Social correlates of sedentary behavior in young people:The UP&DOWN study

Purpose:The aim of the present study was to analyze the associations of youths' sedentary behavior(SB) with parents' and siblings' SB and physical activity(PA),as well as the associations of youths' coparticipation with parents,siblings,and friends in PA and SB with youths' SB.Methods:The sample consisted of 1543 youths(12.02±2.51 years;788 boys) enrolled in the baseline cohort of the UP&DOWN study.SB was assessed by accelerometry and questionnaire.Participants reported the time spent by their parents and siblings watching television,playing videogames,surfing the Internet,sitting/resting,and doing PA.Further,participants reported coparticipation with parents,siblings,and friends in these activities.Linear mixed models,including school and city as random effects,were performed.Results:Parents' television time was positively associated with youths' screen-based SB.Coparticipation with friends in playing videogames(in boys) and in surfing the Internet(in girls) showed a positive association with screen-based SB and a negative association with educational-based SB.Moreover,coparticipation with siblings and friends in PA was inversely associated with accelerometer-based SB in boys and girls.Conclusion:Our results emphasize the important role of social modeling in the development of sedentary lifestyles in youths.Interventions aimed at reducing health risk behaviors in youths could be more effective if they are oriented from a social perspective that involves their families and networks of their closest friends.     

The impact of government-supported participative loans on the growth of entrepreneurial ventures

We study the employment and sales growth of entrepreneurial ventures that have received a government-sponsored participative loan (PL), a hybrid form of financing between debt and equity. We use propensity-score matching (PSM) and instrumental variable analysis (2SLS) to study a sample of 512 entrepreneurial ventures that received a PL from a Spanish government agency between 2005 and 2011. We find evidence that PLs significantly boosted their beneficiaries’ employment and sales. In the two years following loan issuance, a 1-million-Euro PL generated an increase in average employment of between 12.1 (PSM) and 14.7 (2SLS) units and an increase in sales of between 1.09 and 1.97 million Euro relative to the average for the two years prior to loan issuance. The effect is larger for high-tech, young and small entrepreneurial ventures and for those that received a PL during the global financial crisis. The effect on growth is significant and stable, and PLs increase their beneficiaries’ annual growth by 10.6% for employment and by 18.0% for sales. We do not find evidence of industry or regional spillovers, nor do we find differences in the probability of survival of PL beneficiaries after we control for their characteristics.     

Replication crisis or an opportunity to improve scientific production?

Science is undergoing a crisis that has been referred to, since the early 21st century, as a crisis of confidence and a crisis of replication. This article reviews questions pertaining to the replication crisis; questions addressing the quality and credibility of the sciences; specifically, questions linked to what are known as false positives, null results, and questionable research practices (p-hacking, harking, cherry-picking). As an outcome of our review and analysis, a set of recommendations to strengthen the elaboration of reliable and valid research studies is provided. Changes are needed in order to foment meta-research, open science practices and replication studies; notably, changes are needed in the instruction of research methods; in the use and interpretation of statistical data, as well as in research culture in general. We conclude that the replication crisis presents an opportunity to improve research practices and the quality of scientific production in all fields of research, including research in education.     

Effect of bike-fit in the perception of comfort,fatigue and pain

ABSTRACT

The aim of this study was to assess the influence of different bike positions on the perception of fatigue, pain and comfort. Twenty cyclists underwent three tests that involved cycling for 45 min at their individual 50% peak aerobic power output while adopting different positions on the bike. Participants performed the cycling tests adopting three positions defined by two parameters (knee flexion angle [20°, 30°, 40°] and trunk flexion angle [35°, 45°, 55°]) in random order. Angles were measured using a 2D motion analysis system during cycling and applying Fonda’s correction factor. Perceptions of comfort, fatigue and pain were reported before the end of each test. The combination of 40° knee flexion and 35° trunk flexion was perceived as the most uncomfortable position. Moreover, greater knee flexion had a negative effect on trunk comfort, accompanied by greater levels of fatigue and pain perception in the anterior part of the thigh and knee. In conclusion, cyclists perceived the most comfortable position to be when the saddle height was within the recommended knee angle (30° calculated from the offset position or 40 ± 4.0° of absolute value). Upright trunk was found to be the most comfortable position for recreational cyclists, where aerodynamics is not so important. Cyclists’ bike perceptions should be taken into account when it comes to choosing the most beneficial position, since this can play a role in injury prevention and enhance cycling performance.     

School and Community Wellness: Transforming Achievement Using a Holistic Orientation to Learning

A comprehensive school and community wellness plan was developed and implemented to transform Lemon Grove Academy for the Sciences and Humanities, an urban school, where student achievement and faculty satisfaction has soared. The school has become the center for the local neighborhood where culture, language, and equity are valued. The school's Comprehensive Wellness Plan includes student wellness, family wellness, staff/faculty wellness, and environmental wellness.     

Facilitators of and barriers to school psychologists' social–emotional/behavioral practices

Using data from a national survey of school psychologists we investigated (a) the extent to which school psychologists supported students' social–emotional and behavioral well-being using data and evidence-based practices programming, (b) how facilitators and barriers impacted school psychologists' service delivery in these areas, and (c) how participants' demographic characteristics predicted facilitators to these practices. The survey was administered to randomly selected National Association of School Psychologists' members. One hundred ninety-nine full-time, school-based school psychologists (24% response rate) completed the survey. Results indicated more practitioners reported using data to design, implement, and evaluate evidence-based strategies for social–emotional and behavioral supports (M = 3.32, SD = 0.90) than reported using evidence-based strategies themselves in these same areas (M = 3.10, SD = 1.05). School psychologists who reported more facilitators were more likely to use data and engage in evidence-based practices related to social–emotional and behavioral supports for students. Results also indicated certain barriers impeded school psychologists' practices in these areas. Few demographic characteristics predicted the presence of facilitators or barriers. Findings from the current study extend the extant literature by providing empirical data on facilitators of and barriers to services related to school psychologists' use of data and evidence-based practices in these areas.     

Garlic Oil and Vitamin E Prevent the Adverse Effects of Lead Acetate and Ethanol Separately as well as in Combination in the Drinking Water of Rats

Daily feeding of drinking water containing lead acetate (160 mg/l) or 10% alcohol by volume or a combination of both to rats for a month produced certain deleterious effects through oxidative stress. Both heavy metal lead and alcohol are capable of doing such damages. The deleterious alterations observed were in the parameters of blood, serum and tissues, viz; Hb, Pb, proteins, lipids, lipid per oxidation, Vitamins C and E levels and enzyme activities of AST, ALT, and catalase. Simultaneous feeding of either of the two antioxidants garlic oil (GO) and vitamin E at equal doses of 100 mg/kg/day, to the rats counteracted the deleterious effects of the above two chemicals significantly. The maximum damage was brought about by feeding of drinking water containing both lead acetate and alcohol. The protective effects of GO and Vitamin E were not significantly different. The mechanism of actions of the Vitamin E and GO is probably due to their efficiency as detoxifying agents and antioxidants, to scavenging free radicals as well as an independent action of GO on the removal of lead salt as lead sulfide.     

An asynchronous collaborative search system for online video search

There are a number of multimedia tasks and environments that can be collaborative in nature and involve contributions from more than one individual. Examples of such tasks include organising photographs or videos from multiple people from a large event, students working together to complete a class project, or artists and/or animators working on a production. Despite this, current state of the art applications that have been created to assist in multimedia search and organisation focus on a single user searching alone and do not take into consideration the collaborative nature of a large number of multimedia tasks. The limited work in collaborative search for multimedia applications has concentrated mostly on synchronous, and quite often co-located, collaboration between persons. However, these collaborative scenarios are not always practical or feasible. In order to overcome these shortcomings we have created an innovative system for online video search, which provides mechanisms for groups of users to collaborate both asynchronously and remotely on video search tasks. In order to evaluate our system an user evaluation was conducted. This evaluation simulated multiple conditions and scenarios for collaboration, varying on awareness, division of labour, sense making and persistence. The outcome of this evaluation demonstrates the benefit and usability of our system for asynchronous and remote collaboration between users. In addition the results of this evaluation provide a comparison between implicit and explicit collaboration in the same search system.     

Conceptual navigation in knowledge management environments using NavCon

This article presents conceptual navigation and NavCon, an architecture that implements this navigation in World Wide Web pages. NavCon architecture makes use of ontology as metadata to contextualize user search for information. Based on ontologies, NavCon automatically inserts conceptual links in Web pages. By using these links, the user may navigate in a graph representing ontology concepts and their relationships. By browsing this graph, it is possible to reach documents associated with the user desired ontology concept. This Web navigation supported by ontology concepts we call conceptual navigation. Conceptual navigation is a technique to browse Web sites within a context. The context filters relevant retrieved information. The context also drives user navigation through paths that meet his needs. A company may implement conceptual navigation to improve user search for information in a knowledge management environment. We suggest that the use of an ontology to conduct navigation in an Intranet may help the user to have a better understanding about the knowledge structure of the company.     

Validity of the “Samsung Health” application to measure steps: A study with two different samsung smartphones

The purpose of this study was to examine the validity of a highly popular pedometer application (Samsung Health). Sixteen adults (28.8 ± 8.9 years of age) wore two Samsung smartphone models, Samsung Galaxy Core Prime (SGCP) and Samsung Galaxy S4 (SGS4), at three body locations (waist, arm, and hand) while walking and running over a 50-m test. All trials were recorded using a video as a gold standard measure of step counts. Results indicated that the validity of Samsung Health varied depending on the smartphone model, its body location, and the type of gait (walking and running). Samsung Health showed acceptable validity when the SGCP was located on the hand (Bias = ?8.3%; RMSE = 5.6), and especially on the arm (Bias = ?7.2%; RMSE = 4.9) while running, and when the SGS4 was located on the arm (Bias = ?7.5%; RMSE = 5.4), and especially on the waist (Bias = 5.4%; RMSE = 3.7) while walking. Samsung Health only showed good validity when the SGS4 was located on the arm (Bias = 2.9%; RMSE = 3.6), and especially on the hand (Bias = 0.5%; RMSE = 2.5) while running. This application showed unacceptable validity in the remaining options.