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The Credibility Assessment Process of Political Information on WhatsApp in Brazil
No full textInstant messaging applications (IMA) like WhatsApp are increasingly used for political information and news and have been directly related to the spread of misinformation (Newman, 2019). Although the platform’s closed nature differentiates it from open social media, it also has hindered studies exploring political information processing on this platform (Valenzuela et al., 2019; Valeriani & Vaccari, 2018). This study investigates the credibility assessment process of political information on WhatsApp, a central skill for individuals and a main component of information processing. Based on past literature, this study explores the credibility assessment along three fronts: perceived sources, social relationships, and platform affordances.
Data were collected from 134 solicited diaries from 30 Brazilian participants around the 2022 Brazilian General Elections. Following, 14 diarists participated in in-depth interviews. Solicited diaries provided contextualized insight into users’ interactions with political content, while in-depth interviews explored underlying motivations and the role of affordances.
Results reveal a predominantly heuristic credibility assessment process, with more elaborated evaluations occurring when users are highly motivated and not constrained by time or context. A pre- assessment phase was also identified, where users decide whether to engage with a piece of political information. Findings also indicate the importance of social relationships and norms for the credibility assessment of information and users’ interactions. Finally, WhatsApp’s visibility constraints create additional barriers to in-depth assessment.
This research concludes with three focus areas for improved credibility assessment on WhatsApp: addressing platform visibility barriers, promoting information literacy skills compatible with the existing evaluation practices, and fostering s collective misinformation correction
The Heritagization of Africville: Tourism, Racism, and the Politics of Commemoration
No full textThis dissertation critically examines the heritagization of Africville, a historic Black community in Halifax, Nova Scotia, through the theoretical framework of Critical Race Theory (CRT). Utilizing qualitative methodologies - including critical race methodology (CRM) and netnography, and methods such as semi-structured interviews with former residents, descendants, and stakeholders, participant observation at the Africville Annual Reunion, and document analysis of articles and online visitor reviews - the study investigates Africville’s transformation into a heritage tourism site and museum. The findings reveal how the Africville Museum functions as a site of racial resilience, collective memory, and anti-racism discourse, while simultaneously serving as a platform for reconciliation and healing. However, the research also interrogates how institutionalized reconciliation efforts may inadvertently reinforce marginalization within the "apology paradigm". By foregrounding lived experiences and visitor interpretations, the study highlights the dual function of Africville as both a commemorative space and a catalyst for social justice advocacy. It argues that museums must evolve beyond static repositories of history to become participatory spaces that foster agency, dialogue, and community ownership. This work contributes to scholarship on roots tourism, Black heritage preservation, and racial justice, offering practical insights into how heritage institutions can more equitably engage with histories of systemic racism and support transformative policy and public understanding in postcolonial Canadian contexts
Reframing Disability, Defining Access: A Critical Discourse Analysis of the Accessible Canada Act
No full textThis project conducts a Critical Discourse Analysis of An Act to ensure a barrier-free Canada, Bill C-81. The corpus of data examined for this project are all drafts of the Accessible Canada Act, transcripts of meetings in the House of Commons, Senate, and Committees, and the written submissions by members of the disability community and their allies throughout the legislative process to Royal Assent. The analysis demonstrates the tension and dynamics of power, control, ability and disability within the scope of creating new legislation that, arguably, does not dream disability justice. The conclusions drawn from this work are based on Bacchi’s ‘What is the Problem Represented to be’ (WPR) Approach, and the application of insights from biopolitics, critical disability theory, Human rights, disability justice and critical policy theory
Écrire sa biographie dans les pages et dans les marges : logiques élémentaires de l’expérience de la détresse psychologique dans les pénitenciers canadiens
No full textLa sociologie carcérale fait abondamment état des souffrances que l’institution pénitentiaire impose, génère et nourrit chez les personnes détenues, que ce soit en termes de privations (Sykes), de mortification (Goffman) ou de surveillance et soumission (Foucault) pour ne nommer que celles-ci. Or, malgré le poids de ces souffrances, l’agentivité des personnes détenues demeure. Munie d’une grille d’analyse basée sur la phénoménologie et la sociologie de l’expérience, la recherche ci-présente se concentre sur le récit de détresse psychologique vécue en détention par des hommes, ayant ou non un diagnostic psychiatrique officiel. Notre conceptualisation de l’expérience des participants met en valeur deux éléments principaux.
En premier lieu, les interactions entre les services de santé mentale carcéraux et les détenus se structurent au travers de trois logiques d’action, soit la soumission, la stratégie et la résistance. Ces logiques d’action sont mobilisées par les participants avec une conscience claire de leur dossier correctionnel qu’ils vivent comme étant omniscient, omniprésent et omnipotent. Que ce soit au travers de comportements de soumission, de stratégie ou de résistance, les détenus tentent alors de se réapproprier leur capacité à se raconter.
En deuxième lieu, notre analyse soutient que chacune de ces logiques d’action se déploie sur trois temporalités simultanées avec des impératifs spécifiques. Le présent immédiat où la personne détenue tente de gérer la détresse ressentie; le présent quotidien où elle veut s’assurer un quotidien vivable; et le présent continu où la personne détenue tente d’écrire sa biographie. Ainsi, malgré les déterminations carcérales, l’expérience des personnes détenues vivant de la détresse psychologique se caractérise par un fin travail d’auteur-ité sur le récit institutionnel indélébile qui les précède dans tant d’interactions
Establishing a core outcome set for creatine transporter deficiency and guanidinoacetate methyltransferase deficiency
No full textAbstract Background Creatine transporter (CTD) and guanidinoacetate methyltransferase (GAMT) deficiencies are rare inborn errors of creatine metabolism, resulting in cerebral creatine deficiency. Patients with either condition commonly exhibit intellectual and developmental disabilities, often accompanied by behavior problems, delayed speech, seizures, and motor impairments. There is currently no efficacious treatment for CTD, while current management for GAMT requires lifelong treatment with a protein restricted diet and intake of high amounts of oral supplements. Efforts to conduct clinical trials on potential treatments for these disorders are made more difficult by the lack of clinical and patient-derived meaningful outcomes. A core outcome set (COS) can facilitate consistent use of outcomes in studies. The current effort included patient and caregiver perspectives into the outcome selection of a COS for CTD and GAMT. Results We partnered with caregivers and health professionals to establish the first COS for CTD and GAMT. The COS developed includes seven outcomes (“Adaptive Functioning”, “Cognitive Functioning”, “Emotional Dysregulation”, “MRS Brain Creatine”, “Seizure/Convulsions”, “Expressive Communication”, and “Fine Motor Functions”) for both CTD and GAMT, and an additional outcome for GAMT (“Serum/Plasma Guanidinoacetate”) that are important to stakeholders and consequently should be considered for measurement in every clinical trial. Caregivers were valued partners throughout the COS development process, which increased community engagement and facilitated caregiver empowerment. Conclusions Development of this COS illustrates a patient-centered approach for clinical trial readiness for CTD and GAMT that if utilized will make clinical trial results comparable, minimize bias in clinical trial outcome selection, and promote efficient use of resources
Exploring Regional Differences in Traditional Food Harvesting in Three Northern Indigenous Communities in Canada
No full textAcross what is now called Canada, Indigenous communities have been navigating a complex and challenging relationship with food security and food sovereignty. This relationship has been shaped by several factors, including geographical location, depletion of food sources, forced settlement, and the shift toward a wage-based economy, among others. This paper investigates how traditional foods contribute to meeting the energy requirements of three northern Indigenous communities: Clyde River, Moose Cree First Nation, and Old Crow. It begins by exploring the concepts of food security and food sovereignty and their relevance to Indigenous communities. This study highlights the cultural significance of traditional food systems and the lasting impacts of colonization on these relationships. By calculating the Total Energy Expenditure (TEE) for each community and estimating how many of the most hunted and consumed animals would be needed to meet a 17% contribution rate, the research illustrates the scale of harvesting required to sustain these communities. While reaching such targets may not be feasible for all, the findings emphasize the absolute necessity of supporting culturally appropriate, community-led, and ecologically sustainable traditional harvesting practices
Ecological drivers of malaria vector habitat and transmission over 1 year of long-lasting insecticidal net intervention in Côte d’Ivoire
No full textAbstract Background Malaria is a mosquito-borne parasitic disease that causes significant morbidity and mortality in at-risk populations, especially in children in sub-Saharan Africa. Despite reductions in malaria burden owing to the scale-up of effective interventions, there are concerns that long-lasting insecticidal net (LLIN) effects may not be sustained owing to widespread insecticide resistance and differential impacts of LLIN on vector species. In this study, we aimed to test the effect of different LLIN products and other environmental factors on the ecological niche of three mosquito vector species using state-of-the-art ecological niche modelling approaches. Methods This study used data from a cluster randomized control trial that took place in Tiébissou, in Central Côte d’Ivoire. Anopheles mosquito density and Plasmodium falciparum vector infection data were available across 33 clusters. We used satellite remote sensing related to land cover, climate, topography and population density across the study area alongside vector species occurrence data to construct ecological niche models for An. coluzzi, An. gambiae s.s. and An. funestus s.s., and for P. falciparum-infected vectors, at baseline and 1-year post-LLIN intervention. We compared the projected habitat and habitat determinants for each species, and assessed the respective contributions of each intervention arm and environmental factors on the probability of species occurrence. Results Minimal to considerable overall reductions in suitable habitat across the study area were observed for the three mosquito vector species (less than 1% to more than 60%), and considerable overall reduction was observed for P. falciparum-infected vectors (more than 50%). We did not detect an effect of intervention arm on the probability of occurrence of any vector species, while we found strong significant effects of a combination of land cover, climate, topography and/or population density variables on each of the three mosquito vector species and malaria-infected vectors. Our results suggest environmental factors may have facilitated or restricted changes in the probability of occurrence of vector species and infected vectors in the context of vector control interventions. Conclusions Our study highlights wide ecological differences across malaria vector species and supports the need to consider malaria vector species composition when deploying malaria vector control interventions in endemic settings. Graphical abstrac
Advancing Elementary Flux Mode Analysis for Large-Scale Metabolic Flux Networks Under Steady State
No full textCellular metabolism is a dynamic process regulating the production and consumption of metabolites. These reaction rates, or metabolic fluxes, are regulated at multiple cellular levels by genes, transcripts, proteins, and metabolites. Advancements in technological and computational methods are leading to increasingly comprehensive estimates of steady state fluxes. In this thesis, I focus on advancing methods to analyse steady state flux data using minimal, steady state pathways known as elementary flux modes (EFMs). Since an arbitrary set of steady state fluxes can be reconstructed by a positive, linear combination of EFMs, these pathways can be viewed as functional units of steady state flow within and through a metabolic flux network. Working with EFMs present two challenges, however; the non-uniqueness of flux decomposition in terms of EFMs, and scaling of EFM analysis in large networks. Here, I address both computational problems and show how EFM analysis can be used to characterize the flow of metabolites and their atomic constituents in large-scale metabolic networks. In the first part of this thesis, I develop a biophysically-motivated method enforcing a Markovian constraint to uniquely decompose fluxes onto EFMs in strictly-unimolecular reaction networks. I refer to this method as the cycle-history Markov chain (CHMC) and prove its correctness with both discrete- and continuous-time Markov chains. Using the CHMC, I address biophysical questions regarding the distribution of pathway fluxes in a unimolecular, sphingolipid kinetic model of healthy and Alzheimer's disease patients. My statistical analyses of EFM weights support a dominant pathway flux hypothesis, whereby the majority of network fluxes are explained by a small subset of highly active EFMs. In my final aim, I generalize my Markov chain method to any type of metabolic network, including those with multispecies reactions. I do this through my proposal of atomic elementary flux modes (AEFMs) which explain the minimal, steady state flow of indivisible atoms in a metabolic network. By constraining atomic movements with atom mapping predictions, I show that AEFMs, unlike EFMs, can be enumerated in five large-scale metabolic networks by means of an atomic cycle-history Markov chain (ACHMC). In a subsequent analysis of a single set of inferred fluxes in a human liver cancer cell line (HepG2), I further show that glutamine-derived carbon AEFMs exhibit pathway flux dominance, with the most active AEFMs corresponding to well-known metabolic subsystems and the recently discovered non-canonical tricarboxylic acid (TCA) cycle. Altogether, my (atomic) cycle-history Markov chain ((A)CHMC) methods address fundamental challenges in EFM analysis and showcase the potential of both EFMs and AEFMs to further our understanding of cellular metabolism
Ex vivo myo-mechanical assessment of isolated rectus abdominis muscle in pregnancy-specific urinary incontinence: a cross-sectional study nested within the Diamater cohort
No full textAbstract Background Rectus abdominis muscle (RAM) myopathy is the underlying mechanism of pregnancy-specific urinary incontinence (PSUI), which has been shown to be a predictor of long-term urinary incontinence (UI). However, there is limited knowledge about selective ex vivo myo-mechanical assessment (MMA) of the RAM in healthy pregnant women, particularly those with PSUI. Results Our analysis revealed no specific quantitative parameters from the window analysis or contractile response of the RAM in ex vivo MMA. A gradual and consistent decline was predominantly observed in the peak and strength parameters for both groups. The qualitative contractile response analysis of the RAM using peak and strength parameters revealed three distinct behaviors under electrical stimulation: a progressive decrease in strength, sudden muscular arrest, and asynchrony with erratic fluctuations. In-depth quantitative analysis of the RAM ex vivo did not yield substantial differences between the two groups. However, qualitative analysis proved valuable in distinguishing the groups, revealing a tendency toward the loss of the progressive peak declines observed in the control group. Conclusion This study highlights the complexity of RAM myopathy in the context of PSUI and its potential impact on UI outcomes. Method In this cross-sectional study nested within a cohort, we examined ex vivo myography assessments in 87 mothers, comprising 48 with PSUI and 39 without PSUI, all of whom exhibited normal glucose tolerance. General data were extracted from our database, whereas RAM samples were collected during C-section for qualitative and quantitative ex vivo myography analysis, with a focus on initial and final baseline measurements, peak responses, strength, and duration times
The Human Intestinal Virome at the Mucosal-luminal Interface
No full textThe virome is a core but understudied part of the human gut microbiome. New laboratory and bioinformatic technologies have greatly advanced our understanding of our gut viruses, however most studies are based on fecal sampling. The objective of this research was to study the human virome at the intestinal mucosal surface, which enables multisite sampling and the characterization of mucosal viruses at the site of intestinal inflammation.
First, I developed a protocol to extract viral nucleic acids from human mucosal-luminal interface (MLI) samples, which are obtained during endoscopy. I showed that we could reproducibly profile the mucosal virome community. Second, I performed deep multiomic sequencing on MLI samples from three pediatric participants with ulcerative colitis, demonstrating a distinct mucosa-associated viral community in comparison to stool. The combination of metavirome, metagenome, and metatranscriptome sequencing enabled studies of microbial interactions, including bacteriome-virome relationships and prophage analysis. Lastly, we applied our virome methodology in a cohort of over fifty pediatric subjects undergoing investigation for inflammatory bowel disease. We demonstrated that viromes are highly individualized and found that Crassvirales were enriched in the proximal colon in participants without IBD. We also performed longitudinal sampling to identify a persistent and highly abundant viral subpopulation.
Altogether, we have contributed methodology and commentary for virome sequencing of an important human sample type, extended the repertoire of virome sequences, and characterized the mucosa-associated virome in the setting of inflammatory bowel disease. These efforts provide practical guidance for future studies on the intestinal virome in human health and disease