Linking ethnic/racial discrimination to adolescent mental health: Sleep disturbances as an explanatory pathway

Ethnic/racial discrimination is associated with negative psychosocial outcomes, and this study considered sleep disturbance as a mediating pathway. Employing a combination of daily diary and biannual surveys, multilevel structural equation models estimated the indirect effects of sleep/wake concerns on negative, anxious, and positive mood, rumination, and somatic symptoms. In a sample of 350 urban Asian (74% Chinese, 8% Korean, 4% Indian, 1% Filipinx, 1% Vietnamese, and 12% other), Black, and Latinx (25% Dominican, 24% South American, 22% Mexican, 15% Puerto Rican, 5% Central American, and 9% other) youth (M = 14.27 years, 69% female, 77% U.S. born, 76% monoethnic/racial, data collected from 2015 to 2018), there was evidence for sleep disturbances mediating the impact of ethnic/racial discrimination on adjustment. Nighttime disturbance, daytime dysfunction, and daytime sleepiness evidenced partial or full mediation for daily- and person-level outcomes (υ = 0.1%–17.9%). Reciprocal associations between sleep disturbances and negative mood and rumination were also observed.     

Teachers,Arts Practice and Pedagogy

What are possible overlaps between arts practice and school pedagogy? How is teacher subjectivity and pedagogy affected when teachers engage with arts practice, in particular, theatre practices? We draw on research conducted into the Learning Performance Network (LPN), a project that involved school teachers working with the Royal Shakespeare Company and the University of Warwick. The aim of the commissioned research was to look at the effects on teacher development, focusing on the active rehearsal room pedagogic techniques and ensemble methods of exploring Shakespearean text and performance. The practices of working as an ensemble through rehearsal room pedagogy were central to the LPN. Our interest is in looking for possible shifts in teachers’ subjectivity, their self-perception. What affordances, limitations, accommodations and tensions are experienced by the teachers in transposing work from the rehearsal room to the classroom? We draw on a range of cultural theories that provide complementary perspectives on aspects of subjectivity; these include Vygotskian approaches to the psychology of art and acting. Raymond Williams’s work on the ‘dramatized society’ and Jacques Rancière’s work on spectatorship and pedagogy. Data in the form of excerpts from field notes, taken in an introductory workshop where teachers worked with theatre practitioners, and from transcribed interviews with participants in the project are used to provide evidence of shifts in perspective, self-perception and pedagogic practice.     

Submaximal Treadmill Exercise Test to Predict VO2max in Fit Adults

This study was designed to develop a single-stage submaximal treadmill jogging (TMJ) test to predict VO₂max in fit adults. Participants (N?=?400; men?=?250 and women?=?150), ages 18 to 40 years, successfully completed a maximal graded exercise test (GXT) at 1 of 3 laboratories to determine VO₂max. The TMJ test was completed during the first 2 stages of the GXT. Following 3 min of walking (Stage 1), participants achieved a steady-state heart rate (HR) while exercising at a comfortable self-selected submaximal jogging speed at level grade (Stage 2). Gender, age, body mass, steady-state HR, and jogging speed (mph) were included as independent variables in the following multiple linear regression model to predict VO₂max (R?=?0.91, standard error of estimate [SEE]?=?2.52 mL?·?kg^?1?·?min^?1): VO₂max (mL?·?kg^?1?·?min^?1)?=?58.687?+?(7.520 × Gender; 0?=?woman and 1?=?man)?+?(4.334 × mph) ? (0.211 × kg) ? (0.148 × HR) ? (0.107 × Age). Based on the predicted residual sum of squares (PRESS) statistics (R_PRESS?=?0.91, SEE _PRESS?=?2.54 mL?·?kg^?1?·?min^?1) and small total error (TE; 2.50 mL?·?kg^?1?·?min^?1; 5.3% of VO₂max) and constant error (CE; ?0.008 mL?·?kg^?1?·?min^?1) terms, this new prediction equation displays minimal shrinkage. It should also demonstrate similar accuracy when it is applied to other samples that include participants of comparable age, body mass, and aerobic fitness level. This simple TMJ test and its corresponding regression model provides a relatively safe, convenient, and accurate way to predict VO₂max in fit adults, ages 18 to 40 years.     

Tour de France,Giro, Vuelta,and classic European races show a unique progression of road cycling speed in the last 20 years

Abstract

Road cycling ranks among the most intense endurance exercises. Previous studies and mathematical models describing road cycling have not analysed performances per se. We describe the evolution of road cycling performance over the past 116 years. We studied the top ten cyclists' mean speeds in eight famous classic races and three European Grand Tours, using a previously published multi-exponential model that highlights the different progression periods of an event during the century. In addition, we measured an indicator of difficulty for the Tour de France by calculating the climbing index (i.e. the total altitude climbed over total distance). The eleven races' mean speed increased progressively from 23.13 km · h^?1 in 1892 to 41.19 ± 2.03 km · h^?1 in 2008. Road cycling development, like other quantifiable disciplines, fits a piecewise progression pattern that follows three periods: before, between, and after the two World Wars. However, a fourth period begins after 1993, providing a speed progression of 6.38% from the third one. The Tour de France's climbing index also provided insight into a recent paradoxical relationship with speeds: when the climbing index increased, the winner's speed also increased. Our results show a major improvement (6.38%) in road cycling performance in the last 20 years and question the role of extra-physiological parameters in this recent progression.     

Balancing Head and Heart: The Importance of Relational Accountability in Community-University Partnerships

In this article we introduce a “head and heart” approach to community-engaged scholarship. Through the literatures of Aboriginal scholarship and engaged scholarship we reflect on a community-university research and program development project undertaken in response to health and education concerns of Aboriginal people in Canada. We suggest that the head and heart approach was crucial to the program’s success and provides access to an ethical space where multiple worldviews are recognized and where the importance of relational accountability becomes evident. We then examine the implications of this approach for engaged scholarship and higher education practices.     

Peer review and panel decisions in the assessment of Australian Research Council project grant applicants: what counts in a highly competitive context?

Applications submitted to the Australian Research Council Large Grants Scheme in five discipline groups were examined with a view to determining the extent of influence of biographical and academic track record variables on ratings by independent assessors (peers) and on final outcomes as determined by the Council's discipline review panels. Variables considered included age, gender, type and status of position, institutional base, previous grants history and publication records of the applicants. Age and gender of the applicants did not have a significant impact on outcomes. Those in research only positions were rated more highly, and those in more prestigious institutions were more likely to win support, but these factors were partly accounted for by the more impressive publication records of these groups. The academic status of the applicant was, however, found to make a significant contribution to an explanation of the variance in independent assessor's ratings of the strength of the researcher, along with but additionally to that contributed by publication components of their track record. Assessor's ratings of the strength of the proposal were, as would be expected, the major influence on the final decisions made by review panels, although academic status of the applicant did, again, make a small but significant additional contribution to an explanation of variance in outcome. These results lend some support to the idea that the Matthew effect, or theory of accumulative advantage, has some impact on peer and panel review of applications within the highly competitive arena of Australian Research Council large grants.     

Measuring child maltreatment in the United Kingdom: a study of the prevalence of child abuse and neglect

OBJECTIVE: To provide reliable measures of the prevalence of all forms of child maltreatment in the UK that will be robust in the context of social and cultural differences due to social class, ethnicity and, region. METHODS: Two thousand eight hundred sixty-nine (2,869) young adults aged 18=-24, obtained by random probability sampling throughout the UK, were interviewed face to face by trained interviewers. Maltreatment was defined using a post hoc assessment of a range of experienced behaviors and treatments while the respondents were aged 16 or under. RESULTS: Over 90% of respondents reported that they came from a warm and loving family background. Maltreatment (both intra and extrafamilial) was experienced by 16% of the sample. Serious maltreatment was experienced by 7% of respondents for physical abuse, 6% for emotional abuse, 6% for absence of care, and 5% for absence of supervision, and 11% reported sexual abuse involving contact. Attitudes to maltreatment were explored through the examination of respondents' views of different behaviors and experiences that children may have been exposed to. CONCLUSION: The maltreatment of children in the UK today remains an extensive social problem. Prevalence data reveal that children are most at risk in the home for physical and emotional abuse and neglect. They are at greater risk of sexual abuse outside the home, particularly in dating relationships.     

Teaching elements of nature of science: A yearlong case study of a fourth‐grade teacher

This study examined and supported the efforts of Tina, an experienced elementary teacher, in helping her fourth graders internalize informed views of the inferential, tentative, and creative nature of science (NOS). Tina held informed views of, and was motivated to teach about, NOS. The study aimed to answer the following question: What specific supports were needed to enable Tina to make the target NOS elements explicit in her teaching? The lead researcher visited Tina's classroom every week and interacted with her on a continuous basis. Data sources included classroom observations and videotapes, teacher NOS questionnaires and associated interviews, teacher–researcher communications, and teacher and researcher logs. Although Tina's understandings and intentions were necessary to enable her to teach about NOS, they were not sufficient. Tina needed support to translate her NOS views and intentions into pedagogically appropriate instructional activities that would make the target NOS aspects accessible to her students. Socially mediated support was needed at the personal level in terms of helping Tina activate her tacit NOS understandings, and at the professional level in terms of modeling explicit NOS instruction in Tina's own classroom by the lead researcher. © 2003 Wiley Periodicals, Inc. J Res Sci Teach 40: 1025–1049, 2003