NUI Maynooth Eprint Archive
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Is Pre-season Eccentric Strength Testing During the Nordic Hamstring Exercise Associated with Future Hamstring Strain Injury? A Systematic Review and Meta-analysis
No full textBackground Interventions utilising the Nordic hamstring exercise (NHE) have resulted in reductions in the incidence of
hamstring strain injury (HSI). Subsequently, quantifying eccentric knee fexor strength during performance of the NHE to
identify an association with the occurrence of future HSI has become increasingly common; however, the data to date are
equivocal.
Objective To systematically review the association between pre-season eccentric knee fexor strength quantifed during
performance of the NHE and the occurrence of future HSI.
Design Systematic review and meta-analysis.
Data sources CINAHL, Cochrane Library, Medline Complete, Embase, Web of Science and SPORTDiscus databases were
searched from January 2013 to January 10, 2020.
Eligibility criteria for selecting studies Prospective cohort studies which assessed the association between pre-season eccentric
knee fexor strength quantifed during performance of the NHE and the occurrence of future HSI.
Methods Following database search, article retrieval and title and abstract screening, articles were assessed for eligibility
against pre-defned criteria then assessed for risk of bias. Meta-analysis was used to pool data across studies, with metaregression utilised where possible.
Results A total of six articles were included in the meta-analysis, encompassing 1100 participants. Comparison of eccentric
knee fexor strength during performance of the NHE in 156 injured participants and the 944 uninjured participants revealed
no signifcant diferences, regardless of whether strength was expressed as absolute (N), relative to body mass (N kg−1) or
between-limb asymmetry (%). Meta-regression analysis revealed that the observed efect sizes were generally not moderated
by age, mass, height, strength, or sport played.
Conclusion Eccentric knee fexor strength quantifed during performance of the NHE during pre-season provides limited
information about the occurrence of a future HS
Juventius and the Summer of Youth in Catullus 48
No full textCatullus’ poem 48 has barely been studied, except as the “less interesting” sibling of the family of kiss poems. It continues the characterisation of Juventius as an aristocratic young man in the flower of his youth (flosculus … Iuventiorum , 24.1), but it complicates this image with agricultural imagery which suggests that the boy is on the cusp of manhood, making a transition from smooth-cheeked spring to bristly summer. Juventius’ honey-sweet eyes and kisses like thick crops of the dry beards of grain evoke the ‘young man with the first down’, a figure with a long and conflicting literary pedigree. A better understanding of the literary background of this imagery illuminates poem 48 as a complex and passionate celebration of the fragility of youthful beauty, but it also reveals more clearly just how the poem participates in the persuasive rhetoric of the kiss poems
One month before Covid-19 and one year after: An assessment of wellbeing of post-primary school leaders in Ireland
No full textThe impact of Covid-19 is widely discussed, however, little is known about the actual changes in participants’ wellbeing before and during the pandemic. The current report provides a unique perspective on the differences in post-primary school leaders’ wellbeing one month before the pandemic outbreak (Time 1) and one year later (Time 2). The participants comprised of 267 (Time 1) and 251 (Time 2) post-primary school leaders whose wellbeing was assessed using Mental Health Continuum Short-form (personal wellbeing) and Workplace PERMA profiler (work-related wellbeing), as well as a one-question measure of perceived stress. The results showed that while leaders’ stress levels increased during the pandemic, their personal wellbeing remained the same, whereas many aspects of their work-related wellbeing increased during the pandemic, such as meaning for work, engagement or accomplishment. In addition to the wellbeing, participants were asked about their experiences of Covid-19, school community strengths, challenges, as well as their views about changes required to improve education in Ireland post-Covid. These changes included Communication, Assessment, Leaving Certificate and Junior Cycle reforms. The findings are discussed in the context of international research and recommendations are made across various levels impacting school communities in Ireland
How can Older Adults Shop Online in the Future? Developing Design Principles for Virtual-Commerce Stores
No full textThe Covid-19 crisis has significantly affected retailers in interacting with their customers. Now more than ever, retailers innovate and strive for effective replication of in-store experiences in an online environment. Virtual reality can be effective in emulating experiential shopping at home. However, particularly older adults (OAs) experience difficulties in using these novel technologies as they undergo several age-related changes, such as deteriorating vision or weakened hand-eye-coordination. Thus, we identify the requirements of OAs and develop seven design principles for virtual-commerce stores for OAs. We follow a design science research approach with a staged research process and iterative cycles. The requirements and design principles are evaluated and refined by conducting semi-structured interviews and focus groups. This study offers prescriptive knowledge in form of design principles for virtual retail and a specific customer segment and contributes to customer-centred design literature. These principles can further guide developers in designing digital systems for OAs
Planning and 3D Spatial Media: Progress, Prospects, and the Knowledge and Experiences of Local Government Planners in Ireland
No full textFor three decades the case has been made for the development and adoption of digital tools that better support spatial decision-making in planning using 3D information. Here we report on a study that interviewed planners from local authorities in Ireland concerning their knowledge and experience of 3D spatial media. We consider the potential uses of these tools in planning, and the prospects for their adoption within local government planning departments. The interviews reveal that the planning system, as currently resourced and operated in Ireland, provides significant challenges and few incentives for the adoption of 3D spatial media
Charting the design and implementation of the smart city: the case of citizen-centric bikeshare in Hamilton, Ontario
No full textPrevious scholarship on the smart city has expressed concern at the top-down, technocratic nature of smart technologies and the lack of meaningful citizen participation in their development. In this paper, we utilize instrumentalization theory to trace the initiation, design and deployment of a specific smart city initiative: bikeshare in Hamilton, Ontario. Smart bikeshare is increasingly seen as complicit in processes of social stratification, serving a predominately white, middle-class demographic and particular locales. Our case study reveals the potential of reflexive design praxes to reconfigure bikeshare as a platform for both instrumental and social value. In particular, we highlight how collaborative, open and inclusive forms of urban governance can enroll a broad range of civic actors to create a scheme that embodies diverse but complimentary goals and ideologies. We conclude that instrumentalization theory provides a conceptual means to open up the “black box” of urban design to critical interrogation, and to identify how to enact participatory design and citizen-centric smart urbanism
'Double activation': Workfare meets marketisation
No full textSince the financial crisis, Ireland’s welfare state has been reorientated around a regulatory, ‘work-first’ activation model. Claimants now face penalty rates for non-compliance with activation requirements that have been significantly extended since 2009. Alongside these formal policy reforms, the organisations delivering Public Employment Services, and the modes by which they are commissioned, have also been reconfigured through a series of New Public Management style governance reforms, including, most notably, the creation of a quasi-market for employment services (JobPath) in 2015. This article addresses the intersection between activation and quasi-marketisation, positioning the latter as a form of ‘double activation’ that reshapes not only how but also what policies are enacted at the street level. It unpacks their shared logics and mutual commitment to governing agents at a distance through a behavioural public policy orientation, and reflects on the extent to which marketisation is capable of producing lower-cost but more responsive employment services
Introduction: The dual tracks of welfare and activation reform–Governance and conditionality
No full textThe abstract is included in the text
Income Support in an Eco-Social State: The Case for Participation Income
No full textContemporary models of welfare capitalism have frequently been critiqued about their fit-for-purpose in provisioning for people’s basic needs including care, and longer-term ecological sustainability. The Covid-19 pandemic has also exposed the need for better institutions and a new welfare architecture. We argue a post-productivist eco-social state can deliver sustainable well-being and meet basic needs. Arguing Universal Basic Services are an essential building block and prerequisite for a de-commodified welfare state, we focus on examining the form of income support that might best complement UBS. The article develops, from the perspective of feminist arguments and the capabilities approach, a case for Participation Income. This, we argue, can be aligned with targeted policy goals, particularly reward for and redistribution of human and ecological care or reproduction and other forms of socially valued participation. It may also, in the short term, be more administratively practical and politically feasible than universal basic income