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Jonathan Shay argued that social, relational, and institutional contexts were central to understanding moral injury and conceptualised moral injury as a normative response to the betrayal of an individual's understanding of what is right by a more senior/authoritative "other". Using the conceptual lens of moral injury, this paper investigates academic staff experiences of HE during the COVID-19 pandemic and explores the rapid transition back to face-to-face teaching that took place in autumn 2020. To collect data, we used an online survey that opened in January 2021 and ran until the end of March 2021. A total of 663 complete questionnaires were received across the survey period. The questionnaire was comprised of ten topic-related questions, each of which included follow-up sub-questions and also invited participants to write in additional information. The majority of participants felt that during the course of the COVID-19 pandemic, they had acted in ways that put their own health and wellbeing at risk. Of those who had acted in ways that put their health and wellbeing at risk, they believed that their senior management were the most responsible for them acting in such ways, followed by the UK government. Qualitative data showed a systemic absence of leadership in the sector during the time, a sense of betrayal of staff and students by senior management and the government, and feelings of compulsion to act in ways which put lives at risk. On the basis of these results, we argue that there could be synergies between the situation facing healthcare staff and academics during the pandemic. Many of the experiences of HE academic staff during the pandemic reported to us in this research are resonant with the concepts of betrayal and moral injury and resulted in affective responses which we understand here in relation to feelings of guilt, shame, and anger, leading ultimately to poor mental health and wellbeing. This paper discusses implications for the HE sector going forward. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In March 2020, the UK was placed in lockdown following the spread of the Covid-19 virus. Just as legitimate workplaces made changes to enable their employees to work from home, the illicit drugs trade also made alternative arrangements, adapting its supply models to ensure continuity of operations. Based upon qualitative interviews with 46 practitioners, this paper assesses how front-line professionals have experienced and perceived the impact of Covid-19 on child criminal exploitation and County Lines drug supply in the UK. Throughout the paper, we highlight perceived adaptations to the County Lines supply model, the impact of lockdown restrictions on detection and law enforcement activities aimed at County Lines, and on efforts to safeguard children and young people from criminal exploitation. Our participants generally believed that the pandemic had induced shifts to County Lines that reflected an ongoing evolution of the drug supply model and changes in understanding or attention because of Covid-19 restrictions, rather than a complete reconstitution of the model itself. Practitioners perceived that Covid-19 has had, and continues to have, a significant impact on some young people's vulnerability to exploitation, on the way in which police and frontline practitioners respond to County Lines and child criminal exploitation, and on the way illegal drugs are being moved and sold. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

A cornerstone of well-being research is that the resource-rich are happier with their lives than the resource-poor and better positioned to cope with stressful life events. This paper addresses the role of various resources—human, economic, social, and psychological capital—in life satisfaction during the coronavirus pandemic, using panel data from Germany and the United Kingdom for 2020 and 2021. Cross-sectionally, we find life satisfaction to be clearly related to all these forms of capital, with psychological capital being the strongest predictor of life satisfaction. Longitudinally, the capital endowments in 2020 did not predict changes in life satisfaction within individuals from 2020 to 2021, except for psychological capital. Our results suggest two things: first, the unfolding pandemic did not heighten well-being inequalities; and second, weathering the pandemic required psychological resources in the first place. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Action research is the predominant approach for organisational inquiry, but it comes in many guises and in some cases ends up as all action and no research. A common feature of all action research is the necessity to meet stakeholders in person in order to gain an understanding 'from within', this is particularly the case where 'soft' action research is the basis of the inquiry. In this paper first, we reflect, briefly, upon the history of action research and second, upon the lessons leant from the outcomes from two projects. The first project was conducted 'virtually', between a college in the USA and one in the UK and the second undertaken during the disruption caused by the restrictions arising from the Covid-19 pandemic. The experiences gained from these two 'virtual' action research projects and the lessons learnt are of interest to both the 'traditional' and 'soft' action research community. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Economic shocks create insolvency law-making space, generating opportunities for legal reform that may be absent in good times. Policymakers may suddenly acquire a mandate to resource institutions or drive through a change in the law where in good times such reforms were likely to be foiled by interest group capture, or simply unlikely to get sufficient political traction. A crisis, then, is an opportunity for the well-prepared insolvency policymaker. Insolvency rule-making in crisis conditions is, however, plainly also risky. Making best use of the opportunity implies making more than temporary changes to the regime. But design choices made mid-crisis will almost inevitably be influenced by the features of the crisis itself, generating a risk that the result of the reform effort will be distorted law, ill-suited to the achievement of the lawmaker's objectives in the long run. This paper considers the permanent restructuring law reforms enacted in the UK during the first wave of the Covid-19 pandemic. At first glance, these reforms appear to exemplify the case of the well-prepared policymaker, poised to drive through carefully planned changes to the law when the opportunity arises. On closer inspection, however, a different picture emerges. The permanent measures, which were enacted in a fast-track legislative process, departed from the Government's pre-pandemic plan in material and undesirable ways. In some cases, these deviations mean that the original objective has not been achieved at all; in others, the objective has been at least partially achieved, but at unnecessary cost. Overall, the UK experience appears to better exemplify the risks of attempting insolvency law reform in a crisis, than the opportunities that a crisis affords to an insolvency policymaker. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Research has shown that stress impacts on people's religious beliefs. However, several aspects of this effect remain poorly understood, for example regarding the role of prior religiosity and stress-induced anxiety. This paper explores these aspects in the context of the recent coronavirus pandemic (COVID-19). The latter has impacted dramatically on many people's well-being; hence it can be considered a highly stressful event. Through online questionnaires administered to UK (n = 140) and USA (n = 140) citizens professing either Christian faith or no religion, this paper examines the impact of the coronavirus crisis upon common people's religious beliefs. Anxiety about the coronavirus and prior religiosity showed an interaction effect upon change in religious beliefs (t(276) = 2.27, p =.024): for strong believers higher anxiety about coronavirus was associated with increased strengthening of religious beliefs (r =.249), while for non-believers higher anxiety about coronavirus was associated with increased scepticism towards religious beliefs (r = −.157). These observations are consistent with the notion that stress-induced anxiety enhances support for an individual's existing ideology already embraced before a stressful event occurs. This study sheds light on the psychological and cultural implications of the coronavirus crisis, which represents one of the most serious health emergencies in recent times. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The COVID-19 epidemic has raised major issues with regard to modelling and forecasting outcomes such as cases, deaths and hospitalisations. In particular, the forecasting of area-specific counts of infectious disease poses problems when counts are changing rapidly and there are infection hotspots, as in epidemic situations. Such forecasts are of central importance for prioritizing interventions or making severity designations for different areas. In this paper, we consider different specifications of autoregressive dependence in incidence counts as these may considerably impact on adaptivity in epidemic situations. In particular, we introduce parameters to allow temporal adaptivity in autoregressive dependence. A case study considers COVID-19 data for 144 English local authorities during the UK epidemic second wave in late 2020 and early 2021, which demonstrate geographical clustering in new cases—linked to the then emergent alpha variant. The model allows for both spatial and time variation in autoregressive effects. We assess sensitivity in short-term predictions and fit to specification (spatial vs space-time autoregression, linear vs log-linear, and form of space decay), and show improved one-step ahead and in-sample prediction using space-time autoregression including temporal adaptivity. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Landslides involving peat are relatively common in Ireland, upland areas of Great Britain and subantarctic islands. Bogflows and bog slides are less common types of peat failure and almost unknown outside Ireland. Unusually, three of these occurred in 2020 including one bogflow at a windfarm that gained much adverse media attention, and a small but damaging peat slide was also reported. The aim of this paper is to determine the extent to which the new bog slide and bogflows are consistent with previous examples in terms of their contexts, characteristics and possible causes, particularly relating to commercial forestry operations. Aerial video footage of all three landslides obtained by local people using drones, and ground-based footage of one of them in progress, allowed a detailed examination of their characteristics and contexts to be made despite the global travel and activity restrictions caused by the coronavirus pandemic. The windfarm bogflow appears to have resulted from removal of toe support by an earlier peat flow that was itself probably caused by construction of an access road; the other two landslides were most likely triggered by rainfall. All three are consistent with previous examples of their respective types in their general characteristics and appear to be associated with well-known causal factors including hydrological, topographic and/or forestry influences. Forestry operations probably contributed to the occurrence of two of the landslides and restricted the expansion of two of them. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In an era when public faith in politicians is dwindling, yet trust in scientists remains relatively high, governments are increasingly emphasizing the role of science based policy-making in response to challenges such as climate change and global pandemics. In this paper we question the quality of some scientific advice given to governments and the robustness and transparency of the entire framework which envelopes such advice, all of which raise serious ethical concerns. In particular we focus on the so-called Imperial Model which heavily influenced the government of the United Kingdom in devising its response to the COVID-19 crisis. We focus on and highlight several fundamental methodological flaws of the model, raise concerns as to the robustness of the system which permitted these to remain unchallenged, and discuss the relevant ethical consequences. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: Research is beginning to quantify the impact of COVID-19 on people with pre-existing mental health conditions. Our paper addresses a lack of in-depth qualitative research exploring their experiences and perceptions of how life has changed at this time. Methods: We used qualitative interviews (N = 49) to explore experiences of the pandemic for people with pre-existing mental health conditions. In a participatory, coproduced approach, researchers with lived experiences of mental health conditions conducted interviews and analysed data as part of a multi-disciplinary research team. Results: Existing mental health difficulties were exacerbated for many people. People experienced specific psychological impacts of the pandemic, struggles with social connectedness, and inadequate access to mental health services, while some found new ways to cope and connect to the community. New remote ways to access mental health care, including digital solutions, provided continuity of care for some but presented substantial barriers for others. People from black and ethnic minority (BAME) communities experienced heightened anxiety, stigma and racism associated with the pandemic, further impacting their mental health. Conclusion: There is a need for evidence-based solutions to achieve accessible and effective mental health care in response to the pandemic, especially remote approaches to care. Further research should explore the long-term impacts of COVID-19 on people with pre-existing mental health conditions. Particular attention should be paid to understanding inequalities of impact on mental health, especially for people from BAME communities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Substantial research is available on detecting influencers on social media platforms. In contrast, comparatively few studies exists on the role of online activists, defined informally as users who actively participate in socially-minded online campaigns. Automatically discovering activists who can potentially be approached by organisations that promote social campaigns is important, but not easy, as they are typically active only locally, and, unlike influencers, they are not central to large social media networks. We make the hypothesis that such interesting users can be found on Twitter within temporally and spatially localised contexts. We define these as small but topical fragments of the network, containing interactions about social events or campaigns with a significant online footprint. To explore this hypothesis, we have designed an iterative discovery pipeline consisting of two alternating phases of user discovery and context discovery. Multiple iterations of the pipeline result in a growing dataset of user profiles for activists, as well as growing set of online social contexts. This mode of exploration differs significantly from prior techniques that focus on influencers, and presents unique challenges because of the weak online signal available to detect activists. The paper describes the design and implementation of the pipeline as a customisable software framework, where user-defined operational definitions of online activism can be explored. We present an empirical evaluation on two extensive case studies, one concerning healthcare-related campaigns in the UK during 2018, the other related to online activism in Italy during the COVID-19 pandemic. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]