclusion of strategies to align with usual care workflow to increase uptake and retention. METHODS: This study is a multicenter randomized controlled trial with two parallel arms. Children, 2-6 years old with Medicaid/CHIP/no insurance, and their English- and Spanish-speaking caregivers recruited from pediatric primary care clinics in Philadelphia and North Carolina will be enrolled. Caregivers assigned to the intervention regimen will attend PriCARE/CARIÑO and receive usual care. Caregivers assigned to the control regimen will receive usual care only. The primary outcome is occurrence of an investigation for CM by child protective services during the 48 months following completion of the intervention. In addition, scores for CM risk, child behavior problems, harsh and neglectful parenting behaviors, caregiver stress, and caregiver-child interactions will be assessed as secondary outcome measures and for investigation of possible mechanisms of intervention-induced change. We will also identify PriCARE/CARIÑO implementation factors that may be barriers and facilitators to intervention referrals, enrollment, and attendance. DISCUSSION: By evaluating proximal outcomes in addition to the distal outcome of CM, this study, the largest CM prevention trial with individual randomization, will help elucidate mechanisms of change and advance the science of CM prevention. This study will also gather critical information on factors influencing successful implementation and how to optimize intervention referrals, enrollment, and attendance to inform future dissemination and practical applications. TRIAL REGISTRATION: This trial was registered on ClinicalTrials.gov (NCT05233150) on February 1, 2022, prior to enrolling subjects

Context-Bounded Analysis For Concurrent Programs With Dynamic Creation of Threads

Context-bounded analysis has been shown to be both efficient and effective at finding bugs in concurrent programs. According to its original definition, context-bounded analysis explores all behaviors of a concurrent program up to some fixed number of context switches between threads. This definition is inadequate for programs that create threads dynamically because bounding the number of context switches in a computation also bounds the number of threads involved in the computation. In this paper, we propose a more general definition of context-bounded analysis useful for programs with dynamic thread creation. The idea is to bound the number of context switches for each thread instead of bounding the number of switches of all threads. We consider several variants based on this new definition, and we establish decidability and complexity results for the analysis induced by them

Integrating robotics into wildlife conservation: testing improvements to predator deterrents through movement

Background Agricultural and pastoral landscapes can provide important habitat for wildlife conservation, but sharing these landscapes with wildlife can create conflict that is costly and requires managing. Livestock predation is a good example of the challenges involving coexistence with wildlife across shared landscapes. Integrating new technology into agricultural practices could help minimize human-wildlife conflict. In this study, we used concepts from the fields of robotics (i.e., automated movement and adaptiveness) and agricultural practices (i.e., managing livestock risk to predation) to explore how integration of these concepts could aid the development of more effective predator deterrents. Methods We used a colony of captive coyotes as a model system, and simulated predation events with meat baits inside and outside of protected zones. Inside the protected zones we used a remote-controlled vehicle with a state-of-the art, commercially available predator deterrent (i.e., Foxlight) mounted on the top and used this to test three treatments: (1) light only (i.e., without movement or adaptiveness), (2) predetermined movement (i.e., with movement and without adaptiveness), and (3) adaptive movement (i.e., with both movement and adaptiveness). We measured the time it took for coyotes to eat the baits and analyzed the data with a time-to-event survival strategy. Results Survival of baits was consistently higher inside the protected zone, and the three movement treatments incrementally increased survival time over baseline except for the light only treatment in the nonprotected zone. Incorporating predetermined movement essentially doubled the efficacy of the light only treatment both inside and outside the protected zone. Incorporating adaptive movement exponentially increased survival time both inside and outside the protected zone. Our findings provide compelling evidence that incorporating existing robotics capabilities (predetermined and adaptive movement) could greatly enhance protection of agricultural resources and aid in the development of nonlethal tools for managing wildlife. Our findings also demonstrate the importance of marrying agricultural practices (e.g., spatial management of livestock at night) with new technology to improve the efficacy of wildlife deterrents

The mental and physical health of older adults with a genetic predisposition for autism

Autism commonly aggregates in families, with twin studies stimating heritability to be around 80%. Subclinical autism-like characteristics have also been found at elevated rates in relatives of autistic probands. Physical and psychiatric conditions have been reported at elevated rates in autistic children and adults, and also in their relatives. However, to date there has been no exploration of how ageing may affect this pattern. This study examined cross-sectional data from the ongoing online PROTECT study. A total of 20,220 adults aged 50 years and older reported whether they have an autistic first-degree relative. In total, 739 older adults reported having an autistic first-degree relative (AFDR group) and 11,666 were identified as having no family history of any neurodevelopmental disorder (NFD group). The AFDR group demonstrated significantly higher frequencies of self-reported psychiatric diagnoses and a greater total number of co-occurring psychiatric diagnoses than the NFD group. Furthermore, the AFDR group reported elevated current self-report symptoms of depression, anxiety, traumatic experience, and post-traumatic stress than the NFD group. By contrast, few differences between AFDR and NFD groups were observed in physical health conditions, and no differences were observed in the total number of co-occurring physical health diagnoses. These findings suggest that adults who have an autistic first-degree relative may be at greater risk of poor mental, but not physical, health in later life. Older adults with autistic relatives may benefit from close monitoring to mitigate this susceptibility and to provide timely intervention

The mental and physical health profiles of older adults who endorse elevated autistic traits

Objective The mental and physical health profile of autistic people has been studied in adolescence and adulthood, with elevated rates of most conditions being reported. However, this has been little studied taking a dimensional approach to autistic traits, and in older age. Methods A total of 20,220 adults aged 50-81 years from the PROTECT study reported whether they experienced persistent socio-communicative traits characteristic of autism. Approximately 1%, 276 individuals, were identified as endorsing elevated autistic traits in childhood and currently, henceforth the ‘Autism Spectrum Trait’ (AST) group. An age and gender matched comparison group was formed of 10,495 individuals who did not endorse any autistic behavioral traits, henceforth the ‘Control Older Adults’ (COA) group. Differences between AST and COA groups were explored in self-reported psychiatric diagnoses, self-reported symptoms of current depression and anxiety, and self-reported physical health diagnoses. Associations were also examined between autistic traits and health across the whole sample. Results The AST group reported significantly elevated rates of psychiatric diagnoses compared to COAs. Additionally, the AST group showed significantly higher self-reported symptoms of current depression and anxiety than COAs. However, few differences were observed in individual physical health conditions, and no differences in total co-occurring physical diagnoses between groups. Similar associations between autistic traits and health were also found taking a dimensional approach across the whole sample. Discussion These findings suggest that older adults with elevated autistic traits may be at greater risk of poorer mental, but not physical, health in later life. Future studies should incorporate polygenic scores to elucidate the possible genetic links between propensity to autism/high autistic traits and to psychiatric conditions, and to explore whether those with elevated autistic traits experience particular barriers to mental health care

Traumatic life experiences and post-traumatic stress symptoms in middle-aged and older adults with and without autistic traits

Objectives Research with younger adults has begun to explore associations between autism/autistic traits and vulnerability to Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). Large scale studies and/or examination of age-effects have not been conducted. Methods Adults aged 50 years+ from the PROTECT study (n = 20,220) completed items about current and childhood socio-communicative difficulties characteristic of autism. Approximately 1% (n = 251) endorsed high autistic traits, henceforth the Autism Spectrum Traits (AST) group. Differences between the AST and an age—and sex-matched “Comparison Older Adults” (COA; n = 9179) group were explored for lifetime traumatic experiences and current symptoms of PTSD, depression, and anxiety. Results Almost 30% of the AST group, compared to less than 8% of the COA, reported severe trauma in childhood/adulthood, including emotional, physical or sexual abuse. Elevated current PTSD symptoms were reported by AST compared to COA. An interaction was observed between autistic traits and trauma severity; the effect of level of trauma on PTSD symptoms was significantly greater for AST versus COA participants. This interaction remained significant when controlling for current depression and anxiety symptoms. Conclusions The findings suggest that high autistic traits may increase the likelihood of experiencing trauma across the lifespan, and the impact of severe trauma on PTSD symptoms. Older adults with high (vs. low) autistic traits may be at greater risk of experiencing PTSD symptoms in latter life. Future research should test whether the pattern of results is similar for diagnosed autistic adults

67/12/12 Oral Arguments before the US Supreme Court

Tuesday, December 12, 1967 oral arguments before the United States Supreme Court