Is there change over time in the season-of-birth effect for schizophrenia? Data from the southern hemisphere

The aim of this paper is to examine distributions of schizophrenia and general population births over time in order to determine whether (a) the pattern has changed over time, (b) any pattern was similar for both males and females, and (c) whether there is any indication that there is any relationship between the changes in pattern between schizophrenia and general population births. Birth month and year for 7807 individuals with ICD8/9 schizophrenia were gained from the Queensland Mental Health Statistical System for 1914-1975. Monthly births for the general population in Queensland for the same period were obtained from the Australian Bureau of Statistics. For each decade we obtained two comparisons, (1) between two 'seasons' (summer-autumn/winter-spring), and (2) between the third (coldest) quarter and the remaining quarters. Based on expected contrasts from general population proportions, odds ratios and their confidence intervals were used to analyse these comparisons for all subjects, and for males and females separately. The seasonality found in our previous studies was again evident (OR 1.09; 95% CI= 1.01-1.17). However there was no significant change in its pattern over time either for the total group or for males and females separately. When the general population births alone were examined using the same contrasts, seasonality was also observed, but here there were fluctuations over time. These results suggest that exposures linked to changes in general population births over time should be examined in disorders such as schizophrenia which demonstrate seasonality in births. The Stanley Foundation supported this project.

The nomenclature of style: Brutalism, Minimalism, art history and visual style in architecture journals

The naming of styles or movements is a basic mechanism of the architectural journals. The announcement of new tendencies, groups or philosophies, gives a journal its character as ‘news’, and if such terms are taken up in general discourse this demonstrates the prescience of the editor and enhances the repute of the journal. The announcement of phenomenon such as ‘critical regionalism’ or ‘deconstructivism’ referred architectural developments to a context in socio-politics or philosophy, and thus aimed to provide at least an initial resistance to their understanding as the formal styles which they quickly became. A different strategy, or occasion, which this paper will discuss, is where the name of an architectural moment is given in the traditional form of an art historical style. Here the nomenclature of style and a certain attitude to form is introduced as the starting point for a more open ended critical inquiry. Two examples of this strategy will be given. The first is Peter Reyner Banham and the Architecture Review’s promotion of ‘Brutalism’ as an anti-aesthetic which took its conceptual form from early twentieth century art movements, particularly Futurism. The second, identified with Architectural Design in the 1990’s is ‘Minimalism’, a term describing a strand of the visual arts of the 1960’s which can be understood as an attempt to nuance and add seriousness to the present rampant nostalgia for the style of the architecture of the 1960’s.

Managing change and time in dynamic workflow processes

Business environments have become exceedingly dynamic and competitive in recent times. This dynamism is manifested in the form of changing process requirements and time constraints. Workflow technology is currently one of the most promising fields of research in business process automation. However, workflow systems to date do not provide the flexibility necessary to support the dynamic nature of business processes. In this paper we primarily discuss the issues and challenges related to managing change and time in workflows representing dynamic business processes. We also present an analysis of workflow modifications and provide feasibility considerations for the automation of this process.