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The First 1000 Days (the period from conception to a child's second birthday) is an important developmental period. However, little is known about experiences of parents with refugee and migrant backgrounds during this period. A systematic review was conducted according to PRISMA guidelines. Publications were identified through searches of the Embase, PsycINFO, PubMed, and Scopus databases, critically appraised, and synthesised using thematic analysis. A total of 35 papers met inclusion criteria. Depressive symptomatology was consistently higher than global averages, however maternal depression conceptualisations differed across studies. Several papers reported changes in relationship dynamics as a result of having a baby post-migration. Consistent relationships were found between social and health support and wellbeing. Conceptualisations of wellbeing may differ among migrant families. Limited understanding of health services and relationships with health providers may impede help-seeking. Several research gaps were identified, particularly in relation to the wellbeing of fathers, and of parents of children over 12 months old. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In this article I consider David Olson's account of how literacy produces a new kind of consciousness, one in which a process of metacognition makes possible both knowledge and an understanding of language itself. This, he argues, enables readers and writers to reflect upon language, understand what constitutes reasoning, and recognize any logical flaws embedded in written texts. I then locate Olson within the cognitivist tradition of Jerome Bruner, critically analyzing Bruner's concept of emotion as well as Olson's account of experience. While he acknowledges the place of experience in John Dewey's account of literacy, he tends to regard it as a form of consciousness rather than something more primordial. I go on to argue that experience, rather than consciousness, is a fundamental ingredient in the life of the mind and learning in general, where aesthetic emotions play a significant role. A theory of literacy that fails to take these elements into account is incomplete, however powerful it may appear. In order to make this argument, I utilize the work of John Dewey and Alfred North Whitehead, who afford experience and aesthetic emotions a primordial place in their process philosophies. I also contrast the organic concept of mind advocated by Whitehead and Dewey in their theory of learning with the mechanistic account Olson inherits from Bruner. Furthermore, I analyze the importance Whitehead ascribes to art education, and go on to show why he believes art to be the source of consciousness itself. Once again, this contrasts with Olson's cognitivist account. I conclude that without experience and aesthetic emotion our capacity to reflect upon them through language would not be possible. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Special Supplemental Nutrition Program for Women, Infants, and Children (WIC) is an essential nutrition assistance program that has led to successful health outcomes and healthcare access. To alleviate discomfort associated with WIC shopping at stores, the Congress mandated the transition to electronic benefit transfer (EBT) card system from paper vouchers. This study aimed to explore the experiences of WIC recipients in using EBT cards in stores. WIC recipients from one WIC clinic in northern New Jersey (N = 220) participated in this study. An online survey was framed under the theory of planned behavior to probe their underlying behavioral, normative, and control beliefs of using EBT cards. Using content analyses, dominating themes of each belief were extracted. Participants composed of Hispanic (91.2%) with mean age of 31.68 (SD = 7.69). Most frequently mentioned advantages of using EBT cards were convenience and ease (34.3%) followed by fast and efficient (28.5%). Participants noted that most people would approve of using EBT cards (70%), especially those who receive the benefits and approve of the public assistance (16.7%). They stated that having improved store inventory and an increase in WIC-authorized stores (17.2%) would make the EBT cards use easy. The transition to EBT cars allowed purchase flexibility, alleviated stigma and the purchase process burdens, but the challenges associated with WIC app usage and store specific issues remained. These challenges should be addressed in future intervention to enable WIC recipients more engaged in using the EBT cards. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: The purpose of this paper is to add to the research literature and begin to fill the gap in knowledge about shared parenting arrangements for women with young children and who have experienced domestic violence (DV), in three Canadian provinces; Alberta, Manitoba and Ontario. Method: This paper reports on the qualitative findings from a mixed methods study on shared parenting from women with children ages 4 and under. Twenty women participated in one-on-one individual interviews through electronic platform utilizing Zoom. Thematic analysis is used to analyze the data. Results: Despite efforts to not exclusively recruit women who had experienced domestic violence (DV) from their former partner, all participants identified as survivors of DV and ongoing survivors of DV, specifically, coercive controlling behaviours. Five themes describe the women's experiences of shared parenting with young children: 1) walking a tight-rope; 2) navigating post-separation relationships; 3) emotional realities of shared parenting; 4) shared parenting outcomes; and, 5) structural challenges. Conclusions: This paper not only adds to the significant and longstanding gap in knowledge directly from women with children ages 4 and under in shared parenting relationships, and who have experienced DV, and also helps to inform social service and legal actors. It is timely with the amendments to the Divorce Act in Canada which now includes DV as a factor in determining the best interests of the child. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

In quantum foundations, there is growing interest in the program of reconstructing the quantum formalism from clear physical principles. These reconstructions are formulated in an operational framework, deriving the formalism from information-theoretic principles. It has been recognized that this project is in tension with standard ψ-ontic interpretations. This paper presupposes that the quantum reconstruction program (QRP) (i) is a worthwhile project and (ii) puts pressure on ψ-ontic interpretations. Where does this leave us? Prima facie, it seems that ψ-epistemic interpretations perfectly fit the spirit of information-based reconstructions. However, ψ-epistemic interpretations, understood as saying that the wave functions represents one's knowledge about a physical system, recently have been challenged on technical and conceptual grounds. More importantly, for some researchers working on reconstructions, the lesson of successful reconstructions is that the wave function does not represent objective facts about the world. Since knowledge is a factive concept, this speaks against epistemic interpretations. In this paper, I discuss whether ψ-doxastic interpretations constitute a reasonable alternative. My thesis is that if we want to engage QRP with ψ-doxastic interpretations, then we should aim at a reconstruction that is spelled out in non-factive experiential terms. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

An overview of Applied Behavior Analysis (ABA) and Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) in the Middle East was published by Kelly and colleagues in 2016. The focus of the review was to explore clinical services, educational opportunities, and published research in the six countries of the Gulf Cooperation Council, namely the Kingdom of Bahrain, the State of Kuwait, the Sultanate of Oman, the State of Qatar, the Kingdom of Saudi Arabia, and the United Arab Emirates. The objective of the current paper was to provide an update on the current status of ABA and ASD in the Gulf region, with a focus on successes, challenges, and recommendations for future directions. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The aim of this paper is to compare the theory of Gestalt qualities, introduced by the Austrian philosopher Christian von Ehrenfels (1859–1932), with the concept of Umwelt, proposed by Jakob von Uexküll (1864–1944). The primary basis for the comparison will be the phenomenology of Maurice Merleau-Ponty (1908–1961), who extensively discusses the two concepts in his work. In the Uexküll–Ehrenfelsian context, we focus on analysing the similarities and differences of their argumentation and model approaches to understanding the living and non-living natural entities, their mutual communication, development, and ontological grounding. We also consider the role of individual experience with the environment: in that context, the metaphysical frameworks within which the two thinkers operate in their efforts to explain natural phenomena are central to our comparative reflections. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: This paper foregrounds the experiences of mothers involved with England's children's social care system when experiencing domestic abuse. It reports on data from a survivor-led study on domestic violence and/or abuse (DVA), involving women victim-survivors and domestic abuse practitioners. It aimed to understand how dominant discourses governing child protection work with families in which there is a perpetrator of DVA, might be revised to shift a tendency to hold mothers (solely) responsible for the protection of children as well as for their partners' abuse. Methods: The study advances a discourse analysis of interview and focus group data, substantiating how children's social care practices produce the routine responsibilisation of the non-abusing parent, usually the mother, with limited focus on the abusing parent, usually the father. Results: The paper exposes the gendered discourses of mother-victim-blame and responsibility patterning children's social care responses to domestic abuse, which together intensify adult and child victim-survivor material harm and hamper child protection work. Also in evidence are the enduring traumatic consequences of the court-ordered removal of children. Conclusion: The paper has implications for policy and practice, asserting that shifting responsibility away from mothers requires the ongoing interrogation of normative understandings of gender relations and gender-role stereotypes as they manifest in families. Fathers' accountability should be constructed on a structural as well as individual level, which in the case of DVA and the family, incorporates efforts to enable perpetrators of DVA to cultivate an individual sense of responsibility and accountability, as standard practice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper explores the potential of collaborative group facilitation between therapists and peer workers in mental health. A case study of co-practice between a music therapist and a peer worker is used to illustrate how lived experience expertise can enrich and complement therapeutic groups. The paper aims to begin a discussion around collaborative group facilitation within mental health practice and to advocate for continued development of collaborative practice between peer workers and therapists. Experiences of collaboration are explored through the case study provided using a synthesis of the authors' reflections and dialogue. The importance of role negotiation, role definition, and open communication around changing roles and boundaries are discussed as key considerations for beginning collaborations, as well as the establishment and maintenance of a foundation of trust and support within the working relationship. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines suicide prevalence among Nigerian youth struggling to find meaning in life. Frustrated by unattainable ideals, they experience despair. The study explores religion's role in providing support for meaning-seeking individuals. Utilizing an explorative approach, the paper highlights how religion can play a role in offering solidarity, morality, and hope as vital resources for creating a meaningful life. It introduces "Pastrotherapy" as a pastoral care approach to addressing existential questions. Findings emphasize the importance of religious communities and leaders in promoting resilience and addressing underlying causes of despair. This study reveals how religious beliefs and practices support Nigerian youth facing existential challenges, shedding light on the intersection of religion, meaning-making, and mental health. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Within state-owned enterprises (SOEs), supervisory board mandates are often given to politicians, many of whom are selected through political processes in which competence is not necessarily the decisive factor. This paper analyzes the impact of this form of governance, examining the business competence level of supervisory board members and their influence on the financial performance of 58 state-owned utility companies in Germany from 2011 to 2016 by applying OLS regression. For this purpose, the biographical backgrounds of 3350 supervisory board members were compiled to discern their education, management, and industry experience. Contrary to our hypotheses, the empirical analyses show no effects for any of the competence dimensions on companies' profitability. In a more detailed analysis, we find that board members with management experience from outside the energy sector seem detrimental to the company, which may indicate self-overestimation bias. This result is robust across different specifications and opens up an interesting new approach to analyzing the impact of board member competence on firm performance. The insignificance of the other competence areas indicates a rather low impact of supervisory boards on SOEs based on their unique institutional setting and in comparison to private sector corporate governance. Overall, this study contributes to both scholars and practitioners by providing new insights in the field of public corporate governance, focusing on the unique situation of the competence of politically connected boards and their influence on SOEs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The present paper aims to introduce a constructivist narrative intervention for Narrative Identity Reconstruction (NIR) in working with clients with a history of stressful life events (SLE). This intervention is based on a proposed conceptual framework explaining how SLE affects narrative identity. First, we provide a conceptual model to show the theoretical links between SLE and narrative identity through the three functions of making meaning, unity, and purpose. The present conceptualization proposes that concepts of meaning-making, self-concept clarity, and agency should improve for narrative identity reconstruction. For designing therapy steps, we were inspired by the procedure of the Life Design process for reconstructing narrative identity. We defined the following steps: (a) construct self-story through small stories, (b) deconstruct these stories, (c) reconstruct them into an identity narrative or life portrait, and (d) co-construct intentions that lead to the next action episode in the real world. We hope NIR can help clients construct a robust self-narrative in which the SLE is not a confusing and distressing experience leading to a broken narrative; instead, it can make sense and integrate into the bigger picture of self-narrative. It is suggested that future research empirically examine the NIR to explore the feasibility and effectiveness of the intervention in mental health settings. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Objectives: Bowel urgency is an impactful core symptom of ulcerative colitis (UC). Patient-reported outcome (PRO) questionnaires have been developed and used to assess the patient experience of this important symptom. The objective of this paper is to present evidence from qualitative research conducted to support the use and interpretation of select PRO questionnaires to assess bowel urgency related to the UC patient experience. Methods: Qualitative interviews were conducted with ten adults with a clinician-confirmed diagnosis of moderately to severely active UC. Interviews aimed to document patient interpretation of modified recall periods for the Urgency Numeric Rating Scale (Urgency NRS), two global assessments (i.e., the Patient Global Impression of Severity [PGIS] and Patient Global Impression of Change [PGIC]), and four items (Items 11, 16, 23, and 26) of the Inflammatory Bowel Disease Questionnaire (IBDQ), and explore the patient perspective of meaningful change on these questionnaires. Results: Both modified Urgency NRS versions (with 7-day or 3-day recall period) were interpreted as intended by most patients (≥ 88.9%), and slightly more than half of patients (60.0%) reported that the 7-day recall period was more relevant to their bowel urgency experience. Patients reported thinking of bowel urgency (≥ 80.0%) or bowel urgency-related accidents (70.0% of patients) when interpreting the global assessments and IBDQ items. Most patients reported a 1- to 3-point change as the smallest meaningful improvement that would be meaningful on the Urgency NRS (similar to findings on other questionnaires). Conclusion: Adults with UC can understand and respond to the Urgency NRS with modified recall periods (i.e., 7-day or 3-day), interpret the conceptual content of the PGIS, PGIC, and select IBDQ items to be inclusive of bowel urgency and bowel urgency-related accidents, and select answers representing meaningful improvements on the Urgency NRS, PGIS, PGIC, and IBDQ item response scales. These results further contribute patient-centered data to existing UC and bowel urgency research. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: Research on intimate partner violence (IPV) is generally focused on female survivors. However, in Canada, about half of all self-reported victims of IPV are men and 1 in 5 calls to police for domestic violence are for male victims. This paper takes a comparative approach to understanding survivors' experiences of IPV. Methods: Across Canada, 110 female and 45 male survivors of IPV were recruited through media, social media, and listservs for a survey and interviews in 2017. Results: Findings indicate areas of similarity (healthcare needs; difficulty accessing formal support; fear of false accusations) and areas of difference (availability of formal support; types of violence experienced most often; interactions with the justice system). Women and men reported similar types of IPV, with women experiencing higher rates of sexual violence, stalking, and damage to property. Women and men reported similar physical and mental health consequences following IPV. Men were less satisfied than women with the response of the justice system, and both female and male participants encountered gender bias within the justice system. Some women reported being turned away from services that were at their maximum capacity, and men reported difficulty identifying IPV-related services for male survivors. Conclusions: Findings can be used by frontline service providers and the justice system to ensure that services are gender-inclusive and gender-sensitive. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Over a third of individuals diagnosed with a psychotic disorder are also a parent. The symptoms of psychosis and side effects of antipsychotic medication can impact on parents' awareness of the needs of their children and, at times, the parent may be emotionally and practically unavailable to their child. This study assessed the expressed emotion of parents with psychosis and used qualitative methods to investigate their needs and experience in order to identify how best to support this parent group. Twelve parents with a diagnosed psychotic disorder and with a child aged between 3 and 11 years took part in semi-structured interviews. The majority of parents displayed high levels of warmth and low levels of negativity towards their child. Four themes were generated using reflexive thematic analysis: (1) the impact of psychosis on parenting, (2) the need to protect their child, (3) the need to feel normal, and (4) the impact of parenting stress on psychosis. These results showed how parents want to protect their children and feel normal despite experiencing psychosis. They also highlighted the cyclical relationship between parenting stress and psychotic symptoms, whereby psychotic symptoms can impact on a parent's capacity to care for their child and parenting stress can exacerbate psychotic symptoms. Highlights: This paper investigated the expressed emotion of parents with psychosis, and found that, generally, parents displayed high levels of warmth. This paper also investigated the needs and experiences of parents with psychosis using qualitative methods. Psychosis can impact on the parent's capacity to parent, and many parents were reluctant to talk about psychosis with their children. The stress from parenting was described by some parents as a trigger for their psychosis. Participants described a need to feel normal, and suggested that peer support would be beneficial. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Within psychiatric research fields, there has been a marked uptick of interest in service user involvement in recent years. Nevertheless, it is often unclear how robust or impactful common forms of inclusion are, and the extent to which they have included individuals with psychosis. Using collective auto-ethnography, this paper describes the experiences of 8 academic and non-academic members of the 'lived experience' and participatory research workgroup of a global psychosis Commission and our navigation of power and power hierarchies, differences in background and training, and multiple vectors of identity, diversity, and privilege. We conclude that the realities of "involvement" are much messier, more fraught, and less intrinsically empowering than often signaled in calls for involvement and co-production. We nevertheless stress the power of collective dialogue and support—between and among a pluralistic group—and of honesty and transparency about challenges, barriers, and the colonial underpinnings and geopolitics of global mental health. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: Colorectal cancer (CRC) is prevalent in the developed world. Favourable survival rates highlight the need to better understand CRC survivors' experiences of long-term impacts of treatment, which can in turn inform decision making. This systematic review aimed to identify and synthesise CRC survivors' experiences of long-term impacts on health-related quality of life. Methods: We searched Medline, Embase and PsychINFO from inception to January 2019. Qualitative studies describing CRC survivors' experiences at least 1-year post-treatment were included. Study eligibility, quality assessment (COREQ guidelines), and data synthesis was performed independently by two reviewers and discussed with the study team. Results: Of 1363 papers retrieved, 20 reporting 15 studies met eligibility. Thematic synthesis produced 12 themes: symptoms, physical, social, psychological and sexual functioning, impact on relationships, informal care needs provided by family/friend, supportive care needs provided by healthcare professional, health care experiences, health behaviour, financial toxicity and occupational experiences. Stoma problems (e.g. leakage, skin irritation) were common in ostomates. Survivors with no/reversed stoma experienced unexpected, long-term altered and unpredictable bowel functioning. Survivors often regulated timing, amount and foods consumed to manage bowel functioning. Less common symptoms included fatigue, impaired sleep and anal pain. Stoma problems and altered bowel functioning impaired survivors' physical, social, sexual and psychological functioning. Cognitive functioning and heredity issues were not reported in any paper. Conclusion: CRC survivors experience ongoing symptoms and functioning impairments more than 1-year post-treatment completion. Many survivors find their own ways to manage symptoms rather than seek professional help. Follow-up care for CRC survivors should integrate screening for long-term effects and provide targeted supportive care. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Expressive Flamenco© theory and praxis is presented by Sánchez through this art-based personal reflection paper, which explores the applications of flamenco for its inherent psycho-somatic therapeutic capacities. She asserts the applied practice of flamenco (in its broadest definition), when combined with other expressive arts practices, can have therapeutic benefits; including (but not limited to) psycho-social, spiritual, and aesthetic connection to the individual's unconscious. During these experiences of arts based emotional expression, one can transcend the self into divine connection with their authentic self, what the author understands as the "duende". By allowing one's authentic truth to be expressed through Expressive Flamenco©, a spirit of evocation, born from within the self, appears when the self-connects with and is in creative conversation with its unconscious. The main hypothesis asserts the emergence of the "duende" facilitates an epistemological process of self-knowledge and an emotional process of catharsis, suggesting that when this art form is utilized as 'Expressive Flamenco' it helps facilitate holistic healing. This paper aims to stretch flamenco into new applied therapeutic practice territories, specifically in the arts therapies. Practical applications of Expressive Flamenco in the expressive therapies, including expressive arts therapy and dance/movement therapy, is presented along with the preliminary results of a virtual telehealth group facilitated during Covid-19. Professor Pinna-Perez′s critical reflections on Expressive Flamenco© and its importance to the field is presented in response to this emerging expressive arts practice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Family-centered care (FCC) is widely established as the standard professional practice model in pediatric hospital settings (Arabiat, D., Whitehead, L., Foster, M., Shields, L., & Harris, L. (2018). Parents' experiences of family centred care practices. Journal of Pediatric Nursing, 42, 39–44. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.pedn.2018.06.012; Espe-Sherwindt, M. (2008). Family-centred practice: Collaboration, competency and evidence. Support for Learning, 23(3), 136–143. https://doi.org/10.1111/j.1467-9604.2008.00384.x). It embraces social work values that promote self-determination and family empowerment by positioning family members as partners in healthcare treatment, delivery, and decision-making (Kuo, D. Z., Houtrow, A. J., Arango, P., Kuhlthau, K. A., Simmons, J. M., & Neff, J. M. (2012). Family-centered care: Current applica?tions and future directions in pediatric health care. Maternal and Child Health Journal, 16(2), 297–305. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10995-011-0751-7). To promote and advance FCC principles, healthcare organizations collaborate with patients and families as lived experience volunteers, or family leaders, to ensure program design and education reflect users' perspectives and experiences. Despite evidence for its efficacy and uptake (Arabiat, D., Whitehead, L., Foster, M., Shields, L., & Harris, L. (2018). Parents' experiences of family centred care practices. Journal of Pediatric Nursing, 42, 39–44. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.pedn.2018.06.012), translating FCC principles into practice can be challenging (McCarthy, E., & Guerin, S. (2022). Family-centred care in early intervention: A systematic review of the processes and out?comes of family-centred care and impacting factors. Child: Care Health and Development, 48(1), 1–32. https://doi.org/10.1111/cch.12901). In this paper, we introduce an innovative training program for family leaders that embodies the core principles of FCC. The training program was developed in collaboration with families, healthcare and higher education stakeholders, and engagement specialists by a social worker in a pediatric rehabilitation setting in Toronto, Ontario. The program prepares family leaders to engage in teaching and facilitation roles in healthcare education. The Teaching and Facilitation Course for Family as Faculty is the first program of its kind in Canada and was recently recognized by the Health Standards Organization of Canada as a leading practice in healthcare. Since launching in 2019, over 50 participants connected with healthcare organizations across Ontario have completed the course. Graduates have partnered with educators in designing and facilitating over 85 initiatives and workshops across healthcare and academic institutions. The outcomes of a utilization-focused program evaluation, including the strengths and lessons learned are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Advanced technologies such as drones, intelligent algorithms and androids have grave implications for human existence. With the purpose of exploring their basis for doing so, the paper proposes a framework for investigating the complex relationship between such devices and human practices and language-mediated cognition. Specifically, it centers on the importance of the typically neglected intermediate layer of culture which not only drives both technophobia and philia but also, more fundamentally, connects pre-reflective experience and socio-material practices by placing advanced technologies in the loop. Theoretically, the paper draws on contributions from performativist Science and Technology Studies and Radically Embodied Cognitive Science and pushes new grounds by stressing their compatibility. Yet, it also emphasizes the importance of the enlanguaged side of cognition which is a requirement for human-style socio-material practices and, hence, the emergence of cultures that fetishizes certain technologies. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper aims to explore young people's perspectives of a real-life scenario of child language brokering in a healthcare setting (the doctor's office), when the topic of discussion is sensitive and potentially conflictual. Child Language brokers are migrant young people who translate and interpret for family members, peers and the local community. Often the spaces in which children broker (e.g., healthcare, banks), referred to here as a 'contact zone', are dominated by adults in positions of authority and unequal power differentials. The language broker and those for whom they are brokering may be in a less powerful position because of their migration status and/or age status. Existing research has focused mainly from the view of adults and young people's perspectives on the practice are underexplored. We draw the existing literature to explore how brokers understand the wider societal context and the strategies they employ to manage conflict. Findings are presented from 29 individual qualitative vignette-based interviews with language brokers (aged 13–16) in the United Kingdom which were qualitatively analysed. Findings show how these children play a vital role in protecting those for whom they broker, often navigating sophisticated social interactions and tactics (such as delay and selective modification). Equally, they carry a weight of responsibility trying to manage complicated, perhaps morally questionable, situations. By asking brokers to reflect on a real-life healthcare scenario, we are advancing understanding of migrant youth brokers and the families they support in their day to day lives. Highlights: Child language brokers find themselves brokering in health care settings with unequal power relations. Vignette methodology is a useful way of capturing complex sensitive and conflictual accounts of healthcare brokering in children. Brokering in the doctor's office required children to have knowledge of tri-interactional actors, institutional factors and wider societal norms. Young people used different strategies for managing conflict (e.g., delay tactics and selective modification). Clearer guidelines are needed around child language brokering in medical settings and spaces with contentious power inequalities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Previous choice studies have proposed a way to condition the utility of each alternative in a choice set on experience with the alternatives accumulated over previous periods, defined either as a mode used or not in a most recent trip, or the mode chosen in their most recent trip and the number of similar one-way trips made during the last week. The paper found that the overall statistical performance of the mixed logit model improved significantly, suggesting that this conditioning idea has merit. Experience was treated as an exogenous influence linked to the scale of the random component, and to that extent it captures some amount of the heterogeneity in unobserved effects, purging them of potential endogeneity. The current paper continues to investigate the matter of endogeneity versus exogeneity. The proposed approach implements the control function method through the experience conditioning feature in a choice model. We develop two choice models, both using stated preference data. The paper extends the received contribution in that we allow for the endogenous variable to have an impact on the attributes through a two stage method, called the Multiple Indicator Solution, originally implemented in a different context and for a single (quality) attribute, in which stage two is the popular control function method. In the first stage, the entire utility expression associated with all observed attributes is conditioned on the prior experience with an alternative. Hence, we are capturing possible correlates associated with each and every attribute and not just one selected attribute. We find evidence of potential endogeneity. The purging exercise however, results in both statistical similarities and differences in time and cost choice elasticities and mean estimates of the value of travel time savings. We are able to identify a very practical method to correct for possible endogeneity under experience conditioning that will encourage researchers and practitioners to use such an approach in more advanced non-linear discrete choice models as a matter of routine. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: A growing gap in exclusive breastfeeding across racial/ethnic groups in the United States includes a very low proportion of African American/Black women, with only 17.4% breastfeeding exclusively in 2015. While many quantitative studies examine these disparities, few qualitative studies have examined the overall experience of breastfeeding for Black women. Objective: The aim of this study is to evaluate the existing qualitative literature on experiences of African American/Black women who breastfeed to gain insight on barriers and facilitators unique to this population. Methods: This scoping review included studies that had a focus on any qualitative study design. Evidence was identified by searching electronic databases (PubMed, CINAHL, and PsychINFO). Results: Thirteen papers met the inclusion criteria for this review. Each study was summarized and then analyzed for content to produce a synthesis. Seven themes that influence Black women's experience with breastfeeding were identified: influence of interpersonal relationship on intention to and sustained breastfeeding experiences, influence of institutional systems on initiating and sustaining infant feeding decision, influence of personal beliefs on breastfeeding decisions and experience, material barriers and facilitators to breastfeeding experience, traditional stigma of breastfeeding, historical stigma of breastfeeding influences feeding choice in Black women, and negative impacts of body image. Conclusion: The breastfeeding experience for Black women is unique and poses additional areas for intervention based on cultural and historical stigma. Incorporating the identified factors into intervention design is key to creating more effective policies for improving breastfeeding rates in the Black women and closing the gap across racial/ethnic demographics in the United States. Still, more qualitative research with culturally relevant theories needs to be done to investigate the full scope and complexities of breastfeeding as a Black woman to develop messaging to encourage the behavior. Significance: What is Already Known on this Subject? Many barriers hinder women from breastfeeding, and disproportionately impact Black women, leading to growing disparities in breastfeeding rates. What does this study add? This scoping review synthesizes the findings from prior qualitative studies on the breastfeeding experiences of Black women, exploring the presence of current well-documented themes across studies, with additional attention to themes that may be unique for Black women to further investigate Black women's experiences with breastfeeding. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The Global North has over the years been a popular destination for migrants from the Global South. Most of the migrants are in their reproductive ages who go on to bear and raise children. The differences and subjectivity in the context of their experiences may have an impact on how they ensure that their children have the best possible health and well-being. This paper synthesises 14 qualitative research papers, conducted in 6 Global North countries. We gathered evidence on settled Southern African migrants experiences of bearing and raising children in Global North destination countries and how they conceptualise sustaining children's health and well-being. Results of the review indicated a concerning need for support in sustaining children's health and well-being. Cultural and religious beliefs underpin how the parents in these studies raise their children. More research is needed which engages with fathers and extended family. Highlights: Fathers and extended family should be included in parenting research. There is a need to expand work in investigating these groups separately and understand the nuances between them. These findings can be used to support the voice of settled migrants in the evidence base. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper reports on findings from an empirical study based on qualitative interviews with Norwegian parents identified as part of a high-conflict divorce situation and interviews with caseworkers from a child welfare service. The site of study is an institutional circuit of concern, assessment, and referral involving the court, child welfare services, and a public family therapy service. The paper draws on the social ontology and analytic concepts of institutional ethnography and adopts parents' standpoint to explore how their knowledge and experience are shaped through encounters with professionals in the process of being identified and assessed as a high-conflict divorce case. The focus on people's doings and their expert knowledge about their doings sets institutional ethnographic research apart from more conventional forms of qualitative inquiry that focus on informants' inner experience. The paper highlights how a generalized professional discourse seems to permeate the work that parents and caseworkers jointly engage in, sometimes subsuming the knowledge and experience of those involved. When the issues of life as subjectively known and experienced are different from those of the institutional discourse, there is a danger that what is important to those whose lives they concern escapes the dialogue between parents and professionals. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: Co-creation of a citizen-science research initiative with a collaborative team of community members and university-based scientists to address regional disparities in maternal and fetal health outcomes for Black birthing people. Description: Citizen scientist-led projects, where community members actively contribute to each discovery step, from setting a research agenda to collecting data and disseminating results, can extend community participatory research initiatives and help reconceptualize traditional research processes. The Pregnancy Collaborative is a citizen-science research initiative and one of nine scientific committees of The Pittsburgh Study—a longitudinal, community-partnered study designed to bring together collaborators to improve child thriving. Assessment: Ten community members and five university-based scientists participated during all phases of developing a citizen-scientist collaboration over an initial two-and-a-half-year period. Phases include forming the Pregnancy Collaborative and group research ethics training; co-creating a research agenda grounded in shared principles; and community-partnered data collection, analysis, and dissemination. These phases produced three key co-designed products: (1) a mission and vision statement of the Pregnancy Collaborative, (2) a Collaborative-endorsed research agenda, and (3) a citizen-scientist-executed research survey. Conclusion: Lessons learned from the formation of the Pregnancy Collaborative highlight the importance of equitable power distribution through bidirectional knowledge sharing and by centering intellectual effort, lived experience, and tools and resources of those affected by health inequities. Using a citizen science approach to co-designing and executing research helps us move maternal health inequity work from "research on" to "research with." Significance: Persistent disparities characterize maternal and child health outcomes in the United States. These disparities, mediated by poverty, racism, and place-based social and structural determinants of health, are the biggest threats to Black maternal health. Recently, community-engaged efforts to improve Black maternal health disparities have moved towards cross-sector approaches that center the lived experiences of Black birthing people. Despite these comprehensive approaches, community members rarely participate throughout the research lifecycle. Citizen science-led projects like those described in this paper are one way to acknowledge and commit to bidirectional community-partnered research and action. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper draws on a qualitative case study of the motherhood experiences of visually impaired Chinese women. The aim is to explain how disability and gender intersected in terms of motherhood experiences. By applying an intersectionality analytical framework, the present study argues that as people with disabilities, visually impaired women encounter more barriers and receive excessive support that threatens their expression of agency throughout motherhood decisions and childcare; as women with disabilities, visually impaired women receive less support from their family of origins compared to men with disabilities. By reinterpreting disability, employing various strategies to resist societal stigmas, and emphasizing their roles in the public sphere, women with visual impairments challenge the boundaries between disability and ability and reframe their relations with the world as mothers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Sexual wellness can be a difficult topic for people who have both bipolar disorder (BD) and bisexual identities, despite the essential role sexuality plays as a core feature of health and human behavior. In the United States, bi+ (bisexual, pansexual, sexually fluid) persons with BD can experience discrimination and face barriers by living in a society where misinformation and ableist ideals remain unchallenged. Examples of this include persistent stereotyping of hypersexuality and risky sexual behaviors, stigmatization, erasure, and biases against both groups. These groups need to be examined free from ableist tendencies and generalizations. In this conceptual paper, we introduce varied experiences of bi + and bipolar individuals, with a focus on their ability to engage freely with their sexuality despite societal judgments and conventions that refuse to acknowledge their sexuality in literature, academic research, and public spaces. By assessing this specific population, we have identified patterns and correlations that can start conversations to create a better understanding and acceptance of fluid sexualities and marginalized populations. We ultimately aim to guide further research for both bi + and bipolar populations that will advance cultural acceptance and facilitate sexual empowerment. This, in turn, may help in developing best practices, expanding knowledge, improving sexual health education, and ultimately reducing stigma. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This study investigates the meanings of the Japanese low-degree modifiers kasukani 'faintly' and honokani 'approx. faintly' and the English low-degree modifier faintly. I argue that, unlike typical low-degree modifiers such as sukoshi 'a bit' in Japanese and a bit in English, they are sense-based in that they not only semantically denote a small degree but also convey that the judge (typically the speaker) measures the degree of predicates based on their own sense (the senses of sight, smell, taste, etc.) at the level of conventional implicature (CI) (e.g., Grice (in: Cole, Morgan (Eds.), Syntax and semantics iii: speech acts, Academic Press, New York, 1975), Potts (The logic of conventional implicatures, Oxford University Press, Oxford, 2005), McCready (Semant Pragmat 3:1–57, 2010. https://doi.org/10.3765/sp.3.8, Sawada (Pragmatic aspects of scalar modifiers. Ph.D. Dissertation, University of Chicago, 2010), Gutzmann (Empir Issues Syntax Semant 8:123–141, 2011)). I will also show that there are variations among the sense-based low-degree modifiers with regard to (i) the kind of sense, (ii) the presence/absence of positive evaluativity, and (iii) the possibility of direct measurement of emotion and will explain the variations in relation to the CI component. A unique feature of sense-based low-degree modifiers is that they can indirectly measure the degree of non-sense-based predicates (e.g., emotion) through sense (e.g., perception). I show that the proposed analysis can also explain the indirect measurement in a unified way. This paper shows that like predicates of personal taste such as tasty (e.g., Pearson (J Semant 30(1):103–154, 2013. https://doi.org/10.1093/jos/ffs001), Ninan (Proc Semant Linguist Theory, 24:290–304, 2014. https://doi.org/10.3765/salt.v24i0.2413), Willer & Kennedy (Inquiry, 1–37, 2020. https://doi.org/10.1080/0020174X.2020.1850338)), sense-based low-degree modifiers trigger acquaintance inference. The difference between them is that, unlike predicates of personal taste, sense-based low-degree modifiers co-occur with gradable predicates and their experiential components signal the manner/way in which the degree of the predicate in question is measured. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Utilizing national migration data regarding the outbreak of the novel coronavirus (2019-nCoV), this paper employs a difference-in-differences approach to empirically analyze the relationship between human mobility and the transmission of infectious diseases in China. We show that national human mobility restrictions ascribed to the first-level public health emergency response policy effectively reduce both intercity and intracity migration intensities, thus leading to a declining scale of human mobility, which improves the effectiveness in controlling the epidemic. Human mobility restrictions have greater influences on cities with better economic development, denser populations, or larger passenger volumes. Moreover, mobility restriction measures are found to be better implemented in regions with increased public awareness, or with provincial leaders who have healthcare crisis management experience, local administrative experience, or the opportunity to serve a consecutive term. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction: Cancer-related pain is common and undertreated. Exercise is known to have a pain-relieving effect in non-cancer pain. Objectives: This systematic review aimed to evaluate (1) the effect of exercise on cancer-related pain in all cancers, and (2) whether the effect of exercise differed according to exercise mode, degree of supervision, intervention duration and timing (during or after cancer treatment), pain types, measurement tool and cancer type. Methods: Electronic searches were undertaken in six databases to identify exercise studies evaluating pain in people with cancer, published prior to 11 January 2023. All stages of screening and data extraction were conducted independently by two authors. The Cochrane risk of bias tool for randomised trials (RoB 2) was used and overall strength of evidence was assessed using the GRADE approach. Meta-analyses were performed overall and by study design, exercise intervention and pain characteristics. Results: In total, 71 studies reported in 74 papers were eligible for inclusion. The overall meta-analysis included 5877 participants and showed reductions in pain favouring exercise (standardised mean difference − 0.45; 95% confidence interval − 0.62, − 0.28). For most (> 82%) of the subgroup analyses, the direction of effect favoured exercise compared with usual care, with effect sizes ranging from small to large (median effect size − 0.35; range − 0.03 to − 1.17). The overall strength of evidence for the effect of exercise on cancer-related pain was very low. Conclusion: The findings provide support that exercise participation does not worsen cancer-related pain and that it may be beneficial. Better pain categorisation and inclusion of more diverse cancer populations in future research would improve understanding of the extent of benefit and to whom. PROSPERO registration number: CRD42021266826. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Recent studies implicate the use of psychedelic substances in the treatment of psychiatric conditions. However, this literature also suggests that the psychedelics may have utility in the promotion of positive adult development. Accordingly, this paper outlines a study exploring this premise. An online sample (n = 684) of psychedelic users and non-users (age range: 18–24 to 75–84; median = 25–34) was recruited. Conditional process analysis was used to assess whether the relationship between psychedelic use and two facets of adult development, adjustment and growth, would be mediated by openness to experience, awe-proneness, and mystical experiences, and whether these relationships would be moderated by drug-use reflection/integration. Results show that the direct relationship between psychedelic use and growth was moderated by drug-use reflection/integration. In addition, the indirect relationship between psychedelic use and adjustment was mediated through awe-proneness, while the indirect relationships between psychedelic use and growth were mediated via awe-proneness and openness to experience; drug-use reflection/integration moderated these mediated relationships. In addition, drug-use reflection/integration directly predicted openness, awe-proneness, and growth. These findings suggest that, when used with self-expansive intentions and actively reflected upon and integrated post use, psychedelics may augment positive adult development. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Grace Hibshman has developed a new explanation for why narrative self-conceptions might contribute to one's flourishing: conceiving of one's life narratively, she argues, can facilitate an improved self-understanding. In this short paper, we argue that, pace Hibshman, life narratives tend to misrepresent and mislead. So while they may give the impression of an improved self-understanding, that impression is typically mistaken. In this respect, conceiving of one's life narratively hinders flourishing. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Prior scholarly approaches to meaningful work have largely fallen into two camps. One focuses on identifying how work can contribute to a meaningful life. The other studies the antecedents and outcomes of workers experiencing their work as meaningful. Neither of these approaches, however, captures what people look for when they seek meaningful work—or so I argue. In this paper, I give a new, commitment-based account of meaningful work by focusing on the reasons people have to choose meaningful work over other options. I draw on philosopher Ruth Chang's account of voluntarist reasons (reasons that arise from an act of the will) to argue that commitments can create distinctive reasons to pursue certain work. It is the presence of these distinctive reasons that makes work meaningful. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Hope is essential to mental health recovery, yet little is known about how mental health services can foster hope. This paper addresses the question: How can mental health services influence the sense of hope experienced by people who access their services? Sixty-one people who accessed a new mental health service were interviewed about their experiences, including about how the service had influenced their sense of hope. Interviews were analysed using constant comparative analysis. The data revealed that hope increased when people perceived positive changes in themselves and their circumstances: developing new understandings and perspectives; having effective strategies to manage challenges; seeing progress or having plans; and having support. Changes were attributed to three major features of the service: accessibility; staff competence and wisdom; and caring interactions. The findings highlight that, while individual clinicians are important, other interactions with services and the wider service context are also critical for facilitating hope. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Becoming a parent creates a new phase in adult development where the creation of a family brings new meanings and relational dimensions to one's life. For people who are involuntarily childless, however, the absence of children can have a multifaceted impact on their everyday lives. Although extensive studies concerning childlessness have been conducted, past work has tended to have a clinical focus on women's infertility and fertility treatments and much less attention has been paid to how involuntarily childless people live beyond the phase of trying for a child while contemporaries pursue their lives with children. This study explores the experience of 11 White, heterosexual British women in midlife living with involuntary childlessness. To gain experiential insights, semi-structured interviews were conducted and transcripts analyzed using interpretive phenomenological analysis. Analysis reveals two interrelated key patterns exemplifying intrapersonal and interpersonal features. This paper focuses on the latter. The findings bring to light not only layers of complex relational issues caused by being involuntarily childless, but also different ways of reconstructing meaning in relational reconnections that impacted positively on developing generativity. The paper presents the dynamics unique to each woman and offers micro-level understandings helpful for health professionals, family therapists, life coaches, and researchers looking into childlessness and midlife/adult development. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

One of the most poorly understood features of consciousness is the relation between an experience and the subject of the experience. In this paper, I develop an ontology of consciousness on which experiences are events constituted by substances having properties at times. I use this to explain the relation between a subject and her experience. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper describes an exploratory study that examined the content of preservice elementary teachers' reflections of their documented early field experiences of science teaching in authentic contexts. The study used an early field experience model that was focused on the objective of profiling an elementary science teacher as the practical merit of reflection. Preservice elementary teachers individually and collaboratively reflected on their early field experiences and used the resulting reflections to construct profiles of an elementary science teacher respectively in synthesis papers. Data sources included journal entries and synthesis papers resulting from individual and collaborative reflections. Thematic analysis revealed that profiles of an elementary science teacher constructed from both individual and collaborative reflections were based on the roles of teacher as a guide and teacher as a mediator. Analysis further revealed that classroom management and discipline and safety were the key foci factored within individual reflections while what promotes learning and the difference between what is effective and ineffective scaffolding respectively, served as the foci within collaborative reflections. Also, collaborative reflection provided a structured approach to reflection as it drew preservice elementary teachers into collective dialogue and negotiation capturing the tensions they faced when trying to make sense of the practice of other teachers. Implications include the need to frame early field experiences with objectives that are understood by all parties involved in early field experiences; and, the need to instill the importance of observation, documentation, and reflection which collectively sum up preservice teachers' early field experiences. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper critically examines efforts to "professionalize" the field of healthcare management and its corresponding costs. Drawing upon the scholarly critiques of professionalization in medicine and the broader field of management, this paper seeks to explore the symbolic role professionalization might play in the psyche of its constituents, and specifically its function as a defense against uncertainty and anxiety. This psychodynamic heuristic is then deployed to put forth the hypothesis that an ongoing crisis of professional identity continues to both propel and impede professionalization efforts in healthcare management, giving rise to a litany of standardization pressures that ultimately limit the field's potential. To mitigate these pressures, the call is made for rekindling healthcare management's moral, political, and existential aspects. Specifically, this entails engaging with the deeper themes that flow through the field: the experience of illness and what it means to suffer, the experience of life and what it means to have hope, and the experience of death and dying. It also entails squarely confronting questions of power, poverty and disease, and the pursuit of justice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Little and colleagues' (1998) paper describing a key aspect of cancer patients' experience, that of "liminality," is remarkable for giving articulation to a very common and yet mostly overlooked aspect of patient experience. Little et. al. offered a formulation of liminality that deliberately set aside the concept's more common use in analysing social rituals, in order to grasp at the interior experience that arises when failing bodily function and awareness of mortality are forced into someone's consciousness, as occurs with a diagnosis of cancer. We set out the reasons as to why this analysis was so significant in 1998—but we also consider how the "liminality" described by Little and colleagues was (as they suggested) a feature of modernity, founded on what we term "the mirage of settlement." We argue that this mirage is impossible to sustain in 2022 amid the many forms of un-settling that have characterized late modernity, including climate change and COVID-19. We argue that many people in developed nations now experience liminality as a result of the being forced into the consciousness of living in a continued state of coloniality. We thus rejoin the social aspects of liminality to the interior, Existential form described by Little et. al. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper by Miles Little and colleagues identified the state they described as "liminal" within the trajectory of cancer survivorship. Since that time the concept of liminality has provided a powerful model to explore some of the difficulties experienced by people with severe and chronic illness. In this commentary I consider the expanding application of liminality not just to a widening range of medical conditions but to the consequences of therapeutic interventions as well and how this expansion has enriched and challenged its use as a conceptual tool. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper provides field experiment-based evidence that user experience and learning can increase the attractiveness of an important new cooking technology promoted in Ethiopia. Slow cooking is a potentially significant stumbling block in promoting new lower-emission, fuelwood-conserving cookstoves. We ran a randomized experiment that made these improved stoves available to potential users and conducted three rounds of controlled cooking tests over a one year period, with each respondent cooking on both traditional and improved stoves on the same day. We combined our CCT results with electronic stove use monitoring data to derive inferences related to learning. Although times to cook standardized batches of injera, the Ethiopian staple, are initially on average 25% longer using the new stove, we document that with experience households reduced cook times by 18% over the first 5 to 6 months of adoption, with a further 7% reduction in the next 6 months, leading to negligible differences in cook times within a year of adoption. Those who regularly used the stoves saw greater cooking time savings, suggesting learning-by-doing was important. Fuelwood savings associated with the stove do not appear to be driven by experience or learning. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The principles of CBT emphasize the interactions among cognition, emotion, and behavior. CBT's origins lie in Stoicism philosophy and share similarities with the ideas of Confucianism, Taoism, and Traditional Chinese Medicine (TCM) in China. The idea of mind–body regulation in traditional Chinese culture has laid a cultural foundation for the promotion of CBT in China. This paper analyzes the applicability and challenges of CBT in China based on the current development of CBT in mainland China and the learning and practice of CBT therapists. It also explores the potential further development of CBT in China and the integration of CBT with the Chinese culture. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

There were 9.7 million Native Americans (American Indian, Alaska Native-AI/AN- these acronyms will be used interchangeably with Native Americans throughout the paper) in 2019 comprising 2.9% of the U.S. population. Native American populations have disproportionately higher rates of mental illnesses compared to other racial groups in the U.S. Mental health is a significant public health concern for this population, impacting different areas of their lives including employment. Additionally, Native Americans continue to experience significant disparities in access to Vocational Rehabilitation (VR) services and have poor employment outcomes. However, little is known about the relationships among demographic factors, vocational rehabilitation services, and employment outcomes of Native Americans with mental illness. Consequently, the current study examined how demographic factors and VR services are related to successful employment outcomes for Native American VR clients with mental illnesses using data from the Rehabilitation Services Administration (RSA) program year (2019) Case Service Report (9–11). Both descriptive analysis and data mining approaches were used to answer the research questions. Chi-square Automatic Interaction Detector (CHAID) analysis was used to determine which of the VR services could best predict the successful employment outcome of Native Americans with mental illness. The findings of the data mining approach revealed that among all the vocational rehabilitation services, job placement assistance was the strongest predictor of successful employment among Native American clients with mental illnesses. The second most important service predicting successful employment for those who received job placement assistance was shown to be maintenance. Implications for rehabilitation counselors and future research are discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Religion and spirituality are an important part of the human experience for many of our clients. Clients often turn to their religion or spirituality as one of their first resources when faced with significant stressors; however, therapists often feel ill-equipped when spiritual or religious content is discussed in therapy. The efforts of clinicians to ethically and competently address spirituality and religion with clients hinges on the work of supervisors and faculty members of Couple, Marriage, and Family Therapy programs. This paper seeks to explain how the supervision process can help therapists overcome the barriers they face when attempting to integrate spirituality and religion into session. A case vignette is presented where a supervisor and supervisee use an Internal Family Systems lens to consult about a case where religious concerns are present. Utilizing IFS, we believe that therapists can better acknowledge their spiritual or religious biases and begin to consider how religion and spirituality can be respected as a diverse part of clients. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper highlights findings from the first phase of an ongoing qualitative Youth Participatory Acton Research (YPAR) study with a group of students with foster care experience at a large public university in the Northeastern United States. The first phase of data collection consisted of a focus group designed and carried out by co-researchers, amongst themselves. Data was analyzed in two ways, by a faculty member and doctoral student, using thematic content analysis, and through a collaborative analytic process with student co-researchers using an adapted version of Carol Gilligan's, "Listening Guide" in which co-researchers created, analyzed and performed "I Poems" from the focus group transcript. Findings from each data analytic process were compared and contrasted; discrepancies amongst themes from each analytic process led to the merging and creation of new modified themes. Findings illuminate the barriers and facilitators to completion of high school, and applying to college for this cohort of students, as well as barriers and facilitators to retention once in college. Additionally, recommendations are made for university professionals to become more affirming of scholars connected to foster care systems. This study is unique in that it is the first known study to engage with college students with foster care experience in a participatory research process that centers their voices, concerns and priorities in both research design and data. Student organizing and action emanating from the PAR approach are also discussed. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The world population is aging and more and more people suffer from dementia, which makes remembering and orientation in time and space difficult. Moreover dementia has a strong negative effect on the quality of living of the people suffering from it, but also of their relatives. In this paper, we investigate if and how the playback of carefully chosen and recognizable sounds, such as music, a clock tower, or nature sounds, can help these people and have a positive effect on the behavioral and psychological symptoms of dementia (BPSD). The selection and playback of these sounds, augmenting the existing soundscape, is performed in a personalized manner, since sounds can elicit a different response in different people. Caregivers can provide feedback on the soundscape based on the resident's behavior and response to hearing the sounds. This allows a continuous adaptation of the soundscape. The soundscape system was tested with 19 people suffering from dementia and resident of 6 different nursing homes. Comparison of the nursing home environment before and after installation of the soundscape system showed that most residents (13/19) experienced this as an improvement of the sound environment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The goal of this paper is to explain the evolution of life through the evolution of cellular and supra-cellular closures, two distinct ways of strict delimitation against the surroundings. Such closures are a necessary precondition of organisation, semiosis, and agency. We argue that in addition to the basic, first-order, cellular closures, which have been in existence without interruption since the dawn of life, there also exist second-order closures (cell communities), which are dynamic and often formed ad hoc. Moreover, a living entity may belong simultaneously to different kinds of such second-order closures. It is these second-order closures which organise cellular (and higher-order) communities and form the core of the bonds that hold the biosphere together. In second-order closures, there exist countless crisscrossing pathways leading to manifold interpretations of particular situations. We provide examples of such relationships and point to an elaborate network connecting all denizens of the biosphere. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This paper examines how company board characteristics (directors' quoted boards to date, quoted boards currently, board tenure and age) influence firm performance in a sample of Spanish listed companies for the period 2005–2015. Among the main contributions of the paper are that it analyses the boards of companies operating under a Continental, as opposed to Anglo-American, governance system characterized by high ownership concentration and low investor protection, and that it differentiates between inside and outside board members based on the role each type plays on the board. The results reveal differences between inside and outside board members in terms of the performance impact of some board characteristics. Thus, while for inside directors age has no significant effect on firm performance, for outsiders it has a negative one. Similarly, longer tenure on the board is associated with higher performance levels just in the case of outsiders, whereas we find a positive influence of directors' number of current board positions for insiders; finally, we do not find any evidence concerning the influence of board positions to date on performance for any of them. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Software engineering is a highly dynamic discipline. Hence, as times change, so too might our beliefs about core processes in this field. This paper checks some five beliefs that originated in the past decades that comment on the relationships between (i) developer productivity; (ii) software quality and (iii) years of developer experience. Using data collected from 1,356 developers in the period 1995 to 2006, we found support for only one of the five beliefs titled “Quality entails productivity.” We found no clear support for four other beliefs based on programming languages and software developers. However, from the sporadic evidence of the four other beliefs, we learned that a narrow scope could delude practitioners in misinterpreting certain effects to hold in their day-to-day work. Lastly, through an aggregated view of assessing the five beliefs, we find programming languages act as a confounding factor for developer productivity and software quality. Thus the overall message of this work is that it is both important and possible to revisit old beliefs in software engineering. Researchers and practitioners should routinely retest old beliefs. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]