Deception about study purpose does not affect participant behavior

The use of deception in research is divisive along disciplinary lines. Whereas psychologists argue that deception may be necessary to obtain unbiased measures, economists hold that deception can generate suspicion of researchers, invalidating measures and ‘poisoning’ the participant pool for others. However, experimental studies on the efects of deception, notably false-purpose deception— the most common form of experimental deception—are scarce. Challenges with participant attrition and avoiding confounds with a form of deception in which two related studies are presented as unrelated likely explain this scarcity. Here, we avoid these issues, testing within an experiment to what extent false-purpose deception afects honesty. We deploy two commonly used incentivized measures of honesty and unethical behavior: coin-fip and die-roll tasks. Across two pre-registered studies with over 2000 crowdsourced participants, we found that false-purpose deception did not afect honesty in either task, even when we deliberately provoked suspicion of deception. Past experience of deception also had no bearing on honesty. However, incentivized measures of norms indicated that many participants had reservations about researcher use of false-purpose deception in general—often considered the least concerning form of deception. Together, these fndings suggest that while false-purpose deception is not fundamentally problematic in the context of measuring honesty, it should only be used as a method of last resort. Our results motivate further experimental research to study the causal efects of other forms of deception, and other potential spillovers

COVID-19: The environmental implications of shedding SARS-CoV-2 in human faeces

First paragraph: The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic is having significant public health repercussions, with a global response to limit the predicted mortality associated with this outbreak. The virus, ‘severe acute respiratory syndrome coronavirus 2’ (SARS-CoV-2), is a respiratory virus disseminated though droplets from coughs and sneezes from an infected person or from fomites (Hellewell et al., 2020). Therefore, many countries have put ‘social distancing’ measures in place to reduce person-to-person spread of the disease. However, recently it has been confirmed that infectious virions can also be present in human faeces (Ling et al., 2020), and there are reports that viral RNA can be persistently shed in faeces for a maximum of 33 days after the patient has tested negative for respiratory viral RNA (Wu et al 2020). Although it remains unclear whether SARS-CoV-2 can be transmitted via the faecal-oral route (Xu et al., 2020), viral shedding from the digestive system can last longer than shedding from the respiratory tract. As such, faecal-oral transmission may be an important, but as yet unquantified, pathway for increased exposure during the current outbreak (Wu et al., 2020). Therefore, safely managing faecal wastes from infected, recovering and recovered patients poses a significant nosocomial challenge. For example, during the SARS outbreak of 2002–2003, the closely related SARS-CoV-1 was detected in sewage discharged by two hospitals (Wang et al., 2005), which emphasises the care needed when handling such faecal wastes. However, these challenges are not limited to hospital wastes, as it has been predicted that most of the population will experience only mild symptoms of COVID 19 and convalesce at home, whilst others, including children, can carry the virus asymptomatically, and are still capable of shedding the virus in their faeces (Kam et al., 2020, Tang et al., 2020). This means that the virus could soon become widespread throughout wastewater systems (Naddeo and Liu, 2020). Whilst a lack of testing for the majority of the population makes it difficult to predict the spatially-distributed volume of potentially infectious faeces delivered through the sewerage infrastructure to wastewater treatment works (WWTWs), wastewater surveillance may be a useful tool to indicate where the virus is circulating in the human population (Lodder and de Roda Husman, 2020). However, whilst knowingly infected individuals can take steps to increase their level of hygiene, asymptomatic carriers do not change their behaviour, and can anonymously spread enteric pathogens within the community (Quilliam et al., 2013)

Exercise Can Rescue Recognition Memory Impairment in a Model with Reduced Adult Hippocampal Neurogenesis

Running is a potent stimulator of cell proliferation in the adult dentate gyrus and these newly generated hippocampal neurons seem to be implicated in memory functions. Here we have used a mouse model expressing activated Ras under the direction of the neuronal Synapsin I promoter (named synRas mice). These mice develop down-regulated proliferation of adult hippocampal precursor cells and show decreased short-term recognition memory performances. Voluntary physical activity reversed the genetically blocked generation of hippocampal proliferating cells and enhanced the dendritic arborisation of the resulting doublecortin newly generated neurons. Moreover, running improved novelty recognition in both wild type and synRas littermates, compensating their memory deficits. Brain-derived neurotrophic factor (BDNF) has been proposed to be a potential mediator of physical exercise acting in the hippocampus on dentate neurons and their precursors. This was confirmed here by the identification of doublecortin-immunoreactive cells expressing tyrosine receptor kinase B BDNF receptor. While no difference in BDNF levels were detected in basal conditions between the synRas mice and their wild type littermates, running was associated with enhanced BDNF expression levels. Thus increased BDNF signalling is a candidate mechanism to explain the observed effects of running. Our studies demonstrate that voluntary physical activity has a robust beneficial effect even in mice with genetically restricted neurogenesis and cognition

Role of Neuronal Ras Activity in Adult Hippocampal Neurogenesis and Cognition

Hippocampal neurogenesis in the adult mammalian brain is modulated by various signals like growth factors, hormones, neuropeptides, and neurotransmitters. All of these factors can (but not necessarily do) converge on the activation of the G protein Ras. We used a transgenic mouse model (synRas mice) expressing constitutively activated G12V-Harvey Ras selectively in differentiated neurons to investigate the possible effects onto neurogenesis. H-Ras activation in neurons attenuates hippocampal precursor cell generation at an early stage of the proliferative cascade before neuronal lineage determination occurs. Therefore it is unlikely that the transgenically activated H-Ras in neurons mediates this effect by a direct, intracellular signaling mechanism. Voluntary exercise restores neurogenesis up to wild type level presumably mediated by brain-derived neurotrophic factor. Reduced neurogenesis is linked to impairments in spatial short-term memory and object recognition, the latter can be rescued by voluntary exercise, as well. These data support the view that new cells significantly increase complexity that can be processed by the hippocampal network when experience requires high demands to associate stimuli over time and/or space

Police Whistleblowing: A systematic review of the likelihood (and the barriers and facilitators) of the willingness of police officers to report the misconduct of fellow officers

Introduction Recent high-profile cases of police misconduct have revealed that officers were often aware of misconduct, but remained silent, compromising public trust in law enforcement. Here, we systematically review ‘police whistleblowing’ literature to identify barriers and facilitators to officers challenging misconduct. Methodology Employing PRISMA guidelines, we systematically reviewed 118 relevant papers, extracting data and coding key variables including who the ‘target’ of the research was; whether reporting practices were studied, and whether practical solutions were offered. A reflexive thematic analysis then assessed consensus among researchers within the literature. Results Five themes - 1) knowledge and rules, 2) consequences, 3) interpersonal relations, 4) responsibility, and 5) police culture and group relations – emerged as barriers and facilitators to whistleblowing. The review revealed relatively poorer representation of internal police reporting structures and limited practical solutions, with only 40 papers proposing strategies, predominantly centred on training and education. Discussion This review highlights methodological limitations in existing research, with an overreliance on survey methods and a dominant focus on the characteristics of individuals over the structural constraints of reporting. The positive impacts of whistleblowing on policing as an institution and the development of practical strategies to overcome officers' reluctance to report misconduct remain largely unexplored

Schizophrenia liability shares common molecular genetic risk factors with sleep duration and nightmares in childhood

Background: Sleep abnormalities are common in schizophrenia, often appearing before psychosis onset; however, the mechanisms behind this are uncertain. We investigated whether genetic risk for schizophrenia is associated with sleep phenotypes. Methods: We used data from 6,058 children and 2,302 mothers from the Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children (ALSPAC). We examined associations between a polygenic risk score for schizophrenia and sleep duration in both children and mothers, and nightmares in children, along with genetic covariances between these traits. Results: Polygenic risk for schizophrenia was associated with increased risk of nightmares (OR=1.07, 95% CI: 1.01, 1.14, p=0.02) in children, and also with less sleep (β=-44.52, 95% CI: −88.98, −0.07; p=0.05). We observed a similar relationship with sleep duration in mothers, although evidence was much weaker (p=0.38). Finally, we found evidence of genetic covariance between schizophrenia risk and reduced sleep duration in children and mothers, and between schizophrenia risk and nightmares in children. Conclusions: These molecular genetic results support recent findings from twin analysis that show genetic overlap between sleep disturbances and psychotic-like experiences. They also show, to our knowledge for the first time, a genetic correlation between schizophrenia liability and risk of nightmares in childhood

Head up ; an interdisciplinary, participatory and co-design process informing the development of a novel neck support for people living with progressive neck muscle weakness

This paper presents the Head-Up project that aims to provide innovative head support to help improve posture, relieve pain and aid communication for people living with progressive neck muscle weakness. The initial focus is motor neurone disease. The case study illustrates collaborative, interdisciplinary research and new product development underpinned by participatory design. The study was initiated by a two-day stakeholder workshop followed by early proof-of-concept modeling and patient need evidence building. The work subsequently led to a successful NIHR i4i application funding a 24-month iterative design process, patenting, CE marking and clinical evaluation. The evaluation has informed amendments to the proposed design we refer to here as the Sheffield Support Snood (SSS). The outcome positively demonstrates use and performance improvements over current neck orthoses and, the process of multidisciplinary and user engagement has created a sense of ownership by MND participants, who have since acted as advocates for the product.</p

Physical activity levels and patterns of 19-month-old children

Purpose: It is a commonly held perception that most young children are naturally active and meet physical activity recommendations. However, there is no scientific evidence available on which to confirm or refute such perceptions. The purpose of this study was to describe the physical activity levels and patterns of Australian toddlers. Methods: Physical activity and demographic data of two hundred ninety-five 19-month-old children from the Melbourne InFANT Program were measured using accelerometers and parent surveys. Validated cut points of 192&ndash;1672 and &gt;1672 counts per minute were used to determine time spent in light- (LPA) and moderate-to-vigorous- (MVPA) intensity physical activity, respectively. To be included in the analysis, children were required to have four valid days of accelerometer data to provide an acceptable (&gt;0.70) reliability estimate of LPA and MVPA. Physical activity data for different periods of the day were examined. Results: On average, toddlers engaged in 184 min of LPA and 47 min of MVPA daily, and 90.5% met the current Australian physical activity recommendations for 0- to 5-yr-olds (180 min of LPA/MVPA per day). Physical activity levels during mid morning and mid afternoon were higher than those during other periods. Physical activity patterns for boys and girls were similar, although boys engaged in more physical activity during the morning hours than girls did. Conclusions: Most children meet the physical activity recommendations, although the majority of activity undertaken in the study was of light intensity. Boys were more active than girls were in the morning hours, but there were no differences between sexes over the entire day. Certain periods of the day may hold more promise for intervention implementation than others do. <br /