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Barriers to uptake of harm reduction techniques for GBMSM who use drugs in night-clubs and sex-on-premises venues in London and the Southeast: a mixed-methods, qualitative study
No full textBackgroundDrug-related harm is a significant public health concern in the UK, particularly among underserved groups such as gay, bisexual, and other men who have sex with men (GBMSM). This study explores the role of night-time venues (for example night clubs or sex-on-premises venues) in promoting harm reduction strategies for GBMSM who use drugs, highlighting unique challenges within these spaces.MethodsThe study used a mixed-methods approach, including an online survey (n = 53) and semi-structured interviews (n = 8). Participants included GBMSM with lived experience of substance use in night-time venues, as well as those providing support to this population. Data was collected through a Likert-scale survey and thematic analysis of qualitative responses.ResultsFindings reveal dissatisfaction among survey respondents about the level of support for harm reduction provided by night-time venues, which are perceived as inconsistent in their approach towards substance use. The study also identifies economic and legal barriers faced by venues that prevent the endorsement of harm reduction techniques.ConclusionsAddressing these barriers could transform night-time venues into effective sites for harm reduction, particularly by targeting “afters” culture (the phenomenon where club-goers will return to a residential setting and continue substance use for prolonged periods ‘after’ the night-time venue closes or the event ends) and promoting safer practices. This research suggests that coordinated efforts with local government and policy reform are crucial to fostering safer environments for GBMSM.</p
Countering hegemony: North Korea's diplomacy towards Latin America (1950-1977)
No full textEmbargoed : expected end date 05.02.2027</p
Emerging technologies, institutional groups and inter-organisational networks: The case of microneedles
No full textThis paper extends our understanding of how institutional logics contribute to inter-organisational collaboration formation during the emergence of a technology. We classify organisations into five institutional groups – Government (GOV), Healthcare (HC), Industry (IND), Non-Governmental (NGO), and Research and Higher Education (RHE). We then examine the extent to which collaborative relationships within (homophily) and across (heterophily) these groups shape network dynamics. We focus on an emerging technology, namely, microneedles, and estimate a series of Exponential Random Graphs Models (ERGMs) using publication co-authorship data. Our analysis provides evidence that institutional homophily contributes to the formation of inter-organisational ties – indicating that organisational actors tend to establish ties within their group rather than across different groups. However, the impact of this mechanism varies across groups and phases of technological emergence. In the early development stages, institutional homophily drives the formation of homophilous ties within the GOV and IND groups, where collaborations focus on basic technical challenges. This is followed by the HC group, where collaborations centre around clinical applications. In the later development stages, homophily continues to influence the formation of intra-group ties among the GOV, IND, HC, and NGO groups, with collaborations expanding to clinical applications and informing decision-making processes.</p
Centrophilic retrotransposons of plant genomes
No full textIn organisms ranging from vertebrates to plants, major components of centromeres are rapidly-evolving repeat sequences, such as tandem repeats (TRs) and transposable elements (TEs), which harbor centromere-specific histone H3 (CENH3) 1,2 . Complete centromere structures recently determined in human and Arabidopsis suggest frequent integration and purging of retrotransposons within the TR regions of centromeres 3–5 . Despite the high impact of “centrophilic” retrotransposons on the paradox of rapid centromere evolution, the mechanisms involved in centromere targeting remain poorly understood in any organism. Here we show that both Ty3 and Ty1 LTR retrotransposons rapidly turnover within the centromeric TRs of Arabidopsis species. We demonstrate that the Ty1/Copia element Tal1 (Transposon of Arabidopsis lyrata 1) integrates de novo into regions occupied by CENH3 in A. thaliana, and that ectopic expansion of the CENH3 region results in spread of Tal1 integration regions. The integration spectra of chimeric TEs reveal the key structural variations responsible for contrasting chromatin-targeting specificities to centromeres versus gene-rich regions, which have recurrently converted during the evolution of these TEs. Our findings reveal the impact of centromeric chromatin on TE-mediated rapid centromere evolution, with relevance across eukaryotic genomes.</p
Frank O’Hara’s presentation of self in everyday life: Erving Goffman and the lyric of social occasion
No full textThe article locates compelling similarities in attitude and style between two contemporaries, the New York School poet Frank O'Hara and the sociologist Erving Goffman. Goffman's analysis of 'interaction rituals' and the 'gossamer reality of social occasions' allows me to expand upon and ramify Jonathan Culler's theory of lyric apostrophe as a form of triangulation to better account for O'Hara's poetry of the 'social occasion'. In drawing on Goffman's inductive terminology of 'unfocused interaction', 'footing', 'face-work', and the dramaturgical analysis of the self in everyday life, I offer a language sensitive to the description of sociality in lyric performances. Furthermore, I reflect on the lyric of social occasion as a challenge to poetic form, suggesting instead that the poem is better understood according to social interaction as a temporally bounded yet fragile and porous event. To understand why Goffman and O'Hara share a fierce acuity to social mannerisms I discuss Goffman's analysis of social stigma and of the asylum, alongside O'Hara's sexuality and support of decolonizing poets. Both figures share an acute sense of the precarity of social valuation, the intense pressures of heterenormativity, and of the energy - the 'tonus' - required to maintain social interactions.</p
Passional atheism, passional agnosticism and ‘the will to be-lieve’
No full textJack Warman and Joshua Cockayne (2019) have recently claimed that the arguments that William James (1897) provides in his famous lecture ‘The Will to Believe’ to justify passional theism would equally justify passional atheism. They are correct in this claim, but there is in fact more than one way that a non-theistic doxastic attitude can be passionally justified given what is said in James’s lecture. In addition to outright, passionally-motivated, atheistic belief, there is also the possibility of arriving at theistic non-belief (henceforth ‘agnosticism’) when the passional reasons for adopting theism (even where that option is “live”) are overcome by the passional reasons for not adopting theism. James takes great pains to argue against the claim that we must prefer passional non-belief over passional belief, but he does not argue that we must prefer passional belief over passional non-belief and, in fact, he explicitly denies this, or so I shall argue. Thus, on my interpretation of the lecture, the choice to go without religious belief, even where that option is presented as forced, momentous and live, can be passionally justified. Moreover, so can the adoption of outright atheistic belief for passional reasons.</p
Hand, limb, and other motor preferences
No full textTraditionally, lateral features of human brains and behaviors were considered unique to humans. However, with an explosion in cross-species investigations in recent history, research demonstrates that biases in hand, limb, and other motor preferences result from millions of years of shared evolution with other vertebrates and significant efforts are being made to develop and apply standardized measures to facilitate valid comparisons both within and across species. The behavioral sciences stand at the forefront of a paradigm shift to view human motor preferences within a comparative framework. Individual-level motor biases may reflect an early evolutionary division of primary survival functions for the left and right hemispheres of the brain, while population-level motor alignment may offer social advantages that benefit both the individual and the group. These lateralized primary functions may still influence modern human behavior and provide a foundational platform for the development of our seemingly unique and sophisticated social and other cognitive functions. In this way, the evolution and development of cognition are inextricably linked. This chapter considers hand, limb, and other motor preferences in humans and other animals with a focus on methodological practice, findings, and the future of this fast-paced field.</p
International norms for adult handgrip strength: a systematic review of data on 2.4 million adults aged 20 to 100+ years from 69 countries and regions
No full textMuscular strength is a powerful marker of current health status and robust predictor of age-related disease and disability. Handgrip strength (HGS) using isometric dynamometry is a convenient, feasible, and widely used method of assessing muscular strength among people of all ages. While adult HGS norms have been published for many countries, no study has yet synthesized available data to produce international norms. The objective of this study was to generate international sex- and age-specific norms for absolute and body size-normalized HGS across the adult lifespan. METHODS: Systematic searches were conducted in 6 databases/web search engines (MEDLINE, SPORTDiscus, Embase, Web of Science, CINAHL, and Google Scholar) up to December 1, 2023. We included full-text peer-reviewed observational studies that reported normative HGS data for adults aged ≥20 years by sex and age. Pseudo data were generated using Monte Carlo simulation following harmonization for methodological variation. Population-weighted Generalized Additive Models for Location, Scale, and Shape were used to develop sex- and age-specific norms for absolute HGS (kg) and HGS normalized by height (Ht, m) squared (i.e., HGS/Ht2 in kg/m2). Norms were tabulated as percentile values (5th to 95th) and visualized as smoothed percentile curves. RESULTS: We included data from 100 unique observational studies representing 2,405,863 adults (51.9% female) aged 20 to 100+ years from 69 countries and regions tested from the year 2000 onward. On average, absolute and normalized HGS values negligibly improved throughout early adulthood, peaked from age 30-39 years (at 47.8 kg (males) and 29.7 kg (females) for absolute HGS or 16.3 kg/m2 (males) and 11.3 kg/m2 (females) for HGS/Ht2), and declined afterwards. The age-related decline in HGS accelerated from middle to late adulthood and was slightly larger for males than for females during middle adulthood. CONCLUSION: This study provides the world's largest and most geographically comprehensive international norms for adult HGS by sex and age. These norms have utility for global peer-comparisons, health screening, and surveillance.</p
The political consequences of work: an integrative review
No full text Work experiences and political participation outside work are intrinsically linked. Management scholars have acknowledged the role that organizations play in shaping political behavior from a firm-level perspective, but the specific working conditions and how they translate into employee political participation and attitudes outside work remain poorly understood. This paper offers an interdisciplinary review of the empirical literature from the past 25 years across the management and political science disciplines. It examines how individual work-related experiences (broadly categorized into job content, working environment, employment characteristics, and social relations at work) relate to political engagement outside of work: political participation, political attitudes, political trust, and political values. The results show that enabling work experiences (e.g., more skill use, autonomy, higher income, more social interactions) and experiences that caused grievances (e.g., more job or financial insecurity) were both related to more political participation but differed in their effect on political trust and regarding political attitudes on economic and cultural issues. We also review the main theoretical explanations and consolidate contradictions. Finally, we propose a future research agenda, calling for the expansion of theoretical lenses, a focus on individual-level explanatory mechanisms, and more multilevel research.</p
[Editorial] Resistance, tensions and consent to digital working in healthcare
No full textEarlier research has extended knowledge about how the nature of healthcare work is changing, and the implications this has for professionals seeking to deliver effective, robust and state-of-the-art services. However, since the onset of the Covid-19 pandemic there has been a rapid mobilization of digital services across the sector that has raised new challenges. In this Special Issue (SI), we therefore aim to offer novel insights on how new patterns of work are playing out in this new era of digital healthcare. As digitalization has become widespread, even ubiquitous, it is now necessary to identify the theoretical, practical and empirical issues that affect the organization of health work now and how it might affect it in the future. Our overarching research question in this SI, which we address through the nine selected articles we present in this Editorial, is: How is digital work in healthcare being organized post-Covid 19, and how does this impact interprofessional collaborations, clinical work practices, professional identities and relations of power?</p