A participatory systems approach to understanding climate adaptation needs

Emerging literature on climate adaptation suggests the need for effective ways of engaging or activating communities and supporting community roles, coupled with whole-of-system approaches to understanding climate change and adaptation needs. We have developed and evaluated a participatory approach to elicit community and stakeholder understanding of climate change adaptation needs, and connect diverse community members and local office bearers towards potential action. The approach was trialed in a series of connected social-ecological systems along a transect from a rural area to the coast and islands of ecologically sensitive Moreton Bay in Queensland, Australia. We conducted ‘climate roundtables’ in each of three areas along the transect, then a fourth roundtable reviewed and extended the results to the region as a whole. Influence diagrams produced through the process show how each climate variable forecast to affect this region (heat, storm, flood, sea-level rise, fire, drought) affects the natural environment, infrastructure, economic and social behaviour patterns, and psychosocial responses, and how sets of people, species and ecosystems are affected, and act, differentially. The participatory process proved effective as a way of building local empathy, a local knowledge base and empowering participants to join towards future climate adaptation action. Key principles are highlighted to assist in adapting the process for use elsewhere.

An unexpected legacy and its contribution to early Indian typography

Reprinted from Matrix 7 (Winter 1987) with revisions

Contrasting longitudinal and cross-sectional relationships between insulin resistance and percentage of body fat, fitness, and physical activity in children—the LOOK study

Background: Knowledge of individual changes in insulin resistance (IR) and longitudinal relationships of IR with lifestyle-associated factors are of important practical significance, but little longitudinal data exist in asymptomatic children. We aimed to determine (a) changes in the homeostatic model of insulin resistance (HOMA-IR) over a 2-yr period and (b) comparisons of longitudinal and cross-sectional relationships between HOMA-IR and lifestyle-related risk factors.

Methods: Our subjects, 241 boys and 257 girls, were assessed at age 8.1 yr (SD 0.35) and again 2 yr later for fasting blood glucose and insulin, dual X-ray absorptiometry-assessed percentage of body fat (%BF), pedometer-assessed physical activity (PA), and cardio-respiratory fitness (CRF) by multistage running test.

Results: HOMA-IR was initially 9% greater in girls than boys and 27% greater 2 yr later. There was no evidence of longitudinal relationships between HOMA-IR and %BF in boys or girls, despite significant cross-sectional relationships (p < 0.001). In boys, there was evidence of a longitudinal relationship between HOMA-IR and both PA (p < 0.001) and CRF (p = 0.05). In girls, we found a cross-sectional relationship between HOMA-IR and CRF (p < 0.001).

Conclusions: HOMA-IR increases between 8 and 10 yr of age and to a greater extent in girls. Longitudinal, unlike cross-sectional, relationships do not support the premise that body fat has any impact on HOMA-IR during this period or that PA or CRF changes affect HOMA-IR in girls. These data draw attention to difficulties in interpreting observational studies in young children.