DESIGNING QUESTIONNAIRES FOR USE IN MULTICULTURAL CONTEXTS

Measurement is an integral part of the assessment process in social work. Whether or not this isdone formally, social workers inevitably quantify the functioning of client systems duringassessment: “This community lacks access to social resources; this family experiences highlevels of conflict; this person has a severe drug addiction.” All of these statements, typical ofsocial work assessments, involve measurement

Social work students’ experience and management of countertransference

Countertransference – the emotional reactions that clients trigger in practitioners – can, when not understood or managed, result in unethical conduct and harm to clients, practitioners and the profession. A solid understanding of countertransference theory, insight into one’s countertransference reactions and skills in managing countertransference appropriately are a vital component of ethical and effective social work practice. This paper reports on a small qualitative study among undergraduate social work students. Results reveal that countertransference is indeed experienced by students, but poorly understood and sometimes inappropriately managed. Recommendations for social work education, field instruction and supervision are provided

A critical review of South African child and youth resilience studies, 2009-2017

Abstract: In contexts of high levels of structural disadvantage, such as South Africa, resilience among children and youth becomes increasingly important to buffer children and youth from the negative effects of adversity. This article reports on a systematic review of research conducted in South Africa over the period 2009 to 2017 on the resilience of children and youth (ages 0 to 24) from the perspectives of young people themselves. It serves as a follow-up and refinement of an earlier publication in 2010. A total of 61 journal articles are reviewed. Four categories of social-ecological resilience-enablers emerge from these study, viz. personal, relational, structural and spiritual/cultural. Most of the resilience-enablers identified in these studies are in the personal and relational domains. Various reasons for this finding are discussed, and emerging recommendations for service professionals (particularly social worker and educational psychologists) and youth resilience researchers are advanced

Culturally informed resilience in conflict settings: A literature review of Sumud in the occupied Palestinian territories

Investigating culturally specific views and experiences of trauma and resilience can offer new insights that can aid distress management, meaning making, coping and resilience in adverse conditions, and inform emergency and disaster responses. Sumud is a Palestinian cultural construct and component of resilience in the occupied Palestinian territories (oPt). Sumud in Arabic refers to steadfastness or perseverance. This literature review focuses on research studies on Sumud in the oPt, with particular attention on the meaning and manifestations of Sumud, the role of non-violent resistance, and how Sumud and non-violent resistance informs resilience and coping in the context of a military occupation, protracted political conflict, and chronic adversity. The peer-reviewed literature was surveyed using the PubMed and PsycINFO databases. The findings indicate how Sumud is a central component of resilience and provides a meta-cognitive framework which Palestinians use to interpret, cope and respond to ongoing injustice and traumatic experiences, engendering a sense of purpose and meaning. It is both a value and an action that manifests via individual and collective action to protect family and community survival, wellbeing, dignity, Palestinian identity and culture, and a determination to remain on the land. The implications of this study and the relevance of the findings to mental health and disaster relief are considered

Electron-phonon interaction in C70

The matrix elements of the deformation potential of C$_{70}$ are calculated by means of a simple, yet accurate solution of the electron-phonon coupling problem in fullerenes, based on a parametrization of the ground state electronic density of the system in terms of $sp^{2+x}$ hybridized orbitals. The value of the calculated dimensionless total electron-phonon coupling constant is $\lambda\approx0.1$, an order of magnitude smaller than in C$_{60}$, consistent with the lack of a superconducting phase transition in C$_{70}$A$_3$ fullerite, and in overall agreement with measurements of the broadening of Raman peaks in C$_{70}$K$_4$. We also calculate the photoemission cross section of C$_{70}^-$, which is found to display less structure than that associated with C$_{60}^-$, in overall agreement with the experimental findings.Comment: To be published in Phys. Rev.

Does the risk of childhood diabetes mellitus require revision of the guideline values for nitrate in drinking water?

In recent years, several studies have addressed a possible relationship between nitrate exposure and childhood type 1 insulin-dependent diabetes mellitus. The present ecologic study describes a possible relation between the incidence of type 1 diabetes and nitrate levels in drinking water in The Netherlands, and evaluates whether the World Health Organization and the European Commission standard for nitrate in drinking water (50 mg/L) is adequate to prevent risk of this disease. During 1993-1995 in The Netherlands, 1,104 cases of type 1 diabetes were diagnosed in children 0-14 years of age. We were able to use 1,064 of these cases in a total of 2,829,020 children in this analysis. We classified mean nitrate levels in drinking water in 3,932 postal code areas in The Netherlands in 1991-1995 into two exposure categories. One category was based on equal numbers of children exposed to different nitrate levels (0.25-2.08, 2.10-6.42, and 6.44-41.19 mg/L nitrate); the other was based on cut-off values of 10 and 25 mg/L nitrate. We determined standardized incidence ratios (SIRs) for type 1 diabetes in subgroups of the 2,829,020 children with respect to both nitrate exposure categories, sex, and age and as compared in univariate analysis using the chi-square test for trend. We compared the incidence rate ratios (IRRs) by multivariate analysis in a Poisson regression model. We found an effect of increasing age of the children on incidence of type 1 diabetes, but we did not find an effect of sex or of nitrate concentration in drinking water using the two exposure categories. For nitrate levels > 25 mg/L, an increased SIR and an increased IRR of 1.46 were observed; however, this increase was not statistically significant, probably because of the small number of cases (15 of 1,064). We concluded that there is no convincing evidence that nitrate in drinking water at current exposure levels is a risk factor for childhood type 1 diabetes mellitus in The Netherlands, although a threshold value > 25 mg/L for the occurrence of this disease can not be excluded

Microvascular damage assessed by optical coherence tomography angiography for glaucoma diagnosis: a systematic review of the most discriminative regions

A growing number of studies have reported a link between vascular damage and glaucoma based on optical coherence tomography angiography (OCTA) imaging. This multitude of studies focused on different regions of interest (ROIs) which offers the possibility to draw conclusions on the most discriminative locations to diagnose glaucoma. The objective of this work was to review and analyse the discriminative capacity of vascular density, retrieved from different ROIs, on differentiating healthy subjects from glaucoma patients. PubMed was used to perform a systematic review on the analysis of glaucomatous vascular damage using OCTA. All studies up to 21 April 2019 were considered. The ROIs were analysed by region (macula, optic disc and peripapillary region), layer (superficial and deep capillary plexus, avascular, whole retina, choriocapillaris and choroid) and sector (according to the Garway–Heath map). The area under receiver operator characteristic curve (AUROC) and the statistical difference (p-value) were used to report the importance of each ROI for diagnosing glaucoma. From 96 screened studies, 43 were eligible for this review. Overall, the peripapillary region showed to be the most discriminative region with the highest mean AUROC (0.80 ± 0.09). An improvement of the AUROC from this region is observed when a sectorial analysis is performed, with the highest AUROCs obtained at the inferior and superior sectors of the superficial capillary plexus in the peripapillary region (0.86 ± 0.03 and 0.87 ± 0.10, respectively). The presented work shows that glaucomatous vascular damage can be assessed using OCTA, and its added value as a complementary feature for glaucoma diagnosis depends on the region of interest. A sectorial analysis of the superficial layer at the peripapillary region is preferable for assessing glaucomatous vascular damage

Dutch Robotics 2011 adult-size team description

This document presents the 2011 edition of the team Dutch Robotics from The Netherlands. Our team gathers three Dutch technical universities, namely Delft University of Technology, Eindhoven University of Technology and University of Twente, and the commercial company Philips. We contribute an adult-size humanoid robot TUlip, which is designed based on theory of the limit cycle walking developed in our earlier research. The key of our theory is that stable periodic walking gaits can be achieved even without high-bandwidth robot position control. Our control approach is based on simultaneous position and force control. For accurate force control, we make use of the Series Elastic Actuation. The control software of TUlip is based on the Darmstadt’s RoboFrame, and it runs on a PC104 computer with Linux Xenomai. The vision system consists of two wide-angle cameras, each interfaced with a dedicated Blackfin processor running vision algorithms, and a wireless networking interface

Dutch Robotics 2010 adult-size team description

This document presents the 2010 edition of the team Dutch Robotics from The Netherlands. Our team gathers three Dutch technical universities, namely Delft University of Technology, Eindhoven University of Technology and University of Twente, and the commercial company Philips. We contribute an adult-size humanoid robot TUlip, which is designed based on theory of the limit cycle walking developed in our earlier research. The key of our theory is that stable periodic walking gaits can be achieved even without high-bandwidth robot position control. Our control approach is based on simultaneous position and force control. For accurate force control, we make use of the Series Elastic Actuation. The control software of TUlip is based on the Darmstadt’s RoboFrame, and it runs on a PC104 computer with Linux Xenomai. The vision system consists of two wide-angle cameras, each interfaced with a dedicated Blackfin processor running vision algorithms, and a wireless networking interface

Kinetic modelling of competition and depletion of shared miRNAs by competing endogenous RNAs

Non-conding RNAs play a key role in the post-transcriptional regulation of mRNA translation and turnover in eukaryotes. miRNAs, in particular, interact with their target RNAs through protein-mediated, sequence-specific binding, giving rise to extended and highly heterogeneous miRNA-RNA interaction networks. Within such networks, competition to bind miRNAs can generate an effective positive coupling between their targets. Competing endogenous RNAs (ceRNAs) can in turn regulate each other through miRNA-mediated crosstalk. Albeit potentially weak, ceRNA interactions can occur both dynamically, affecting e.g. the regulatory clock, and at stationarity, in which case ceRNA networks as a whole can be implicated in the composition of the cell's proteome. Many features of ceRNA interactions, including the conditions under which they become significant, can be unraveled by mathematical and in silico models. We review the understanding of the ceRNA effect obtained within such frameworks, focusing on the methods employed to quantify it, its role in the processing of gene expression noise, and how network topology can determine its reach.Comment: review article, 29 pages, 7 figure