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Commerce and Consumers: The Ubiquitous Chest of the Late Middle Ages
Get PDFThis document is the Accepted Manuscript version of a published work that appeared in final form in Journal of Interdisciplinary History. To access the final edited and published work see https://doi.org/10.1162/jinh_a_01591Contrary to their ubiquity within written, visual, and material sources, chests have largely remained overlooked in studies of the late Middle Ages. Bill Brown’s “thing theory” helps to explain the ways in which chests can transform from unnoticed “things” in the background to meaningful “objects” when viewed through their entanglements with commercial, consumer, political, and moral concerns. The interdisciplinary study of chests in the late Middle Ages brings together a range of evidence including inventories, guild accounts, court pleas, contemporary writings, images, and material culture from Burgundy, France, and England
LevelEd VR: A virtual reality level editor and workflow for virtual reality level design
Get PDFVirtual reality entertainment and serious games popularity has continued to rise but the processes for level design for VR games has not been adequately researched. Our paper contributes LevelEd VR; a generic runtime virtual reality level editor that supports the level design workflow used by developers and can potentially support user generated content. We evaluated our LevelEd VR application and compared it to an existing workflow of Unity on a desktop. Our current research indicates that users are accepting of such a system, and it has the potential to be preferred over existing workflows for VR level design. We found that the primary benefit of our system is an improved sense of scale and perspective when creating the geometry and implementing gameplay. The paper also contributes some best practices and lessons learned from creating a complex virtual reality tool, such as LevelEd VR
Public acceptability of public health policy to improve population health: A population‐based survey
Get PDFBackground: For public health policies to be effective, it is critical that they are acceptable
to the public as acceptance levels impact success rate.
Objective: To explore public acceptance of public health statements and examine
differences in acceptability across socio-demographics, health behaviours (physical
activity, diet, binge drinking and smoking), health status and well-being.
Method: A cross-sectional survey was conducted with a nationally representative
sample (N = 1001) using a random stratified sampling method. Face-to-face interviews
were conducted at homes of residents in Wales aged 16+ years. Individuals
reported whether they agreed, had no opinion, or disagreed with 12 public health
statements.
Results: More than half of the sample were supportive of 10 out of 12 statements.
The three statements with the greatest support (>80% agreement) reflected the importance
of: a safe and loving childhood to becoming a healthy adult, schools teaching
about health, and healthier foods costing less. Individuals who engaged in unhealthy
behaviours were less likely to agree with some of the statements (eg 39.8% of binge
drinkers agreed alcohol adverts should be banned compared to 57.6% of those who
never binge drink; P < .001).
Conclusions: Findings show an appetite for public health policies among the majority
of the public. The relationship between supporting policies and engaging in healthy
behaviours suggests a feedback loop that is potentially capable of shifting both public
opinion and the opportunities for policy intervention. If a nation becomes healthier,
this could illicit greater support for stronger policies which could encourage more
people to move in a healthier direction
The Counsellor’s Experience of Aloneness And Its Impact on The Therapeutic Relationship: A Heuristic Study
Get PDFAims and Method:
This small scale study explored counsellors’ experiences of aloneness and how this influenced the therapeutic relationship. The research was conducted within a qualitative paradigm and used a heuristic methodology. Semi-structured interviews were undertaken with four therapists who had expressed an interest in exploring their perceptions of this phenomenon. Thematic analysis was used to analyse the data from these dialogues.
Findings:
Two overarching themes emerged from the data (Braun & Clarke, 2013): Personal experience of aloneness and Awareness of aloneness and the therapeutic space (the therapist’s perspective). Seven themes were highlighted under these two main headings: aloneness provides space, aloneness affects attachments, aloneness as a choice, the uniqueness of aloneness experience, aloneness is not always understood by others, how aloneness affects the therapeutic relationships, and the final theme is aloneness and self-care as a therapist.
Conclusion:
Our experiences of aloneness are unique and complex and how these encounters are defined, and the skills needed to be alone, are still little understood. This investigation explored individual experience of aloneness and has provided insight into how the phenomenon affects relationships with clients in the therapeutic space. It adds to a general conversation on loneliness, aloneness and solitude, and shines a light on the little researched association of our alone experiences impacting on the counselling relationship.
Key Words: Aloneness, Therapeutic Relationship, Counsello
An exploration of creativity in the lives of English teachers: Representing voices through found poetry
Get PDFThis arts-based research sets out to explore the place of creativity in the lives of a group of English teachers in one secondary school in the north west of England. More specifically, it uses found poetry to examine creativity in the lives of English teachers who work within the context of an increasingly performative educational system. As well as interrogating the place of creativity in the lives of the participants, the study also explores how found poetry can be used as a research method to represent and analyse data and communicate research findings in a manner that is democratic and illuminating. The words that created the poems came from two semi-structured interviews with each participant. After the first interview, the participants were able to scrutinise and reflect upon the content of the found poems before returning for a second interview. This recursive process helped build confidence in the findings and gave a deeper understanding of the experiences of the participants in relation to creativity whilst eliciting further responses in the interview process itself. The findings suggest that English teachers have limited space to be creative, or to think differently in their teaching practice. The limited space to be creative comes from the normalising practices of a performance culture, but the restrictions are both real and self-imposed by the participants. There is perhaps a need to find a new space for English teachers to act, or think creatively and form notions of resistance in order to re-think English teacher identity
The use of carbon nanomaterials in membrane distillation membranes: a review
Get PDFFrom Springer Nature via Jisc Publications RouterHistory: registration 2020-01-23, received 2020-04-01, accepted 2020-07-20, pub-electronic 2021-01-25, online 2021-01-25, pub-print 2021-08Publication status: PublishedAbstract: Membrane distillation (MD) is a thermal-based separation technique with the potential to treat a wide range of water types for various applications and industries. Certain challenges remain however, which prevent it from becoming commercially widespread including moderate permeate flux, decline in separation performance over time due to pore wetting and high thermal energy requirements. Nevertheless, its attractive characteristics such as high rejection (ca. 100%) of nonvolatile species, its ability to treat highly saline solutions under low operating pressures (typically atmospheric) as well as its ability to operate at low temperatures, enabling waste-heat integration, continue to drive research interests globally. Of particular interest is the class of carbon-based nanomaterials which includes graphene and carbon nanotubes, whose wide range of properties have been exploited in an attempt to overcome the technical challenges that MD faces. These low dimensional materials exhibit properties such as high specific surface area, high strength, tuneable hydrophobicity, enhanced vapour transport, high thermal and electrical conductivity and others. Their use in MD has resulted in improved membrane performance characteristics like increased permeability and reduced fouling propensity. They have also enabled novel membrane capabilities such as in-situ fouling detection and localised heat generation. In this review we provide a brief introduction to MD and describe key membrane characteristics and fabrication methods. We then give an account of the various uses of carbon nanomaterials for MD applications, focussing on polymeric membrane systems. Future research directions based on the findings are also suggested
Shut and re-open: the role of schools in the spread of COVID-19 in Europe
Get PDFFrom The Royal Society via Jisc Publications RouterHistory: accepted 2020-12-02, pub-electronic 2021-05-31, pub-print 2021-07-19Article version: VoRPublication status: PublishedFunder: Wellcome Trust; Id: http://dx.doi.org/10.13039/100004440; Grant(s): 202562/Z/16/ZFunder: Royal Society; Id: http://dx.doi.org/10.13039/501100000288; Grant(s): 202562/Z/16/ZFunder: Department for Health and Social CareFunder: Canadian Institutes of Health Research; Id: http://dx.doi.org/10.13039/501100000024; Grant(s): 2019 Novel Coronavirus (COVID-19) rapid researchFunder: Medical Research Council; Id: http://dx.doi.org/10.13039/501100000265; Grant(s): MC UU 00002/11We investigate the effect of school closure and subsequent reopening on the transmission of COVID-19, by considering Denmark, Norway, Sweden and German states as case studies. By comparing the growth rates in daily hospitalizations or confirmed cases under different interventions, we provide evidence that school closures contribute to a reduction in the growth rate approximately 7 days after implementation. Limited school attendance, such as older students sitting exams or the partial return of younger year groups, does not appear to significantly affect community transmission. In countries where community transmission is generally low, such as Denmark or Norway, a large-scale reopening of schools while controlling or suppressing the epidemic appears feasible. However, school reopening can contribute to statistically significant increases in the growth rate in countries like Germany, where community transmission is relatively high. In all regions, a combination of low classroom occupancy and robust test-and-trace measures were in place. Our findings underscore the need for a cautious evaluation of reopening strategies. This article is part of the theme issue ‘Modelling that shaped the early COVID-19 pandemic response in the UK’
Developing active personal learning environments on smart mobile devices.
No full text‘Tablets’ and other 'smart' devices (such as iPads and iPhones)have established themselves as a significant part of mobile technologies used in mobile (m-)learning. Smart devices such as iPads and the Apple Watch not only provide many apps that can be used for a variety of educational purposes; they also allow communication between students and tutors and with the world at large via social media. We argue that 'smart' mobile devices enable personalized learning by adjusting to the educational needs of individuals. We refer to Salmon's quadrat diagram to suggest where using mobile technologies should be of benefit to revising our views of pedagogy, making it much more responsive to students' needs in education as well as the world in general. Smart mobile devices now contain computing power to allow voice and face recognition, augmented reality and machine learning to make them intelligent enough to act as tutors for individual students and adjust and respond accordingly. To take advantage of these facilities on mobile devices, pedagogy must change from an institution-centred to a student-tutor-device focus. This is best done via 'active learning' and incorporating cognitive awareness into an educational operating system that can develop with the owner
A wordbook of rare mithers: Fendfallatic
No full textA quarterly periodical that looks at Cheshire and its dialec
Introduction (Marie Duval: Maverick Victorian Cartoonist)
No full textIntroduction to the book 'Marie Duval: maverick Victorian cartoonist'
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