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The discourse of deservingness has been mobilised against certain groups in the UK society navigating UK labour markets, among them refugees and asylum seekers. These discourses, leading to the stigmatisation of the unemployed are coupled with an emphasis on the importance of individuals taking responsibility to develop their 'employability'. Little attention has been paid to scrutinise the contrast between the deservingness rhetoric and policy making with the actual conditions newcomers, and in particular refugees and asylum seekers, are confronted with when seeking employment. Our paper fills such a gap by indicating key contradictions at the heart of labour market integration in the UK. On the one hand, the emphasis on deservingness is coupled with policy discourses that construct an environment shaped by welfare and labour market chauvinism. On the other hand, the policy architecture is fundamentally flawed in a number of ways in terms of the support mechanisms necessary to ensure that newcomers can successfully integrate into the labour market. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Existing policy research has not comprehensively examined the processes by which young people experience social exclusion: that is, the relationships among different risk factors for exclusion, their actual experiences of exclusion, and outcomes that matter for their life chances. Drawing on data from a survey of Australian 13-14 year olds (N=3,535), this paper adapts the Bristol Social Exclusion Matrix to examine pathways from young people's personal and family resources, their experience of participation (school engagement; bullying victimization; teacher support), and their life satisfaction – a predictive indicator of wellbeing and mental health in adulthood. The effects of other characteristics or risk factors for young people's social exclusion (living with disability, being a young carer, identifying as Indigenous, and speaking a language other than English at home), are also examined. This paper shows that experience of exclusion mediates the relationship between young people's personal and family resources and life satisfaction. Controlling for characteristics or risk factors does not change this relationship, suggesting that processes of social exclusion, enacted in interpersonal encounters, are driven by overarching structural factors. These findings are relevant for policy in Australia, and in other countries with similar policy regimes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Dementia, a global health priority, poses a disproportionately high risk to lesbian, gay, bisexual and trans plus (LGBT+)/gender and sexuality diverse people. Despite this, little research has explored the lived experience of LGBT+ people with dementia or their care partners. This scoping review aims to understand what the literature reveals about their experiences, the ways in which their lives have been investigated, to inform future research, policy and practice. Using an established scoping review methodology, we identified seven papers that reported empirical research on the lived experience of LGBT+ people with dementia and their care partners. Only a single study reported on in two of the papers included people who were trans. This in itself reveals how rarely LGBT+ people are asked to speak about how dementia has shaped their lives in academic research. Our reflexive thematic analysis indicates that LGBT+ people with dementia and their care partners endure overlapping forms of disadvantage. This results in heightened experiences of fear and discrimination, lack of services and compounded social isolation. Importantly, while dementia was embodied as interference and loss by LGBT+ people, it was their gender and sexuality differences that provided solace, even in the face of disadvantage. Importantly, people's relationships with LGBT+ identities were framed as fundamental for safety, resilience and wellbeing, rather than a complicating or confounding factor in living with dementia. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In liberal welfare systems, social security policy has been increasingly shifting towards conditionality and individualisation (Knotz, 2019). It is within this context that failure to meet the set conditions becomes personal rather than systemic. This has been enabled by policy discourses that construct poverty and unemployment as the result of personal failure and poor social behaviour. While this area of study over emphasises 'the constraints imposed by discourse' (Bacchi, 2000: 55), alternative discourses are often developed. This paper draws on ethnographic research investigating the development of self-reliant groups (SRGs) in Scotland. SRGs are small groups of women supporting each other in creating opportunities for personal development. We find that the process of involvement and sharing of experiences between women at the forefront of welfare reform led to the development of a counter public sphere. Yet, the experience doesn't move fully towards actions for transformative social change. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The search for the existence and nonexistence of bilingual advantages and disadvantages has become a battleground marked by polarized comments and perspectives, furthering our understanding of neither bilingualism as an experience nor cognition as higher-level mental processes. In this paper, I provide a brief historical overview of research examining the cognitive and linguistic consequences of multilingualism and address the assumptions underlying research exploring the bilingual behavioral difference. I aim to illustrate the sole focus on behavioral (dis)advantage fails to reflect the complexity and dynamicity of people's bilingual experiences, thereby distracting from understanding bilingualism. Responding to the call of this special issue, I describe the necessity to focus on people when moving toward a just and equitable future for applied psycholinguistic research. Furthermore, I explain why the nuances of bilingualism need to be recognized beyond binary categorization to advance knowledge about bilingualism and its consequences. To avoid unjust misattribution of a behavioral outcome to people's life experience and to report research findings in a transparent manner, the myopic representation of the terms "bilingual (dis)advantage" should be recognized and reflected on. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Necrotising otitis externa is a serious infective condition. Patients are typically frail, diagnostic delay is common and severe pain is a key feature. This study aimed to qualitatively analyse patient-centred data to identify key themes in the patient's experience. Methods: Open-ended questionnaires were sent to 28 patients. Responses were qualitatively analysed using a grounded theory approach. Iterative cycles were used to develop codes using a constant comparison technique. Emerging categories were refined to identify core themes. Results: Four main themes emerged: severe pain, mental health, quality of life and diagnostic delays. Conclusion: This is the first study to explore patients' perspectives in necrotising otitis externa. It indicates a need to raise awareness of necrotising otitis externa, and to improve symptom management, pain control and quality of life. This valuable information can be used to identify research priorities, guide service improvements, improve clinical care and feed into the development of a Core Outcome Set for necrotising otitis externa. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

While research on men's mental health is increasing, it has not typically focused on the intersections between ageing, masculinity and mental health in a rural context. Given the significant increase not only in our global ageing population, but also our growing awareness of mental health problems in the general population, understanding men as they grow older in relation to mental health is a notable gap in research. In this paper, the authors explore the ageing experiences of male participants over 50 with self-identified mental health problems in rural Manitoba. We draw on semi-structured qualitative interviews from a larger project which focused on the diversity of rural men's perceptions, experiences and expressions of mental health and wellness. Specifically, we explore how these men reflect on their mental health and wellness. Participants in the study described their experiences as a cumulative process of making meaning, developing strategies, resources and a more positive sense of self – but sometimes also simply for survival. Men's sense of time over time – looking back and reflecting on the present and the future – appears to be a critical resource and a positive coping strategy for these men associated with ageing. The main themes include sustaining relationships; work, retirement and volunteering; and reflections on physical and emotional health. Our paper concludes with a discussion of the implications for new research on ageing men's mental health in a rural context. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article revisits a paper and from an autoethnographic/critical reflective biographical approach re-examines seven cultural notions or myths, which may encourage ageism. It is framed within my experiential knowledge of caring for my ageing parents, with the tensions and challenges around problematising the value of expertise based on experience, communication, grief, and autonomy and freedom versus safety. The commentary emphasises that by analysing the impact of our personal life experiences, we can start to understand both the intended and unintended consequences of policy and practice affecting those in the fourth age. As a social work educator, I wanted to reflect upon how my tacit experiential knowledge, if made explicit, could impact upon my own and others' learning. The recent death of my father has allowed for a period of reflection on my own caring and indeed my professional social work experience, knowledge, skills and practice. It is argued that the ageing process is unequal as class and socio-economic factors, i.e. geography, age, gender, religion and ethnicity, all play parts in determining how someone ages, and indeed upon the care an individual older person receives. A fuller understanding of negotiating the role of one stakeholder, that of a family carer in the ageing process, is elicited in this paper. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper aims to develop a sensory methodological framework to explore older user's landscape experience. Applying empirical experience in Australian aged-care facilities, it addresses a methodological gap in the current literature to help move beyond the current taken-for-granted approaches such as interviews, cognitive mapping, behavioural observation and visual methods. We propose a more holistic method which enables the exploration of older people's in situ environmental experience. The multisensory framework we propose here is based on the first author's doctoral fieldwork experience that took place in two aged-care facilities in Brisbane, Australia. Findings suggest this framework facilitates an understanding of users' olfactory, auditory and visual responses to the physical environment, and promotes a deeper engagement with the landscape. We argue that this is essential to promoting good landscape design which genuinely connects with older people's needs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Engagement in health research is increasingly practised worldwide. Yet many questions remain under debate in the ethics field about its contribution to health research and these debates have largely not been informed by those who have been engaged in health research. This paper addresses the following key questions: what should the ethical goals of engagement in health research be and how should it be performed? Qualitative data were generated by interviewing 22 people with lived experience, members of the public, and engagement managers about power sharing in health research. Thematic analysis of study data identified the following five themes: the value of engagement in research, ideal engagement, tokenistic engagement, terms to describe those engaged, and engagement roles in research. The paper presents that data and then considers what insights it offers for what engagement should look like—its ethical goals and approach—according to those being engaged. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Teaching healthcare ethics at the doctoral level presents a particular challenge. Ethics is often taught to medical students, but rarely is medicine taught to graduate students in health care ethics. In this paper, Medicine for Ethicists [MfE] — a course taught both didactically and experientially — is described. Eight former MfE students were independently interviewed in a semi-structured, open-ended format regarding their experience in the experiential component of the course. Themes included concrete elements about the course, elements related to the broader PhD student learning experience, and themes related to the students' past and future career experiences. Findings are related to the educational philosophy of John Dewey and David Kolb's experiential learning theory. Broader implications of this work are explored. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this essay, the author reflects on a decade's old essay on baseball and bioethics inspired by a conversation with the late David Thomasma. In a reprise of his earlier paper, Fins worries that modernity has come to baseball with the advent of the pitch clock and that this innovation brings age discrimination to a timeless pastime. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Although social frailty has been described from a theoretical perspective, the lived experiences of older adults regarding social frailty are yet unknown. In this paper, we aim to (a) gain more in-depth insights into community-dwelling and assisted-living older adults' experiences of social frailty and (b) explore the differences in these experiences between these two groups. We conduct a thematic analysis of 38 interviews with community-dwelling and assisted-living older adults in rural villages the Netherlands. We structure our findings along three overarching themes which highlight different aspects of the social frailty experiences of our participants: (a) present resources and activities to fulfil social needs, (b) resources and activities that have been lost, and (c) how they manage and adapt to changes in resources and activities over time. Loneliness is only reported among the community-dwelling participants, while the loss of mobility and participation in (social) activities is experienced most strongly by the assisted-living participants. These findings challenge the widespread policies and practices of ageing in place. We conclude that for some older adults, living in assisted arrangements is preferred over ageing in place, as doing so can prevent social frailty. The key reason for this is that life in assisted living is likely to bring about new social resources and activities, which may serve to fulfil the social needs of older adults. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The concept of dignity is core to community district nursing practice, yet it is profoundly complex with multiple meanings and interpretations. Dignity does not exist absolutely, but, rather, becomes socially (de)constructed through and within social interactions between nurses and older adult patients in relational aspects of care. It is a concept, however, which has, to date, received little attention in the context of the community nursing care of older adults. Previous research into dignity in health care has often focused on care within institutional environments, very little, however, explores the variety of ways in which dignity is operationalised in community settings where district nursing care is conducted 'behind closed doors', largely free from the external gaze. This means dignity (or the lack of it) may go unobserved in community settings. Drawing on observational and interview data, this paper highlights the significance of dignity for older adults receiving nursing care in their own homes. We will demonstrate, in particular, how dignity manifests within the relational aspects of district nursing care delivery and how tasks involving bodywork can be critical to the ways in which dignity is both promoted and undermined. We will further highlight how micro-articulations in caring relationships fundamentally shape the 'dignity encounter' through a consideration of the routine and, arguably, mundane aspects of community district nursing care in the home. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Many care home residents lack opportunities for meaningful activity and social connection, resulting in poor physical and emotional wellbeing. Providing residents with varied activities and social opportunities can improve their quality of life. In this paper, we examine the potential for film to provide a meaningful, social activity. The limited existing research on film in care homes has predominantly examined the use of film clips and materials in stimulating reminiscence for people with dementia. In this paper, we adopt a broader, trans-disciplinary perspective of film, drawing on evidence from Film Studies that shared spectatorship has social and emotional benefits for the viewer. We offer the first qualitative study of care home residents' social, emotional and embodied engagement with feature-length film and identify the key benefits of film in this setting. We ran social film screenings in two Scottish care homes over six weeks. Underpinned by psycho-cinematic theory, we collected and analysed observational data alongside interviews with care home staff and discussion groups with residents. Our findings identified three ways in which film screenings benefit residents and supports social connection: prompting reminiscence; enhancing residents' experiences in the present; and creating a shared future and intergenerational connections. The paper offers useful insights into the rich potential for film to enhance the care home community, facilitate social connectivity and promote resident wellbeing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Maintaining good wellbeing in older age is seen to have a positive effect on health, including cognitive and physiological functioning. This paper explores experiences of wellbeing in a particular older adult community: those who have served in the military. It aims to identify the specific challenges that ex-service personnel may have, reporting findings from a qualitative study focused on how older veterans told stories of military service and what these stories revealed about wellbeing. We used a qualitative approach; data are drawn from 30 individual interviews, and from engagement with veterans in workshops. Analysis was conducted using a data-driven constant comparison approach. Three themes are presented: how loneliness affects older adult veterans; how they draw on fictive kinship; and the role of military visual culture. Although participants had diverse experiences of military service, they felt that being a veteran connected them to a community that went beyond association with specific experiences. Using narratives of military experience to connect, both in telling stories and by stories being listened to, was vital. As veterans, older adults were able to access each other as a resource for listening and sharing. However, it was also exclusionary: civilians, because they lacked military service experience, could not empathise and be used as a resource. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The financialization of everyday life has received considerable attention since the 2008 global financial crisis. Financialization is thought to have created active financial subjects through the ability to participate in mainstream financial services. While the lived experience of these mainstream financial subjects has been the subject of close scrutiny, the experiences of financial subjects at the financial fringe have been rarely considered. In the UK, for example, the introduction of High-Cost, Short-Term Credit [HCSTC] or payday loan regulation was designed to protect vulnerable people from accessing unaffordable credit. Exploring the impact of HCSTC regulation is important due to the dramatic decline of the high-cost credit market which helped meet essential needs in an era of austerity. As such, the paper examines the impact of the HCSTC regulation on sixty-four financially marginalized individuals in the UK that are unable to access payday loans. First, we identify the range of socioeconomic strategies that individuals employ to manage their finances to create a typology of financial subjectivity at the financial fringe. Second, we demonstrate how the temporal and precarious nature of financial inclusion at the financial fringe adds nuance to existing debates of the everyday lived experience of financialization. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Inter- and intragenerational relationships are known to be important in maintaining the wellbeing of older people. A key aspect of these relationships is the exchange of both emotional and instrumental social support. However, relatively little is known about how this exchange of support changes in the context of widespread disruption. The COVID-19 pandemic provides an opportunity to examine how older people's family relationships are impacted by such social change. The present qualitative study explores how older people in the United Kingdom experienced changes in inter- and intragenerational support during the COVID-19 pandemic. Participants (N = 33) were recruited through a large-scale nationally representative survey (https://www.sheffield.ac.uk/psychology-consortium-covid19). We asked how life had been pre-pandemic, how they experienced the first national lockdown and what the future might hold in store. The data were analysed using constructivist grounded theory. This paper focuses on the importance of family relationships and how they changed as a consequence of the pandemic. We found that the family support system had been interrupted, that there were changes in the methods of support and that feelings of belonging were challenged. We argue that families were brought into disequilibrium through changes in the exchange of inter- and intragenerational support. The important role of grandchildren for older adults was striking and challenged by the pandemic. The significance of social connectedness and support within the family had not changed during the pandemic, but it could no longer be lived in the same way. The desire to be close to family members and to support them conflicted with the risk of pandemic infection. Our study found support for the COVID-19 Social Connectivity Paradox: the need for social connectedness whilst maintaining social distance. This challenged family equilibrium, wellbeing and quality of life in older people. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

South-East Asian refugees have lived in the United States of America for nearly four decades, with early refugee immigrants experiencing ageing and later life within the refugee context. As refugees age, health concerns of this older population grow, highlighting the need for ongoing assessment of refugee health and health-seeking behaviours. This study builds on previous literature that assessed the health and health-seeking patterns of South-East Asian refugees in the early years following resettlement, exploring how health and health-seeking is understood among older refugees 40 years after immigration. This paper includes a subset of 37 older refugees from a larger, community-based participatory, mixed-methods intergenerational study of Cambodian and Laotian refugee families conducted over four years (quantitative N = 433; qualitative N = 183). Thematic analysis of 34 semi-structured interviews with these older refugees in coastal Alabama revealed trends in health and health-seeking practices. Older refugees reported high rates of diabetes and hypertension within their generational cohort, and indicated a shift in health-seeking behaviours, whereby Western biomedicine is sought first for such chronic concerns, followed by traditional medicines for mild ailments such as headaches or colds. Older refugees underscored barriers of language, finances and transportation as limiting access to Western health care. Implications for engaging in community health practices and incorporating services to specifically meet the needs of the ageing refugee population are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this paper, the author describes her personal experiences with liver disease and the challenges both before and after receiving an organ transplant. She describes how organs are currently allocated and offers her perspective on what fairness entails in situations where organs fail and patients need multiple organs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The article critically examines the Strategic State approach to social policy as represented by the 'Scottish Approach' to policy-making and delivery. The article outlines the defining features of a strategic approach to social policy and critically appraises the Scottish Government's claim to reflect these principles in flagship welfare reforms. The article considers how far a strategic policy approach has been applied in Scotland and draws upon research exploring the response of local leaders to the challenges posed by the COVID-19 pandemic to examine what this experience reveals about how 'strategic' these actions were. The article concludes that, in contrast to previous slow progress in implementing a strategic approach, the exigencies of COVID compelled innovations in policy making and accelerated practices consistent with a strategic approach. The article concludes with some reflections on what this evidence implies for strategic social policy making and governance. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Exploiting the random assignment of judges to corporate bankruptcy filings, we estimate financial costs of judicial inexperience. Despite new judges' prior legal experience, formal education, and rigorous hiring process, their public Chapter 11 cases spend 19% more time in bankruptcy, realize 31% higher legal and professional fees, and 21% lower creditor recovery rates. Examining possible mechanisms, we find that new judges take longer to rule on motions and cases assigned to these judges file more plans of reorganization. Conservative estimates suggest that minor policy adjustments could increase creditor recoveries by approximately $16.8 billion for the public firms in our sample. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In Infancy and History Agamben (1993) suggests, following Benjamin's footsteps, that true experience is only possible in infancy, a time that has not yet been expropriated by the bareness of modern life. The kind of potentiality that he attributes to infancy signifies the emergence of a new self, which, rather than moving into the mechanical domain of "work," prefers to remain in the creative territory of "play," where it is possible to transform old societal structures into new ones. Agamben's approach to play and its non-chronological temporality offers useful clues in revealing the dynamics of the increasing number of contemporary childhood narratives in Irish and Turkish literature, where characters resist the linear structure of the bildungsroman and the corresponding model of progress, eventually forming a culture of adolescents resistant to maturity. Focusing on some common features of these novelistic characters, such as playfulness, self-experimentation, and messianic idealism, this paper argues that the return of children to contemporary Turkish and Irish novel opens a new terrain of possibilities that offer liberation from the poverty of experience Agamben attributes to modern society. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Informal caregiving for older family members is increasingly recognized and encouraged by public policies. This is even more the case in familialistic countries such as Austria. This article aims to examine the role of the family in the care culture of a familialistic care regime through the experiences of care dyads combining upwards intergenerational family care and formal care services. The analysis is based on framework analysis of 48 face-to-face interviews, almost all conducted separately, with 24 care dyads of older care users (average age 86 years old with moderate to high care needs) and their main informal carers in Austria combining formal and informal care. A quarter of caregivers and care receivers were male. We identified four different ideals (family care, preferences, involvement, gendered care) which were distributed across different groups of Socio-Economic Status (SES) and described by women and men. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Preliminary evidence shows that discordance in stress experience, expression, and physiology (EEP) in adolescents is linked to depression, suicidal ideation (SI), non-suicidal self-injury (NSSI), and brain functioning. This study employs person-centered analysis to probe the relationship between stress responses, psychopathology, and neural patterns in female adolescents who are oversampled for engagement in NSSI. Methods: Adolescent females (N = 109, ages 12–17) underwent a social stress test from which self-report measures of stress experience, observer ratings of stress expression, and physiological metrics of stress (via salivary cortisol) were obtained. Multi-trajectory modeling was employed to identify concordant and discordant stress EEP groups. Depressive symptoms, SI and attempt, NSSI engagement, frontal and limbic activation to emotional stimuli, and resting state fronto-limbic connectivity were examined in the EEP groups derived from the multi-trajectory models. Results: Four groups were identified, three of which demonstrated relatively concordant EEP and one which demonstrated discordant EEP (High Experience-High Expression-Low Physiology). Further, replicating past research, the High Experience-High Expression-Low Physiology discordant group exhibited higher depressive symptoms, SI, suicide attempt, and NSSI episodes (only for sensitivity analyses based on past year) relative to other EEP groups. No significant group differences in brain functioning emerged. Conclusion: Results indicate that within-person, multi-level patterns in stress responding capture risk for dysfunction including depression and self-injurious thoughts and behaviors. Further interrogating of system-level stress functioning may better inform assessment and intervention efforts. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Family members of people with mental illness (MI) may experience a host of psychological adversities such as increased stress, burden, and reduced wellbeing. However, relatively little is known about siblings. This study aimed to characterise the experience of distress (viz. depressive and anxiety symptoms), burden, and wellbeing in siblings of people with MI. Methods: Studies reporting on quantitative measures of depression, anxiety, burden, or wellbeing in siblings; and/or qualitative findings on siblings' experience were eligible. The literature search was conducted up until 20th October 2022. Results: Sixty-two studies comprising data from 3744 siblings were included. The pooled mean percentage of depressive symptoms fell in the mild range at 15.71 (k = 28, N = 2187, 95% CI 12.99–18.43) and anxiety symptoms fell in the minimal range at 22.45 (k = 16, N = 1122, 95% CI 17.09–27.80). Moderator analyses indicate that siblings of people with a schizophrenia spectrum disorder experience greater depressive symptoms than siblings of people with other types of MI (β = −16.38, p < 0.001). Qualitative findings suggest that individuals may be particularly vulnerable during their siblings' illness onset and times of relapse. Limited communication, confusion about MI, and the need to compensate may contribute to siblings' distress and/or burden. Siblings' experience of wellbeing and caregiving were closely related. Conclusion: This review highlights the complex psychological experience of siblings and the need for greater research and clinical support for this important yet often overlooked cohort. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Few studies have examined online experience by young people who die by suicide. Methods: A 3-year UK-wide consecutive case series of all young people aged 10–19 who died by suicide, based on national mortality data. We extracted information on the antecedents of suicide of 544 of these 595 deaths (91%) from official investigations, mainly inquests. Results: Suicide-related online experience was reported in 24% (n = 128/544) of suicide deaths in young people between 2014 and 2016, equivalent to 43 deaths per year, and was more common in girls than boys (OR 1.87, 95% CI 1.23–2.85, p = 0.003) and those identifying as LGBT (OR 2.35, 95% CI 1.10–5.05, p = 0.028). Searching for information about method was most common (n = 68, 13%), followed by posting suicidal ideas online (n = 57, 10%). Self-harm, bereavement (especially by suicide), social isolation, and mental and physical ill-health were more likely in those known to have suicide-related online experience compared to those who did not. 29 (5%) were bullied online, more often girls (OR 2.84, 1.34–6.04, p = 0.007). Online bullying often accompanied face-to-face bullying (n = 16/29, 67%). Conclusions: Suicide-related online experience is a common, but likely underestimated, antecedent to suicide in young people. Although its causal role is unclear, it may influence suicidality in this population. Mental health professionals should be aware that suicide-related online experience – not limited to social media – is a potential risk for young patients, and may be linked to experiences offline. For public health, wider action is required on internet regulation and support for children and their families. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study sought to explore qualitatively experiences of existential loneliness (EL) in 80 older people living in retirement communities across the United Kingdom and Australia. Qualitative semi-structured interviews permitted in-depth exploration of issues such as biographical narrative, close relationships, loss, feelings of loneliness and retirement living. It was our intention to conduct a large-scale, deep-listening exercise that would provide further clues about EL in older people and the circumstances that give rise to such feelings. Data provided rich insight into older people's inner lives. Core themes identified loss of close attachments, lack of physical touch and intimacy, deterioration of health and body, and lack of an emotional language through which to express EL as central to older people's experiences. Furthermore, there was a suggestion that the move to retirement living was for many people inextricably connected to their experience of EL. Our data further support and extend the notion that EL can be thought of as a gradual sense of separation from the world and that ageing intensifies a myriad of social, emotional and physical circumstances that prompt its emergence. This sense of existential isolation need not be thought of as exclusive to those experiencing extreme frailty or who face death imminently – our data pointed to a clear and gradual emergence of EL throughout later life. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Older adults 75 and above are a fast-growing segment of the population. However, few studies have investigated what it means to age successfully from their perspective. This group of older adults face challenges that might characteristically differ from younger older adults. Therefore, the aim of this study was to conduct a systematic review of the perspectives of older adults aged 75 and above regarding what it means to age successfully and to summarise the findings through a narrative synthesis. We also aimed to provide a snapshot of inhibitors and facilitators to achieve successful ageing. A systematic review of the 75+ older adults' perspectives was conducted across PubMed, CINAHL, Scopus, Web of Science and PsycINFO. Qualitative, quantitative and mixed-methods original peer-reviewed studies were included. After reviewing 4,661 articles, 15 articles met the inclusion criteria and 15 themes were identified. They ranged from biomedical components such as physical functioning to psychosocial components such as relationships, reflections on life and past experiences, preparations for death and environmental factors. The findings revealed that as people age, their definition of successful ageing changes, expanding the current conceptualisation of successful ageing by including additional factors that can act as facilitators and/or inhibitors, such as death and environmental factors. The findings also highlight the need for further research on theory development by considering age-related differences and the perspectives of under-studied populations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In Sweden, sheltered housing is a housing model that provides accessible apartments with elevated social possibilities for older people. The environment within sheltered housing is expected to support resident health and reduce the need for care services. A previous study has shown that with increasing levels of depressive mood and decreasing levels of self-rated health and functional status, those residing in sheltered housing report higher levels of thriving compared to those ageing in place. Therefore, the aim of this study was to illuminate aspects of sheltered housing that are facilitators and/or barriers to thriving. Seven semi-structured group interviews in five different sheltered housing accommodations in Sweden were conducted between April 2019 and January 2020 (N = 38). The results, analysed using qualitative content analysis and presented in a model developed by Grol and Wensing, illuminate the four main categories of facilitators and barriers to thriving: individual factors, social context, environmental factors and organisational context. The results of this study show that the factors that influence experiences of thriving in sheltered housing are multifaceted and interconnected. Although the supportive environment provided in sheltered housing seems to contribute to thriving, the limited consideration towards the shifting health of residents is a barrier to thriving. The results of this study may assist in implementing tailored interventions to help support thriving on various levels. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The overall aim of this grounded theory study was to explore the context of a nursing home as 'home' from the perspective of residents and staff. Sixteen focus group interviews were used to collect qualitative data from nursing home residents (N = 48) and staff (N = 44). Five distinct categories captured the views and experiences of participating residents and staff. These were: (a) Starting off on the right foot, 'First impressions can be the lasting ones; (b) Making new and maintaining existing connections, 'There is great unity between staff and residents'; (c) The nursing home as home, 'It's a bit like home from home for me'; (d) Intuitive knowing, 'I don't even have to speak, she just knows'; and (e) Feeling at home in a regulated environment, 'It takes the home away from nursing home'. Together these five categories formed the basis of the core category 'Knowing me, knowing you', which captures the experiences of participants who repeatedly highlighted the importance of relationships and feelings of mutuality and respect between and among staff and residents as central to feeling at home in a nursing home. The reciprocity and mutuality associated with the core category, 'Knowing me, knowing you', was at times challenged by staff shortages, time constraints, and conflicting priorities associated with the co-existence of a regulated and homely environment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Although mental wellbeing has been linked with positive health outcomes, including longevity and improved emotional and cognitive functioning, studies examining the underlying neural mechanisms of both subjective and psychological wellbeing have been sparse. We assessed whether both forms of wellbeing are associated with neural activity engaged during positive and negative emotion processing and the extent to which this association is driven by genetics or environment. Methods: We assessed mental wellbeing in 230 healthy adult monozygotic and dizygotic twins using a previously validated questionnaire (COMPAS-W) and undertook functional magnetic resonance imaging during a facial emotion viewing task. We used linear mixed models to analyse the association between COMPAS-W scores and emotion-elicited neural activation. Univariate twin modelling was used to evaluate heritability of each brain region. Multivariate twin modelling was used to compare twin pairs to assess the contributions of genetic and environmental factors to this association. Results: Higher levels of wellbeing were associated with greater neural activity in the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex, localised in the right inferior frontal gyrus (IFG), in response to positive emotional expressions of happiness. Univariate twin modelling showed activity in the IFG to have 20% heritability. Multivariate twin modelling suggested that the association between wellbeing and positive emotion-elicited neural activity was driven by common variance from unique environment (r = 0.208) rather than shared genetics. Conclusions: Higher mental wellbeing may have a basis in greater engagement of prefrontal neural regions in response to positive emotion, and this association may be modifiable by unique life experiences. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Oral histories from 9/11 responders to the World Trade Center (WTC) attacks provide rich narratives about distress and resilience. Artificial Intelligence (AI) models promise to detect psychopathology in natural language, but they have been evaluated primarily in non-clinical settings using social media. This study sought to test the ability of AI-based language assessments to predict PTSD symptom trajectories among responders. Methods: Participants were 124 responders whose health was monitored at the Stony Brook WTC Health and Wellness Program who completed oral history interviews about their initial WTC experiences. PTSD symptom severity was measured longitudinally using the PTSD Checklist (PCL) for up to 7 years post-interview. AI-based indicators were computed for depression, anxiety, neuroticism, and extraversion along with dictionary-based measures of linguistic and interpersonal style. Linear regression and multilevel models estimated associations of AI indicators with concurrent and subsequent PTSD symptom severity (significance adjusted by false discovery rate). Results: Cross-sectionally, greater depressive language (β = 0.32; p = 0.049) and first-person singular usage (β = 0.31; p = 0.049) were associated with increased symptom severity. Longitudinally, anxious language predicted future worsening in PCL scores (β = 0.30; p = 0.049), whereas first-person plural usage (β = −0.36; p = 0.014) and longer words usage (β = −0.35; p = 0.014) predicted improvement. Conclusions: This is the first study to demonstrate the value of AI in understanding PTSD in a vulnerable population. Future studies should extend this application to other trauma exposures and to other demographic groups, especially under-represented minorities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The tradition of intergenerational care and support exchanges in Indian families is assumed to be disturbed because of changes in family structure brought on by modern life, which is mainly based on studies investigating experiences of older adults regarding the impact of socio-economic change on their care arrangement. However, there is a large gap in understanding the experiences of adult children from a larger relational perspective, more than just care provision to their older relatives. Drawing on 26 in-depth interviews with adult children living in modern and traditional living arrangements from South India, the study explores their experiences with their parents with regard to reciprocity of care and support, the challenges they experience and strategies they adopt to overcome those challenges. The analysis shows adult children perceive the increased demands of modern work life and their older kin's preferences to be heard, lack of flexibility and related extra domestic work and costs, do cause a bigger burden for them in both living arrangements. However, adult children strive to uphold the traditional values of caring for their older kin and sharing emotional bonding with them. This inspiration helps them to employ strategies to accept their older relatives as they are, focus their attention on the benefits they receive from them and distribute care tasks with other relatives to overcome the challenges. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Mental illness among young adults is increasing both nationally and internationally. Primary care's mission is to be the hub of health care and to offer high-quality care regardless of age, patient group, or disease. The role of district nurse varies in terms of definition and scope of practice but has a central role through their health promotion mission and by being the first person these young adults meet in primary care. Aim: The aim of this study was to explore district nurses' experiences of meeting young adults with mental illness in primary care. Method: The study was conducted with a qualitative inductive approach. Data were collected through semi-structured interviews with nine district nurses in primary care in Sweden. The data were analysed through qualitative content analysis. Results: Three categories emerged in the results – The difficult meeting , The district nurse's ability to promote health , and A sense of inadequacy. The results show that district nurses can experience feelings of stress and frustration when time, resources, and knowledge are lacking. Continuous training in mental illness was desired by all district nurses. Listening, confirming, and daring to ask were highlighted as particularly important in the meeting with young adults. Cooperation between different professions and colleagues was highlighted as a prerequisite for the provision of good quality care. Conclusion: To meet the increasing number of young adults with mental health problems seeking care, district nurses in primary care need continuous training. By working in a person-centred and health-promoting manner, the district nurse's competence can be utilized. The district nurses perceive they could manage the important role being a resource and take a greater responsibility to guide young adults on the right path. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In "The Devil's Dictionary", Bierce (1911) defined language as "The music with which we charm the serpents guarding another's treasure." This satirical definition reflects a core truth – humans communicate using language to accomplish social goals. In this Keynote, we urge cognitive scientists and neuroscientists to more fully embrace sociolinguistic and sociocultural experiences as part of their theoretical and empirical purview. To this end, we review theoretical antecedents of such approaches, and offer a new framework – the Systems Framework of Bilingualism – that we hope will be useful in this regard. We conclude with new questions to nudge our discipline towards a more nuanced, inclusive, and socially-informed scientific understanding of multilingual experience. We hope to engage a wide array of researchers united under the broad umbrella of multilingualism (e.g., researchers in neurocognition, sociolinguistics, and applied scientists). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Evidence suggests that increasing the descriptive representation of groups improves their substantive representation. What underpins this link? Many scholars writing on the subject stop short of arguing explicitly that it is "shared experience" within groups. I argue that we should embrace the potential conceptual and empirical benefits of framing representation through experience. To do this, we should think of experience specifically in terms of the epistemic content and capacities gained through subjective experience, which can allow individuals to think about the world in distinct ways. I reframe the idea that experiences might be shared within groups and ameliorate concerns that the concept is essentialist, drawing out the political relevance of my argument. This has the strategic implication that we should be unafraid to argue in favor of political presence on the basis of (shared) experience and the empirical implication that future research should consider subjective experience more closely. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The number of relatives and geographical proximity between them affects informal support provided to older persons. In this study, we investigate whether (a) childless persons and parents living remotely from their adult children experience similar shortages in informal support, and (b) whether neighbours, friends and other non-family helpers compensate for these shortages. On the basis of Survey on Health, Ageing and Retirement in Europe (SHARE) data for 12 European countries, we estimate the probability and amount of informal non-financial support received by persons aged 65 and over who remain childless or live at different distances to their children. The contribution of non-family individuals is rather complementary to the help from family. Parents residing in the proximity of their children rely almost exclusively on family; as the geographical distance between adult children and older parents increases, the probability and amount of non-family support increase as well. But childless individuals differ from parents of remotely living children: the former rely on smaller support networks and resort more often to other relatives than the latter. Non-family individuals compensate for the scarcity of informal support only in the case of parents of distant children, but not in the case of childless individuals. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The term 'in the moment' has received growing interest in the context of music programmes for people living with dementia, with music therapists, family carers, health-care professionals and people living with dementia themselves reporting the value of framing musical experiences in the 'here and now'. Although this term is being used more frequently within the literature, there has yet to be a formal examination of such 'in the moment' musical experiences and how they might benefit a person living with dementia. We used a multiple-case study approach to develop a thematic framework of 'in the moment' musical experiences within the context of a music-making programme for people living with dementia. The research followed six people living with dementia and four family carers, and used video-observation and video-elicitation interviews to capture and analyse 'in the moment' experiences. Four thematic observations were developed which captured 'in the moment' musical experiences: Sharing a life story through music, Musical agency 'in the moment', Feeling connected 'in the moment' and Musical ripples into everyday life. These findings showcase the creativity and musical abilities of people living with dementia whilst affirming music as a medium to connect people living with dementia with their own life story, other people and the environments in which music-making takes place. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Personhood has been a key influence on the development of person-centred care models in dementia. However, there is ambiguity around the concept and interpretation of personhood, and what it means in practical terms for the delivery of care to people with dementia. This study examines the conceptualisation of personhood within the formal care system for people with dementia in Ireland. A multiple perspective study design examines the experiences of personhood in dementia from the perspectives of people with dementia, family carers and a range of formal carers. Semi-structured interviews with participants were conducted in both community and long-term care settings. Interpretative phenomenological analysis is used to examine the data. A total of 31 participants were interviewed: eight people with dementia, eight family carers and 15 formal carers. There is general consensus on the core elements of personhood among all participants: interests and preferences; lifecourse experiences; social interaction; family; and place. However, there is ambiguity among family carers and formal carers in the interpretation of changes to personhood as the disease progresses. Interpersonal and structural barriers to supporting personhood are identified by all participants. The findings provide guidance on the traits of personhood-enhancing care, including effective communication skills, and the potential of health and social care reform to support the core elements of personhood among people with dementia. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: The role of the Consultant Radiographer (CR) is crossing traditional boundaries to encompass duties and responsibilities normally performed by the medical profession. Changes and streamlining of radiotherapy (RT) services result as therapeutic radiographers are taking on the responsibility of informed consent. Purpose: This article discusses and evaluates the legal, ethical and practical aspects of informed consent within the trust and how they have implemented the introduction of CR-led consent. It reports on the impact on the waiting times for treatment and user experience for myeloma patients receiving RT for pain relief from bone metastases. Materials and methods: A literature search was conducted using PubMed, CINAHL, Medline and Cochrane library using the term 'informed consent'. The legal, ethical and practical aspects were compared to the current system and then was used to inform the development of a new pathway. Data were analysed from the department's statistics for waiting times and the number of treatment courses. Results and conclusions: CR-led informed consent has streamlined the patient pathway and has improved patient care and experience. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Social isolation of older adults is difficult to break through, and interventions that focus on network development or enhanced social participation are hardly effective, especially when the older adults have been isolated for a long time and have problems in multiple life domains. This study aimed to investigate the needs and subjective experiences of this less-researched group and obtain a deeper understanding of their goals and priorities. The study involved a qualitative study with 25 socially isolated persons who receive assistance from a social worker in an individual guidance trajectory. Data were collected via repeated in-depth interviews with the older adults. By directing the focus towards their subjective experiences, the study gives insight into the 'experiential effectivity' of the intervention. It shows what their experienced problems were, and to what degree they benefited from the intervention in this respect. The experience of personal attention and involvement of the social workers represents the most relevant results for them. The participants have no need for network development or engagement in local communities. Yet, the help offered by the social workers produces other results for them, such as solved practical problems, emotional support, more self-sufficiency, a point of contact or a safety net that was not there before. This knowledge can help to improve the quality of intervention for this target group. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Social Policy as an academic discipline has been at the forefront of many progressive movements in society, exploring problems of poverty, hardship, exclusion and suffering, government intervention, and the critical appraisal of those interventions. Yet it has been strangely silent on issues of sexual identity and gender identity and the inequities faced by the LGBTQ+ community. In this article we draw upon lesbian and gay studies, and queer studies, to, first, unpack how heteronormativity is reinforced in social policy in practice and in its analysis within Social Policy as a discipline. This illustrates how the family, as a core basis for welfare in societies, has meant that, reflexively, the base unit of analysis within Social Policy has been the heterosexual family, without a full interrogation of what this means for different groups. Second, we review the limited evidence available around the inequalities LGBTQ+ people face, primarily in the UK (and wider global North), highlighting how the years of oppression have made "counting" this group of people difficult within our usual survey instruments. Thus, while Social Policy has aimed to achieve a universal social citizenship for all, it has inadvertently remained silent on how to include LGBTQ+ in its analysis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Researchers and programme champions alike have identified older adults as key contributors to age-friendly community change efforts. There has been very little scholarship, however, to characterise the nature of older adults' engagement in age-friendly community initiatives (AFCIs). To help address this gap, we drew on five waves of data from semi-structured interviews with core group members of eight AFCIs in a Northeast region of the United States of America. Interviews were conducted as part of a multi-year, community-engaged study on the development of philanthropically supported AFCIs. We iteratively coded segments of the interviews in which core group members described the involvement of older adults, as well as their efforts to engage older adults in the initiatives. This analysis resulted in an inductive-analytic typology with five qualitatively distinct categories, including older adults as: (a) consumers (receiving information, goods and services through the AFCI), (b) informants (sharing perspectives on ageing in the community with the core group), (c) task assistants (assisting with project-oriented tasks under the direction of the core group), (d) champions (contributing ideas and implementing action on their own initiative), and (e) core group members (holding primary responsibility for driving the work of the AFCI forward). We discuss implications of the typology for research on AFCI implementation and evaluation, as well as opportunities for AFCIs to enhance the engagement of older adults from historically marginalised groups. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Earlier studies show that experiencing life as meaningful in old age promotes holistic wellbeing and health among older people. As more and more people are living with reduced capacities in their own homes, there is an urgent need to find new ways of promoting holistic wellbeing of the ageing population. Analysing data gathered from existential discussion groups on Service TV (STV), we show how strongly relationality and meaning in life are intertwined for older people. Our findings indicate that respect and support for the autonomy of older people is very important: in order to continue living at home, and prepare for a future with reduced capacities, they need family members for support. Autonomy of ageing becomes relational as choices and wishes are negotiated with family members. Relationships also contribute to loss of meaning. When older people felt that they were not close enough to their family, longed for friends of the same age, were bereaved or widowed, the relational gap caused a violation of meaning. In contrast, participation and activities with peers brought deep joy and connectedness to the lives of the participants. STV provided a new channel for participants to find and form meaningful relationships. Therefore, it is concluded that relationality can be supported by technological means of care. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This article draws upon six social research studies completed by members of the Dementia and Ageing Research Team at The University of Manchester and their associated networks over an eight-year period (2011–2019) with the aim of constructing a definition of 'being in the moment' and situating it within a continuum of moments that could be used to contextualise and frame the lived experience of dementia. Using the approach formulated by Pound et al. (2005) in synthesising qualitative studies, we identified this continuum of moments as comprising four sequential and interlinked steps: (a) 'creating the moment', defined as the processes and procedures necessary to enable being in the moment to take place – the time necessary for this to occur can range from fleeting to prolonged; (b) 'being in the moment', which refers to the multi-sensory processes involved in a personal or relational interaction and embodied engagement – being in the moment can be sustained through creativity and flow; (c) 'ending the moment', defined as when a specific moment is disengaged – this can be triggered by the person(s) involved consciously or subconsciously, or caused by a distraction in the environment or suchlike; and (d) 'reliving the moment', which refers to the opportunity for the experience(s) involved in 'being in the moment' to be later remembered and shared, however fragmentary, supported or full the recall. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In recent decades, historians have become increasingly interested in the logistical challenges and difficulties encountered by those responsible for the collection, preservation and safe transport of specimens from the field to the museum or laboratory. This article builds on this trend by looking beyond apparent successes to consider the practices and practicalities of shipboard travel and maritime and coastal collecting activities. The discussion focuses on the example of William Henry Harvey, who travelled to Australia in pursuit of cryptogams – non-flowering plants like mosses, lichens and algae – in 1853. In his private correspondence to family and friends, Harvey offered insights into the challenges and obstacles faced by all collectors in the period. His experiences were fundamentally shaped by the material culture, embodied knowledge and physical constraints he encountered on the way. On one level, shipboard and onshore collecting activities were facilitated by the connections forged by new technologies and Britain's global empire. But they also depended on specific contexts and relied on local agents and actors, as well as on the physical and technical facilities (and limitations) of those doing the collecting. The examples of Harvey and others shed light on the real, 'lived' experiences of individual collectors, the difficulties and challenges they encountered in amassing their collections, and the networks of people on which they relied. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

User involvement is increasingly common in health-care research, and the ideal is user participation and influence during all research stages. Here we describe and reflect on the processes and outcomes associated with advisory group–researcher collaboration from a person-centred perspective. When planning a study in which older adults' experiences of reablement were investigated, older adults with previous first-hand experience of reablement participated in an advisory group. We found that the fostering of healthful relationships, in which experiential and research knowledge are considered complimentary and equitable, and all members have the power to exercise their unique roles, seems to be a prerequisite for the co-creation of knowledge. Also, practical arrangements and social relationships constitute important details that are crucial to ensuring contribution from older adults with health-related conditions. While such individuals may be unable to participate during all stages of a research project, their involvement on an advisory level during the initial stages can increase study quality and relevance. Input from the advisory group members contributed to the improvement of the language in the study information sheet, improvement of the study design, development and validation of the interview guide, and insight into how the interviews should be conducted. The personal knowledge and expertise of the advisory group members, which emanated from their immediate sensitivity, contributed to the person-centredness in the study. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Aims: To review the experiences of healthcare professionals (HCPs) and service users on the provision and receipt of home enteral nutrition (HEN) in primary care settings, respectively. Backgrounds: HEN supports the nutritional needs of service users in primary care settings who are unable to meet their nutritional requirements through oral intake alone. While HEN supports service users to remain in their home, the provision of HEN services can be variable. The prevalence of HEN is increasing as health systems shift delivery of care from acute to primary care settings, and therefore the evolving needs of HCPs and service users in relation to HEN deserve exploration. Methods: Quantitative and qualitative studies were included if they described (1) practices that support best outcomes in adults on HEN and residing in their own homes and/or (2) service user and HCP experiences of HEN. Studies on the economics of HEN were included. Databases searched included MEDLINE/PubMed, EMBASE, Web of Science, and CINAHL. Publications up to March 2021 were included. A descriptive analytical approach was used to summarise the findings. Findings: Key themes included the importance of initial education to enable service users to adapt to HEN and the need for support from knowledgeable HCPs. Access to support from HCPs in primary care was limited, and some HCPs felt their knowledge of HEN was inadequate. Service users highlighted the significant impact of HEN on daily living and emphasised the need for support from a HEN team. HEN services were also associated with reduced hospital admissions, lengths of stay in hospital, and costs of hospitalisation. Conclusions: A specialist HEN service can manage enteral nutrition-related complications, reduce unnecessary hospital admissions, and improve quality of care and patient satisfaction. Further education of HCPs is needed on the provision of HEN. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Residents of older people's homes furnish their rooms with belongings that are associated with meaningful relationships. Previous research shows how material culture symbolises residents' past and existing relationships, helping residents to remain embedded within familial and social networks. Less attention has been paid to how relationships are actively (re)constituted through socio-material interactions, and to the potential for objects to facilitate new relationships. This article presents findings from an ethnographic study into the everyday experiences of residents of an older people's home in northern England. Using observations of daily life and in-depth interviews with residents, it demonstrates how residents used material culture in gift-giving, divestment practices and in mundane social interactions. In this way, residents used objects to not only maintain relationships with family members outside the home, but form new relationships inside the home with other residents and members of staff. Combining theories of materiality, relationality and social practice, I argue that residents' interactions with material culture helped to facilitate new social interaction and meaningful relationships. This is important in a social context where loneliness has been identified as a significant threat to residents' mental and physical health. Residential homes for older people can develop guidance on practical activities and strategies that can use material culture to increase social interaction and enhance quality of life for residents. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]