Rock avalanches and other landslides in the central Southern Alps of New Zealand: a regional study considering possible climate change impacts

Slope instabilities in the central Southern Alps, New Zealand, are assessed in relation to their geological and topographic distribution, with emphasis given to the spatial distribution of the most recent failures relative to zones of possible permafrost degradation and glacial recession. Five hundred nine mostly late-Pleistocene- to Holocene-aged landslides have been identified, affecting 2% of the study area. Rock avalanches were distinguished in the dataset, being the dominant failure type from Alpine slopes about and east of the Main Divide of the Alps, while other landslide types occur more frequently at lower elevations and from schist slopes closer to the Alpine Fault. The pre-1950 landslide record is incomplete, but mapped failures have prevailed from slopes facing west-northwest, suggesting a structural control on slope failure distribution. Twenty rock avalanches and large rockfalls are known to have fallen since 1950, predominating from extremely steep east-southeast facing slopes, mostly from the hanging wall of the Main Divide Fault Zone. Nineteen occurred within 300 vertical metres above or below glacial ice; 13 have source areas within 300 vertical metres of the estimated lower permafrost boundary, where degrading permafrost is expected. The prevalence of recent failures occurring from glacier-proximal slopes and from slopes near the lower permafrost limit is demonstrably higher than from other slopes about the Main Divide. Many recent failures have been smaller than those recorded pre-1950, and the influence of warming may be ephemeral and difficult to demonstrate relative to simultaneous effects of weather, erosion, seismicity, and uplift along an active plate margi

Towards the development of a simple tool to assist in agile methodology adoption decisions: agile adoption matrix

This paper describes the development of a decision support tool, an adoption assessment matrix based on critical adoption factors, that addresses a need in industry; namely, to improve the overall understanding of the constituent parts of agile systems development methodologies. It highlights the importance of critical adoption factors to the adoption of an agile method and illustrates the usefulness of a decision support process to determine the viability of an agile method for a specific software project. The paper describes the results of a series of workshops (two carried out in commercial software developement companies, and one with personnel from the British Minsitry of Defence) where the adoption assessment matrix was used to assess the suitability of agile methods in software development projects. A major benefit of the tool is that it guides discussion, concentrating the debate on the critical factors, applied to the individual project. These discussions proved to be as valuable as the output of the tool itself. The results of these workshops show that an argument can be made for the use of and benefit of such a decision support process in industry, in supporting the decision to adopt an agile methodology

Help-seeking in emerging adults with and without a history of mental health referral: a qualitative study.

BACKGROUND: Young people are generally reluctant to seek professional help when experiencing problems. However, past experience of services is often cited as increasing the intention to seek help, therefore those with a history of mental health referral may adopt more adaptive help seeking strategies. The current study investigated whether the pattern of different help seeking strategies and barriers to help seeking differed as a function of previous referral history. METHODS: Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 29 emerging adults (12 males, 17 females); 17 with a history of mental health referral and 12 without and analysed using thematic analysis. RESULTS: Overall, those with a referral to services were more likely than those without to rely on avoidant coping, especially techniques that depended upon suppression. This could help account for the increased use of strategies involving self-harm and substances in those with past referral. An exploration of barriers to help seeking showed those with a history of mental health referral were much more likely to self-stigmatise and this became attached to their sense of identity. CONCLUSIONS: Emerging adults with a history of referral are more likely to adopt avoidant coping strategies when dealing with problems and self-stigmatise to a greater degree than those without a history of referral. This suggests that current approaches to mental health in emerging adults are not decreasing the sense of stigma with potentially far-reaching consequences for the developing sense of self and choice of help seeking strategies.This work was supported by the Wellcome Trust programme Grant (No. 053642). Ruth Spence was funded by a doctoral studentship through CLAHRC.This is the final version of the article. It first appeared from BioMed Central at http://dx.doi.org/10.1186/s13104-016-2227-8

Leaving care and mental health: outcomes for children in out-of-home care during the transition to adulthood.

There were 59,500 Children in out-of-home care in England in 2008. Research into this population points to poor health and quality of life outcomes over the transition to adult independence. This undesirable outcome applies to mental health, education and employment. This lack of wellbeing for the individual is a burden for health and social care services, suggesting limitations in the current policy approaches regarding the transitional pathway from care to adult independence. Although the precise reasons for these poor outcomes are unclear long term outcomes from national birth cohorts suggest that mental health could be a key predictor for subsequent psychosocial adjustment.Researching the wellbeing of children in out-of-home care has proven difficult due to the range and complexity of the factors leading to being placed in care and the different methods used internationally for recording information. This paper delineates the estimated prevalence of mental health problems for adolescents in the care system, organisational factors, influencing service provision, and pathways through the transition from adolescence to independent young adult life. The extent to which being taken into care as a child moderates adult wellbeing outcomes remains unknown. Whether the care system enhances, reduces or has a null effect on wellbeing and specifically mental health cannot be determined from the current literature. Nonetheless a substantial proportion of young people display resilience and experience successful quality of life outcomes including mental capital. A current and retrospective study of young people transitioning to adult life is proposed to identify factors that have promoted successful outcomes and which would be used to inform policy developments and future longitudinal studies.RIGHTS : This article is licensed under the BioMed Central licence at http://www.biomedcentral.com/about/license which is similar to the 'Creative Commons Attribution Licence'. In brief you may : copy, distribute, and display the work; make derivative works; or make commercial use of the work - under the following conditions: the original author must be given credit; for any reuse or distribution, it must be made clear to others what the license terms of this work are

Melding Information Systems Evaluation with the Information Systems Development Lifecycle

In this paper we consider the synergy between two areas of IS literature: that concerned with the evaluation of information systems and that concerned with explaining the phenomenon of IS failure. On the basis of an analysis of both such areas a model is developed which attempts to integrate IS evaluation into the life-cycle of information systems development. The model clearly links the issue of failure assessment with the evaluation process and constitutes a strategy for stimulating organisational learning in relation to information systems development. The paper concludes with a brief description of our attempts to validate aspects of the model and plans for further empirical work in this area

The Millenium Problem as a Form of Information Systems Failure

In this paper we wish to examine the phenomenon of Y2K as an instance of information systems failure. Taking this particular stance on the issue leads we feel to a number of interesting areas that demand further investigation. We first review the current phenomenon of Y2K and discuss some of the relevant work in the area of IS failure. The topic of IS failure has tended to concentrate on issues of success or failure in relation to one specific IS project. We highlight a number of ways in which Y2K can be characterised as a particularly unique and interesting instance of IS failure. In one sense Y2K can be characterised merely as a technological failure and the responses to it merely of a technical kind. However Y2K, and the responses taken to it are of interest also on the organisational, societal, and economic level. It is therefore a phenomenon of primary concern to the IS academic. We raise a number of issues posed by our examination of Y2K that demand further investigation by IS academics. Y2K and the panic that it has generated can be seen as a clear demonstration of the degree to which IS/IT is closely embedded within modern organisations. However, there is preliminary evidence that Y2K has had an effect on the relationship between the IS/IT function and organisations. We particularly raise questions of its effect on IS strategy and planning, outsourcing and the IS development portfolio of organisations

Photon counting with loop detector

We propose a design for a photon counting detector capable of resolving multiphoton events. The basic element of the setup is a fiber loop, which traps the input field with the help of a fast electrooptic switch. A single weakly coupled avalanche photodiode is used to detect small portions of the signal field extracted from the loop. We analyze the response of the loop detector to an arbitrary input field, and discuss both the reconstruction of the photon number distribution of an unknown field from the count statistics measured in the setup, and the application of the detector in conditional state preparation.Comment: 3 pages, REVTe

Electronic Consultation at the National Assembly for Wales

Significant developments are occurring in the domain of electronic government within the UK – the use of ICT to enable re-structuring of governmental processes. In this paper we look at that subset of e-Government known as electronic democracy. In particular, we describe how electronic consultation, an important facet of electronic democracy, is being used to procure ideas from partnership organisations and citizenry in relation to the policy formulation processes at a devolved regional assembly in the UK – the National Assembly for Wales (NAfW). We utilise a process model of governance focused around the concept of the policy cycle. This process is currently being enabled at the NAfW through the development of a series of bespoke ICT systems. Such forms of ICT innovation are seen by many to be significant ways in which government may re-engage with its populace, address issues of social exclusion in the area of democratic participation and generally re-energise the democratic process

Circulation changes and teleconnections between glacial advances on the west coast of New Zealand and extended spells of drought years in South Africa

Twentieth century changes in the terminal position of the Franz Josef Glacier on the west coast of New Zealand are compared with an area‐averaged mean annual rainfall series for the summer rainfall region of South Africa. Distinctive teleconnections are evident in an out‐of‐phase relationship between the two series, each of which exhibits an oscillation of 18–20 years. Periods of glacial advance are shown to coincide with extended dry spells in South Africa, when drought years are prevalent. Reconstructed pressure anomaly fields are presented for periods of advance and recession of the glacier and for the inter‐decadal wet and dry spells in South Africa. In both cases major regional atmospheric circulation adjustments take place in a quasi‐regular fashion over time to produce an enhancement in westerly airflow during the periods of drought in Africa and glacial advance on the west coast of New Zealand. Extended wet periods and glacial recession are likewise shown to be associated with an enhancement of easterly components of the circulation. Changes in precipitation, temperature and moisture transport are examined and associations with the Southern Oscillation Index are investigated. Franz Josef glacial advances are shown to occur 4–5 years after the onset of enhanced south‐westerly airflow on to the west coast of New Zealand. Advances occur on average 4 years after the onset of extended dry spells in South Africa. Similar atmospheric circulation anomalies in the respective sectors of the Southern Hemisphere and adjustments in the locations of the positions of the ridges in standing wave three are responsible for this correspondence