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A framework for heavy metal prioritization and mitigation for reducing metal intake: Rice and spinach case studies
No full textThis project has two main parts that contribute to the design of a novel conceptual framework for heavy metal prioritization and mitigation: (1) application of this framework to rice; and (2) application of this framework to spinach. These case studies will deliver lessons through the application of the framework that will be discussed for the transferability of the findings to other grain or vegetable products, or to other settings such as tree or specialty herb commodities, or to small-holder, low-input, and/or low-income farm settings internationally. We will particularly focus on farm-level interventions and their achievability, based on our background experiences and new interviews with farmers and other members of the food-production system
Characteristics of Significant Life Events and Their Associations with Subjective Well-Being, Health, and Life Satisfaction Across Adulthood
No full textSignificant life events have a clear time frame, interfere with everyday life, and are perceived as personally significant (Luhmann et al., 2020). Although significant life events have a major impact on our lives and well-being (Luhmann et al., 2012), studies of the experience and handling of significant life events across the lifespan are not yet sufficiently available.
The first part of the paper aims to investigate whether there are age differences in the characteristics of significant life events, meaning, whether (a) age-normativity, (b) valence, and (c) perceived control of life events differ with increasing age. The second part examines whether these characteristics age-differentially predict the outcomes of significant life events in terms of subjective well-being, subjective health, and life satisfaction.
(a) Age-normativity is a socially shared idea about age-appropriate development across the life course (e.g., Neugarten, 1969). Different life events are normative in different age groups (Wrosch & Freund, 2001). For example, starting a family is more likely to occur in young adulthood, while losing a partner is more likely to occur in older adulthood. Non- normative events are usually not expected (Frazier et al., 2011) and are not shared with peers who would provide mutual support (Leopold & Lechner, 2015). Thus, people who experience non-normative events need to invest more internal resources and self-regulation to compensate for the lack of socio-structural support (Wrosch & Freund, 2001). This has consequences for the outcomes of normative and non-normative life events. According to some studies (most recently Shi & Brown, 2021), normative events are perceived more positively, whereas non- normative life events are perceived more negatively. Across the life span, non-normative events might become more prevalent and prominent (Baltes et al., 1980). In other words, older adults might report lower expectancy of and fewer peers with similar experiences than younger adults. At the same time, older adults might deal with non-normative events better than young adults. This might be the case because older adults have better self-regulatory skills than younger adults (Kunzmann et al., 2014). Thus, we expect that non-normative events are negatively associated with subjective well-being, life satisfaction, and subjective health, but that this negative association becomes weaker with increasing age.
(b) Across the lifespan, individuals experience both positive (e.g., birth of a child) and negative life events (e.g., loss of a loved one). However, people of different ages might not experience the same amount of positive and negative life events. Older compared to younger adults experience more developmental losses and fewer developmental gains (Heckhausen et al., 1989). Thus, older adults might experience less positive life events (indicating developmental gains) and more negative life events (indicating developmental losses). At the same time, older adults might deal with negative life events, or strains and challenges better than young adults. There are two reasons for this assumption. According to the positivity effect (Reed & Carstensen, 2012), older adults perceive and remember more positive and less negative information than younger adults. Thus, they might experience the same life event more positively than younger adults. In addition, older adults have better emotion-regulation strategies when dealing with difficult life situations (Birditt et al., 2005; Charles et al., 2010; Kunzmann et al., 2014), which might help them to deal with negative life events. In line with these arguments, Gomez and colleagues (2009) found that the influence of negative life events on subjective well-being was weaker in older compared to younger adults. Accordingly, we expect that the association between the valence and strain of the life event on the one hand and subjective well-being, life satisfaction, and subjective health on the other is weaker in older compared to younger adulthood.
(c) Perceived control over one’s life (e.g., individual’s perceived capacity to influence a certain incident) is fundamental for the mobilization of resources and coping strategies in stressful situations (Lachman, 2006), leading to better well-being and psychological outcomes (Kunzmann et al., 2002; Lachman et al., 2011). It has been shown that older adults experience less controllable events (e.g., losses or illnesses) and have fewer resources to control significant life events (Glück & Bluck, 2007). However, although older adults might experience life events that are less under their control, they use self-regulatory strategies to compensate for control losses (Heckhausen et al., 1989). Specifically, as older adults have less capacity to influence their lives through primary-control strategies (i.e., influencing the life event), they use secondary-control strategies (such as reframing the life event) to counteract possible negative effects of loss of primary control (Lang & Heckhausen, 2001). Thus, we expect that perceived control over the life event (indicating primary control) is less strongly related to subjective well-being, life satisfaction, and subjective health in older compared to younger adults.
To counteract the limitation of one measurement point, the temporal distance between the survey (i.e., the time point of the assessment) and the occurrence of the life event will be included as a moderator in the analyses. The strength of the associations between the life events’ characteristics and the outcome variables should diminish the further back the event occurred (see for example Nikitin et al., 2012; Suh et al., 1996)
ED PCP Training for Screening & Referral
No full textThis is the pre-registered protocol for a study aiming to evaluate the efficacy of an online, one-hour asynchronous video training for improving pediatric primary care providers’ comfort, knowledge, and behaviors related to eating disorders screening and referral
Speed-Accuracy Tradeoff for Flanker Task - Midpoint Violation Exploration
No full textThis experiment aims to explore changes in neutral condition RT by changing the response focus of participants from Speed, Accuracy, and a Balanced approach. We predict that for higher criterion thresholds (Accuracy Focus), neutral condition RT will bias towards the congruent condition RT more so than for lower thresholds, implying a change in RT patterns over time
Measuring the Cross-Race Effect
No full textWhen the police have a suspect in a crime, they often ask the eyewitness to view a lineup. However, sometimes eyewitnesses make identification errors, and one reason is the Cross-Race Effect (CRE). The CRE is the finding that own-race faces are better remembered and recognized when compared to less familiar faces. The Innocence Project (innocenceproject.org) reports that over a third of wrongful convictions involved a cross-race identification error (Scheck, Neufeld, & Dwyer, 2003). Therefore, it is crucial to study this effect further in order to avoid potential miscarriages of justice.
In this study, we will produce a psychometrically-sound measure of the factors shown to be related to the Cross-Race Effect that reflects the extent to which people show a CRE. This measure will improve the ability of the courts to evaluate eyewitness reliability, therefore improving the administration of justice
Personality and Mortality Risk: A Systematic Review and Meta-Analysis
No full textThis review aims to evaluate the relationship between the ‘big five’ personality traits as predictors of mortality risk. The Five-Factor Model of Personality defines personality traits as basic tendencies characterised as five broad factors, (Neuroticism, Extraversion, Openness, Agreeableness and Conscientiousness), that influence relatively consistent patterns of thoughts, feelings, and behaviour across the lifespan (Costa & McCrae, 1992; McCrae, & Costa, 2008; John et al., 2008). Personality traits may play a key role contributing to risk or protective factors in the etiology of mortality. And, indeed, evidence suggests that personality traits are important predictors of longevity. While conscientiousness is consistently associated with longer life, results have been mixed regarding the other personality traits. (Graham et al., 2017; Jokela et al., 2013; Kern & Friedman, 2008; O'Súilleabháin, & Hughes, 2018; Turiano et al., 2015; Turiano et al., 2020). As research is increasing in the field of personality research, there is a need to examine the quality of evidence and the strength of the association in the context of what is already known about personality traits and mortality risk. There is a need to conduct a systematic review to summarise decades of research on the big five personality traits and mortality risk to provide a foundation in the area. This work will be able to highlight future opportunities to develop research in this field.
Using systematic review methodology, this review seeks to present a synthesis of research studies examining direct predictive effects of the five-factor model of personality on mortality risk within the current literature, and, to facilitate comparisons of survival analysis across the literature. This review will summarise results using a meta-analysis and evaluate moderators using meta-regression, where possible
The effects of stress beliefs on daily psychological and cardiac stress responses
No full textEcological Momentary Assessment Study evaluating the effects of stress beliefs on psychological and cardiac responses to stress in every day lif
The Effects of WhatsApp on Misinformation Beliefs and Polarization: A WhatsApp Media-Constrained Deactivation
No full textThe prevalence of so-called fake news - false or misleading content purposefully produced to resemble news stories - and its potential to influence the public debate, affect citizens’ attitudes, and even distort electoral results has become a widespread concern in our society (Lazer et al., 2018; Tucker et al., 2018). Across distinct scholarly and popular accounts, the role of social media in daily life has often been raised as an environment facilitating the spread of online fake news and accentuating the harmful effects of misinformation on the quality of democratic regimes.
Despite great academic interest in the relationship between social media and disinformation, a large part of the scholarship on the effects of social media comes from advanced democracies. Empirical evidence discussing the impact of social media on exposure and beliefs on misinformation in democracies in the Global South is still somewhat sparse (Tucker et al., 2018; Barberá, 2020; Mitchelstein and Boczkowski, 2021). In these young democracies, political institutions are arguably more unstable, identities are commonly more fragmented, and the interference of non-political actors in elections is more recurrent. Therefore, the disruptive role of social media on the quality of democratic regimes may arguably be even more harmful compared to advanced democracies.
For years WhatsApp has been the primary social media application in many Global South countries, with several anecdotal and scholarly works suggesting that WhatsApp is the primary channel through which citizens are exposed to misinformation online in the Global South (Machado et al., 2019; Resende et al., 2019; Garimella and Tyson, 2018; Garimella and Eckles, 2020; Batista Pereira et al., ND). The platforms and dynamics differ from those studies in advanced democracies, where Twitter and particularly Facebook have traditionally received more attention for facilitating the spread of online misinformation.
To fill these gaps in the literature on social media and misinformation, we propose to conduct a field experiment deployed during the Presidential election in Brazil focusing on reducing users’ exposure to misinformation shared on WhatsApp. Our field experiment will randomly assign users to a Media- Constrained WhatsApp, in which we ask them not to access any media, image, video, or audio received during the weeks up to the forthcoming Presidential election in Brazil on October 3, 2022. After users participate in our Media-Constrained WhatsApp Deactivation for three weeks, we will ask participants to respond a final survey to measure the intervention effects on their ability to identify misinformation and political polarization. The Media-Constrained WhatsApp intervention is motivated by two primary reasons. First, previous literature has suggested that video and images are the primary source of mis- information spreading on WhatsApp in the Global South (Resende et al., 2019; Freitas Melo et al., 2019; Machado et al., 2019; Garimella and Tyson, 2018; Garimella and Eckles, 2020). Second, because of user’s reliance on WhatsApp in daily life, a complete deactivation is unlikely to be feasible from an external validity perspective.
Our study makes three primary contributions. We contribute to the growing experimental litera- ture on the political effects of social media usage. So far, no studies have been conducted to identify a causal connection between WhatsApp usage and attitudinal and behavioral outcomes, particularly users’ ability to determine the veracity of online news and the decision to share false information. To date, we are only aware of prior studies identifying the causal effects of a randomized deactivation of Facebook accounts (Hanley et al., 2019; Vanman et al., 2018; Hall et al., 2021; Allcott et al., 2020; Asimovic et al., 2021). Our study is the first to provide a causal link between messaging apps like WhatsApp and users’ behaviors and attitudes. Messaging applications, like WhatsApp, differ from other social media platforms in a few key dimensions. For the specific case of WhatsApp, any communication within the app is end-to-end encrypted, which means that content is effectively unregulated and unmoderated by the platform. In addition, WhatsApp provides several features for viral spreading, such as public and private groups, automatic forwarding, and broadcasting of content to many contacts with just a few taps. Finally, content is not curated by any algorithmic ranking as in other social media applications; all messages are sorted chronologically. These particular affordances justify the purpose of this study, particularly considering that some of these features make the messaging apps a fertile ground for the circulation of misinformation and other harmful campaigns.
Second, in contrast to previous studies that use a full deactivation to focus more on outgroup ethnic and partisan hostility and personal well-being, our study focuses primarily on reducing users’ exposure to media content, which the previous literature has suggested is the model category for the spread of misinformation in the Global South. Therefore, our work provide as more robust assessment for the causal effects of social media usage on users’ believes and exposure misinformation (Allcott et al., 2020; Asimovic et al., 2021). Although we also pre-register tests of hypotheses regarding polarization, due to the evidence of media as the main format for the circulation of misinformation on WhatsApp, our study primary focus deals with measuring the effects of the WhatsApp Media Deactivation on misinformation. Our belief is that the subset of people willing to deactivate WhatsApp entirely (a platform used for a great deal of both personal and professional communication, as well as financial transactions such as bill payments) would be a very distinct subsection of the population from whom we would be hesitant to generalize outcomes.
Third, social media messaging apps have become the primary means through which online misinformation circulates in major markets in the Global South. We are the first to assess the causal effects of social media usage in the context of elections outside of the United States, providing new insights into studies of social media and politics and bringing greater external validity to related research deployed in other contexts
Children's production of quantifiers as sentence initial subjects across languages - Addendum
No full textThis registration is an addendum to the registration titled 'Children's production of quantifiers as sentence initial subjects in German and Italian' (https://osf.io/apzvy).
This addendum was created in order to allow the inclusion of further languages in the study. This was achieved by amending the original registration such that an mentions of 'Italian/Italian-speakers' are replaced with 'target language' or similar
Characteristics and contexts of anxiety-related ambulance attendances for young men in Australia
No full textYoung men’s experiences of anxiety are poorly understood and have been largely overlooked in mental health scholarship (Fisher, 2021). Young men in comparison to young women, commonly report physical anxiety symptoms such as body tremors, loss of appetite and headaches (Drioli-Phillips, 2019). As a result, anxiety can remain undetected and undiagnosed in young men, and mistaken for somatic sensations or physical illness (e.g., a high association is seen in men with anxiety and other physical morbidities such as gastrointestinal issues, body pains, breathing difficulties and even heart attacks; Weitoft and Rosen, 2005). Anxiety also contradicts the core tenets of traditional masculinity focused on invulnerability, strength and self-reliance (Stoyanova, 2012). This leads some young men to mask or minimise their experiences of anxiety in an attempt to retain alignment with gender-based expectations. Masking anxiety can perpetuate a cycle of internalised shame and self-blame, intensifying anxiety symptoms (Drioli-Phillips, 2021). Anxiety can therefore be difficult to detect in young men prior to it reaching crisis point, despite having a significant impact on their cognitive, emotional, and social functioning (McLean, 2008).
A 2019 report by Turning Point estimated that anxiety-related presentations accounted for 10.3% of all ambulance attendance for men’s mental health concerns in Australia between 1 July 2014 to 30 June 2017 (Lubman, 2019). Anxiety was the most frequently occurring mental health-related presentation for men (Lubman, 2019). Fourteen percent of anxiety-related paramedic attendances also involved other mental health symptoms, 10% involved current self-harm and 18.9% co-occurred with alcohol or other drugs (Lubman, 2019). Despite anxiety demanding substantial ambulance and paramedic resources, the physical, mental, and social contexts in which young men’s anxiety occurs remain poorly understood