980 research outputs found
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The Parish in Peril? Views From the Grassroots of the Church of England
No full textThis study explores opinions about parish finances and about strategies related to parishes among 3,219 clergy and lay people who took part in the Church Citation2024 survey. Just under a third of people thought that their parish was struggling financially and were unable to meet its share of diocesan costs. A third of people felt parishes should be in a position to pay for their clergy, a proportion that was slightly higher among Evangelicals and those from larger congregations. There was strong agreement across the sample that rich parishes should subsidise poor ones, although some laity, especially from larger or Evangelical churches, tended to disagree. There was little support for concentrating resources on larger churches, but slightly more support for closing unviable churches. People from rural churches did not necessarily fit the stereotype of wanting to keep unviable churches going
Charting the composition of British series of children’s classics
No full textClassic children’s literature continues to hold a strong appeal for scholars, publishers, educators and readers in the United Kingdom. This is exemplified by the prominent position that classic texts currently occupy in British educational policy. Since the turn of the twentieth century several British publishers have grouped together individual works and presented them to child readers in series titled classics. Despite the significant role that publishers are acknowledged to play in creating classics and prevalence of British series of children’s classics, these series have received a limited amount of critical attention in children’s literature scholarship. Therefore, the composition of series in terms of the titles that publishers have regularly presented, and currently present, as children’s classics is an unknown entity. This paper reports on a research project that used descriptive statistical analysis with a focus on the frequency of titles, specifically the most regularly occurring titles and non-recurring titles that only appear in a single series, to draw conclusions about the composition of series. This approach and focus necessitated a large data set of information about British series of children’s classics from the start of the twentieth century, specifically metadata about the titles included in these series, that was subsequently organized in a database. The findings reveal the extent to which the composition of series is influenced by commercial factors, namely copyright. Furthermore, studying the types of non-recurring titles and their appearance in series over time reveals that British series of children’s classics in the twenty-first century are generally more homogenised, as series now focus on a small core of titles from the Golden Age of children’s literature and lack diversity. The paper concludes by arguing that a statistical approach to children’s literature that involves the compilation and analysis of large data sets enables researchers to move beyond individual texts and summarise previously unexplored or under explored areas
Strategies to promote cervical screening for an aging demographic: a global insight
No full textClaire Mitchell and Alexandra Carlin use studies from around the world to explain how cervical screening can be boosted, and the role primary care nurses can play in doing so.
Cervical screening coverage, in the United Kingdom (UK), has been steadily declining year-on-year. Concurrently, the Human Papillomavirus (HPV) vaccination schedule excluded women born before 1990, therefore there is growing need to promote screening to those who were ineligible. Local data may help inform practices to identify non-attenders and allow development of targeted strategies to improve screening attendance with aim to meet the national target of 80%. NHS England aims to eradicate cervical cancer by 2040, however, much remains to be done to achieve this goal. Innovations such as self-sampling may be a vital tool to promote screening. This article will explore global targets, and the lessons learnt from countries with higher success rates, than the UK, in eradicating cervical cancer
Exploring connections between prayer preferences and psychological type or temperament:Introducing the Durham Indices of Prayer Preferences (DIPPs)
No full textBuilding on earlier research concerned with connections between prayer preferences and psychological type or temperament, the present study focused specifically on prayer preferences associated with the orientations (extraversion and introversion) and the attitudes (judging and perceiving). Drawing on data provided by 207 Anglican and Methodist ministry training candidates this study proposed and tested the Durham Indices of Prayer Preferences (DIPPs), comprising four eight-item scales of extraversion prayer preference, introversion prayer preference, judging prayer preference, and sensing prayer preference. Each scale demonstrated good properties of internal consistency reliability and construct validity tested against the psychological type preferences of the participants as assessed by the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator
Psychological Temperament, Spirituality, and Augustinian Prayer: An Empirical Enquiry
No full textDrawing on data provided by 207 Anglican and Methodist ministry training candidates, who completed the Myers-Briggs Type Indicator and an 80-item battery of type-related prayer preference items, this study tested the thesis advanced by Michael and Norrisey that the Apollonian (NF) Temperament is associated with Augustinian prayer and spirituality. From the battery of eighty items, the analysis identified eleven items rated more highly by NF participants. These items produced a scale with a satisfactory alpha of .81 (offering internal consistency reliability). Consideration of these items alongside the secondary literature on Augustinian spirituality, and Augustine’s own account in his Confessions, showed that they mapped broadly onto the characteristics of Augustinian prayer and spirituality (offering content validity). These data support the hypothesized link between the Apollonian (NF) Temperament and Augustinian prayer and spirituality
The Woman of Colour: race and gender in the literature we teach
No full textThis paper reports on a short project undertaken with student English teachers during their one year Post Graduate Certificate of Education (PGCE) teaching course that considered the potential inclusion of the novella The Woman of Colour into their teaching. The research considers how the student teachers received the text and the value, issues and questions that they felt it might bring to their teaching. It reflects on short lesson segments created by the participants to include the text in their teaching of KS3 or KS4 classes. The inclusion of literary works by women and by Black writers, and the power, agency and autonomy of the female, non-white protagonists portrayed, was contextualised within wider societal education and values
Invitations to Christian commitment: The distinctive voice of Anglican cathedrals
No full textMy argument in this paper is that cathedrals could make a key contribution to the distinctive invitation that the Anglican Church can offer to Christian commitment. This distinctive invitation is especially important in societies in which the Christian narrative is not dominant and in which other clear invitations are being offered from narrow sectarian perspectives rather than from an inclusive church perspective. This argument emerges from my personal experience serving as canon theologian in three cathedrals within three different provinces of the Anglican Church: Bangor in Wales, St Johns in Newfoundland, and most recently Liverpool in England. I am, however, conscious that this personal experience may or may not be relevant to the Church of Ireland.
The argument also emerges from 20 years of patient and persistent research tested in the peer-reviewed literature. This paper invites the reader to enter that research world and to critique its potential relevance for a different political, social, and ecclesial context. The argument progresses in four steps. Step one introduces two key concepts: the science of cathedral studies and empirical theology. Step two draws on theology and ecclesiology to frame a vision. Step three draws on sociological theory to frame a perspective. Step four draws on empirical research to test that perspective
Reading the incident at the pool called Beth-zatha (John 5: 1–16) through the lenses of introverted intuition and extraverted intuition: perceiving text differently
No full textWorking within the sensing, intuition, feeling, thinking (SIFT) approach to biblical hermeneutics, the present study focuses attention on the distinctive voices of dominant extraverted intuition, and dominant introverted intuition. The voice of dominant introverted intuition is further nuanced by taking into account the differential influences of auxiliary extraverted feeling and auxiliary extraverted thinking. These voices are articulated by type-alike hermeneutical communities (involving 22 participants) working with the incident at the pool called Beth-zatha narrated in John 5: 1–16. The present study goes beyond previous work employing hermeneutical communities comprised on the basis of dominant function-orientation by including the effect of contrasting auxiliary functions
Relationships Between Sleep Quality, Anxiety and Depression in University Students: Stable Trends over Time and a Pronounced Concern for Sleep Initiation
No full textBackground/Objectives: Relationships between sleep quality, anxiety and depression are well-documented across the lifespan. Here we investigated relationships between sleep, mental health and markers of obesity and cardiovascular health in Higher Education stu- dents (young adults, 18–28 years) using repeated cross-sectional sampling. Methods: Stu- dents (n = 486) participated at one of four timepoints across 2020–2023. The PSQI (sleep quality), GAD7 (anxiety) and PHQ8 (depression) were completed online. Measurements of obesity (Body Mass Index (BMI), body fat percent (BF%) and waist–hip ratio (WHR)) and cardiovascular function (heart rate (HR), diastolic and systolic blood pressure (DP and SP)) were determined. Changes over time, differences between sexes, and correla- tions between parameters were examined. Results: All measures were stable over the 4-year period. GAD7 (p < 0.0001) and PHQ8 (p = 0.0014) scores were significantly higher in females than males. There were significant, moderate to strong correlations between PSQI, GAD7 and PHQ8 scores for both sexes (r = 0.34–0.71). Only 18.1% of females and 23% of males reported both good quality sleep and no or low levels of anxiety and de- pression. Significant sex-specific differences were observed across markers of obesity and cardiovascular function (for BF%, WHR, HR and SP—all p ≤ 0.01), which showed weak to moderate correlations with sleep and mental health. Impaired sleep latency (C2) was identified as a potential key contributing factor. Conclusions: These observations provide evidence of multiple established, interlinked chronic challenges affecting sleep, mental and physical health in students. Identification of a key role for impaired sleep latency provides a foundation for targeted intervention, focusing upon improving sleep initiation, to improve mental health outcomes