Evidence to Suggest that Women’s Sexual Behavior is Influenced by Hip Width Rather than Waist-to-Hip Ratio

Waist-to-hip ratio (WHR) is an important ornament display that signals women’s health and fertility. Its significance derives from human development as a bipedal species. This required fundamental changes to hip morphology/musculature to accommodate the demands of both reproduction and locomotion. The result has been an obstetric dilemma whereby women’s hips are only just wide enough to allow the passage of an infant. Childbirth therefore poses a significant hip width related threat to maternal mortality/risk of gynecological injury. It was predicted that this would have a significant influence on women’s sexual behavior. To investigate this, hip width and WHR were measured in 148 women (M age = 20.93 + 0.17 years) and sexual histories were recorded via questionnaire. Data revealed that hip width per se was correlated with total number of sexual partners, total number of one night stands, percentage of sexual partners that were one night stands, number of sexual partners within the context of a relationship per year sexually active, and number of one night stands per year sexually active. By contrast, WHR was not correlated with any of these measures. Further analysis indicated that women who predominantly engaged in one night stand behavior had wider hips than those who did not. WHR was again without effect in this context. Women’s hip morphology has a direct impact on their risk of potentially fatal childbirth related injury. It is concluded that when they have control over this, women’s sexual behavior reflects this risk and is therefore at least in part influenced by hip width

Language, relationships and skills in mixed-nationality Active Learning classrooms

Based on a phenomenological exploration of Chinese students at a UK university business school, this article supports a growing body of research questioning the assumptions underpinning the putative Socratic/Confucian dichotomy of academic cultures. Beginning with a review of research literature on the experiences of Chinese students on Active Learning courses, the main part of the study is based on an analysis of qualitative interviews conducted in English and Mandarin. Findings suggest that, whilst Active Learning pedagogies are perceived as supporting their learning on these modules, for some students the ‘double-learning agenda’ entailed by these pedagogies can make their classrooms an uncomfortable space. The conclusion makes a strong case for reconceptualising the ‘language problems’ reported by many international students as ‘conversational problems’, and for recognising the nexus of language, relationships and meta-cognitive skills as legitimate areas for intervention by teachers in their role as facilitators of Active Learning

Narrowing the attainment gap between international and domestic students::use of a simulation and experiential learning in mixed-cohort strategic management teaching

In this article we present an Action Research project which attempted to address the significant performance gap between domestic and international students on an undergraduate Business Management course at a UK university business school. In designing a final year strategy module around a business simulation, we provided international students with opportunities for active engagement through collaborative tasks, which we hoped would lead to enhanced performance and deeper engagement with teamwork, leadership and negotiation skills when studying in mixed-nationality cohort

Five year prognosis in patients with angina identified in primary care : incident cohort study

Peer reviewedPublisher PD

Exploring Chinese Business Management Students' Experience of Active Learning Pedagogies: How Much Action is Possible in Active Learning Classrooms?

This phenomenological study explores how certain “innovative” pedagogies were experienced by a group of Chinese students studying Business Management at a mid-ranking UK university. Analysis of the transcripts of interviews (some in Chinese) with 24 students using NVivo shows that whilst most students felt that Active Learning pedagogies effectively supported their learning, for some students the “zone of indeterminacy” in which group projects and simulations were carried out was an uncomfortable space. Salient aspects of these students’ experiences were language, relationships and metacognitive skills, and the discussion explores the way in which these three experiential themes can be conceptualised as interrelated elements of the action (Biesta, 2006) which takes place in Active Learning classrooms. The following recommendations are made: HEIs should attempt to provide students with the advanced skills of negotiation which they will need to use in the flexible, ill-structured environments associated with Active Learning pedagogies; tutors should develop consistent approaches to collaborative assignments focussing on group work processes as well as task completion; the development of metacognitive skills through Active Learning pedagogies should be promoted through the use of explicit reflective elements embedded within the teaching, learning and assessment activities. The concluding discussion proposes that the successful use of Active Learning pedagogies requires a reconceptualisation of the purpose of education and that these pedagogies provide a potential readjustment of the balance between the functions of qualification, socialisation and subjectification (Biesta, 2010)

Language, relationships and skills in mixed-nationality Active Learning classrooms

Based on a phenomenological exploration of Chinese students at a UK university business school, this article supports a growing body of research questioning the assumptions underpinning the putative Socratic/Confucian dichotomy of academic cultures. Beginning with a review of research literature on the experiences of Chinese students on Active Learning courses, the main part of the study is based on an analysis of qualitative interviews conducted in English and Mandarin. Findings suggest that, whilst Active Learning pedagogies are perceived as supporting their learning on these modules, for some students the ‘double-learning agenda’ entailed by these pedagogies can make their classrooms an uncomfortable space. The conclusion makes a strong case for reconceptualising the ‘language problems’ reported by many international students as ‘conversational problems’, and for recognising the nexus of language, relationships and meta-cognitive skills as legitimate areas for intervention by teachers in their role as facilitators of Active Learning

A retrospective cohort study assessing patient characteristics and the incidence of cardiovascular disease using linked routine primary and secondary care data

This is the final version. Available from the publisher via the DOI in this record.Objectives: Data linkage combines information from several clinical data sets. The authors examined whether coding inconsistencies for cardiovascular disease between components of linked data sets result in differences in apparent population characteristics. Design: Retrospective cohort study. Setting: Routine primary care data from 40 Scottish general practitioner (GP) surgeries linked to national hospital records. Participants: 240 846 patients, aged 20 years or older, registered at a GP surgery. Outcomes: Cases of myocardial infarction, ischaemic heart disease and stroke (cerebrovascular disease) were identified from GP and hospital records. Patient characteristics and incidence rates were assessed for all three clinical outcomes, based on GP, hospital, paired GP/hospital (similar diagnoses recorded simultaneously in both data sets) or pooled GP/hospital records (diagnosis recorded in either or both data sets). Results: For all three outcomes, the authors found evidence (p<0.05) of different characteristics when using different methods of case identification. Prescribing of cardiovascular medicines for ischaemic heart disease was greatest for cases identified using paired records (p≤0.013). For all conditions, 30-day case fatality rates were higher for cases identified using hospital compared with GP or paired data, most noticeably for myocardial infarction (hospital 20%, GP 4%, p=0.001). Incidence rates were highest using pooled GP/hospital data and lowest using paired data. Conclusions: Differences exist in patient characteristics and disease incidence for cardiovascular conditions, depending on the data source. This has implications for studies using routine clinical data