A method for assessing the success and failure of community-level interventions in the presence of network diffusion, social reinforcement, and related social effects

Prevention and intervention work done within community settings often face unique analytic challenges for rigorous evaluations. Since community prevention work (often geographically isolated) cannot be controlled in the same way other prevention programs and these communities have an increased level of interpersonal interactions, rigorous evaluations are needed. Even when the `gold standard' randomized control trials are implemented within community intervention work, the threats to internal validity can be called into question given informal social spread of information in closed network settings. A new prevention evaluation method is presented here to disentangle the social influences assumed to influence prevention effects within communities. We formally introduce the method and it's utility for a suicide prevention program implemented in several Alaska Native villages. The results show promise to explore eight sociological measures of intervention effects in the face of social diffusion, social reinforcement, and direct treatment. Policy and research implication are discussed.Comment: 18 pages, 5 figure

Navigating International, Interdisciplinary, and Indigenous Collaborative Inquiry

This report describes how multiple community constituents came together with university researchers to develop a shared agenda for studying young indigenous people in five international circumpolar communities. The paper focuses on the setup and process of an initial face-to-face methodological planning workshop involving youth and adult community members and academics. Members of Yup’ik, Inupiat, Eveny, Inuit, and Sámi communities from Siberia to Norway participated in the workshop and engaged in negotiations to arrive at shared research interests. This was essential since the ultimate goal of the research is translational and transformative, spurring social action in communities. Describing the beginning stage of this project and the underlying participatory methodology offers insight into how the approach engaged community members with varying degrees of sustained interest and practical success. It, therefore, articulates a methodological approach for international community-based participatory research

Shared Neuroanatomical Substrates of Impaired Phonological Working Memory Across Reading Disability and Autism

Background Individuals with reading disability and individuals with autism spectrum disorder (ASD) are characterized, respectively, by their difficulties in reading and social communication, but both groups often have impaired phonological working memory (PWM). It is not known whether the impaired PWM reflects distinct or shared neuroanatomical abnormalities in these two diagnostic groups. Methods White-matter structural connectivity via diffusion weighted imaging was examined in 64 children, age 5 to 17 years, with reading disability, ASD, or typical development, who were matched on age, gender, intelligence, and diffusion data quality. Results Children with reading disability and children with ASD exhibited reduced PWM compared with children with typical development. The two diagnostic groups showed altered white matter microstructure in the temporoparietal portion of the left arcuate fasciculus and in the occipitotemporal portion of the right inferior longitudinal fasciculus (ILF), as indexed by reduced fractional anisotropy and increased radial diffusivity. Moreover, the structural integrity of the right ILF was positively correlated with PWM ability in the two diagnostic groups but not in the typically developing group. Conclusions These findings suggest that impaired PWM is transdiagnostically associated with shared neuroanatomical abnormalities in ASD and reading disability. Microstructural characteristics in left arcuate fasciculus and right ILF may play important roles in the development of PWM. The right ILF may support a compensatory mechanism for children with impaired PWM

Sedimentary carbon on the continental shelf : emerging capabilities and research priorities for Blue Carbon.

This work was supported by Cefas internal Seedcorn self-investment funding under the project DP440: Blue carbon within climate mitigation and ecosystem service approaches to natural asset assessments, and by Cefas’ Ecosystem Theme science theme.Continental shelf sediments store large amounts of organic carbon. Protecting this carbon from release back into the marine system and managing the marine environment to maximize its rate of accumulation could both play a role in mitigating against climate change. For these reasons, in the context of an expanding ‘Blue Carbon’ concept, research interest in the quantity and vulnerability of carbon stored in continental shelf, slope, and deep ocean sediments is increasing. In these systems, carbon storage is physically distant from carbon sources, altered between source and sink, and disturbed by anthropogenic activities. The methodological approaches needed to obtain the evidence to assess shelf sea sediment carbon manageability and vulnerability within an evolving blue carbon framework cannot be transferred directly from those applied in coastal vegetated ‘traditional’ blue carbon habitats. We present a ‘toolbox’ of methods which can be applied in marine sediments to provide the evidence needed to establish where and when marine carbon in offshore sediments can contribute to climate mitigation, focusing on continental shelf sediments. These methods are discussed in the context of the marine carbon cycle and how they provide evidence on: (i) stock: how much carbon is there and how is it distributed? (ii) accumulation: how rapidly is carbon being added or removed? and (iii) anthropogenic pressures: is carbon stock and/or accumulation vulnerable to manageable human activities? Our toolbox provides a starting point to inform choice of techniques for future studies alongside consideration of their specific research questions and available resources. Where possible a stepwise approach to analyses should be applied in which initial parameters are analysed to inform which samples, if any, will provide information of interest from more resource-intensive analyses. As studies increasingly address the knowledge gaps around continental shelf carbon stocks and accumulation – through both sampling and modelling – the management of this carbon with respect to human pressures will become the key question for understanding where it fits within the blue carbon framework and within the climate mitigation discourse.Publisher PDFPeer reviewe

Insulin Like Growth Factor-1 (IGF-1) Causes Overproduction of IL-8, an Angiogenic Cytokine and Stimulates Neovascularization in Isoproterenol-Induced Myocardial Infarction in Rats

Angiogenesis factors are produced in response to hypoxic or ischemic insult at the site of pathology, which will cause neovascularization. Insulin like growth factor-1 (IGF-1) exerts potent proliferative, angiogenic and anti-apoptotic effects in target tissues. The present study was aimed to evaluate the effects of IGF-1 on circulating level of angiogenic cytokine interleukin-8 (IL-8), in experimentally-induced myocardial ischemia in rats. Male Sprague-Dawley rats were divided into control, IGF-1 treated (2 μg/kg/day subcutaneously, for 5 and 10 days), isoproterenol (ISO) treated (85 mg/kg, subcutaneously for two days) and ISO with IGF-1 treated (for 5 and 10 days). Heart weight, serum IGF-1, IL-8 and cardiac marker enzymes (CK-MB and LDH) were recorded after 5 and 10 days of treatment. Histopathological analyses of the myocardium were also done. There was a significant increase in serum cardiac markers with ISO treatment indicating myocardial infarction in rats. IGF-1 level increased significantly in ISO treated groups and the level of IGF-1 was significantly higher after 10 days of treatment. IL-8 level increased significantly after ISO treatment after 5 and 10 days and IGF-1 concurrent treatment to ISO rats had significantly increased IL-8 levels. Histopathologically, myocyte necrosis and nuclear pyknosis were reduced significantly in IGF-1 treated group and there were numerous areas of capillary sprouting suggestive of neovascularization in the myocardium. Thus, IGF-1 protects the ischemic myocardium with increased production of circulating angiogenic cytokine, IL-8 and increased angiogenesis

Altered engagement of the speech motor network is associated with reduced phonological working memory in autism

Nonword repetition, a common clinical measure of phonological working memory, involves component processes of speech perception, working memory, and speech production. Autistic children often show behavioral challenges in nonword repetition, as do many individuals with communication disorders. It is unknown which subprocesses of phonological working memory are vulnerable in autistic individuals, and whether the same brain processes underlie the transdiagnostic difficulty with nonword repetition. We used functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to investigate the brain bases for nonword repetition challenges in autism. We compared activation during nonword repetition in functional brain networks subserving speech perception, working memory, and speech production between neurotypical and autistic children. Autistic children performed worse than neurotypical children on nonword repetition and had reduced activation in response to increasing phonological working memory load in the supplementary motor area. Multivoxel pattern analysis within the speech production network classified shorter vs longer nonword-repetition trials less accurately for autistic than neurotypical children. These speech production motor-specific differences were not observed in a group of children with reading disability who had similarly reduced nonword repetition behavior. These findings suggest that atypical function in speech production brain regions may contribute to nonword repetition difficulties in autism.R01 DC011339 - NIDCD NIH HHS; R21 DC017576 - NIDCD NIH HHS; R03 DC014045 - NIDCD NIH HHS; T32 DC000038 - NIDCD NIH HHSPublished versio

Syntactic architecture and its consequences I: Syntax inside the grammar

This volume collects novel contributions to comparative generative linguistics that “rethink” existing approaches to an extensive range of phenomena, domains, and architectural questions in linguistic theory. At the heart of the contributions is the tension between descriptive and explanatory adequacy which has long animated generative linguistics and which continues to grow thanks to the increasing amount and diversity of data available to us. The chapters address research questions on the relation of syntax to other aspects of grammar and linguistics more generally, including studies on language acquisition, variation and change, and syntactic interfaces. Many of these contributions show the influence of research by Ian Roberts and collaborators and give the reader a sense of the lively nature of current discussion of topics in synchronic and diachronic comparative syntax ranging from the core verbal domain to higher, propositional domains. This book is complemented by volume II available at https://langsci-press.org/catalog/book/276 and volume III available at https://langsci-press.org/catalog/book/277

Syntactic architecture and its consequences I: Syntax inside the grammar

This volume collects novel contributions to comparative generative linguistics that “rethink” existing approaches to an extensive range of phenomena, domains, and architectural questions in linguistic theory. At the heart of the contributions is the tension between descriptive and explanatory adequacy which has long animated generative linguistics and which continues to grow thanks to the increasing amount and diversity of data available to us. The chapters address research questions on the relation of syntax to other aspects of grammar and linguistics more generally, including studies on language acquisition, variation and change, and syntactic interfaces. Many of these contributions show the influence of research by Ian Roberts and collaborators and give the reader a sense of the lively nature of current discussion of topics in synchronic and diachronic comparative syntax ranging from the core verbal domain to higher, propositional domains. This book is complemented by volume II available at https://langsci-press.org/catalog/book/276 and volume III available at https://langsci-press.org/catalog/book/277

Syntactic architecture and its consequences I: Syntax inside the grammar

This volume collects novel contributions to comparative generative linguistics that “rethink” existing approaches to an extensive range of phenomena, domains, and architectural questions in linguistic theory. At the heart of the contributions is the tension between descriptive and explanatory adequacy which has long animated generative linguistics and which continues to grow thanks to the increasing amount and diversity of data available to us. The chapters address research questions on the relation of syntax to other aspects of grammar and linguistics more generally, including studies on language acquisition, variation and change, and syntactic interfaces. Many of these contributions show the influence of research by Ian Roberts and collaborators and give the reader a sense of the lively nature of current discussion of topics in synchronic and diachronic comparative syntax ranging from the core verbal domain to higher, propositional domains. This book is complemented by volume II available at https://langsci-press.org/catalog/book/276 and volume III available at https://langsci-press.org/catalog/book/277