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It is no secret that collegiality matters in academe regardless of the size and type of institution. When it comes to promotion, reappointment and tenure, the invocation of collegiality occurs. This paper aims to examine the perception and issues surrounding collegiality in the academic library setting. The data, based on the survey results of the Massachusetts public higher education librarians, reveals gender disparity on collegiality issues, attitudes and perception. The study findings also include that congeniality is not the same as collegiality. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Background: The US is experiencing an unprecedented opioid overdose epidemic fostered in recent years by regional contamination of the heroin supply with the fentanyl family of synthetic opioids. Since 2011 opioid-related overdose deaths in the East Coast state of Massachusetts have more than tripled, with 75% of the 1374 deaths with an available toxicology positive for fentanyl. Fentanyl is 30-50X more potent than heroin and its presence makes heroin use more unpredictable. A rapid ethnographic assessment was undertaken to understand the perceptions and experiences of people who inject drugs sold as 'heroin' and to observe the drugs and their use.Methods: A team of ethnographers conducted research in northeast Massachusetts and Nashua, New Hampshire in June 2016, performing (n=38) qualitative interviews with persons who use heroin.Results: (1) The composition and appearance of heroin changed in the last four years; (2) heroin is cheaper and more widely available than before; and (3) heroin 'types' have proliferated with several products being sold as 'heroin'. These consisted of two types of heroin (alone), fentanyl (alone), and heroin-fentanyl combinations. In the absence of available toxicological information on retail-level heroin, our research noted a hierarchy of fentanyl discernment methods, with embodied effects considered most reliable in determining fentanyl's presence, followed by taste, solution appearance and powder color. This paper presents a new 'heroin' typology based on users' reports.Conclusion: Massachusetts' heroin has new appearances and is widely adulterated by fentanyl. Persons who use heroin are trying to discern the substances sold as heroin and their preferences for each form vary. The heroin typology presented is inexact but can be validated by correlating users' discernment with drug toxicological testing. If validated, this typology would be a valuable harm reduction tool. Further research on adaptations to heroin adulteration could reduce risks of using heroin and synthetic opioid combinations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Abstract: Coastal and marine spatial planning (CMSP) is a key component of the US National Ocean Policy. Efforts to implement CMSP in US federal waters are beginning in earnest. Beyond sound science and data, a stakeholder engagement process that encourages public participation, collaboration and communication between disparate groups is at the heart of effective marine spatial planning (MSP). While a rich body of literature on stakeholder engagement exists, few opportunities exist to compare different stakeholder engagement processes as they occur on the ground for a particular stakeholder group. Between 2008 and 2010 marine spatial planning efforts were conducted by the neighboring US states of Rhode Island and Massachusetts. The Massachusetts Ocean Management Plan and Rhode Island Ocean SAMP provide models for the nation in structuring effective stakeholder processes for ocean management. Within both states, commercial fishermen were identified as key stakeholders. For this study, commercial fishermen''s perceptions of the engagement process in Massachusetts and Rhode Island were examined. Specifically, this paper explores the role fishermen sought in these two pioneering MSP efforts, and the role they felt they actually played. Key findings include the need for clear communication of the role of stakeholders, stakeholder empowerment and background stakeholder analysis to understand the needs and challenges faced by participating groups. This work provided a unique opportunity to examine how each ocean planning effort engaged commercial fishermen and to reflect on lessons learned for future such initiatives in the US and beyond. Exploring effectiveness through the perceptions of primary stakeholders such as commercial fishermen further elucidates the challenges and opportunities of carrying out MSP and stakeholder processes in practice. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Abstract: Responding to extant power imbalances in the typical redevelopment process, grounded theory is introduced to aid in recalibrating development suitability models to serve the interests of underrepresented communities resisting development. Using a community-based research model, this paper reports on testing the potential of grounded theory in a low-income, primarily Latino neighborhood of Chelsea, Massachusetts (USA). After 13 iterations and a ground-truthing exercise, the research resulted in a development suitability model that offers a useful heuristic for community leaders to view development likelihood – an innovation over the conventional development suitability model by directly incorporating community issues in the model calibration. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Communities with environmental health concerns in the USA frequently request studies from their local or state departments of public health. This paper presents findings from three focus groups conducted in communities north of Boston that have been the subject of two different environmental health studies. The focus groups were designed to elicit residents' perceptions of environmental health, and of the particular studies conducted in their communities. In all focus groups, participants had difficulty accepting the findings of health studies that contradicted their own experiences of environmental exposures and illness. Our results suggest that lay knowledge, informed in varying degrees by the experience of what we term “tangible evidence,” creates a lens through which communities interpret a health study's findings. The differences in reliance on tangible evidence were related to participants' sense of trust in public officials, and the institutions responsible for conducting health studies. Participants from the wealthier, predominantly white communities discussed trust in study design and methodologies used. In contrast, participants from the lower-income, higher-minority communities assessed health studies with reference to their trust (or lack thereof) in study sponsors and public health institutions. Participants' experience of tangible evidence, trust or distrust in health agencies and research institutions, and a sense of relative community power, influence how they assess the findings of environmental health studies and may have implications for pubic health. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

The cross-tabulation matrix is a fundamental starting point in the analysis of land change, but many scientists fail to analyze the matrix according to its various components and thus fail to gain as much insight as possible concerning the potential processes that determine a pattern of land change. This paper examines the cross-tabulation matrix to assess the total change of land categories according to two pairs of components: net change and swap, as well as gross gains and gross losses. Analysis of these components can distinguish between a clearly systematic landscape transition and a seemingly random landscape transition. Multiple resolution analysis provides additional information concerning the distances over which land change occurs. An example of change among four land categories in central Massachusetts illustrates the methods. These methods enable scientists to focus on the strongest signals of systematic landscape transitions, which is necessary ultimately to link pattern to process. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

In response to Sallie Marston, this paper reads her case study in terms of religion and nationalism in order to explore the ways that culture is implicated in the state. To comprehend fully the contradictory decisions of the Massachusetts Supreme Judicial Court and the U.S. Supreme Court with regard to a lesbian and gay contingent in the Boston St. Patrick''s Day Parade, it is necessary to interpret the decisions in light of the Protestant-inspired seperation of speech and action in the U.S. Constitution. This separation allows both Courts to disembody speech and separate it from the spatial context of action, which creates opposing decisions that do not adequately address the issues at hand. Understanding the role of religious nationalsim allows us to see how the final decision of U.S. Supreme Court enforces Protestant sexual regulation in the guise of protecting freedom. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

The mathematical study of the small-world concept has fostered quite some interest, showing that small-world features can be identified for some abstract classes of networks. However, passing to real complex systems, as for instance transportation networks, shows a number of new problems that make current analysis impossible. In this paper we show how a more refined kind of analysis, relying on transportation efficiency, can in fact be used to overcome such problems, and to give precious insights on the general characteristics of real transportation networks, eventually providing a picture where the small-world comes back as underlying construction principle. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

Economists often estimate models with a log-transformed dependent variable. The results from the log-transformed model are often retransformed back to the unlogged scale. Other studies have shown how to obtain consistent estimates on the original scale but have not provided variance equations for those estimates. In this paper, we derive the variance for three estimates--the conditional mean of y, the slope of y, and the average slope of y--on the retransformed scale. We then illustrate our proposed procedures with skewed health expenditure data from a sample of Medicaid eligible patients with severe mental illness. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper presents findings on the impact of implementing a parenting component in two urban residential treatment programs in Massachusetts for pregnant and parenting chemically-dependent women. The parenting component consisted of multiple services for both women and their infants while they were in residential treatment as well as aftercare services after discharge from treatment. Findings presented focus on: (a) the characteristics of the 170 pregnant and parenting women who participated in the parenting component during its 48 months of implementation; (b) changes in the parenting skills and self-esteem of women who completed parenting training; (c) the quality of mother-child interaction; and (d) the participants' perceptions about the impact of the parenting training. Women in both programs made dramatic improvements in self-esteem and experienced significant gains in parenting knowledge and attitudes. The participants were also overwhelmingly positive about the impact of the parenting training on their lives. Study findings underline the importance of parenting services for pregnant and parenting women in residential substance abuse treatment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]