Informal kinship care in rural China : the influence of Confucianism and attachment

This article examines the role of informal kinship care in addressing the emotional needs and mental health, along with relationships, of school-age children left behind in rural China. Rural–urban migration in China has caused many rural children to be left behind in their local communities. Based on semi-structured interview data, this article explores Confucianism’s impact on Chinese kin caregivers’ understandings of children’s needs and their childrearing practices to address these needs. Through the lens of attachment theory, this study identified a close affective bond between children left behind and their kin caregivers. This relationship is underpinned by kin caregivers’ high commitment and love for children, and the Confucian concept of ‘benevolence’. It not only provides children left behind with a sense of belonging, it also alleviates their trauma/grief due to separation from their parents

Urban Food Security, Urban Resilience and Climate Change

The growing importance of logistics in increasingly globalised production and consumption systems strengthens the case for explicit consideration of the climate risks that may impact on the operation of ports in the future, as well as the formulation of adaptation responses that act to enhance their resilience. Within a logistics chain, seaports are functional nodes of significant strategic importance, and are considered as critical gateways linking local and national supply chains to global markets. However, they are more likely to be exposed to vagaries of climate-related extreme events due to their coastal locations. As such, they need to be adaptive and respond to the projected impacts of climate change, in particular extreme weather events. These impacts are especially important in the logistics context as they could result in varying degrees of business interruption; including business closure in the worst case scenario. Since trans-shipment of freight for both the import and export of goods and raw materials has a significant impact on Australia’s sustained economic growth it was considered important to undertake a study of port functional assets, to assess their vulnerability to climate change, to model the potential impacts of climate-related extreme events, and to highlight possible adaptation responses.

Towards networked governance : improving interagency communication and collaboration for disaster risk management and climate change adaptation in Australia

Major disasters, such as bushfires or floods, place significant stress on scarce public resources. Climate change is likely to exacerbate this stress. An integrated approach to disaster risk management (DRM) and climate change adaptation (CCA) could reduce the stress by encouraging the more efficient use of pooled resources and expertise. A comparative analysis of three extreme climate-related events that occurred in Australia between 2009 and 2011 indicated that a strategy to improve interagency communication and collaboration would be a key factor in this type of policy/planning integration. These findings are in accord with the concepts of Joined-up Government and Network Governance. Five key reforms are proposed: developing a shared policy vision; adopting multi-level planning; integrating legislation; networking organisations; and establishing cooperative funding. These reforms are examined with reference to the related research literature in order to identify potential problems associated with their implementation. The findings are relevant for public policy generally but are particularly useful for CCA and DRM.

Homelessness and leaving care : the experiences of young adults in Queensland and Victoria, and implications for practice

This research first asks ‘What happens when young people leave state care?’ in respect of Victoria and Queensland and second ‘What are the service support implications of this?’ A number of methods were used to explore these questions including semi-structured interviews with 27 young adults aged 19-23 years who had been homeless or at risk of homelessness, and focus groups with young people and service providers. This study provides support for the proposition that young people should be proactively and voluntarily involved in periodic monitoring of their lived experience post care and linkage of this monitoring to the activation of timely support. The great majority of young people involved in this study thought this was not only desirable but important. Whilst some young people will be in close contact with leaving care services many others will not. New research is recommended to develop a mentoring and support activation process using participatory monitoring and action research methods. This type of approach reflects the importance of utilising processes with young people in care and leaving care which acknowledge their personhood and capacity to contribute voluntarily to the processes which seek to support them.

Enhancing the capacity of kin caregivers and their families to meet the needs of children left behind

Based on qualitative research of the experiences of 23 kin caregivers and five school personnel, this article explores the role of informal kinship care in addressing the needs of school-age children left behind in rural China. The findings of this study suggest that kin caregivers' child-rearing capacity is limited in the rural context, and they are often overwhelmed by children's diverse and complex needs, particularly their emotional ones. In view of the huge population and their vulnerability, it is imperative for the state to take up its responsibilities and develop specific social work services and other support for children left behind and their families. 根据对23位亲属照顾者和5位学校人员的质性研究，文章探讨在处理中国留守学龄儿童的需要时，非正式亲属照料所担当的角色。研究发现，在农村的亲属照料者的抚养儿童能力有限，而且他们时常在面对儿童众多复杂的需求时应接不暇，问题又以情绪需要尤甚。有见于留守儿童的数目众多和易受伤害，政府急切需要承担相关的责任，为留守儿童及其家庭发展专门的社会工作服务和其他支援。

Physical activity, walking and quality of life in women with depressive symptoms

Background Physical activity (PA) has a positive association with health-related quality of life (HRQL) in the general population. The association between PA and HRQL in those with poor mental health is less clear. Purpose To examine the concurrent and prospective dose-response relationships between total physical activity (TPA) and walking only with HRQL in women aged 50-55 with depressive symptoms in 2001. Methods Participants were 1904 women born in 1946-1951 who completed mailed surveys for the Australian Longitudinal Study on Women's Health in 2001, 2004, 2007 and 2010 and who, in 2001, reported depressive symptoms. At each time point, they reported their weekly minutes of walking, moderate PA, and vigorous PA. A summary TPA score was created that accounted for differences in energy expenditure among the three PA types. Mixed models were used to examine associations between TPA and HRQL (SF-36 component and subscale scores) and between walking and HRQL, for women who reported walking as their only PA. Analyses were conducted in 2013-2014. Results Concurrently, higher levels of TPA and walking were associated with better HRQL (p<0.05). The strongest associations were found for physical functioning, vitality, and social functioning subscales. In prospective models, associations were attenuated, yet compared with women doing no TPA or walking, women doing “sufficient” TPA or walking had significantly better HRQL over time for most SF-36 scales. Conclusions This study extends previous work by demonstrating trends between both TPA and walking and HRQL in women reporting depressive symptoms.

Establishing and maintaining social connectivity: An understanding of the lived experiences of older adults residing in regional and rural communities

- Objective To better understand how to plan for an ageing demographic that resides in ever-changing community typologies. Design: Semi-structured in-depth interviews. - Setting Community settings in rural and regional towns in Queensland. - Participants Twenty-two people aged over 65 years living in regional and rural Australia. - Interventions Qualitative study of social connectedness. - Main outcome measure(s) Thematic qualitative analysis. - Results Formal and informal social contact, through family, friends and social groups, was found to be important to the everyday lives of the participants. - Conclusions Social connections for older adults are important in maintaining independence and community engagement.

Is Merit on the Agenda? Approaches to Recruitment and Promotion in Australian Organisations

Employment on the basis of merit is the foundation of Australia’s equal opportunity legislation, beginning with the Affirmative Action (Equal Opportunity for Women) Act 1986, and continuing through the Equal Opportunity for Women in the Workplace Act 1999 to the Workplace Gender Equality Act 2012, all of which require organisations with more than 100 employees to produce an organisational program promoting employment equity for women (WGEA 2014a; Strachan, Burgess & Henderson 2007). The issue of merit was seen as critically important to the objectives of the original 1986 Act and the Affirmative Action Agency produced two monographs in 1988 written by Clare Burton: Redefining Merit (Burton 1988a) and Gender Bias in Job Evaluation (Burton 1988b) which provided practical advice. Added to this, in 1987 the Australian Government Publishing Service published Women’s Worth: Pay Equity and Job Evaluation in Australia (Burton, Hag & Thompson 1987). The equity programs set up under the 1986 legislation aimed to ‘eliminate discriminatory employment practices and to promote equal employment opportunities for women’ and this was ‘usually understood to mean that the merit principle forms the basis of appointment to positions and for promotion’ (Burton 1988a, p. 1).

Regional and seasonal variation in airborne grass pollen levels between cities of Australia and New Zealand

Although grass pollen is widely regarded as the major outdoor aeroallergen source in Australia and New Zealand (NZ), no assemblage of airborne pollen data for the region has been previously compiled. Grass pollen count data collected at 14 urban sites in Australia and NZ over periods ranging from 1 to 17 years were acquired, assembled and compared, revealing considerable spatiotemporal variability. Although direct comparison between these data is problematic due to methodological differences between monitoring sites, the following patterns are apparent. Grass pollen seasons tended to have more than one peak from tropics to latitudes of 37°S and single peaks at sites south of this latitude. A longer grass pollen season was therefore found at sites below 37°S, driven by later seasonal end dates for grass growth and flowering. Daily pollen counts increased with latitude; subtropical regions had seasons of both high intensity and long duration. At higher latitude sites, the single springtime grass pollen peak is potentially due to a cooler growing season and a predominance of pollen from C3 grasses. The multiple peaks at lower latitude sites may be due to a warmer season and the predominance of pollen from C4 grasses. Prevalence and duration of seasonal allergies may reflect the differing pollen seasons across Australia and NZ. It must be emphasized that these findings are tentative due to limitations in the available data, reinforcing the need to implement standardized pollen-monitoring methods across Australasia. Furthermore, spatiotemporal differences in grass pollen counts indicate that local, current, standardized pollen monitoring would assist with the management of pollen allergen exposure for patients at risk of allergic rhinitis and asthma. © 2015 Springer Science+Business Media Dordrecht

Genome-wide association study of CNVs in 16,000 cases of eight common diseases and 3,000 shared controls

Copy number variants (CNVs) account for a major proportion of human genetic polymorphism and have been predicted to have an important role in genetic susceptibility to common disease. To address this we undertook a large, direct genome-wide study of association between CNVs and eight common human diseases. Using a purpose-designed array we typed 19,000 individuals into distinct copy-number classes at 3,432 polymorphic CNVs, including an estimated 50% of all common CNVs larger than 500 base pairs. We identified several biological artefacts that lead to false-positive associations, including systematic CNV differences between DNAs derived from blood and cell lines. Association testing and follow-up replication analyses confirmed three loci where CNVs were associated with diseaseIRGM for Crohns disease, HLA for Crohns disease, rheumatoid arthritis and type 1 diabetes, and TSPAN8 for type 2 diabetesalthough in each case the locus had previously been identified in single nucleotide polymorphism (SNP)-based studies, reflecting our observation that most common CNVs that are well-typed on our array are well tagged by SNPs and so have been indirectly explored through SNP studies. We conclude that common CNVs that can be typed on existing platforms are unlikely to contribute greatly to the genetic basis of common human diseases. © 2010 Macmillan Publishers Limited. All rights reserved.

Localization of type 1 diabetes susceptibility to the MHC class I genes HLA-B and HLA-A

The major histocompatibility complex (MHC) on chromosome 6 is associated with susceptibility to more common diseases than any other region of the human genome, including almost all disorders classified as autoimmune. In type 1 diabetes the major genetic susceptibility determinants have been mapped to the MHC class II genes HLA-DQB1 and HLA-DRB1 (refs 1–3), but these genes cannot completely explain the association between type 1 diabetes and the MHC region4, 5, 6, 7, 8, 9, 10, 11. Owing to the region's extreme gene density, the multiplicity of disease-associated alleles, strong associations between alleles, limited genotyping capability, and inadequate statistical approaches and sample sizes, which, and how many, loci within the MHC determine susceptibility remains unclear. Here, in several large type 1 diabetes data sets, we analyse a combined total of 1,729 polymorphisms, and apply statistical methods—recursive partitioning and regression...

How Jung's concept of the wounded healer can guide learning and teaching in social work and human services

The concept of the “wounded healer” has been used to explain why those with adverse childhood histories often enter helping professions such as social work and human services (SWHS). Psychotherapist Carl Jung (1875–1961) believed wounded healers developed insight and resilience from their own experiences, enabling transformative interventions to occur with clients. Concerns exist that students with adverse childhood histories in SWHS may display unresolved emotional issues. This journal article explores how Jung’s interpretation of the wounded healer can be critically applied to understanding the learning needs of SWHS students with histories of abuse, neglect or other childhood adversity. The relevance of the wounded healer to SWHS education is explored in three key areas: - 1) the increased possibility of the occurrence of countertransference; - 2) the potential for vicarious traumatisation and burnout, and; - 3) personal and professional resilience displayed by SWHS students with a history of childhood adversity. The wounded healer metaphor allows for a more nuanced understanding of SWHS students with these histories. It also provides insight into the pedagogical considerations associated with teaching this student cohort.

Identification of seven loci affecting mean telomere length and their association with disease

Interindividual variation in mean leukocyte telomere length (LTL) is associated with cancer and several age-associated diseases. We report here a genome-wide meta-analysis of 37,684 individuals with replication of selected variants in an additional 10,739 individuals. We identified seven loci, including five new loci, associated with mean LTL (P < 5 x 10(-8)). Five of the loci contain candidate genes (TERC, TERT, NAF1, OBFC1 and RTEL1) that are known to be involved in telomere biology. Lead SNPs at two loci (TERC and TERT) associate with several cancers and other diseases, including idiopathic pulmonary fibrosis. Moreover, a genetic risk score analysis combining lead variants at all 7 loci in 22,233 coronary artery disease cases and 64,762 controls showed an association of the alleles associated with shorter LTL with increased risk of coronary artery disease (21% (95% confidence interval, 5-35%) per standard deviation in LTL, P = 0.014). Our findings support a causal role of telomere-length variation in some age-related diseases.