Glycemic Control: Risk Factors, Quality of Life, Workforce Participation, and Mortality Among US Adults with Type 2 Diabetes

Despite research showing the benefits of glycemic control, it remains suboptimal among adults with diabetes in the United States. Possible reasons include unaddressed risk factors as well as lack of awareness of its immediate and long term consequences. The objectives of this study were to, using cross-sectional data, 1) ascertain the association between suboptimal (Hemoglobin A1c (HbA1c) ≥7%), borderline (HbA1c 7-8.9%), and poor (HbA1c ≥9%) glycemic control and potentially new risk factors (e.g. work characteristics), and 2) assess whether aspects of poor health and well-being such as poor health related quality of life (HRQOL), unemployment, and missed-work are associated with glycemic control; and 3) using prospective data, assess the relationship between mortality risk and glycemic control in US adults with type 2 diabetes. Data from the 1988-1994 and 1999-2004 National Health and Nutrition Examination Surveys were used. HbA1c values were used to create dichotomous glycemic control indicators. Binary logistic regression models were used to assess relationships between risk factors, employment status and glycemic control. Multinomial logistic regression analyses were conducted to assess relationships between glycemic control and HRQOL variables. Zero-inflated Poisson regression models were used to assess relationships between missed work days and glycemic control. Cox-proportional hazard models were used to assess effects of glycemic control on mortality risk. Using STATA software, analyses were weighted to account for complex survey design and non-response. Multivariable models adjusted for socio-demographics, body mass index, among other variables. Results revealed that being a farm worker and working over 40 hours/week were risk factors for suboptimal glycemic control. Having greater days of poor mental was associated with suboptimal, borderline, and poor glycemic control. Having greater days of inactivity was associated with poor glycemic control while having greater days of poor physical health was associated with borderline glycemic control. There were no statistically significant relationships between glycemic control, self-reported general health, employment, and missed work. Finally, having an HbA1c value less than 6.5% was protective against mortality. The findings suggest that work-related factors are important in a person’s ability to reach optimal diabetes management levels. Poor glycemic control appears to have significant detrimental effects on HRQOL.

Reaganomics and its effects on pricing and participation in the regular paying sector of the National School Lunch Program in Dade County public high schools

Problem: This research proposes to examine the effects of Reaganomics on pricing and participation in the regular paying sector of the National School Lunch Program in Dade County Public High Schools. Subproblems: The first subproblem is to examine the effects of Reaganomics on pricing in the regular paying sector of the National School Lunch Program in Dade County Public High Schools. The second subproblem is to examine the effects of Reaganomics on participation in the regular paying sector of the National School Lunch Program in Dade County Public High Schools. Hypotheses: The first hypothesis is that Reaganomics has resulted in price increases to the regular paying sector of the National School Lunch Program in Dade County Public High Schools. The second hypothesis is that Reaganomics has decreased the percentage of the regular paying sector participating in the National School Lunch Program in Dade County Public High Schools.

Participation de l'endocarde dans les malformations cardiaques du syndrome Holt-Oram

Mémoire numérisé par la Direction des bibliothèques de l'Université de Montréal.

La participation civique de nouveaux(elles) citoyen(ne)s canadien(ne)s originaires du Pérou

Mémoire numérisé par la Direction des bibliothèques de l'Université de Montréal.

Les minorités ethniques et l'État québécois : participation et représentations sociales des associations de groupes ethniques minoritaires lors de commissions parlementaires, 1974-2000

Thèse numérisée par la Direction des bibliothèques de l'Université de Montréal.

Participation de l'endocarde dans les malformations cardiaques du syndrome Holt-Oram

Mémoire numérisé par la Direction des bibliothèques de l'Université de Montréal.

Exploring Perceptions of Middle Class Urban Indian Women Regarding Socio-Cultural Deterrents Influencing Participation in Adult and Continuing Educational Programs

Unlike its childhood counterpart, adult and continuing education is a voluntary activity, where adult learners partake in educational programs for the sake of realizing some explicit or implicit goal. The purpose of this study was to explore the association between socio-cultural influences and deterrents to participation of middle class urban Indian women in adult and continuing educational programs. Darkenwald and Merriam’s (1982) theory of non-participation was selected as the theoretical lens used to guide this study. This study involved collecting qualitative data to analyze participant views and was collected through 16 semi-structured interviews to explore participants’ individual perceptions concerning socio-cultural deterrents influencing participation of middle class urban Indian women in adult and continuing educational programs. Qualitative data were analyzed to discover emerging themes and sub-themes. In the second phase of the study, a modified Deterrent to Participation Scale – General (DPS-G) was used to measure data collected from the surveys completed by participants, that included specific demographic questions. Descriptive statistics were used to examine the relationships between the demographic questions and the deterrent identified on the DPS-G. The interview and survey data were used convergently to understand the relationship between socio-cultural influences and deterrents impacting participant participation in adult and continuing educational programs. The findings of the study indicated that the biggest socio-cultural influence deterring participation among middle class urban Indian women in adult and continuing educational programs is marriage. It is an Indian social norm that comes with a set of pre-defined roles and expectations, and married women find themselves consumed by fulfilling the marital and familial expectations and responsibilities and participation in adult and continuing educational program is furthest from their mind. Middle class urban Indian women do realize the importance of educational pursuits, but do not feel that they can, after marriage. They are open, however, to pursuing adult educational programs in the form of short-term skill development programs leading to income generation, although they would lead primarily to home-based work enterprises.

Global Factors Affecting Women's Participation in Leadership

This dissertation is a multi-level, cross-cultural study of women in leadership conducted with both macro-society data and individual-level data aggregated to the country level. The research questions are, “What macro and micro forces are hindering or advancing women into business or political leadership?” “How do these forces impact the level of women’s involvement in business and political leadership in a particular country?” Data was collected from 10 secondary sources, available for 213 countries, and includes about 300 variables for business leadership (N=115) and political leadership (N=181). To date, most women in leadership research has been Western- or US- based, and little rigorous empirical, multi-level research has been done across countries. The importance of cross-cultural studies on women in leadership stems from the potential to better understand why some countries have more women in positions of both business and political leadership; and the factors that affect women’s involvement in such positions in different countries. A “Levels of Women’s Participation in Leadership” country model is tested using cluster and discriminant analyses. Results indicate that the factors that affect women’s participation in leadership in countries with fewer women leaders are different from the factors that affect women’s participation in countries with high levels of participation. This dissertation proposes that initiatives to increase participation of women in leadership need to consider the relevant factors that significantly affect countries at certain Levels of Women’s Participation in Leadership.

Integrating a mobile accessible electronic system into dockside monitoring: How can small-scale fisheries data collection programs transition from paper-based to digital data collection?

Thesis (Master's)--University of Washington, 2016-06

The use of e-voting as a new tool of e-participation in modern democracies

Finding the answer to the question of the role of electronic voting in a modern country consti - tutes an important part of researches into electronic democracy. The recent dynamic development of in - formation and communication technologies (ICT) and mass media have been leading to noticeable changes in functioning of contemporary countries and societies. ICT is beginning to play a greater and greater role and filter down to almost every field of contemporary human life – including politics. Elec - tronic voting represents one of the more and more popular forms of so called e-democracy, and is an in - teresting research subject in the context of mechanisms for implementing this form of participation in elections, its legitimization, specific technological solutions for e-voting and their effectiveness as well as unintended consequences. The main subject of this text is the use of electronic voting ( e-voting )asone of the forms of electronic democracy . The article attempts to answer the following research questions: First, what is the impact of ICT on the political processes – particularly on the voting procedures? Sec- ondly, what is the essence of electronic voting and what are its main features? Finally, what are the e-voting experiences in the European countries? The text is devoted rather to general remarks on e-voting, and does not constitute a complete analysis of the issue. It is intended to be a contribution to the further considerations.

Participation Space Studies: a socio-technical exploration of activist and community groups’ use of online and offline spaces to support their work

Participation Space Studies explore eParticipation in the day-to-day activities of local, citizen-led groups, working to improve their communities. The focus is the relationship between activities and contexts. The concept of a participation space is introduced in order to reify online and offline contexts where people participate in democracy. Participation spaces include websites, blogs, email, social media presences, paper media, and physical spaces. They are understood as sociotechnical systems: assemblages of heterogeneous elements, with relevant histories and trajectories of development and use. This approach enables the parallel study of diverse spaces, on and offline. Participation spaces are investigated within three case studies, centred on interviews and participant observation. Each case concerns a community or activist group, in Scotland. The participation spaces are then modelled using a Socio-Technical Interaction Network (STIN) framework (Kling, McKim and King, 2003). The participation space concept effectively supports the parallel investigation of the diverse social and technical contexts of grassroots democracy and the relationship between the case-study groups and the technologies they use to support their work. Participants’ democratic participation is supported by online technologies, especially email, and they create online communities and networks around their goals. The studies illustrate the mutual shaping relationship between technology and democracy. Participants’ choice of technologies can be understood in spatial terms: boundaries, inhabitants, access, ownership, and cost. Participation spaces and infrastructures are used together and shared with other groups. Non-public online spaces, such as Facebook groups, are vital contexts for eParticipation; further, the majority of participants’ work is non-public, on and offline. It is informational, potentially invisible, work that supports public outputs. The groups involve people and influence events through emotional and symbolic impact, as well as rational argument. Images are powerful vehicles for this and digital images become an increasingly evident and important feature of participation spaces throughout the consecutively conducted case studies. Collaboration of diverse people via social media indicates that these spaces could be understood as boundary objects (Star and Griesemer, 1989). The Participation Space Studies draw from and contribute to eParticipation, social informatics, mediation, social shaping studies, and ethnographic studies of Internet use.

La participation en amont de grands projets d'aménagement : les effets sur le projet et ses acteurs.

Depuis plus de trente ans, nos pratiques démocratiques évoluent au rythme de liens grandissants entre les instances décisionnelles et la société civile. Les exemples de démarches participatives s’accumulent et leurs formes sont de plus en plus diverses. Au cours des dernières années, les démarches en amont sont de plus en plus présentes dans le paysage participatif et les organisations sont plus nombreuses que jamais à faire le pari de l’amont. C’est le cas d’Hydro-Québec avec ses les tables d’information et d’échange (TIE). Ces tables, existantes depuis la fin des années 1990 et dirigées par le maître d’ouvrage, regroupent plusieurs acteurs du milieu. Elles se tiennent dès le début du processus de planification. L’Office de consultation publique de Montréal (OCPM) a elle aussi faut le saut en amont en adaptant ses méthodes pour intervenir plus tôt dans le processus pour certains mandats. À travers deux études de cas, une portant sur les TIE du complexe hydroélectrique de la Romaine, et l’autre sur la consultation de l’OCPM sur la planification détaillée du secteur de Griffintown, ce mémoire explore les effets de la participation en amont sur les projets et sur ces acteurs.

Différences sur le plan de la motivation au travail, de la capacité de résilience et du sentiment d’efficacité personnelle en classe et à l’école des enseignants débutants selon leur participation à des programmes d’insertion professionnelle offerts dans leurs commissions scolaires d’attache

Actuellement au Québec, le contexte d’insertion professionnelle en enseignement représente plusieurs défis pour les enseignants débutants, et ce, en raison de multiples causes (p.ex. la précarité et le manque de soutien). Résultat : près de 15 % à 20 % d’entre eux quitteront la profession dans les cinq premières années de leur carrière et cette statistique ne cesse d’augmenter. Pour remédier à la situation, l’une des solutions envisagées est la mise en place de programmes d’insertion professionnelle (PIP) par les commissions scolaires, lesquels offrent différentes mesures de soutien telles que du mentorat, des ateliers de formation et des réseaux d’entraide en ligne. Cela dit, les modalités de mise en place de ces programmes varient grandement d’un milieu à l’autre, et ce, autant en ce qui a trait aux services offerts qu’à l’admission des candidats. De plus, ceux-ci ne sont généralement évalués que de façon informelle par le milieu. On ne sait donc pas si les enseignants débutants qui y participent se distinguent réellement quant à leur persévérance dans le métier, laquelle repose notamment sur leur motivation au travail, leur capacité de résilience et leur sentiment d’efficacité personnelle (SEP) en classe et à l’école (Bandura, 1997, 2007; Bélair & Lebel, 2007; Deci & Ryan, 1985, 2002; Fernet, Sénécal, Guay, Marsh, & Dowson, 2008; Zacharyas & Brunet, 2012). Ce projet de recherche vise d’une part à mesurer les différences sur le plan de ces variables chez les enseignants débutants participant ou non à un PIP. D’autre part, il vise également à mesurer la prédiction de ces variables par les différentes mesures de soutien offertes dans les PIP chez ceux qui y participent pour constater leur contribution respective dans un PIP. Pour ce faire, une étude préexpérimentale a été menée auprès de 86 participants. À l’aide d’un questionnaire, la motivation au travail, la capacité de résilience et le SEP en classe et à l’école ont été mesurés afin de comparer les résultats du groupe d’enseignants participant à un programme à ceux n’y participant pas. Une MANCOVA a d’abord été conduite avec ces variables et trois variables contrôles « avoir pensé quitter » le milieu d’enseignement, « ordre d’enseignement » et « expérience d’enseignement » comme covariables. Des régressions linéaires multivariées ont ensuite été menées à partir des mesures de soutien. Aucun résultat significatif n’a été obtenu quant aux différences entre les participants en fonction de la participation à un PIP ce qui est représentatif des résultats obtenus dans d’autres recherches sur le sujet (Ingersoll & Strong, 2011). Aucun résultat significatif n’a été obtenu concernant la prédiction des variables d’intérêt par les mesures de soutien.

Bien vieillir en étant actif : le cas de la participation des aînés à l’Université du troisième âge de Québec

Ce mémoire porte sur la participation des aînés à l’Université du troisième âge de Québec (UTAQ) et son lien avec la norme du bien vieillir véhiculée dans la politique québécoise sur le vieillissement. Quinze étudiants de l’UTAQ ont été rencontrés lors d’entrevues semi-dirigées pour recueillir leurs propos, tant sur ce qui les amène à fréquenter cette institution que sur le vieillissement lui-même et sa prise en charge sociale. Le cadre conceptuel de cette recherche s’inspire de l’anthropology of policy et permet d’envisager la manière dont nous sommes gouvernés dans une société néolibérale. Il est constitué des écrits foucaldiens sur le rapport savoir-pouvoir et les normes. De la littérature récente sur le néolibéralisme, je retiens également la technique de responsabilisation, centrale à ce mode de gouvernement. Les récits des étudiants de l’UTAQ montrent qu’ils sont très sensibles aux discours de la politique sur le vieillissement et qu’ils adhèrent à la vision de la vieillesse qui en découle tout en demeurant très critiques à son endroit. Enfin, mon analyse montre que l’UTAQ peut servir de relais de la politique du bien vieillir, et ce, de multiples façons.

Electronic And Structural Study Of Pt-modified Au Vicinal Surfaces: A Model System For Pt-au Catalysts.

Two single crystalline surfaces of Au vicinal to the (111) plane were modified with Pt and studied using scanning tunneling microscopy (STM) and X-ray photoemission spectroscopy (XPS) in ultra-high vacuum environment. The vicinal surfaces studied are Au(332) and Au(887) and different Pt coverage (θPt) were deposited on each surface. From STM images we determine that Pt deposits on both surfaces as nanoislands with heights ranging from 1 ML to 3 ML depending on θPt. On both surfaces the early growth of Pt ad-islands occurs at the lower part of the step edge, with Pt ad-atoms being incorporated into the steps in some cases. XPS results indicate that partial alloying of Pt occurs at the interface at room temperature and at all coverage, as suggested by the negative chemical shift of Pt 4f core line, indicating an upward shift of the d-band center of the alloyed Pt. Also, the existence of a segregated Pt phase especially at higher coverage is detected by XPS. Sample annealing indicates that the temperature rise promotes a further incorporation of Pt atoms into the Au substrate as supported by STM and XPS results. Additionally, the catalytic activity of different PtAu systems reported in the literature for some electrochemical reactions is discussed considering our findings.