Determinants of English accents

In this study we investigate which factors affect the degree of non-native accent of L2 speakers of English who learned English in school and mostly lived for some time in an anglophone setting. We use data from the Speech Accent Archive containing over 700 speakers speaking almost 160 different native languages. We show that besides several important predictors, including the age of English onset and length of anglophone residence, the linguistic distance between the speaker’s native language and English is a significant predictor of the degree of non-native accent in pronunciation. This study extends an earlier study which only focused on Indo-European L2 learners of Dutch and used a general speaking proficiency measure

Longitudinal analyses of depression, anxiety, and suicidal ideation highlight greater prevalence in the northern Dutch population during the COVID-19 lockdowns

BACKGROUND: The pandemic of the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) has led to an increased burden on mental health. AIMS: To investigate the development of major depressive disorder (MDD), generalized anxiety disorder (GAD), and suicidal ideation in the Netherlands during the first fifteen months of the pandemic and three nation-wide lockdowns. METHOD: Participants of the Lifelines Cohort Study –a Dutch population-based sample-reported current symptoms of MDD and GAD, including suicidal ideation, according to DSM-IV criteria. Between March 2020 and June 2021, 36,106 participants (aged 18–96) filled out a total of 629,811 questionnaires across 23 time points. Trajectories over time were estimated using generalized additive models and analyzed in relation to age, sex, and lifetime history of MDD/GAD. RESULTS: We found non-linear trajectories for MDD and GAD with a higher number of symptoms and prevalence rates during periods of lockdown. The point prevalence of MDD and GAD peaked during the third hard lockdown at 2.88 % (95 % CI: 2.71 %–3.06 %) and 2.92 % (95 % CI: 2.76 %–3.08 %), respectively, in March 2021. Women, younger adults, and participants with a history of MDD/GAD reported significantly more symptoms. For suicidal ideation, we found a significant linear increase over time in younger participants. For example, 20-year-old participants reported 4.14× more suicidal ideation at the end of June 2021 compared to the start of the pandemic (4.64 % (CI: 3.09 %–6.96 %) versus 1.12 % (CI: 0.76 %–1.66 %)). LIMITATIONS: Our findings should be interpreted in relation to the societal context of the Netherlands and the public health response of the Dutch government during the pandemic, which may be different in other regions in the world. CONCLUSIONS: Our study showed greater prevalence of MDD and GAD during COVID-19 lockdowns and a continuing increase in suicidal thoughts among young adults suggesting that the pandemic and government enacted restrictions impacted mental health in the population. Our findings provide actionable insights on mental health in the population during the pandemic, which can guide policy makers and clinical care during future lockdowns and epi/pandemics

Onnentupa Oy:n jälkihuoltosuunnitelma

Laurea-ammattikorkeakoulu Tiivistelmä Hyvinkää Sosiaalialan ko Seija Mässeli Onnentupa Oy:n jälkihuoltosuunnitelma Vuosi 2013 Sivumäärä 58 Tämän opinnäytetyön toimeksiantona oli tuottaa yksityiselle lastensuojelun yrittäjälle, Onnentupa Oy:lle jälkihuollon ohjeistus. Onnentupa Oy koostuu neljästä Tuusulan alueella sijaitsevasta perhekodista, jotka kuuluvat Ammatillisten perhekotien liittoon. Jälkihuolto on noussut koko ajan ajankohtaisemmaksi aiheeksi, ja yksityisiltä perhekodeilta kysytään koko ajan enemmän jälkihuollon mahdollisuuksista. Tämän kehityksen tueksi tarvittiin jälkihuollon ohjeistus, josta muodostuisi toimiva arjen työväline. Työ on toteutettu kvalitatiivisena aineistotutkimuksena, jossa on käytetty kirjallisten lähteiden lisäksi Onnentupa Oy:n työntekijöiden haastatteluja. Näin on pyritty varmistamaan, että lopputulos on yksityisyrittäjän toiveiden mukainen ja tietyille yksiköille sopiva. Opinnäytetyö sisältää raportin, jossa käsitellään aiheeseen liittyvä teoriaosuus, jossa kuvataan lastensuojelu kokonaisena prosessina ja tarkastellaan etenkin perhekotien tarjoamaa sijaishuoltoa. Nuoruus herkkänä ikävaiheena on myös otettu tässä raportissa erilliseksi tarkastelun kohteeksi. Varsinaisen raportin jälkeen esittelen opinnäytetyössäni konkreettisen jälkihuoltosuunnitelman Onnentupa Oy:lle. Jälkihuolto on osa lastensuojelun kenttää, mutta sitä ei varsinaisesti pidetä kokonaan omana alueenaan vaan enemmänkin sijaishuollon jatkeena. Jälkihuollon perusasioista, kuten sen kestosta ja järjestämisvelvollisuudesta määrää lastensuojelulaki, mutta laki ei määrittele jälkihuollolle tarkkaa sisältöä. Näin ollen tutkimuskysymyksekseni muodostui pohdinta siitä, millainen on hyvä jälkihuoltosuunnitelma. Lopputuloksena syntyi konkreettinen ohjeistus, joka käsittelee jälkihuollon prosessin seikkaperäisesti aina jälkihuollon suunnittelusta sen arviointiin ja päättymiseen. Ohjeistus on pidetty yleisluontoisena, jotta sen voi yksilöidä jokaiselle itsenäistyvälle nuorelle sopivaksi. Avainsanat: Lastensuojelu, nuoruus, sijaishuolto, perhekoti, jälkihuolto.Laurea University of Applied Sciences Abstract Hyvinkää Bachelor of social services Seija Mässeli The after-care plan for Onnentupa Oy Year 2013 Pages 58 The assignment for this thesis was to produce an after-care plan for a private entrepreneur in child-protective services; Onnentupa Oy. Onnentupa Oy consists of four family care units located in the area of Tuusula. All these family care units belong to the Ammatillisten perhekotien liitto (Union of professional family care units). After-care has consistently risen to be more and more topical issue, and private family care units get constantly asked more about the chances of after-care. In support of this development an after-care plan was needed that could provide a working tool in the business’s weekday. The work has been executed as a qualitative material research, in which literary sources have been used in addition of the interviews of Onnentupa Oy’s employees. This has been done to ensure that the product fits the wishes of the private entrepreneur and is fitting for specific care units. This thesis includes a report, which goes through the important theories related to the subject, like child-protective services as a whole process. Special attention is brought to the foster care that the family care units provide. A separate analysis of youth as a delicate age is also included in this report. After the actual report I go on to model the concrete after-care plan for Onnentupa Oy. After-care is part of the field of child-protective services, but it’s not really thought of as a whole separate entirety. Instead it is viewed as a continuation for foster care. Finland’s laws of child-protective services determine the basics of after-care, like how long it lasts and who is obliges to offer it as a service, but the law does not define the precise content of what should be included in an after-care plan. This leads to my research problem: what does a good after-care plan look like? As a final result of this thesis a concrete instruction was produced. It goes through the process of after-care in detail from the planning of after-care to its evaluation and ending the after-care. This instruction has been held general in nature, so that it can be individualized to every young man and woman who are in the process of gaining independence. Keywords child-protective services, youth, foster care, family care unit, after care

Border effects among Catalan dialects

In this study, we investigate which factors influence the linguistic distance of Catalan dialectal pronunciations from standard Catalan. We use pronunciations from three regions where the northwestern variety of the Catalan language is spoken (Catalonia, Aragon and Andorra). In contrast to Aragon, Catalan has an official status in both Catalonia and Andorra, which likely influences standardization. Because we are interested in the potentially large range of differences that standardization might promote, we examine 357 words in Catalan varieties and in particular their pronunciation distances with respect to the standard. In order to be sensitive to differences among the words, we fitted a generalized additive mixed-effects regression model to this data. This allows us to examine simultaneously the general (i.e. aggregate) patterns in pronunciation distance and to detect those words that diverge substantially from the general pattern. The results revealed higher pronunciation distances from standard Catalan in Aragon than in the other regions. Furthermore, speakers in Catalonia and Andorra, but not in Aragon, showed a clear standardization pattern, with younger speakers having dialectal pronunciations closer to the standard than older speakers. This clearly indicates the presence of a border effect within a single country with respect to word pronunciation distances. Since a great deal of scholarship focuses on single segment changes, we compare our analysis to the analysis of three segment changes that have been discussed in the literature on Catalan. This comparison revealed that the pattern observed at the word pronunciation level was supported by two of the three cases examined. As not all individual cases conform to the general pattern,