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Examining the influence of social barriers and sexual scripts on positive casual sexual experiences in university students
Full text linkCasual sex is a common part of the undergraduate university experience. Past research has identified that casual sex encounters often happen in the context of hookup culture, which has many negative outcomes, particularly for heterosexual women. Literature defines the motives, outcomes, norms, and gender interactions associated with casual sex specifically for university aged individuals, but there is a lack of research on identifying barriers to positive experiences and ways to promote more positive experiences. The goal of the current study was to examine beliefs and perceptions on casual sex, whether participants acknowledged barriers associated with casual sex (and what these were), and ways in which individuals can challenge negative norms associated with casual sex. Participants were 9 men, 28 women, and 1 person who was genderqueer/fluid. All participants were from a small undergraduate university who participated in focus groups to discuss casual sex. We found that there was a common understanding that casual sex could be defined as the absence of “normal” relationship components, and that there was a heavy “pre-hookup script” involved in university hookup culture. Participants were aware of key barriers to positive experiences, such as gender double standards, emotional/physical risks, and others. We also identified four strategies to counter negative norms associated with casual sex: communication, learning to deal with rejection, establishing trust and respect, and challenging the Traditional Sexual Script. It was evident that more education around casual sex and the ways it can present itself, as well as more sex education broadly is needed
Prevalence of the zoonotic diseases Leptospirosis and Borreliosis in the Maritimes of Canada
Full text linkLeptospirosis and Lyme borreliosis are two globally important infectious diseases caused by the transmission of either the Leptospira spirochaete or the Borrelia spirochaete, respectively. Although the spirochaetes have similarities in their shape, size, and movement, their transmission to animals is quite different. Infection of pathogenic leptospires requires environmental exposure to infected water or soil.
The main route of exposure is through mucous membranes, such as drinking from infected water sources. Once infected, some of the leptospires remain in the host’s body and replicate, whereas others pass through the renal tubules to be shed back into the environment through the individual’s urine, continuing the infectious cycle. Borrelia infection, on the other hand, is a tick-borne disease in which an individual becomes infected through the bite of an infected tick.
The risk of contracting leptospirosis in Canada has been increasing over the last 30 years, with New Brunswick reporting an increase in infected dogs, an important sentinel species for the infection, with fatal outcomes. To determine the prevalence of Leptospira spp. in the province, multiple methodologies and areas of interest were examined. Three methodologies (centrifugation, filtration, and growth in media) were attempted to detect leptospires in stagnant water sources around areas of recent flooding events. Unfortunately, all three methods returned negative results, although it is unclear if they were unsuccessful in finding the leptospires or if the leptospires were not present in these samples. Molecular testing of local wildlife necropsies, including suspected maintenance hosts as well as accidental hosts, and ticks was carried out. Testing small mammals showed 3.2% specimens were positive for Leptospira borgpetersenii. Testing large mammals showed 1.8% positive for L. borgpetersenii. Infected animals included moose (Alces alces), snowshoe hare (Lepus americanus), meadow vole (Microtus pennsylvanicus), jumping mouse (Napaeozapus insignis), deer mouse (Peromyscus maniculatus), maritime shrew (Sorex maritimensis), and black bear (Ursus americanus).
Testing of ticks (Dermacentor variabilis, Ixodes cookei, and Ixodes scapularis) showed 3.6% were positive for L. borgpetersenii. Finally, dog serum was collected from 14 veterinary hospitals across the province with 19.3% testing positive for the presence of antibodies against Leptospira spp. Together, these
results elucidate a widespread rate of infection in the wildlife species, sentinel species, and tick species of New Brunswick.
The risk of contracting Lyme borreliosis in New Brunswick has also been increasing over the last few years due to expanding tick populations. The risk of transmission of Borrelia species, such B. bissettiae, through the bite of an infected tick within New Brunswick began with the identification of the bacteria in local tick species, yet transmission of B. bissettiae to local wildlife species was still unknown.
Of the small wildlife species tested in this study, one meadow vole (M. pennsylvanicus) and one deer mouse (P. maniculatus) were sequence positive for B. bissettiae. Of the large mammals tested, none were positive for the presence of B. bissettiae. This evidence suggests that the bacteria has established maintenance hosts, but evidence for the ability to infect accidental hosts has not yet been found in New Brunswick.
Understanding the risk of infection by Borrelia spp. of our local wildlife species becomes directly relevant to human health, as it can cause Lyme disease in humans. In its disseminated form, it can affect organs such as the heart, causing what is known as Lyme carditis, a rare but potentially fatal outcome when diagnoses are missed. This thesis presents a case of fatal severe heart disease following suspected untreated Lyme carditis of a 17-year-old female from Nova Scotia, Canada. Formalin fixed paraffin embedded sections of the heart, lung, kidney, adrenals, and pancreas showed florescent structures through immunohistochemistry staining in similar size and shape of Borrelia bacteria. Due to the nature of these samples, however, these findings could not be confirmed through polymerase chain reaction followed by Sanger sequencing and therefore cannot be confirmed as Borrelia
Determining the prevalence of raccoon roundworm (Baylisascaris procyonis) in New Brunswick, Canada
Full text linkThe raccoon roundworm (Baylisascaris procyonis) is an intestinal nematode mainly found within its primary definitive host of raccoons (Procyon lotor). Contraction of the raccoon roundworm by humans can cause the development of Baylisascariasis, a potentially deadly disease that can also cause blindness and a variety of other negative health effects. With the largest risk group consisting of adolescents, and the lack of extensive research on the parasite within the province of New Brunswick, further understanding of the raccoon roundworm and the ecological factors influencing its prevalence is of great epidemiological importance. This study sampled feces from 8 raccoon latrines across the province to determine the prevalence of the raccoon roundworm in New Brunswick for the first time in 10 years. These results were correlated to ecological factors including sightings of domestic animals and of wildlife (excluding raccoons) determined by the establishment of night-vision camera traps across 28 locations around the region of south-eastern New Brunswick for 4-months in 2021. Fecal floatation was performed to isolate potential roundworm eggs for subsequent microscopy and DNA analyses of samples. Raccoon roundworm eggs were microscopically identified across 6 latrine locations, while 3 locations were molecularly confirmed via PCR and genetic sequencing. Fecal samples from latrines with lower roundworm EPG counts ranged from 0 – 8.3, and would be undetectable by PCR analysis, while latrines with higher roundworm EPG counts range from 76.2 – 159.6 (overall median = 5.40 EPG, IQR = 17.6). Increased incidence of Baylisascaris procyonis positive latrine samples were correlated to increased sightings of domestic animals, which may present a possible source of greater risk to humans inhabiting regions with this factor
Investigating the agreement between cognitive assessments of neurologically unhealthy aging
Full text linkMild Cognitive Impairment (MCI) is an intermediate state of cognitive functioning between normal cognitive functioning and dementia, but disordered aging may begin before meeting the diagnostic criteria for MCI (i.e., “at-risk” for MCI). I explored the effectiveness of three neurocognitive assessments, and subjective memory complaints, in identifying older adults (OA) at-risk for MCI. Eight younger adults (age: M = 26.75 years, SD = 5.65) and nine OA (age: M = 62.67 years, SD = 3.08) completed three online tasks that are sensitive to MCI status: the Face Name Associative Memory Exam, the Mnemonic Similarity Task, and the Short-Term Memory Binding Task. Participants also answered, “Do you feel you have memory problems greater than those of your peers?” I found no significant relationship between participants’ performance on the tasks, nor differences in performance between OA with and without subjective-memory complaints. Variability in the performance of healthy and MCI OA prevented clear identification of participants at-risk for MCI; however, two OA performed poorly on all three tasks. My findings provide preliminary evidence that these tasks and subjective memory complaints are not effective at identifying OA at-risk for MCI
Visual and haptic identification of simple and complex objects
Full text linkEncoding specificity is a well-established phenomenon that applies to object recognition. However, recent research has found a violation of encoding specificity for individuals who learn to recognize objects by touch. The current study aimed to examine the types of representations that are created when we learn to recognize objects by sight or by touch, and how these representations may differ based on the complexity of objects. Participants learned to recognize simple or complex objects by sight or by touch (some also completed a distraction task designed to interfere with verbal or visual encoding) and later recognized them in both modalities. Results showed that participants who learned to recognize simple objects required fewer blocks to reach criterion and produced fewer errors compared to participants who learned to recognize complex objects. Participants who learned to recognize objects by sight produced fewer errors than participants who learned to recognize objects by touch. Participants who learned to recognize objects by touch produced fewer errors during visual identification than haptic identification, replicating the violation of encoding specificity. Testing interruptions prevented us from getting enough participants to detect an impact of the distractor task. Potential memory representations for objects will be discussed
Functions of care, community, motherhood, and language in Canadian women's literature
Full text linkDeathbed visions: A study of hospice palliative care volunteers' experiences, perspectives, and reactions
Full text linkDeathbed visions (DBVs) are visits from deceased loved ones or religious figures. They are one of the most reported end-of-life experiences. Because of their unique role at the bedside of the dying, hospice palliative care (HPC) volunteers are well-positioned to witness or be told about DBVs. Eleven female HPC volunteers were interviewed separately about their experiences, perspectives, and reactions to patients’ DBVs. Responding to 14 guiding questions, the volunteers shared 20 stories of their experiences with dying persons’ DBVs and talked about, among other things, the impact of these experiences on their patients and themselves. The most reported visitors were deceased family members (e.g., parents, siblings). The volunteers described their patients’ visions as having a mostly positive impact (e.g., comforting) on the dying. For themselves, their patients’ DBVs also had a positive impact (e.g., made them less afraid to die). All the volunteers provided spiritual explanations for DBVs. Nearly all volunteers said they would not initiate conversations with their patients about DBVs, but would respond to patient reports of DBVs by, for example, listening, asking questions and not being dismissive of their experiences. The implications of the findings are discussed
A novel enzymatic quantification method for polyphosphate in phytoplankton
Full text linkPolyphosphate (polyP) is a basic biological polymer made up of linear chains of inorganic phosphate (Pi) units linked by high-energy phosphoanhydride bonds. The presence of polyP is ubiquitous, but its study has historically been ignored and limited by difficulties in extracting and quantifying polyP from cells. Recently published analytical polyP extraction and enzymatic quantification methods claim to be the “gold standard” for quantitative polyP research but have not yet been tested in species other than Saccharomyces cerevisiae. The adaptation of these methods for use in the quantification of polyP in phytoplankton was attempted. The molybdenum blue assay, using cloned and expressed exopolyphosphatase (EC 3.6.1.11) and pyrophosphatase (EC 3.6.1.1) enzymes, very accurately determined the concentration of polyP in a sample after its enzymatic hydrolysis to Pi. Analyte response is largely unaffected by buffer contamination with phenol or chloroform and sample dilution with Milli-Q water. The polyP extraction methods were unsuccessful and not able to replicate the results of the published protocol when attempted on polyP standards or Polysiphonia samples. An older polyP extraction protocol was used to successfully extract polyP from Synechocystis sp. PCC6803 but was unable to extract polyP standards. By combining these older extraction methods and newly published enzymatic quantification methods, the concentration of polyP stored within the cells of phytoplankton and cyanobacteria can accurately be measured for future studies, but the cause of the inability of either method to extract polyP standards is still unknown
Talk to me about desire: A qualitative investigation of women's experiences
Full text linkSexual desire is a complex psychological construct, and there is variability in the extant desire literature around how to define it. However, desire has been generally defined as an urge to engage in sexual activity, either alone or with a partner. Our scientific understanding of desire, like most things, arose from a model of male sexuality; however, there are important, gendered experiences of desire that have been overlooked, pathologized, or reduced to a numerical rating of frequency or intensity. The goal of this study was to explore how women in long-term relationships experience desire. Participants were 14 women who participated in semi-structured interviews about their desire for sex and masturbation. Data were analyzed using thematic analysis. Women’s experiences of desire fell into two categories: definitions of desire and manifestations of desire. Within the category of definitions of desire, four themes emerged: urge/wanting, physical sensations, embodiment/presence/mindfulness, and different headspace/alternate reality. In the category of manifestations, two themes emerged. The first, responsive desire, included descriptions of desire manifesting in response to external cues and had two subthemes: response to partner cues and response to environmental cues. The second theme in this category was spontaneous desire, where desire was described as manifesting without an obvious external cue. While desire was described as both spontaneous and responsive, responsive descriptions were more prevalent. Women’s desire is more nuanced than measures of frequency and intensity of sexual thoughts can capture, and an understanding of responsive desire is integral to understanding desire in women
