Communicating with first year students ; so many channels but is anyone listening? A practice report

Communicating with first year students has become a far more complex prospect in the digital age. There is a lot of competition for limited attentional resources from media sources in almost endless channels. Getting important messages to students when there is so much competing information is a difficult prospect for academic and professional divisions of the university alike. Students’ preferences for these communication channels are not well understood and are constantly changing with the introduction of new technology. A first year group was surveyed about their use and preference for various sources of information. Students were generally positive about the use of social networking and other new online media but strongly preferred more established channels for official academic and administrative information. A discussion of the findings and recommendations follows.

Technical report : acoustic analysis of the natural environment

This technical report is concerned with one aspect of environmental monitoring—the detection and analysis of acoustic events in sound recordings of the environment. Sound recordings offer ecologists the potential advantages of cheaper and increased sampling. An acoustic event detection algorithm is introduced that outputs a compact rectangular marquee description of each event. It can disentangle superimposed events, which are a common occurrence during morning and evening choruses. Next, three uses to which acoustic event detection can be put are illustrated. These tasks have been selected because they illustrate quite different modes of analysis: (1) the detection of diffuse events caused by wind and rain, which are a frequent contaminant of recordings of the terrestrial environment; (2) the detection of bird calls using the spatial distribution of their component events; and (3) the preparation of acoustic maps for whole ecosystem analysis. This last task utilises the temporal distribution of events over a daily, monthly or yearly cycle.

Safety impacts of alcohol and other drugs in construction : a mid term report

Estimated 640,700 persons suffered a work-related injury or illness in 2009-2010 and 444 lost their lives as a result in 2008-2009, in Australia Very little is known about what proportion of accidents are directly attributable to the effects of AOD Anecdotal evidence highlights issues of AOD and its association with safety risk on construction sites

Twelve-month effectiveness of a parent-led, family-focused weight-management program for prepubertal children : a randomized, controlled trial

BACKGROUND Parenting-skills training may be an effective age-appropriate child behavior-modification strategy to assist parents in addressing childhood overweight. OBJECTIVE Our goal was to evaluate the relative effectiveness of parenting-skills training as a key strategy for the treatment of overweight children. DESIGN The design consisted of an assessor-blinded, randomized, controlled trial involving 111 (64% female) overweight, prepubertal children 6 to 9 years of age randomly assigned to parenting-skills training plus intensive lifestyle education, parenting-skills training alone, or a 12-month wait-listed control. Height, BMI, and waist-circumference z score and metabolic profile were assessed at baseline, 6 months, and 12 months (intention to treat). RESULTS After 12 months, the BMI z score was reduced by ∼10% with parenting-skills training plus intensive lifestyle education versus ∼5% with parenting-skills training alone or wait-listing for intervention. Waist-circumference z score fell over 12 months in both intervention groups but not in the control group. There was a significant gender effect, with greater reduction in BMI and waist-circumference z scores in boys compared with girls. CONCLUSION Parenting-skills training combined with promoting a healthy family lifestyle may be an effective approach to weight management in prepubertal children, particularly boys. Future studies should be powered to allow gender subanalysis.

An explorative qualitative analysis of participants' experience of using kava versus placebo in an RCT. (Clinical report)

Many randomised controlled trials (RCT) have been conducted using Piper methysticum (kava), however no qualitative research exploring the experience of taking kava during a clinical trial has previously been reported. ---------- Patients and methods: A qualitative research component (in the form of semi structured and open ended written questions) was incorporated into an RCT to explore the experiences of those participating in a clinical trial of kava. The written questions were provided to participants at weeks 2 and 3 (after randomisation, after each controlled phase). The researcher and participants were blinded as to whether they were taking kava or placebo. Two open ended questions were posed to elucidate their experiences from taking either kava or placebo. Thematic analysis was undertaken and researcher triangulation employed to ensure analytical rigour. Key themes after the kava phases were a reduction in anxiety and stress, and calming or relaxing mental effects. Other themes related to improvement in sleep and in somatic anxiety symptoms. ---------- Results: Kava use did not cause any serious adverse reactions although a few respondents reported nausea or other gastrointestinal side effects. This represents the first documented qualitative investigation of the experience of taking kava during a clinical trial. The primary themes involved anxiolytic and calming effects, with only a minor theme reflecting side effects. Our exploratory qualitative data was consistent with the significant quantitative results revealed in the study and provides additional support to suggest the trial results did not exclude any important positive or negative effects (at least as experienced by the trial participants).