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Can a values and video-based activity increase knowledge or pro-environmental attitudes and behaviour?
Get PDFEnvironmental education is important in the face of the climate crisis. Although previous studies suggest that knowledge could boost pro-environmental attitudes, behavioural change is complex and may go beyond knowledge acquisition. Previous research highlighted biospheric and altruistic values as motivational factors related to pro- environmental behaviour (PEB). Video-based education has arisen as an accessible environmental learning medium. Video-sharing platforms offer accurate educational videos, although, it is unclear if they can increase knowledge, PEB or change attitudes. An online experiment randomly allocated 72 students in two conditions to watch an informational video on climate change, with one condition engaging in a values clarification task. Participants completed questionnaires on environmental attitudes, PEB, environmental self-efficacy and knowledge. Cross-correlations indicated complex inter-relationships and a non-significant relationship between knowledge and PEB at baseline. The values clarification task did not offer an advantage on PEB or pro-environmental attitudes. Both conditions experienced increases in knowledge, indicating that watching an educational video on climate change contributes to knowledge acquisition. The findings highlight complex mechanisms involved in increasing pro-environmental attitudes and behaviours
Moral injury in secure mental healthcare: Conceptualisation, causes and cognitions
Get PDFThis PhD aimed to explore the conceptualisation of moral injury, and the sources leading to and increasing risk for the development of moral injury in healthcare staff working in secure mental health settings. The program of work also sought to explore a series of cognitive-emotional pathways linking exposure to a potentially morally injurious event (PMIE) with the development of moral injury, and subsequent psychological and somatic adversities.
In line with the first aim, a systematic literature review and meta-ethnography was firstly conducted. Thirty qualitative and quantitative papers identifying potential sources of moral injury for healthcare workers in forensic and mental health settings were identified. Meta-ethnographic synthesis of the findings across papers yielded three third-order factors reflecting a series of moral dichotomies; (i) ‘between profession and system’, (ii) ‘between relations with patients and relations with others’, and (iii) ‘between principles and practices’. The line of argument that developed from the synthesis described the hierarchical relationships between such dichotomies, with discordance between values of the healthcare profession and features of the healthcare system primarily providing the conditions for PMIEs to occur.
Following this, the first study involved the recruitment of 46 experts to partake in a Delphi survey of sources of moral injury, over three successive rounds. A number of PMIEs were identified, which related to aspects of the healthcare system, the secure context, relational dynamics, and individual practices, behaviours and attitudes. Experts also identified and agreed on several items relating to the definition of a PMIE, the factors driving the occurrence of PMIEs, and the factors increasing risk for the subsequent development of moral injury.
In line with the second aim, a cross-sectional study of the risk factors and cognitive mechanisms implicated in the development of moral injury (study two) was conducted. Data was collected from 545 healthcare professionals working in secure mental health settings. In the first instance, the results indicated high rates of exposure to moral transgressions and betrayals, and such events were experienced as impactful by participants. Furthermore, findings supported a developmental-cognitive pathway underlying moral injury. Specifically, a partially mediating serial effect of childhood trauma symptoms, early maladaptive schemas, and maladaptive metacognitions in the pathway between moral injury exposure and distress was found.
Finally, the contributions of moral injury to secondary psychological, somatic, physiological and functional sequalae, and the cognitive-emotional mechanisms linking these facets (study three) was explored. Analyses of data collected from 385 healthcare professionals working in secure mental healthcare organisations indicated moral injury symptoms to be a positive predictor of psychological distress, somatic symptoms, nightmare-related difficulties, and impairments in personality functioning, and contributed to the regression models beyond the effects of burnout. Additionally, findings indicated a mediating role for negative emotional schema in the pathways between moral injury and these adverse well-being outcomes.
This programme of research indicates that secure mental healthcare settings provide many of the conditions for moral injury to occur at an organisational, relational, and individual level. Additionally, the findings support the conceptualisation of moral injury through an intergrated framework that considers developmental, cognitive, emotional and social processes. From the findings, a theoretical model that attempts to explain how moral injury occurs and leads to subsequent adverse well-being outcomes in secure mental healthcare staff is proposed
Deep Models for Rigid Objects Real-Time Pose Estimation
Get PDFAccurate and robust six degrees of freedom (6-DoF) pose estimation of rigid objects is one of the fundamental tasks in computer vision, with wide-ranging applications that span industrial automation, augmented reality, and medical intervention. However, most existing methods typically rely on knowledge of objects’ 3D models and depth measurements, and often require time-consuming iterative refinement to improve accuracy, which can be seen as limiting factors for broader applications.
This PhD thesis is primarily motivated by the desire to overcome these limitations. It presents a comprehensive study of the 6-DoF pose estimation problem. Drawing inspiration from the latest deep learning pose estimation methods, a novel 6-DoF pose estimation framework named Auto-Pose is proposed, which incorporates latent space representations of deep neural networks with supervised learning algorithms. The proposed framework consists of three novel autoencoder-based methods: DALSR-Pose, CVML-Pose, and CVAM-Pose. These proposed methods are specifically designed to address the limitations of the existing methods enabling the estimation of rigid objects’ 6-DoF poses from a single colour image in real time, without access to any explicit 3D models of the objects or depth data or performing a post-refinement.
The fundamental idea is to implicitly learn intermediate representations of objects in the latent space from only colour images, and the 6-DoF poses are estimated from the latent representations using multiple regression-based algorithms such as multilayer perception (MLP), k-nearest neighbours (KNN), and random forest (RF). Deep Models for Rigid Objects Real-Time Pose Estimation. The proposed methods can operate in real time and are applicable in complex scenarios, including textured/texture-less objects represented in low-resolution images with heavy occlusion and clutter.
Extensive experiments and evaluation results across multiple publicly available benchmark datasets demonstrate the superiority of the proposed framework in pose estimation accuracy over existing methods that similarly use latent space representations, with accuracy improved by 30%. It also achieves comparable results to other state-of-the-art methods that use 3D models.
The thesis makes significant contributions to the field of 6-DoF pose estimation facilitating development of model-free estimation algorithms. The novelty of the work rests in the proposed autoencoder-based methods that achieve competitive performance compared to the state-of-the-art using only data from a monoscopic camera, without the need for the object’s 3D model, depth measurement, or further iterative refinement often essential for the existing methods
AI-Enhanced Virtual Clinics and Telemedicine for Cancer Treatment
No full textAI-enhanced virtual clinics and telemedicine are transforming cancer treatment by improving access to care, diagnostic precision, and personalized treatment options. For patients, especially those in remote areas or with mobility challenges, telemedicine offers a lifeline, enabling them to consult with oncology specialists and receive essential follow-up care without needing to travel. When combined with AI, telemedicine becomes even more powerful. AI algorithms can analyze complex data, such as medical imaging, pathology results, and genomic information, to assist doctors in diagnosing cancers more accurately and tailoring treatment plans based on individual patient profiles.
These virtual clinics use AI-powered tools to monitor patients’ progress, detect early signs of complications, and adjust treatment plans accordingly. For example, AI can track subtle changes in imaging that may indicate tumor growth or response to therapy, alerting physicians to potential issues before they become critical. Moreover, AI-driven predictive models can offer insights into prognosis and guide decision-making, making cancer treatment more proactive and personalized. As telemedicine continues to advance, AI-enhanced virtual clinics promise to make cancer care more accessible, efficient, and effective for patients worldwide
Investigating the Role of Periodontitis in Inducing Alzheimer’s Disease-like Pathology
No full textSeveral theories have been proposed to describe the pathology of Alzheimer’s disease (AD) such as the inflammatory hypothesis, whereby neuroinflammation is thought to be the process that drives neurodegeneration. Periodontitis (PD), which was described as the most common chronic disease in humans, has been linked to AD. Neuroinflammation driven by the virulence factors of the PD-associated bacteria such Porphyromonas gingivalis (Pg) have been proposed to give rise to AD-like pathology since Pg virulence factors, gingipains, were found in the brains of patients with AD. The aim of this thesis was to investigate the effects of virulence factors of the bacteria associated with PD in giving rise to AD-like pathology.
Firstly, neuroinflammation was recognized in the post-mortem brain tissues of patients with AD (n=2), which showed high reads of bacterial DNA content from the Porphyromonas genera within the Bacteroidetes phylum, compared to non-AD controls (n=1).
The effect of single dose and multiple doses of Pg LPS, was investigated on monocultures of immortalized human microglial cell lines, HMC3 and IM, an immortalized mouse cell line, BV2, and primary human astrocytes, HA. Pre-conditioning microglia with sub-threshold levels of Pg LPS was also tested. Pg LPS was found to induce reactive oxygen species (ROS) production in HMC3 cells only. Stimulating HMC3 cells with one dose of LPS at has resulted in increased expression of markers of activation as well as the production of IL-6. Priming HMC3 with multiple doses of LPS induced an even greater increase in some activation markers and IL-6 production. IM cells stimulated with LPS showed increased production of IL-6, and this production was greater when primed with multiple doses. An increased expression of markers of activation was recorded following priming with two doses of LPS. HA cells only exhibited a change in the markers of activation profile following LPS priming. BV2 displayed an increase in the markers of activation expression and IL-6 production following LPS exposure. IL-6 production increased even more when primed with multiple doses of LPS. Only BV2 cells showed a sign of pre-conditioning, as evidenced by an increased cell viability.
Cultures of microglia and astrocytes on 3D platforms resulted in a change in the markers of activation in HMC3, HA and BV2. Three-dimensional cultures of HMC3, IM and BV2 produced IL-6 following LPS exposure in similar manners to the monolayer cultures.
Co-culturing microglia and astrocytes provoked a change in the expression of some markers in HA. Also, IL-6 production was recorded at baseline and following LPS stimulation in this model.
Pg OMVs were isolated from Pg bacteria and used to stimulate monolayers of microglia and astrocytes. Stimulating HMC3 with OMVs led to the production of IL-6. Exposing IM to OMVs resulted in ROS production, changes in the markers of activation as well as increased IL-6 production. Increased ROS production, changes in the markers of activation, and increased IL-6 production was recorded after exposing HA to OMVs. In BV2 cells, OMVs resulted in increased ROS production, and resulted in IL-6 production.
These findings indicate that Pg virulence factors could induce neuroinflammation by activating microglia and astrocytes. The chronic activation of microglia and astrocytes by these virulence factors lead to aggravated responses by these cells, which in turn amplifies the effects of neuroinflammation in the brain. Understanding the role of Pg OMVs could further understanding of how PD in gives rise to neuroinflammation as OMVs pack various virulence factors which have showed different effects on microglia and astrocytes compared to Pg LPS
Local food systems: a framework for food sovereignty?
No full textThere are increasing debates about the importance of promoting collaborative local food systems – interconnected networks that merge the strategies of local food initiatives – to build collective power to address sustainability and food security challenges. However, in-depth explorations of the dynamics and potentials of local food systems in differing socio-institutional environments are still lacking. This research addresses this gap by investigating the constitution of local food systems in Vitoria-Gasteiz, Basque Country, and Preston, England, and how internal and external processes affect the delivery of potential outcomes.
In order to ground this research focus, the study introduces a conceptual framework to analyse local food systems: a political food systems approach for food sovereignty, combining a food systems approach, urban political ecology and food sovereignty. The importance of this framework relies in its analytical attention to process-outcome interactions, multi-scalar dynamics, and power relations, which this study demonstrates are crucial considerations to analyse local food systems. To implement this framework, the research project adopts a case study methodology constituted of semi-structured interviews, participant observation, and document analysis.
The analysis of findings identifies three critical aspects to advance integrated local food systems for food sovereignty. First, the findings illustrate the relevance of a systemic view of food that prioritises people’s lived experiences of injustices and the collective construction of territories to address current discrepancies within local food systems. Second, this study highlights the need to accept diversity within local food systems and promote spaces of deliberation for the reflexive construction of collective visions. Finally, the findings illustrate the relevance of balancing top-down and bottom-up strategies in urban food governance processes, which should facilitate intrinsically transformative practices by enacting food sovereignty principles. The thesis ultimately proposes three main strategies that could help achieve this: politicising local food systems, embedding reflexivity, and promoting co-production
Working in partnership to reduce re-offending and improve prison leavers’ lives: a process evaluation of a prison leaver pilot project
Get PDFPrison leavers encounter significant barriers to successfully re-integrating into the community, which can lead to re-offending. Complex interventions which are multi-faceted and involve successful partnerships are needed to meet the distinct health and social needs of this population group. For this study, we conducted a process evaluation of a pilot project, which aimed to offer holistic support to prison leavers through a combination of peer mentoring, sport and physical activity, and signposting, delivered in a community setting. Semi-structured interviews and focus groups were conducted with individuals (n = 14) involved in the delivery and the management of the project to understand how it had been implemented and what factors had influenced the delivery and partnerships involved. Factors that influenced project delivery included safeguarding and risk assessment concerns, lived experience of peer mentors, accessibility of the intervention, and the role of sport and physical activity as a vehicle for community re-integration. Partnership working was influenced by effective information sharing, organizational commitment, building relationships and professional networks, and regular communication between organizations. An intervention involving peer mentoring, sport and physical activity, and signposting, supported by close partnership working, was viewed as a promising approach to support the community re-integration of prison leavers
An Exploration of Contact Child Sexual Exploitation Victim-Perpetrator Interpersonal Dynamics: Providing Indicators of Exploitative Language for Law Enforcement and Safeguarding Agencies
Get PDFUntil recently, empirical evidence exploring contact Child Sexual Exploitation (CSE) has been scarce, particularly where the convicted perpetrator seeks direct physical (offline) contact as opposed to solely targeting the victim online. This thesis aimed to investigate the relatively unexplored and typically hidden interpersonal dynamics that exist between contact CSE perpetrators and their victims, specifically the verbal and non-verbal communication patterns, when preparing for or during sexual activity, and the retrospective discursive constructions that follow. The thesis aimed to address prior research gaps and build on the existing knowledge by including recognised coding frameworks, analysis of non-verbal patterns of communication and genuine victims as opposed to decoys and explore the potential for victim agency. Data for the research consists of victim and perpetrator language (c. 16,000 words) extracted from 41 contact CSE police case files, involving 50 perpetrators (37 lone offenders and 4 groups) and 80 victims. These data were examined by computer aided psycholinguistic software (Language Inquiry Word Count [LIWC] v.2015) and a multi-modal discourse analysis (sequentially conducted to provide context to the LIWC language variables). The combined quantitative and qualitative analysis within this research suggests that there are distinct contact CSE psycholinguistic features and interpersonal verbal and non-verbal communication patterns that characterise victim-perpetrator dynamics in contact CSE. The thesis findings also revealed that as well as the existence of typical retrospective discursive constructs, perpetrators, and victims of contact CSE would differ in their justifications for their involvement in the CSE relationship whilst in the context of a criminal investigation. This unique research will have implications for safeguarding, law enforcement disruption, research, and practice, in relation to contact CSE, with the introduction of the Indicators of Typical Exploitation (InTEL). The proposed InTEL is intended to be evidence-based and inter-disciplinary, prioritising contact CSE victim-perpetrator language to support clinical, child protection or criminal justice decision making and processes, and for improving awareness and preventative education
Through the Lens of Yin-Yang: Photography and Music Exploring Continuity
Get PDFThis ‘exploratory practice-based research’ (Epstein and Dodd, 2012, p38) is an ontological enquiry in photography and music. It addresses the hypothesis that the Yin-Yang of citification appears distinct from the Yin-Yang of natural growth. Humans are approaching transformation that could be catastrophic. The continuing significant concern of human-nature relationship has been studied from many perspectives. Schultz (2004, in Schröder, 2007, p294) suggests the human-nature relationship may ‘be influenced by situational and environmental factors’. Young Chinese adults were taught a harmonious human-nature relationship is essential, is Tao (trans. The Way). However, China appears to be distancing itself from the principle of interaction and interdependence between ‘Earth’, ‘Human’, and ‘Heaven’ (‘人法地，地法天，天法道，道法自然’) with ‘Nature’ as the essence (ca. 400BCE, Chapter 25) and this appears to be affecting ‘wellbeing’ (Liu & Wu, 2021, part 2.3).
This research aligns with Candy’s (2006, p1) description of practice-based research as ‘an original investigation undertaken in order to gain new knowledge partly by means of
practice and the outcomes of that practice’. The central enquiry addressed photographically, musically, and philosophically is continuity and belonging. Particularly, the continuity and belonging of young Chinese internationals during transformation of traditional China into New China. New China is characterised by citification – transforming natural landscapes into cities. This thesis presents fifty-six new research photographs of citification and natural growth. Photographs are interpreted into one hour and fifty minutes of new music. The photographs and music are comparatively evaluated for their representation of Yin-Yang.
My inspiration came from how Chou Wen-Chung’s (n.d.) ‘variable mode’ demonstrates ‘belonging of diversity’ in music (n.d. in Liu, 2011, Chapter 1, p7). However, in this research, photography is an ‘information gathering technique’ (Epstein and Blumenfiled, 2001, p17), ‘an elicitation device’ (Mathison, 2009, p184) for exploring continuity of identity in changing conditions of human occupancy. I seek felt and reflective responses to my work because my occupancy is affected by how the world appears to me and my
perception changes my behaviour. Neither my photographs nor my music represents any material truth about the world but ontologically they allow exploration of essential qualities of ‘being-in-the-world’ (Kakuzo, 1906). The photographic and music representations of natural growth and citification enable unique insights for ‘studying human experience and other natural phenomena’ (McNiff, 1998, p51) because people ‘encounter’ the world not only through fact/ reason but also through ‘sense perception’ (Merleau-Ponty, 1945). In this research, theory is triangulated with critical reflection and ‘interpretive’ analysis (Walsham, 1993, p5) of primary survey and questionnaire data, culminating in
dissemination that contributes to a niche practice of photography and music in the discipline of Yin-Yang
Intravascular imaging and physiology guided interventions in complex chronic diseases as kidney failure and diabetes mellitus
Get PDFCoronary artery disease (CAD) is the leading cause of death globally. There are a variety of risk factors for the development of CAD including diabetes mellitus (DM), hypertension, hyperlipidemia, smoking, sedentary lifestyle, genetic factors, and others. Together, they exert a significant role in the development of CAD, especially when these risk factors are combined. The burden of cardiovascular diseases (CVDs), secondary to chronic conditions like DM, obesity, hypertension and associated renal disease, is rapidly increasing worldwide, not only in developed countries, but also in low-and medium- income developing countries.
Coronary angiography (CA) is considered the gold standard test for the diagnosis of CAD. An accurate interpretation of CA is of paramount importance in decision-making by the Clinicians to treat patients with CAD. CA has the inherent limitation of being a two-dimensional X-Ray lumeno-gram of a complex three-dimensional vascular structure. Visual assessment of angiogram can lead to both inter- and intra-observer variability in the assessment of the severity and extent of the disease which can lead to differences in management strategies.
Catheterization cardiology has been revolutionized recently and today; modern catheterization laboratories globally are fully equipped with adjunctive technologies. These include Quantitative Coronary Angiography (QCA), Fractional Flow Reserve (FFR), Intra-Vascular Ultra-Sonography (IVUS) and Optical Coherence Tomography (OCT) to help the Clinicians to make a well-informed decision based on detailed anatomical and physiological assessments of a coronary artery rather than judgment based solely on visual assessment.
Despite the introduction of coronary physiology and intravascular imaging in very early cases of coronary intervention, practical use of these techniques in the catheterization laboratory did not begin until the late 1990s. A variety of reasons have been understood as hurdles during the initial adoption of these clinical tools in cardiac catheter laboratories. The technological and theoretical aspects were not well understood initially, and currently used well-matured pressure wires which were not readily available. Nevertheless, coronary physiology and intravascular imaging have established a vital role in decision making process during cardiac catheterization laboratory.
This doctoral thesis, via several previous high impact journal publications, emphasized and supported the role of intracoronary imaging and physiology, mineralocorticoids antagonism and infarct size reduction in various clinical settings. The thesis has highlighted that decision-making with the help of intracoronary imaging and physiology is safe, effective and the clinicians can safely defer the decisions of coronary interventions based on negative value or non-ischemic values (Fractional Flow Reserve, FFR>0.80) based on the physiology. It has also been established that these techniques are cost-effective as well. The presented thesis also highlights the utility and evidence behind these adjunctive techniques, supported by clinical cases and highlights the importance of these techniques to make a well-informed treatment decision.
The thesis for PhD by Publication has clearly demonstrated, and more so, emphasized the clinical utility of intra-coronary imaging and physiology in complex disease processes like diabetes mellitus and chronic kidney disease (CKD)