Creating psychological connections between intervention recipients: development and focus group evaluation of a group singing session for people with aphasia

This is the final version of the article. Available from BMJ Publishing Group via the DOI in this record.Objectives The study sought to identify key design features that could be used to create a new framework for group-based health interventions. We designed and tested the first session of a group intervention for stroke survivors with aphasia which was aimed at nurturing new psychological connections between group members. Setting The intervention session, a participant focus group and interviews with intervention facilitators were held in a local community music centre in the South West of England. Participants A convenience sample of 10 community-dwelling people with poststroke aphasia participated in the session. Severity of aphasia was not considered for inclusion. Intervention Participants took part in a 90-min group singing session which involved singing songs from a specially prepared song book. Musical accompaniment was provided by the facilitators. Primary and secondary outcome measures Participants and group facilitators reported their experiences of participating in the session, with a focus on activities within the session related to the intervention aims. Researcher observations of the session were also made. Results Two themes emerged from the analysis, concerning experiences of the session (‘developing a sense of group belonging’) and perceptions of its design and delivery (‘creating the conditions for engagement’). Participants described an emerging sense of shared social identity as a member of the intervention group and identified fixed (eg, group size, session breaks) and flexible (eg, facilitator responsiveness) features of the session which contributed to this emergence. Facilitator interviews and researcher observations corroborated and expanded participant reports. Conclusions Engagement with health intervention content may be enhanced in group settings when intervention participants begin to establish positive and meaningful psychological connections with other group members. Understanding and actively nurturing these connections should be a core feature of a general framework for the design and delivery of group interventions.This research was funded by the National Institute for Health Research (NIHR) Collaboration for Leadership in Applied Health Research and Care South West Peninsula. The views expressed are those of the authors and not necessarily those of the NHS, the NIHR or the Department of Health

The Spectral Signature of Dust Scattering and Polarization in the Near IR to Far UV. I. Optical Depth and Geometry Effects

Spectropolarimetry from the near IR to the far UV of light scattered by dust provides a valuable diagnostic of the dust composition, grain size distribution and spatial distribution. To facilitate the use of this diagnostic, we present detailed calculations of the intensity and polarization spectral signature of light scattered by optically thin and optically thick dust in various geometries. The polarized light radiative transfer calculations are carried out using the adding-doubling method for a plane-parallel slab, and are extended to an optically thick sphere by integrating over its surface. The calculations are for the Mathis, Rumple & Nordsieck Galactic dust model, and cover the range from 1 $\mu m$ to 500 \AA. We find that the wavelength dependence of the scattered light intensity provides a sensitive probe of the optical depth of the scattering medium, while the polarization wavelength dependence provides a probe of the grain scattering properties, which is practically independent of optical depth. We provide a detailed set of predictions, including polarization maps, which can be used to probe the properties of dust through imaging spectropolarimetry in the near IR to far UV of various Galactic and extragalactic objects. In a following paper we use the codes developed here to provide predictions for the dependence of the intensity and polarization on grain size distribution and composition.Comment: 29 pages + 21 figures, accepted for the Astrophysical Journal Supplement February 2000 issue. Some revision, mostly in the introduction and the conclusions, and a couple of correction

Ethical and compliance-competence evaluation: a key element of sound corporate governance

Motivated by the ongoing post-Enron refocusing on corporate governance and the shift by the Financial Services Authority (FSA) in the UK to promoting compliance- competence within the financial services sector, this paper demonstrates how template analysis can be used as a tool for evaluating compliance-competence. Focusing on the ethical dimension of compliance-competence, we illustrate how this can be subjectively appraised. We propose that this evaluation technique could be utilised as a starting point in informing senior management of corporate governance issues and be used to monitor and demonstrate key compliance and ethical aspects of an institution to external stakeholders and regulators

Women, know your limits: Cultural sexism in academia

Despite the considerable advances of the feminist movement across Western societies, in Universities women are less likely to be promoted, or paid as much as their male colleagues, or even get jobs in the first place. One way in which we can start to reflect on why this might be the case is through hearing the experiences of women academics themselves. Using feminist methodology, this article attempts to unpack and explore just some examples of ‘cultural sexism’ which characterise the working lives of many women in British academia.This article uses qualitative methods to describe and make sense of just some of those experiences. In so doing, the argument is also made that the activity of academia is profoundly gendered and this explicit acknowledgement may contribute to our understanding of the under-representation of women in senior positions

Singing for people with aphasia (SPA): a protocol for a pilot randomised controlled trial of a group singing intervention to improve well-being

Introduction: The singing for people with aphasia (SPA) intervention aims to improve quality of life and well-being for people with poststroke aphasia. A definitive randomised controlled trial (RCT) is required to assess the clinical and cost effectiveness of SPA. The purpose of this pilot study is to assess the feasibility of such a definitive trial and inform its design. Methods and analysis: A two-group, assessor-blinded, randomised controlled external pilot trial with parallel mixed methods process evaluation and economic evaluation. Forty-eight participants discharged from clinical speech and language therapy will be individually randomised 1:1 to SPA (10 group sessions plus a resource booklet) or control (resource booklet only). Outcome assessment at baseline, 3 and 6 months postrandomisation include: ICEpop CAPability measure for adults, Stroke and Aphasia Quality of Life, EQ-5D-5L, modified Reintegration into Normal Living Index, Communication Outcome After Stroke, Very Short Version of the Minnesota Aphasia Test, Service Receipt Inventory and Care Related Quality of Life. Feasibility, acceptability and process outcomes include recruitment and retention rates, with measurement burden and trial experiences being explored in qualitative interviews (15 participants, 2 music facilitators and 2 music champions). Analyses include: descriptive statistics, with 95% CIs where appropriate; qualitative themes; intervention fidelity from videos and session checklists; rehearsal of health economic analysis. Ethics and dissemination: NHS National Research Ethics Service and the Health Research Authority confirmed approval in April 2017; recruitment commenced in June 2017. Outputs will include: pilot data to inform whether to proceed to a definitive RCT and support a funding application; finalised intervention manual for multicentre replication of SPA; presentations at conferences, public involvement events; internationally recognised peer reviewed journal publications, open access sources and media releases

Implementation of Flow Tripping Capability in the USM3D Unstructured Flow Solver

A flow tripping capability is added to an established NASA tetrahedral unstructured parallel Navier-Stokes flow solver, USM3D. The capability is based on prescribing an appropriate profile of turbulence model variables to energize the boundary layer in a plane normal to a specified trip region on the body surface. We demonstrate this approach using the k-e two-equation turbulence model of USM3D. Modification to the solution procedure primarily consists of developing a data structure to identify all unstructured tetrahedral grid cells located in the plane normal to a specified surface trip region and computing a function based on the mean flow solution to specify the modified profile of the turbulence model variables. We leverage this data structure and also show an adjunct approach that is based on enforcing a laminar flow condition on the otherwise fully turbulent flow solution in user specified region. The latter approach is applied for the solutions obtained using other one- and two-equation turbulence models of USM3D. A key ingredient of the present capability is the use of a graphical user-interface tool PREDISC to define a trip region on the body surface in an existing grid. Verification of the present modifications is demonstrated on three cases, namely, a flat plate, the RAE2822 airfoil, and the DLR F6 wing-fuselage configuration

Transmutations and spectral parameter power series in eigenvalue problems

We give an overview of recent developments in Sturm-Liouville theory concerning operators of transmutation (transformation) and spectral parameter power series (SPPS). The possibility to write down the dispersion (characteristic) equations corresponding to a variety of spectral problems related to Sturm-Liouville equations in an analytic form is an attractive feature of the SPPS method. It is based on a computation of certain systems of recursive integrals. Considered as families of functions these systems are complete in the $L_{2}$-space and result to be the images of the nonnegative integer powers of the independent variable under the action of a corresponding transmutation operator. This recently revealed property of the Delsarte transmutations opens the way to apply the transmutation operator even when its integral kernel is unknown and gives the possibility to obtain further interesting properties concerning the Darboux transformed Schr\"{o}dinger operators. We introduce the systems of recursive integrals and the SPPS approach, explain some of its applications to spectral problems with numerical illustrations, give the definition and basic properties of transmutation operators, introduce a parametrized family of transmutation operators, study their mapping properties and construct the transmutation operators for Darboux transformed Schr\"{o}dinger operators.Comment: 30 pages, 4 figures. arXiv admin note: text overlap with arXiv:1111.444

Mass-loss rates of Very Massive Stars

We discuss the basic physics of hot-star winds and we provide mass-loss rates for (very) massive stars. Whilst the emphasis is on theoretical concepts and line-force modelling, we also discuss the current state of observations and empirical modelling, and address the issue of wind clumping.Comment: 36 pages, 15 figures, Book Chapter in "Very Massive Stars in the Local Universe", Springer, Ed. Jorick S. Vin

Assessment of Gas-Surface Interaction Models for Computation of Rarefied Hypersonic Flow

Peer Reviewedhttp://deepblue.lib.umich.edu/bitstream/2027.42/76727/1/AIAA-36375-113.pd

The XMM-Newton serendipitous ultraviolet source survey catalogue

The XMM-Newton Serendipitous Ultraviolet Source Survey (XMM-SUSS) is a catalogue of ultraviolet (UV) sources detected serendipitously by the Optical Monitor (XMM-OM) on-board the XMM-Newton observatory. The catalogue contains ultraviolet-detected sources collected from 2,417 XMM-OM observations in 1-6 broad band UV and optical filters, made between 24 February 2000 and 29 March 2007. The primary contents of the catalogue are source positions, magnitudes and fluxes in 1 to 6 passbands, and these are accompanied by profile diagnostics and variability statistics. The XMM-SUSS is populated by 753,578 UV source detections above a 3 sigma signal-to-noise threshold limit which relate to 624,049 unique objects. Taking account of substantial overlaps between observations, the net sky area covered is 29-54 square degrees, depending on UV filter. The magnitude distributions peak at 20.2, 20.9 and 21.2 in UVW2, UVM2 and UVW1 respectively. More than 10 per cent of sources have been visited more than once using the same filter during XMM-Newton operation, and > 20 per cent of sources are observed more than once per filter during an individual visit. Consequently, the scope for science based on temporal source variability on timescales of hours to years is broad. By comparison with other astrophysical catalogues we test the accuracy of the source measurements and define the nature of the serendipitous UV XMM-OM source sample. The distributions of source colours in the UV and optical filters are shown together with the expected loci of stars and galaxies, and indicate that sources which are detected in multiple UV bands are predominantly star-forming galaxies and stars of type G or earlier.Comment: Accepted for publication in MNRA