Adolescent men's attitudes and decision-making in relation to an unplanned pregnancy. Responses to an interactive video drama

This study confronts a gender bias in research on adolescent pregnancy by exploring adolescent men’s decisions relating to a hypothetical unplanned pregnancy. A cross-sectional survey was conducted with adolescent men (N = 360) aged between 14 and 18 years attending schools in the Republic of Ireland. The study, the first of its kind in Europe, extends the small body of evidence on adolescent men and pregnancy decision-making by developing and examining reactions to an interactive video drama used in a comparable study in Australia. In addition, we tested a more comprehensive range of sociological and psychological determinants of adolescent men’s decisions regarding an unplanned pregnancy. Results showed that adolescent men were more likely to choose to keep the baby in preference to abortion or adoption. Adolescent men’s choice to continue the pregnancy (keep or adopt) in preference to abortion was significantly associated with anticipated feelings of regret in relation to abortion, perceived positive attitudes of own mother to keeping the baby and a feeling that a part of them might want a baby. Religiosity was also shown to underlie adolescent men’s views on the perceived consequences of an abortion in their lives.

The European oyster (Ostrea edulis) and its epibiotic succession

This study aimed to investigate intra- and inter-site differences in the epibiota on the European oyster Ostrea edulis of different ages and on hard substrata to assess their contribution to biodiversity. This research has shown that shells of O. edulis do show higher species diversity than non-living hard substrata and as oysters grow larger epibiotic diversity will increase. This investigation has revealed that O. edulis possesses biogenic engineering qualities and the value of O. edulis as a vehicle for increasing biodiversity should not be underestimated. Relatively few studies have examined the shell surfaces of Ostrea edulis, which, together with their associated epifauna provide a large portion of the natural hard substrata for sessile filter-feeding organisms, including oysters, in coastal and estuarine ecosystems. It can be considered a keystone species which has an influence on intertidal and subtidal community structures.

Negotiation of risk in sexual relationships and reproductive decision-making amongst HIV sero-different couples

The paper focuses on the ways in which medical discourses of HIV transmission risk, personal bodily meanings and reproductive decision-making are re-negotiated within the context of sero-different relationships, in which one partner is known to be HIV-positive. Eighteen in-depth interviews were conducted with 10 individuals in Northern Ireland during 2008–2009. Drawing on an embodied sociological approach, the findings show that physical pleasure, love, commitment, a desire to conceive without medical interventions and a dislike of condoms within regular ongoing relationships, shaped individuals' sense of biological risk. In addition, the subjective logic that a partner had not previously become infected through unprotected sex prior to knowledge of HIV status and the added security of an undetectable viral load significantly impacted upon women's and, especially, men's decisions to have unprotected sex in order to conceive. The findings speak to the importance of reframing public health campaigns and clinical counselling discourses on HIV risk transmission to acknowledge how couples negotiate this risk, alongside pleasure and commitment within ongoing relationships.

Getting priorities straight: Risk assessment and decision-making in the improvement of inherited disorders in pedigree dogs

The issue of inherited disorders in pedigree dogs is not a recent phenomenon and reports of suspected genetic defects associated with breeding practices date back to Charles Darwin's time. In recent years, much information on the array of inherited defects has been assimilated and the true extent of the problem has come to light. Historically, the direction of research funding in the field of canine genetic disease has been largely influenced by the potential transferability of findings to human medicine, economic benefit and importance of dogs for working purposes. More recently, the argument for a more canine welfare-orientated approach has been made, targeting research efforts at the alleviation of the most suffering in the greatest number of animals.