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Age and career resilience from the perspective of life course theory: A multi-level study across 28 countries
No full textCareer resilience is critical to the world's aging workforce, aiding older workers in adapting to the ever-evolving nature of work. While ageist stereotypes often depict older workers as less resilient when faced with workplace changes, existing research studies offer conflicting evidence on whether older age hinders or improves career resilience. In response to this conflicting evidence, the present study employs multi-level data from 6772 employees in 28 countries to examine the age-career resilience relationships and underlying mechanisms, hence advancing our understanding of career resilience across the life course. By integrating macro-contextual factors such as the unemployment rate and the culture of education with individual-level mechanisms such as positive career meaning and career optimism, we provide a comprehensive model explaining how career resilience varies across age groups. Grounded in life course theory, our findings resolve prior inconsistencies in resilience research, contribute to bridging the micro-macro gap in HRM literature, and challenge existing age-based stereotypes
Explainable AI for infection prevention and control: modeling CPE acquisition and patient outcomes in an Irish hospital with transformers
No full textBackground: Carbapenemase-Producing Enterobacteriace (CPE) poses a critical concern for infection prevention and control in hospitals. However, predictive modeling of previously highlighted CPE-associated risks such as readmission, mortality, and extended length of stay (LOS) remains underexplored, particularly with modern deep learning
approaches. This study introduces an eXplainable AI (XAI) modeling framework to investigate CPE impact on patient outcomes from Electronic Medical Records (EMR) data of an Irish hospital.
Methods We analyzed an inpatient dataset from an Irish acute hospital (2018–2022), incorporating diagnostic codes, ward transitions, patient demographics, infection-related variables and contact network features. Several Transformerbased architectures (e.g., TabTransformer, TabNet) were benchmarked alongside traditional machine learning models.
Clinical outcomes were predicted, and XAI techniques were applied to interpret model decisions. Results Our framework successfully demonstrated the utility of Transformer-based models, with TabTransformer consistently outperforming baselines across multiple clinical prediction tasks, especially for CPE acquisition (Area
Under Receiver Operating Characteristic and sensitivity). We found infection-related features, including historical hospital exposure, admission context, and network centrality measures, to be highly influential in predicting patient outcomes and CPE acquisition risk. Explainability analyses revealed that features like ”Area of Residence”,
”Admission Ward” and prior admissions are key risk factors. Network variables like ”Ward PageRank” also ranked highly, reflecting the potential value of structural exposure information. Conclusion: This study presents a robust and explainable AI framework for analyzing complex EMR data to identify key risk factors and predict CPE-related outcomes. Our findings underscore the superior performance of the Transformer models and highlight the importance of diverse clinical and network features. The transparent interpretability offered by our XAI approach provides actionable insights for infection prevention and control, paving
the way for more targeted interventions and ultimately enhancing patient safety within acute healthcare settings
Literacy for equitable interprofessional learning: implementation protocol for an online community of practice for Irish teachers and speech and language therapists
No full textCommunities of Practice (CoPs) are often used to enhance
professional learning and support capacity for change. While they
are increasingly popular in both health and education, more
needs to be done to understand how the CoPs can be used to
support equitable, interprofessional collaboration between these
allied disciplines. This paper presents a novel protocol that
describes the implementation and evaluation procedures of an
online CoP for primary school teachers and speech and language
therapists (SLTs) that focuses on effective literacy instruction.
Literacy is an equitable domain of shared practice not previously
explored in the Irish context. This protocol leveraged two distinct
yet converging Implementation Science frameworks to inform the
design and evaluation of the proposed interprofessional CoP.
These frameworks provide a comprehensive blueprint for
designing, executing and evaluating both the process and
outcomes of the CoP
Teaching and Learning Irish in English-Medium Schools. Perspectives of Children, Young People, Parents, Teachers, Principals and Student Teachers. Report 2. Towards an Action Plan for Irish in English-Medium Schools
No full textA wide-ranging consultation was undertaken to ascertain the perspectives of a range of participants on the teaching and learning of Irish in primary and post-primary schools. This report examines the opinions and experiences of children, young people, parents, teachers, student teachers and principals in both primary and post-primary education. On the whole, participants expressed a clear desire to learn Irish, in principle, but signalled a range of challenges that hinder learning and progression in the system. Participants offered a series of recommendations to work towards a more successful, inclusive and stimulating environment for learning, teaching and assessing Irish
Anatomy-Preserving Counterfactual Edits in Breast MRI via Guided Diffusion
No full textDynamic contrast-enhanced breast MRI is highly sensitive
but difficult to interpret. We ask whether counterfactual edits produced
by a latent diffusion model can reveal image cues linked to tumor presence while preserving anatomy. Starting from a latent diffusion backbone, we fine-tune the U-Net denoiser on the MAMA-MIA dataset and generate slice-level edits via DDIM inversion and null-text inversion. We study two operations: curtailment (suppression of tumor evidence) and exaggeration (amplification or addition of tumor-like features). Semantic impact is quantified with a frozen 3D nnU-Net trained on expert
tumor masks. Across cohorts, curtailment yields a consistent 18–43%
mean reduction in predicted tumor extent, whereas exaggeration is less
reliable, highlighting an asymmetry between subtractive and additive
edits. These results suggest diffusion-based counterfactuals provide interpretable, anatomy-preserving “what-if” views that complement saliency maps for model auditing, hypothesis generation, and training (Code and trained models are available at https://github.com/Luab/breastmri-counterfactuals.
SLIVeR: A Narrative VR Experience for Immersive Lifelog Exploration
No full textWe present SLIVeR (Someone else’s Lifelog in Virtual Reality), an interactive system that reimagines lifelog data through narrativebased Virtual Reality (VR). Instead of passively viewing chronological data, users navigate personal history through cinematic scenes and existential prompts embedded in a memory-reconstruction storyline. Guided by life-oriented questions, users progress from disorientation to recollection using curated lifelog clips. Built in Unity and deployed on Meta Quest 3, SLIVeR transforms lifelogging into a reflective, game-like journey that blends storytelling, gamification, and immersive visuals to enhance user engagement
‘Empowering the laity’: new perspectives on the foundation and development of the Legion of Mary, 1921-62
No full textThe Legion of Mary was founded in Dublin in 1921 by Frank Duff and a group of fifteen women. Focusing on evangelical and social work, and set against the rise of Catholic Action in the wider Church, it developed from a single group in a Dublin parish to become a major international organisation and one of the largest lay movements in Catholicism. Surprisingly, the Legion rarely features in Irish historiography and no critical study has been produced. Drawing on the archives of the Legion, as well as state and Church archives in Ireland and Britain, this dissertation aims to rectify this omission by assessing the origins, motivations and development of the Legion between its foundation and the Second Vatican Council.
The Legion’s most prominent activities, which differed from place to place according to local need, included an apostolate to prostitutes, hostels for the homeless, home visitation, evangelical and catechetical work, missionary service, ecumenical outreach and work with Irish emigrants in Britain. A defining aspect of the Legion was the centrality it placed on the role of the laity in the mission of the Church, predating the thinking of the Vatican Council. Initially founded for women, the Legion heralded the place of women in the Church. Attracting members from all classes, it demanded strict equality among them. Extending beyond Ireland to Britain in 1928, and then around the world from 1931, it became a significant, effective and influential global Catholic movement. In its work, as it sought humane solutions for social problems, it challenged an inherent lack of compassion in Irish society. The influence of Duff was substantial, he became the essence of the Legion. His innovative thinking, organisational skills, and openness to new ideas and experimentation in pastoral, social and evangelical work, rooted the Legion in deep, even radical theological, spiritual and historical traditions, and moved it beyond being a mere manifestation of Catholic Action to something unique, universal and effective
Collaborative 360-Degree Video Streaming: A Multi-User Synchronization Solution with Socket.IO
Full text linkThe rapid development of 360-degree video technology has transformed the way users engage with video content. Despite these advancements, synchronizing 360-degree video playback across multiple users remains a significant challenge. While libraries and plugins such as videojs-xr support playback of 360-degree videos on both browsers and headsets, they do not offer a unified, synchronized viewing experience for multiple users viewing simultaneously. This article presents a novel solution for real-time synchronized playback of 360-degree videos across various client devices. The proposed system employs a server architecture built on Node.js and Express.js, along with WebSocket communication managed by Socket.IO, to ensure low-latency state synchronization across all connected clients. By incorporating ngrok for seamless internet access, the solution facilitates real-time interaction without the need for complex network configurations. This approach not only addresses the limitations of existing technologies but also greatly enhances the viewing experience in applications such as education, entertainment, and beyond. Performance evaluation results demonstrate the system's ability to maintain suitable throughput levels and efficient CPU consumption under different scenarios, including setups with 2, 8, and 16 users
School Inspection: a driver of school improvement?
Full text linkSchool inspection has long played a crucial role in ensuring quality education. Initially established to maintain accountability, it now seeks to drive continuous school improvement. Despite its widespread adoption, the mechanisms by which inspections actually contribute to
such improvements remain under-researched, presenting a critical gap addressed by this study. This research aims to investigate the evolution and characteristics of school inspection systems and their impact on school improvement. Specifically, it explores key factors, such as power
dynamics, quality measures, and self-evaluation, that influence inspection outcomes. Additionally, it examines how national and international contexts shape inspection frameworks, as well as the role of inspection in informing education policy and practice. A qualitative case study methodology was adopted, focusing on four distinct inspection systems
in Dubai, Ireland, New Zealand, and Pakistan. Data were collected through an extensive review of literature, analysis of official documents and websites, and semi-structured interviews with school leaders and inspectors. These four regions were selected to provide a broad comparative analysis of inspection systems across varying socio-political environments. The results highlight significant variations in how school inspection systems evolved across jurisdictions. While all systems emphasise accountability, their approaches to fostering improvement differ, shaped by socio-political contexts. The study also found that transparency in inspections remains a challenge, with school leaders often questioning the reliability of feedback. However, positive perceptions of inspection processes encourage greater school
improvement. Additionally, power dynamics—ranging from regulatory authority to collaborative engagement—play a pivotal role in determining inspection efficacy. In conclusion, this study features the need to balance regulatory oversight with school autonomy and self-evaluation. Establishing systematic feedback mechanisms enables school
leaders to share their insights, fostering continuous improvement of inspection processes. Future research should prioritise broader stakeholder perspectives, including teachers, students, and parents, while expanding comparative analyses across diverse socio-political
contexts to identify global best practices
The Violation of The Principle of Non-refoulement in the European Union
Full text linkThis doctoral thesis aims to study the legal system of the European Union (EU) with a focus on the EU's responsibility in asylum policy in relation to the principle of non-refoulement. The principle of non-refoulement, as widely recognised as an absolute norm, prohibits the transfer of people to countries considered unsafe. However, its correct application in the EU seems to be circumvented by the principle of mutual trust and the concept of safe country. Therefore, this research, by analysing legal texts, case law and policy documents, critically examines how these two concepts attempt and sometimes succeed in circumventing the principle of non-refoulement. The examination conducted shows a considerable discrepancy between the theoretical construct of the non-refoulement principle and its application in practice within EU Member States. Mutual trust often results in infringements of the rights of asylum seekers when they are transferred from one EU country to another, and at the same time, the safe country concept, which is open to political interpretation, also most frequently leads to these infringements. This thesis, by illustrating the practical difficulties of protecting the principle of non-refoulement and how some policy choices are not in line with the EU's human rights obligations, contributes to the debate in the EU on asylum and refugees