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This research used three scales to explore ethnicity and other variables' effects on university students' self-assessed academic help-seeking. The scores from each respective scale were regressed onto academic and demographic variables. In two of the three regression models, Age was the only significant factor, older students self-assessing as less avoidant and more persuaded of the benefits of help-seeking. However, investigating an interaction in one model revealed that older Pacific Islanders followed an opposite pattern, self-assessing as more avoidant of help-seeking with increased age, and significantly more avoidant than same-age peers of other ethnicities. Pacific Islanders also self-assessed significantly higher in instrumental help-seeking. In summary, except for Pacific Islanders, ethnic background had surprisingly little effect on academic help-seeking, a finding which may be attributable to the highly multicultural research setting. These findings suggest that younger students and older Pacific Islanders may benefit from focused efforts to facilitate their receiving academic help. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Farkas in (On an Arithmetical Function II. Complex Analysis and Dynamical Systems II. Contemporary Mathematics, American Mathematical Society, Providence, 2005) introduced an arithmetic function δ and found an identity involving δ and a sum of divisor function σ ′ . The first-named author and Raji in (Ramanujan J 19(1):19–27, 2009) discussed a natural generalization of the identity by introducing a quadratic character χ modulo a prime p ≡ 3 (mod 4) . In particular, it turns out that, besides the original case p = 3 considered by Farkas, an exact analog (in a certain precise sense) of Farkas' identity happens only for p = 7 . Recently, for quadratic characters of small composite moduli, Williams in (Ramanujan J 43(1):197–213, 2017) found a finite list of identities of similar flavor using different methods. Clearly, if p ≢ 3 (mod 4) , the character χ is either not quadratic or even. In this paper, we prove that, under certain conditions, no analogs of Farkas' identity exist for even characters. Assuming χ to be odd quartic, we produce something surprisingly similar to the results from Guerzhoy and Raji (Ramanujan J 19(1):19–27, 2009): exact analogs of Farkas' identity happen exactly for p = 5 and 13.abstract [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Background: The Baby-Friendly Hospital Initiative requires hospitals to pay market price for infant formula. No studies have specifically examined the effect of hospitals paying for infant formula on breastfeeding mothers’ exposure to Baby-Friendly steps. Objectives: To investigate the effect of hospitals implementing a policy of paying for infant formula on new mothers’ exposure to Baby-Friendly steps and examine the effect of exposure to Baby-Friendly steps on breastfeeding rates. Methods: We used a repeated prospective cohort study design. We recruited 2 cohorts of breastfeeding mother–infant pairs (n = 2470) in the immediate postnatal period from 4 Hong Kong public hospitals and followed them by telephone up to 12 months postpartum. We assessed participants’ exposure to 6 Baby-Friendly steps by extracting data from the medical record and by maternal self-report. Results: After hospitals began paying for infant formula, new mothers were more likely to experience 4 out of 6 Baby-Friendly steps. Breastfeeding initiation within the first hour increased from 28.7% to 45%, and in-hospital exclusive breastfeeding rates increased from 17.9% to 41.4%. The proportion of mothers who experienced all 6 Baby-Friendly steps increased from 4.8% to 20.5%. The risk of weaning was progressively higher among participants experiencing fewer Baby-Friendly steps. Each additional step experienced by new mothers decreased the risk of breastfeeding cessation by 8% (hazard ratio = 0.92; 95% CI, 0.89-0.95). Conclusion: After implementing a policy of paying for infant formula, breastfeeding mothers were exposed to more Baby-Friendly steps, and exposure to more steps was significantly associated with a lower risk of breastfeeding cessation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]