Search

BackgroundAdolescents and young adults in the age range of 13-24 years are at the highest risk of developing HIV infections. As social media platforms are extremely popular among youths, researchers can utilize these platforms to curb the HIV epidemic by investigating the associations between the discourses on HIV infections and the epidemiological data of HIV infections. ObjectiveThe goal of this study was to examine how Twitter activity among young men is related to the incidence of HIV infection in the population. MethodsWe used integrated human-computer techniques to characterize the HIV-related tweets by male adolescents and young male adults (age range: 13-24 years). We identified tweets related to HIV risk and prevention by using natural language processing (NLP). Our NLP algorithm identified 89.1% (2243/2517) relevant tweets, which were manually coded by expert coders. We coded 1577 HIV-prevention tweets and 17.5% (940/5372) of general sex-related tweets (including emojis, gifs, and images), and we achieved reliability with intraclass correlation at 0.80 or higher on key constructs. Bivariate and multivariate analyses were performed to identify the spatial patterns in posting HIV-related tweets as well as the relationships between the tweets and local HIV infection rates. ResultsWe analyzed 2517 tweets that were identified as relevant to HIV risk and prevention tags; these tweets were geolocated in 109 counties throughout the United States. After adjusting for region, HIV prevalence, and social disadvantage index, our findings indicated that every 100-tweet increase in HIV-specific tweets per capita from noninstitutional accounts was associated with a multiplicative effect of 0.97 (95% CI [0.94-1.00]; P=.04) on the incidence of HIV infections in the following year in a given county. ConclusionsTwitter may serve as a proxy of public behavior related to HIV infections, and the association between the number of HIV-related tweets and HIV infection rates further supports the use of social media for HIV disease prevention.

BackgroundSubstance use by youth remains a significant public health concern. Social media provides the opportunity to discuss and display substance use–related beliefs and behaviors, suggesting that the act of posting drug-related content, or viewing posted content, may influence substance use in youth. This aligns with empirically supported theories, which posit that behavior is influenced by perceptions of normative behavior. Nevertheless, few studies have explored the content of posts by youth related to substance use. ObjectiveThis study aimed to identify the beliefs and behaviors of youth related to substance use by characterizing the content of youths’ drug-related tweets. Using a sequential explanatory mixed methods approach, we sampled drug-relevant tweets and qualitatively examined their content. MethodsWe used natural language processing to determine the frequency of drug-related words in public tweets (from 2011 to 2015) among youth Twitter users geolocated to Pennsylvania. We limited our sample by age (13-24 years), yielding approximately 23 million tweets from 20,112 users. We developed a list of drug-related keywords and phrases and selected a random sample of tweets with the most commonly used keywords to identify themes (n=249). ResultsWe identified two broad classes of emergent themes: functional themes and relational themes. Functional themes included posts that explicated a function of drugs in one’s life, with subthemes indicative of pride, longing, coping, and reminiscing as they relate to drug use and effects. Relational themes emphasized a relational nature of substance use, capturing substance use as a part of social relationships, with subthemes indicative of drug-related identity and companionship. We also identified topical areas in tweets related to drug use, including reference to polysubstance use, pop culture, and antidrug content. Across the tweets, the themes of pride (63/249, 25.3%) and longing (39/249, 15.7%) were the most popular. Most tweets that expressed pride (46/63, 73%) were explicitly related to marijuana. Nearly half of the tweets on coping (17/36, 47%) were related to prescription drugs. Very few of the tweets contained antidrug content (9/249, 3.6%). ConclusionsData integration indicates that drugs are typically discussed in a positive manner, with content largely reflective of functional and relational patterns of use. The dissemination of this information, coupled with the relative absence of antidrug content, may influence youth such that they perceive drug use as normative and justified. Strategies to address the underlying causes of drug use (eg, coping with stressors) and engage antidrug messaging on social media may reduce normative perceptions and associated behaviors among youth. The findings of this study warrant research to further examine the effects of this content on beliefs and behaviors and to identify ways to leverage social media to decrease substance use in this population.

American adolescents consume more sugar-sweetened beverages (SSBs) than any other age group. Sports and energy drinks consumption among adolescents is higher than other SSBs. For sports drinks, there is uncertainty about their "healthiness" and also beliefs that these drinks may provide health benefits such as hydration, enhanced athletic performance, heightened mental alertness, and rapid recovery after exercise. Confusion about relative healthiness and expectations of health benefits suggest that factors that may encourage youth to avoid drinking sports and energy drinks, such as athletic status, psychological reactance, and SSB media literacy, may necessitate different approaches to promoting avoidance of sports drinks compared with avoidance of energy drinks. Using a nationally representative U.S. probability-based web panel augmented by a volunteer nonprobability-based web panel of 500 adolescent participants aged 14 to 18 years, we used the reasoned action approach to model intention to avoid sports and to avoid energy drinks. The result show there are similarities and differences in the determinants associated with adolescents' avoidance of sports and energy drinks: attitudes and descriptive normative pressure are both related to increased avoidance for both types of drinks and perceived control over the avoidance behavior is positively associated for with intention to avoid for energy drinks. Sport identification, psychological reactance, and SSB media literacy also play a different role in the sports and energy drink models. Based on our results, the content of prevention messages in interventions to limit sports drinks will need to be quite different from those targeted at reducing energy drink consumption.

Choral singing was embraced by many missionaries as a means of attracting potential converts to Christianity. A principal choral singing method in 19th century Britain, Tonic Sol-fa, was introduced by missionaries and others to the Indian subcontinent where it was used as both a pedagogical method and a music notation system. Building on the inherent musicality of the Mizo people in Assam, a fine choral singing tradition developed. Hymnbooks were published with Mizo words and Tonic Sol-fa notation. Although aspects of Tonic Sol-fa are utilized in some contemporary school music teaching methods, there is now little or no use made of the original Tonic Sol-fa method for community choral singing in Britain. Nevertheless, it is still used in some former British colonies, particularly for congregational hymn singing in Sub-Saharan Africa and the Asia-Pacific. Tonic Sol-fa has been, and remains, the mainstay of choral music making in Mizoram and neighboring areas. As such, it is a worthy inheritance from the missionary presence in India during the 19th century.

Background: In the USA, lower income minority ethnic children and teenagers report high consumption of sugar sweetened beverages, which cause dental erosion and dental carries, and play a significant role in overweight, obesity and diabetes. Objective: This study aimed to examine urban adolescents' beliefs about sports and energy drinks to identify factors for health messaging to discourage youth consumption. Design: Focus group study involves 34 adolescents in urban areas (12 women, 12 men and 10 unreported sex; 19 Hispanic, 11 non-Hispanic Black, 2 Asian and 2 unknown race or ethnicity). Setting: Four focus groups were conducted with adolescents in urban areas. Method: Each on-time moderated group discussion was structured to generate an inventory of attitudinal, normative and efficacy beliefs associated with sports and energy drink consumption and reduction. Thematic analysis was used to analyse the data. Results: Attitudinal and normative beliefs were more positive towards sports drink consumption and energy drink reduction. Misperceptions about the need for sports drinks to avoid dehydration during physical activity were evident. Product accessibility and advertising pervasiveness were facilitators influencing consumption and barriers to reduction for both products. Conclusion: Results highlight important differences in perceptions about sports and energy drinks that indicate the need for different approaches and messages for interventions designed to curb consumption of these products. Recommendations for message design are provided.

The use of Information and Communication Technology (ICT) as a tool for teaching and learning both in Australia and overseas is now very much taken for granted across all areas of learning and at all levels of education. But how did this addition to the range of pedagogical means and methods employed in music education come about? This article is written from a dual perspective -- as a music education historian and as an early adopter and promoter of technology-based approaches to music education in Australia. The first part of the article is largely autobiographical as I recount my experiences as a tertiary academic with reference to developments in technology infrastructure (hardware and software) and associated pedagogies. In the second part, I refer to recent scholarly opinion on technology in music education and then reflect on future directions and possibilities. Although curricula produced by education authorities advocate the embedding of technology in all learning areas, the inclusion of ICT in curriculum guidelines has been described as 'an afterthought'. It is argued that adoption of technology-based approaches to music learning is reliant on two factors -- adequate opportunities for ICT in teacher education, and individual teacher motivation and commitment.

BackgroundFew trials have tested physical-activity interventions among sexual minorities, including African American men who have sex with men (MSM).PurposeWe examined the efficacy and mediation of the Being Responsible for Ourselves (BRO) physical-activity intervention among African American MSM.MethodAfrican American MSM were randomized to the physical-activity intervention consisting of three 90-min one-on-one sessions or an attention-matched control intervention and completed pre-intervention, immediately post-intervention, and 6- and 12-month post-intervention audio computer-based surveys.ResultsOf the 595 participants, 503 completed the 12-month follow-up. Generalized estimating equation models revealed that the intervention increased self-reported physical activity compared with the control intervention, adjusted for pre-intervention physical activity. Mediation analyses suggested that the intervention increased reasoned action approach variables, subjective norm and self-efficacy, increasing intention immediately post-intervention, which increased physical activity during the follow-up period.ConclusionsInterventions targeting reasoned action approach variables may contribute to efforts to increase African American MSM's physical activity.Clinical trial registrationThe trial was registered with the ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier NCT02561286 .

The Australian mezzo-soprano Ada Beatrice Bloxham (1865-1956) was the inaugural winner (in 1883) of the Clarke Scholarship for a promising musician resident in the Colony of Victoria to study at the Royal College of Music in London. She was the first Australian to enrol at the Royal College of Music and to graduate as an Associate of the College in 1888, and she was the first woman to be awarded a Fellowship of the Tonic Sol-fa College, London, also in 1888. After a period teaching and performing in Japan (1893-1899), she married and lived variously in South Africa, England, and France, returning to Australia in 1927. Due most probably to her marriage and family responsibilities, she appears not to have achieved her full potential as a performer and teacher. Nevertheless, Bloxham is worthy of recognition as having gained success as a musician and educator both in her native Australia and abroad during her early and middle years, and as a pathfinder and role model for other women during the early years of their musical careers.

Source apportionment of PM 2.5 was performed using positive matrix factorization (PMF) based on detailed chemical composition data from 24 h filter samples collected over a 3-month period (August–November 2020) at an urban site in Montréal, a Canadian city with a population of approximately 4×106 people. This source apportionment study, which examined the main contributing sources to PM 2.5 using a larger suite of organic molecular markers than other Canadian studies, is the first of its sort in Canada. A focus of this study was on quantifying previously unresolved sources of PM 2.5 through the inclusion in the PMF analysis of additional organic molecular markers beyond those measured typically by the Canadian government's National Air Pollution Surveillance Program (NAPS). The organic species included in the PMF model were comprised of six n -alkanes, two fatty acids, one dicarboxylic acid, two biogenic secondary organic aerosol (SOA) tracers, and hopane. Secondary inorganic aerosols (SIAs) and SOAs were the dominant components and constituted 39 % of the measured PM 2.5 mass, while the local primary anthropogenic sources, namely traffic exhaust, road dust, industrial, and cooking emissions, contributed 23 %. The chemical transport model GEOS-Chem revealed that ammonium sulfate concentrations in Montréal are strongly influenced by both local sources in Quebec and transboundary input from the United States, with the transboundary input exceeding the local emissions for SOA. Co and Cr(VI) presented an elevated cancer risk, highlighting that more attention should be given to these trace metals, which were associated with industrial emissions by the PMF analysis. Furthermore, the results showed that industrial emissions were minor contributors to the total PM 2.5 mass concentration but were the largest contributors to Co and Cr(VI) concentrations. Thus, the health hazards associated with this source cannot be entirely established by the PM 2.5 mass concentration alone. This study highlights that, when evaluating air quality in Montréal and other urban regions, the prioritization of sources for mitigation strategies will diverge if one considers total PM 2.5 mass concentration or the concentration of individual particulate-bound contaminants. Furthermore, the large transboundary contribution from the United States to total PM 2.5 levels suggests that future municipal, provincial, and federal monitoring and regulations would be more effective if they focus on specific high-risk contaminants (e.g., Co and Cr(VI) rather than total PM 2.5). [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The male-specific Fruitless proteins (FruM) act to establish the potential for male courtship behavior in Drosophila melanogaster and are expressed in small groups of neurons throughout the nervous system. We screened ∼1000 GAL4 lines, using assays for general courtship, male-male interactions, and male fertility to determine the phenotypes resulting from the GAL4-driven inhibition of FruM expression in subsets of these neurons. A battery of secondary assays showed that the phenotypic classes of GAL4 lines could be divided into subgroups on the basis of additional neurobiological and behavioral criteria. For example, in some lines, restoration of FruM expression in cholinergic neurons restores fertility or reduces male-male courtship. Persistent chains of males courting each other in some lines results from males courting both sexes indiscriminately, whereas in other lines this phenotype results from apparent habituation deficits. Inhibition of ectopic FruM expression in females, in populations of neurons where FruM is necessary for male fertility, can rescue female infertility. To identify the neurons responsible for some of the observed behavioral alterations, we determined the overlap between the identified GAL4 lines and endogenous FruM expression in lines with fertility defects. The GAL4 lines causing fertility defects generally had widespread overlap with FruM expression in many regions of the nervous system, suggesting likely redundant FruM-expressing neuronal pathways capable of conferring male fertility. From associations between the screened behaviors, we propose a functional model for courtship initiation.

Understanding why sports and energy drinks remain increasingly popular among adolescents despite declines in other sugar sweetened beverages is critical. This study points to memory for advertising exposure and adolescent athletic identity as two aspects that together help to explain consumption. An online survey of U.S. adolescents aged 14–18 (n = 503) was combined with Nielsen data for television and social media advertising expenditures by sports and energy drink brands in participants' designated market areas (DMAs). Advertisement recall mediates the relationship between social media DMA expenditures and sports and energy drink consumption. Recall for television advertisements is related to consumption but is unrelated to television DMA expenditures. Athletic identity moderated the relationship between recall and consumption such that consumption increased as both recall and athletic identity increased, suggesting a role for motivated memory and motivated processing of ad messages based on athletic identity consistent with the limited capacity model of motivated media message processing. Based on these results, we conclude that effectiveness of expenditures in influencing behavior is dependent upon both ad recall and ad relevance, and that athletic identity is an important factor in ad effectiveness in the context of sports and energy drinks advertising. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This document is a presentation of a special issue of the journal Contratexto, which focuses on exploring health communication in different contexts and platforms in Hispanic America. The region of the Americas faces significant health challenges, including infectious diseases like dengue and the rise of non-communicable chronic diseases. There are also significant social, racial, ethnic, and gender inequalities in health outcomes and access to care. This special issue aims to fill the gap in research on health communication in the region and initiate a debate on how the study of communication can contribute to public health. The issue includes four selected studies that address original and relevant research questions and use diverse methodologies. The articles highlight the potential for growth and development in this field in the region. [Extracted from the article]