Psychosocial Risk Factors in Disordered Gambling: A Descriptive Systematic Overview of Vulnerable Populations

Background: Gambling is a behaviour engaged in by millions of people worldwide; for some, gambling can become a severely maladaptive behaviour, and previous research has identified a wide range of psychosocial risk factors that can be considered important for the development and maintenance of disordered gambling. Although risk factors have been identified, the homogeneity of risk factors across specific groups thought to be vulnerable to disordered gambling is to date, unexplored. Methods: To address this, the current review sought to conduct a systematic overview of literature relating to seven vulnerable groups: young people and adolescents, older adults, women, veterans, indigenous peoples, prisoners, and low socio-economic/income groups. Results: Multiple risk factors associated with disordered gambling were identified; some appeared consistently across most groups, including being male, co-morbid mental and physical health conditions, substance use disorders, accessibility and availability of gambling, form and mode of gambling, and experience of trauma. Further risk factors were identified that were specific to each vulnerable group. Conclusion: Within the general population, certain groups are more vulnerable to disordered gambling. Although some risk factors are consistent across groups, some risk factors appear to be group specific. It is clear that there is no homogenous pathway in to disordered gambling, and that social, developmental, environmental and demographic characteristics can all interact to influence an individual’s relationship with gambling

The preventive services use self-efficacy (PRESS) scale in older women: development and psychometric properties

Background\ud Preventive services offered to older Americans are currently under-utilized despite considerable evidence regarding their health and economic benefits. Individuals with low self-efficacy in accessing these services need to be identified and provided self-efficacy enhancing interventions. Scales measuring self-efficacy in the management of chronic diseases exist, but do not cover the broad spectrum of preventive services and behaviors that can improve the health of older adults, particularly older women who are vulnerable to poorer health and lesser utilization of preventive services. This study aimed to evaluate the psychometric properties of a new preventive services use self-efficacy scale, by measuring its internal consistency reliability, assessing internal construct validity by exploring factor structure, and examining differences in self-efficacy scores according to participant characteristics.\ud \ud Methods\ud The Preventive Services Use Self-Efficacy (PRESS) Scale was developed by an expert panel at the University of Pittsburgh Center for Aging and Population Health - Prevention Research Center. It was administered to 242 women participating in an ongoing trial and the data were analyzed to assess its psychometric properties. An exploratory factor analysis with a principal axis factoring approach and orthogonal varimax rotation was used to explore the underlying structure of the items in the scale. The internal consistency of the subscales was assessed using Cronbach’s alpha coefficient.\ud \ud Results\ud The exploratory factor analysis defined five self-efficacy factors (self-efficacy for exercise, communication with physicians, self-management of chronic disease, obtaining screening tests, and getting vaccinations regularly) formed by 16 items from the scale. The internal consistency of the subscales ranged from .81 to .94. Participants who accessed a preventive service had higher self-efficacy scores in the corresponding sub-scale than those who did not.\ud \ud Conclusions\ud The 16-item PRESS scale demonstrates preliminary validity and reliability in measuring self-efficacy in the use of preventive services among older women. It can potentially be used to evaluate the impact of interventions designed to improve self-efficacy in the use of preventive services in community-dwelling older women

Using Fuzzy Cognitive Mapping to Assess the Impacts of Climate Change on Great Lakes Ecosystem Services

The ecosystem services the Great Lakes provide are imperative in sustaining human well-being and economic viability. To better understand the consequences of climate change and to develop effective means of adapting to them, it is critical that we improve our understanding of the links between climate change and ecosystem services. Validated quantitative models are the best way to project such impacts, however, time, data, and model limitations often make this approach implausible. Alternatively, fuzzy cognitive maps (FCM) can be used to encode expert knowledge about interactions among ecosystem components, which then translates that subjective, qualitative data into predictions of the effects of management on an ecosystem. Leveraging interdisciplinary methodology, we predicted which ecosystem services might be at risk and through which pathways climate change will act on provision of those services. Our study found that cultural services such as recreational fishing, boating, and winter recreation are most likely to be negatively impacted whilst birding is expected to have a positive increase. Respondents predicted that supporting/regulating services may increase, with carbon sequestration showing the largest increase largely due to increased primary productivity. Provisioning services saw mixed results with drinking water, wild rice productivity, and commercial shipping recording an increase while commercial fishing showed a negative impact to declining ice cover.Master of ScienceSchool for Environment and SustainabilityUniversity of Michiganhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/172215/1/GreatLakesCCEcosystemServices.pd

Characterization of Vernal Pools Across National Parks in the Great Lakes Region

Vernal pools are small, ephemeral wetlands that become inundated each spring and provide many ecosystem services, including providing critical habitat to amphibians and invertebrates as their temporary nature keeps them free of fish. We collected data on vernal pool characteristics throughout five Great Lakes National Parks: Pictured Rocks National Lakeshore, Sleeping Bear Dunes National Lakeshore, Apostle Islands National Lakeshore, Isle Royale National Park, and Voyagers National Parks. Our goals were to characterize and assess how vernal pools vary within and across the five national parks, and determine which characteristics are most correlated with the presence of vernal pool indicator species. We sampled 139 pools during spring of 2021 and 2022 where we collected data on pool characteristics related to hydrology, soils, vegetation, geomorphology, and indicator species. We found that vernal pool substrate and forest type does vary between the different parks. Many vernal pool qualities are driven by the type of substrate they occur on and overstory canopy species and amount of tree cover. We also created a classification system that most highly correlated to indicator species presence and can be used in remote sensing products, resulting in a three-class system based on overstory species composition: Deciduous, Coniferous, and Open. Indicator species were more likely to occur in pools with either a deciduous or open canopy than pools with a coniferous canopy. This information can be used to inform land managers within the Great Lakes of vernal pool characteristics they can expect, and which pools are hotspots for indicator species

Table_1_Assessing the broadscale effects of wildfire under extreme drought conditions to boreal peatlands.xlsx

Climate warming and changing fire regimes in the North American boreal zone have the capacity to alter the hydrology and ecology of the landscape with long term consequences to peatland ecosystems and their traditional role as carbon sinks. It is important to understand how peatlands are affected by wildfire in relation to both extent of burn and severity of burn to the organic soil (peat) layers where most of the C is stored. Peatlands cover more than 75% of the landscape in the southern Northwest Territories, Canada where extreme drought led to widespread wildfires in 2014–2015. To assess the wildfire effects across a 14.6 million ha study area including 136 wildfire events, we used an integration of field data collection, land cover mapping of peatland and upland ecotypes, Landsat-8-based mapping of burn severity to the soil organic layers, and MODIS-hotspot mapping of fire progression for season of burning. The intersection of these geospatial products allows for a broadscale assessment of wildfire effects across gradients of ecotype, ecoregions, seasons, and year of burn. Using a series of chi-squared goodness of fit tests, we found that peatlands are more susceptible to wildfire on the Taiga shield where they are smaller and hydrologically isolated by the rocky landscape. There burning affected proportionally larger peat areas with an evenness of burn severity to the organic soil layers which may lead to less spatial diversity in post-fire recovery, making the landscape less resilient to future fire. The most resilient peatlands are expected to be hydrologically well-connected to both ground water systems and larger peatland complexes such as those on the Taiga plains which exhibited large unburned and singed patches across the landscape, and greater variability in burn severity across seasons and ecotypes. Understanding the tipping point of drought conditions at which the landscape becomes connected, and peatlands are susceptible to wildfire with deeper burning of the organic soil layers is important for understanding the potential future effects of climate change and projected increases in wildfire on peatlands. This is critical for C accounting and climate mitigation strategies.</p

A novel approach to assessing memory at the population level: vulnerability to semantic interference

There is increasing interest in identifying novel cognitive paradigms to help detect preclinical dementia. Promising results have been found in clinical settings using the Semantic Interference Test (SIT), a modification of an existing episodic memory test (Fuld Object Memory Evaluation) that exploits vulnerability to semantic interference in Alzheimer's disease. It is not yet known how broadly this work will generalize to the community at large. Participants aged > or = 65 years from the Monongahela-Youghiogheny Healthy Aging Team (MYHAT) were administered the SIT at study entry. Independent of neuropsychological assessment, participants were rated on the Clinical Dementia Rating (CDR) scale, based on reported loss of cognitively driven everyday functioning. In individuals free of dementia (CDR < 1), the concurrent validity of the SIT was assessed by determining its association with CDR using multiple logistic regression models, with CDR 0 (no dementia) vs. 0.5 (possible dementia) as the outcome and the SIT test variables as predictors. Poorer performance on all SIT variables but one was associated with higher CDR reflecting possible dementia (Odds Ratios 2.24-4.79). Younger age and female gender also conferred a performance advantage. Years of education and reading ability (a proxy for quality of education) evidenced a very weak association with SIT performance. The SIT shows promise as a valid, novel measure to identify early preclinical dementia in a community setting. It has potential utility for assessment of persons who may be illiterate or of low education. Finally, we provide normative SIT data stratified by age which may be utilized by clinicians or researchers in future investigations

COGNITIVE TEST PERFORMANCE PREDICTS CHANGE IN FUNCTIONAL STATUS AT THE POPULATION LEVEL. THE MYHAT PROJECT

In the community at large, many older adults with minimal cognitive and functional impairment remain stable or improve over time, unlike patients in clinical research settings, who typically progress to dementia. Within a prospective population-based study, we identified neuropsychological tests predicting improvement or worsening over one year in cognitively-driven everyday functioning as measured by Clinical Dementia Rating (CDR). Participants were 1682 adults aged 65+ and dementia-free at baseline. CDR change was modeled as a function of baseline test scores, adjusting for demographics. Among those with baseline CDR=0.5, 29.8% improved to CDR=0; they had significantly better baseline scores on most tests. In a stepwise multiple logistic regression model, tests which remained independently associated with subsequent CDR improvement were Category Fluency, a modified Token Test, and the sum of learning trials on Object Memory Evaluation. In contrast, only 7.1% with baseline CDR=0 worsened to CDR=0.5. They had significantly lower baseline scores on most tests. In multiple regression analyses, only the Mini-Mental State Exam, delayed memory for visual reproduction, and recall susceptible to proactive interference, were independently associated with CDR worsening. At the population level, changes in both directions are observable in functional status, with different neuropsychological measures predicting the direction of change