"What do I want for my life (我想要的到底是什么)" : a narrative study examining self-authorship in Chinese university students

Self-authorship refers to individuals’ capacity to make complex meaning of beliefs, identities, and social relationships. Self-authorship theory thus provides a holistic framework to consider young adults’ development across epistemological, intrapersonal, and interpersonal dimensions. Recent research on self-authorship not only increased representation of demographically diverse students, but also challenged the original individual-centered theory through incorporating lenses that afforded greater sociocultural relevance. My research aligned with this collective effort toward a more inclusive, socially situated, culturally responsive view of self-authorship. My research adopted narrative inquiry to explore how self-authoring was experienced and expressed in a group of Chinese undergraduate students. My study’s framework was informed by sociocultural theory, narrative constructionism, and dialogical perspectives on narrative analysis. Specifically, 12 Chinese undergraduate students were interviewed in China and Canada about their stories of personal growth in university. Participants were invited to share stories about their pivotal university experiences and how these experiences shaped their beliefs, identities, and social relationships and actions. Dialogical narrative analysis was performed to develop a narrative typology of self-authoring for the Chinese students. Three signature narrative types were elaborated in the typology. They are passion narrative (i.e., participants developed their inner voices by pursuing their passion), resistance narrative (i.e., participants developed deep forms of self-consciousness through resisting uncomfortable situations), and competence narrative (i.e., participants sought a lifepath to fulfill their need to be successful). Under each narrative type, individual narrative trajectories were further specified to capture variations among the participants’ self-authoring processes. These variations reflected how participants’ personal characteristics and their situated context shaped their distinct processes toward self-authorship. The novel insights produced by the narrative typology contributed to a more situated, holistic, and diversified understanding of self-authorship. As the first study to introduce a Chinese student sample, a sociocultural framework, and dialogical methods to self-authorship literature, my study not only generated complex understandings of self-authoring processes in culturally diverse students, but also offered methodological implications for future research in different sociocultural contexts. Finally, my study offered important questions for rethinking practices to foster students’ self-authorship in higher education.Education, Faculty ofEducational and Counselling Psychology, and Special Education (ECPS), Department ofGraduat

Tunable glycyrrhizic acid supramolecular hydrogels via metal ion complexation

Glycyrrhizic acid (GA) is a natural edible chiral triterpene saponin that can undergo hierarchical self-assembly in water to form supramolecular hydrogels. Customizing the properties of GA supramolecular hydrogels is crucial for their wide food and biomedical applications, and the incorporation of specific metal ions can be an attractive way for this purpose. Herein, this study investigates the effects of metal ions with different valence states and concentrations on the linear and nonlinear rheological properties and network structures of GA supramolecular hydrogels. Monovalent metal ions (Na+ and K+), exhibiting weak binding affinity to GA, rely on the electrostatic screening effects at high concentrations (e.g., 50 mM) to enhance the GA interfibrillar interactions and thus the formation of a more compact and ordered gel network, which displays a pronounced nonlinear rheological behavior with a typical transition from elastic to viscous response. Polyvalent metal ions (Ca2+, Zn2+, and Al3+), owing to their greater charge density and stronger binding with GA, significantly enhance the network strength of the hydrogels at low concentrations (e.g., 5 mM). Nonetheless, at high ion concentrations (e.g., 50 mM), the GA-Mn+ forms discrete aggregated network structures due to excessively strong cation-carboxylate complexation, leading to the irregular nonlinear rheological responses and the lower resistance to large deformations. These findings can deepen our understanding of the highly tunable rheological behaviors and network structures of GA hydrogels, which demonstrates a new possibility for the design and development of responsive natural supramolecular hydrogels with controlled properties through the strategy of metal ion complexation

Enteral nutrition feeding in Chinese intensive care units: a cross-sectional study involving 116 hospitals

Abstract Background There is a lack of large-scale epidemiological data on the clinical practice of enteral nutrition (EN) feeding in China. This study aimed to provide such data on Chinese hospitals and to investigate factors associated with EN delivery. Methods This cross-sectional study was launched in 118 intensive care units (ICUs) of 116 mainland hospitals and conducted on April 26, 2017. At 00:00 on April 26, all patients in these ICUs were included. Demographic and clinical variables of patients on April 25 were obtained. The dates of hospitalization, ICU admission and nutrition initiation were reviewed. The outcome status 28 days after the day of investigation was obtained. Results A total of 1953 patients were included for analysis, including 1483 survivors and 312 nonsurvivors. The median study day was day 7 (IQR 2–19 days) after ICU entry. The proportions of subjects starting EN within 24, 48 and 72 h after ICU entry was 24.8% (84/352), 32.7% (150/459) and 40.0% (200/541), respectively. The proportion of subjects receiving > 80% estimated energy target within 24, 48, 72 h and 7 days after ICU entry was 10.5% (37/352), 10.9% (50/459), 11.8% (64/541) and 17.8% (162/910), respectively. Using acute gastrointestinal injury (AGI) 1 as the reference in a Cox model, patients with AGI 2–3 were associated with reduced likelihood of EN initiation (HR 0.46, 95% CI 0.353–0.599; p < 0.001). AGI 4 was significantly associated with lower hazard of EN administration (HR 0.056; 95% CI 0.008–0.398; p = 0.004). In a linear regression model, greater Sequential Organ Failure Assessment scores (coefficient – 0.002, 95% CI – 0.008 to − 0.001; p = 0.024) and male gender (coefficient – 0.144, 95% CI – 0.203 to − 0.085; p < 0.001) were found to be associated with lower EN proportion. As compared with AGI 1, AGI 2–3 was associated with lower EN proportion (coefficient – 0.206, 95% CI – 0.273 to − 0.139; p < 0.001). Conclusions The study showed that EN delivery was suboptimal in Chinese ICUs. More attention should be paid to EN use in the early days after ICU admission