2,957 research outputs found
A qualitative exploration of UK prisonersâ experiences of substance misuse and mental health difficulties, and the Breaking Free Health and Justice interventions
This qualitative study explored prisonersâ lived experiences of substance use and mental health difficulties and aimed to examine perceived links between these two areas and how they might be associated with recovery during engagement with the Breaking Free Health and Justice (BFHJ) treatment programs. Interviews were conducted with 32 prisoners receiving treatment for substance use in North-West England. Emerging from prisonersâ interviews were themes relating to difficult life experiences from childhood into adulthood, how these experiences played a role in the emergence of their multiple and complex difficulties, their treatment experiences, and how their current involvement with the criminal justice system acted as a catalyst for positive change, including engagement with the BFHJ programs. This study identified the roles of substance use and mental health difficulties in the lives of participants, identified how their multiple and complex difficulties might be addressed, and provided insights into prisonersâ interpretations of their life experiences
Initial findings from a mixed-methods feasibility and effectiveness evaluation of the 'Breaking Free Health an Justice' treatment and recovery programme for substance misuse in prison settings
Reshaping substance misuse treatment in prisons is central to the UK Governmentâs drive to address substance dependence in the prison population and reduce substance-related offending and recidivism. Therefore, a through-care project to support prisoners released from custody to community, âGatewaysâ, is taking place across North-West England. Amongst support with housing, education, training and employment, Gateways incorporates the Breaking Free Online (BFO) substance misuse treatment programme. Aims: To explore BFOâs potential to provide support to prisonersâ substance misuse recovery and continuity of care post-release, and examine quantitative outcomes provided by prisoners who have used the programme. Methods: Qualitative interviews with prisoners and analyses of quantitative psychometric data collected pre- and post-intervention. Findings: Themes emerging from qualitative data around prisonersâ experiences of engaging with BFO illustrate its potential for use in prison settings and also upon release to the community. Significant quantitative improvements to quality of life, severity of substance dependence and aspects of recovery progression illustrate initial effectiveness of BFO. Conclusions: The BFO programme demonstrates potential in providing effective treatment for offenders with substance misuse difficulties, and specifically in delivering continuity of care following release to the community
Using the ârecoveryâ and ârehabilitationâ paradigms to support desistence of substance-involved offenders: Exploration of dual and multi-focus interventions (Invited Paper)
Purpose
The links between substance use and offending are well evidenced in the literature, and increasingly, substance misuse recovery is being seen as a central component of the process of rehabilitation from offending, with substance use identified as a key criminogenic risk factor. In recent years, research has demonstrated the commonalities between recovery and rehabilitation, and the possible merits of providing interventions to substance-involved offenders that address both problematic sets of behaviours. The purpose of this paper is to provide an overview of the links between substance use and offending, and the burgeoning literature around the parallel processes of recovery and rehabilitation.
Design/methodology/approach
This is provided as a rationale for a new treatment approach for substance-involved offenders, Breaking Free Online (BFO), which has recently been provided as part of the âGatewaysâ throughcare pathfinder in a number of prisons in North-West England. The BFO programme contains specific behaviour change techniques that are generic enough to be applied to change a wide range of behaviours, and so is able to support substance-involved offenders to address their substance use and offending simultaneously.
Findings
This dual and multi-target intervention approach has the potential to address multiple, associated areas of need simultaneously, streamlining services and providing more holistic support for individuals, such as substance-involved offenders, who may have multiple and complex needs.
Practical implications
Given the links between substance use and offending, it may be beneficial to provide multi-focussed interventions that address both these behaviours simultaneously, in addition to other areas of multiple and complex needs. Specifically, digital technologies may provide an opportunity to widen access to such multi-focussed interventions, through computer-assisted therapy delivery modalities. Additionally, using digital technologies to deliver such interventions can provide opportunities for joined-up care by making interventions available across both prison and community settings, following offenders on their journey through the criminal justice system.
Originality/value
Recommendations are provided to other intervention developers who may wish to further contribute to widening access to such dual- and multi-focus programmes for substance-involved offenders, based on the experiences developing and evidencing the BFO programme
Contact Manifolds, Contact Instantons, and Twistor Geometry
Recently, Kallen and Zabzine computed the partition function of a twisted
supersymmetric Yang-Mills theory on the five-dimensional sphere using
localisation techniques. Key to their construction is a five-dimensional
generalisation of the instanton equation to which they refer as the contact
instanton equation. Subject of this article is the twistor construction of this
equation when formulated on K-contact manifolds and the discussion of its
integrability properties. We also present certain extensions to higher
dimensions and supersymmetric generalisations.Comment: v3: 28 pages, clarifications and references added, version to appear
in JHE
The 1979 outburst of U Scorpii
Optical and ultraviolet observations are presented of the 1979 outburst of the recurrent nova U Sco. For the first time the evolution through outburst is documented photometrically and spectroscopically. Lines of the following ions are identified: H I, He II, C IV, N III, N IV, N V, O IV, O VI and Si IV. No forbidden lines were observed. Mg I was seen in absorption at a late stage in the decline. The Balmer lines have broad and narrow components which change with time. There is evidence that nitrogen is overabundant with respect to carbon and the helium to hydrogen number ratio is about 2
Instantons and Killing spinors
We investigate instantons on manifolds with Killing spinors and their cones.
Examples of manifolds with Killing spinors include nearly Kaehler 6-manifolds,
nearly parallel G_2-manifolds in dimension 7, Sasaki-Einstein manifolds, and
3-Sasakian manifolds. We construct a connection on the tangent bundle over
these manifolds which solves the instanton equation, and also show that the
instanton equation implies the Yang-Mills equation, despite the presence of
torsion. We then construct instantons on the cones over these manifolds, and
lift them to solutions of heterotic supergravity. Amongst our solutions are new
instantons on even-dimensional Euclidean spaces, as well as the well-known
BPST, quaternionic and octonionic instantons.Comment: 40 pages, 2 figures v2: author email addresses and affiliations adde
Heat dissipation in atomic-scale junctions
Atomic and single-molecule junctions represent the ultimate limit to the
miniaturization of electrical circuits. They are also ideal platforms to test
quantum transport theories that are required to describe charge and energy
transfer in novel functional nanodevices. Recent work has successfully probed
electric and thermoelectric phenomena in atomic-scale junctions. However, heat
dissipation and transport in atomic-scale devices remain poorly characterized
due to experimental challenges. Here, using custom-fabricated scanning probes
with integrated nanoscale thermocouples, we show that heat dissipation in the
electrodes of molecular junctions, whose transmission characteristics are
strongly dependent on energy, is asymmetric, i.e. unequal and dependent on both
the bias polarity and the identity of majority charge carriers (electrons vs.
holes). In contrast, atomic junctions whose transmission characteristics show
weak energy dependence do not exhibit appreciable asymmetry. Our results
unambiguously relate the electronic transmission characteristics of
atomic-scale junctions to their heat dissipation properties establishing a
framework for understanding heat dissipation in a range of mesoscopic systems
where transport is elastic. We anticipate that the techniques established here
will enable the study of Peltier effects at the atomic scale, a field that has
been barely explored experimentally despite interesting theoretical
predictions. Furthermore, the experimental advances described here are also
expected to enable the study of heat transport in atomic and molecular
junctions, which is an important and challenging scientific and technological
goal that has remained elusive.Comment: supporting information available in the journal web site or upon
reques
An Investigation into the Determining Factors of Zoo Visitor Attendances in UK Zoos
The debate as to which animals are most beneficial to keep in zoos in terms of financial and conservative value is readily disputed; however, demographic factors have also been shown to relate to visitor numbers on an international level. The main aims of this research were: (1) To observe the distribution and location of zoos across the UK, (2) to develop a way of calculating zoo popularity in terms of the species kept within a collection and (3) to investigate the factors related to visitor numbers regarding admission costs, popularity of the collection in terms of the species kept and local demographic factors. Zoo visitor numbers were positively correlated with generated popularity ratings for zoos based on the species kept within a collection and admission prices (Pearson correlation: nâ=â34, râ=â0.268, Pâ=â0.126 and nâ=â34, râ=ââ0.430, Pâ=â0.011). Animal collections are aggregated around large cities and tourist regions, particularly coastal areas. No relationship between demographic variables and visitor numbers was found (Pearson correlation: nâ=â34, râ=â0.268, Pâ=â0.126), which suggests that the popularity of a zoo's collection relative to the types and numbers of species kept is more indicative of a collection's visitor numbers than its surrounding demographic figures. Zoos should incorporate generating high popularity scores as part of their collection planning strategies, to ensure that they thrive in the future, not only as tourist attractions but also as major conservation organizations
Yang-Mills instantons and dyons on homogeneous G_2-manifolds
We consider Lie G-valued Yang-Mills fields on the space R x G/H, where G/H is
a compact nearly K"ahler six-dimensional homogeneous space, and the manifold R
x G/H carries a G_2-structure. After imposing a general G-invariance condition,
Yang-Mills theory with torsion on R x G/H is reduced to Newtonian mechanics of
a particle moving in R^6, R^4 or R^2 under the influence of an inverted
double-well-type potential for the cases G/H = SU(3)/U(1)xU(1),
Sp(2)/Sp(1)xU(1) or G_2/SU(3), respectively. We analyze all critical points and
present analytical and numerical kink- and bounce-type solutions, which yield
G-invariant instanton configurations on those cosets. Periodic solutions on S^1
x G/H and dyons on iR x G/H are also given.Comment: 1+26 pages, 14 figures, 6 miniplot
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