Dissonant dementia: neuropsychiatry, awareness, and contradictions in cognitive decline

This paper presents an analysis of contemporary neuropsychiatric meaning-making regarding dementia, encompassing distinct beliefs, practices and objects, and the peculiarities of its fragmented public manifestations. First, some core neuropsychiatric beliefs are discussed, arguing that the designation of those beliefs as exceptional truths engenders an imperialist ethic whereby the beliefs must be spread into other populations. Second, the enactment of this spread through dementia awareness is considered, whereby people are presented as having wrong beliefs to justify the promotion of alternative correct knowledge. Third, some emerging contradictions within neuropsychiatric dementia are outlined, as moves toward early diagnosis and “living well” sit uneasily beside notions of dementia as a frightening epidemic. The paper concludes that this produces dissonant dementia wherein contradictory meanings are held together. Finally, it is suggested that this dissonance will likely continue, underpinned by specific interests.

IMPORTANCE OF THE ENVIRONMENT IN INDONESIAN LEARNING

The environment is a medium in which living things live, survive, and have distinctive characters and functions that are reciprocally related to the existence of living things that occupy them, especially humans who have more complex roles. Ira et al (2018) say that between humans and their environment there is a reciprocal relationship. Humans affect their environment, and vice versa humans are influenced by their environment and are inseparable from each other. This is because the influence of the environment is very large on everyone's life. Various kinds of things can be found in the environment, ranging from learning to problems. According to Sukma (2020) as individuals, humans have a responsibility to solve environmental problems. One form of effort to overcome these environmental problems is with the correct knowledge of all environmental factors to protect the environment, and all of that can be obtained through the educational process.

(Not) Knowing and (Not) Caring About Animal Research

Animal research remains a practice marked by controversy and moral dilemma. However, UK science-society dialogues on the issue are increasingly managed via one-way transmissions of information which construct publics as passive and attribute their concerns to a lack of ‘correct’ knowledge. Challenging such assumptions, this paper questions how and why people actively manage their interactions with animal research through entangled practices of knowing and caring. Based on an analysis of writing from the UK Mass Observation Project, this paper explores difficulties and discomforts associated with animal research which can cause strategic withdrawals from engagements with the topic. In doing so, it extends existing concepts of ‘uncomfortable knowledge’ (Rayner) and ‘strategic ignorance’ (McGoey) to develop novel concepts of ‘uncomfortable’ and ‘strategic’ care. Finally, in examining desires to respond to animal research, I engage with Haraway’s notion of ‘response-ability’ to introduce the concepts of ‘responsive caring’ and ‘responsive knowing’

Knowledge and utilization of prevention of mother-to-child transmission of HIV services among pregnant women in Tanzania

Background: Human Immunodeficiency Virus (HIV) infection among children is mainly vectored through mother-to-child transmission. Prevention of mother-to-child-transmission strategy is highly effective; however, its accessibility and utilization is affected by the lack of knowledge among other factors. Methods: A cross-sectional study was conducted among antenatal care attendees in two districts in Tanzania to determine their knowledge and utilization of the prevention of MTCT services. Results: We interviewed 160 antenatal care attendees aged 18-45 years with a mean (SD) age of 30.4 (6.3) years; 74 (46.2 %) were HIV-infected. HIV-infected women demonstrated significantly correct knowledge of HIV (p=0.001) and AIDS (p=0.014) than uninfected individuals. HIV-infected women also significantly demonstrated correct knowledge of mother-to-child transmission during pregnancy than HIV-uninfected women (p=0.016) and during delivery (p=0.005). A significant proportion of HIV-positive women compared to HIV-negative women were aware that correct use of antiretroviral during pregnancy can reduce the risk of mother-to-child-transmission of HIV (p<0.039), but only 6 (3.75%) of all women were aware that correct use of antiretroviral during delivery can significantly reduce the risk of mother-to-child-transmission. HIV-infected women had significant comprehensive knowledge of HIV/AIDS (p=0.001) and prevention of mother-to-child transmission of HIV (p=0.006) than HIV-negative women. Comprehensive knowledge prevention of mother-to-child transmission of HIV was low among the study participants. Male partners’ involvement in maternal antenatal care was significantly higher among HIV-infected women than males from the HIV-infected women group (p<0.006). Conclusion: The study demonstrated inadequate knowledge of PMTCT among women who made ANC visits. HIV uninfected women had poorer knowledge compared to the HIV-infected ones. Routine HIV counseling and testing services were highly accepted among these women.

Fear of COVID-19 and religious coping mediate the associations between religiosity and distress among older adults

Background: A mediation model was proposed to explain how religiosity, religious coping, and fear of coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) explained anxiety and depression among older adults. Methods: With the use of a cross-sectional design, the Integrated Health System was used to randomly invite 1000 older adults residing in Qazvin to participate in an online survey. Within the period of November 2020 to January 2021, 696 older Iranian adults (mean age=69.56years; 57.9% women) agreed to participate in the study and reported demographic information as well as measures of religiosity, fear of COVID-19, religious coping, anxiety, and depression. Results: Religiosity had direct effects on depression (B [SE]=-0.087 [0.037]; P=0.023) but not anxiety (B [SE]=-0.063 [0.036]; P=0.072). Moreover, both fear of COVID-19 and religious coping significantly mediated the association between religiosity and anxiety (B [SE]=-0.360[0.035]; p=0.002) and that between religiosity and depression (B [SE]=-0.365 [0.034];P=0.002). Conclusion: During the tough time of COVID-19 pandemic, religiosity and religious coping were protectors for older adults in developing good mental. Therefore, future research is needed to examine education programs that are effective for older adults to obtain correct knowledge concerning COVID-19, including the protective COVID-19 infection behaviors. Therefore, older adults may reduce their fear via their enhanced correct knowledge concerning COVID-19.

Methods and Technologies for Quality Assurance of Intelligent Decision-Making Systems

An increase in the degree of intellectualization of tasks requires the creation of methodology for improving the quality of intelligent decision-making systems. The possibility of automating decision-making in poorly formalized areas through the using of the expert knowledge leads to increasing of the number of errors in the software, and as a consequence to increasing of the number of various sources of failures.The article provides a detailed overview of existing methods and technologies for quality assurance of intelligent decision systems. The first part of the article describes the methodology for ensuring the quality of the intelligent systems (IS), based on the GOST/ ISO standards, where it is proposed to use a multilevel model to describe the quality of the IS software. It is shown that to ensure the required level of quality, an action plan can be formed and the use of a system dynamics model for the implementation of an action plan for ensuring the quality of IS is described. A comparative analysis of the complex criteria of quality and reliability is given. In the second part, the quality of knowledge base (KB) as a special element of the IS software is described, a comparative analysis of methods for static and dynamic analysis of knowledge bases is considered. An overview of research results in the classification of errors in the knowledge bases and their debugging is given. Special attention is given to the "forgetting about exception" type of errors. The concept of a statically correct knowledge base at the level of the knowledge structure is described and it is shown that statically correct knowledge bases can nevertheless give errors due to errors in the rules themselves because of the inconsistency of the field of studies. Neural network knowledge bases are allocated in a separate class, for neural networks methods of debugging are described.

Self-reported gender differentials in the knowledge of tuberculosis transmission and curative possibility using national representative data in Ghana

Background Health-seeking behaviour, stigma, and discrimination towards people affected by tuberculosis (TB) are influenced by awareness of the disease. Gender differentials in the diagnosis and treatment of TB have been reported in other settings of the world. However, little is known about the gender differences in the knowledge of TB transmission and curative possibility in Ghana. Methods The analysed data were a weighted sample of 9,396 women aged 15–49 years and 4,388 men aged 15–59 years, obtained from the 2014 Ghana Demographic and Health Survey. The dependent variable, correct knowledge regarding TB transmission and cure was derived from questions on the transmission of the disease and the possibility of a cure. A design-based multivariate logistic regression model in Stata 13.0/SE was used to identify the correlates of reporting correct knowledge. Results Overall, the mean knowledge score was 6.1±0.9 (maximum = 7). Of the 13,784 respondents, 45.7% (95% CI: 44.0–47.3) reported correct knowledge regarding TB transmission and cure. Men had significantly higher knowledge than women (50.9% versus 43.2%). Misconceptions, including TB transmitted through sharing utensils (13.3%), food (6.9%), touching a person with TB (4.5%), sexual contact (4.1%), and mosquito bites (0.4%) were noted. About 30% (33% women and 25% men) of the total sample would keep the information secret when a household member is affected with TB. In the adjusted analysis, age, gender, education, region, place of residence, wealth quintile, frequency of reading newspaper/magazine, listening to the radio, and watching television were significantly associated with reporting correct knowledge. Conclusions There was low knowledge regarding TB transmission and cure. Misconceptions regarding the transmission of TB prevailed among the participants. Gender differential in knowledge was observed. Comparatively, females were less likely to be aware of TB and report correct knowledge regarding TB transmission but were more likely to conceal information when a household member was affected by the disease.

The Concept of “Martabat Tujuh” Al-Burhanpuri (Study of the Creation of the Universe in the Perspective of Philosophical Sufism)

When discussing the creation of the universe, the discussion will never be separated from the three objects of philosophical study, namely God as the creator, man and the universe as the created object, and at the same time being the object undergoing the process of creation. God, humans and the universe, are three objects that are always interesting to discuss. The manifestation of the existence of the three becomes a perennial study. For philosophers, these three problems become “fertile” areas of thought in the framework of developing true knowledge (correct knowledge) about these three problems. In the realm of Islamic thought, these three objects have always received major attention among Muslim philosophers, including the Sufis. Even in the context of Sufism (Sufism), these three objects become eternal discussions, especially at the level of Sufism which has philosophical nuances, or commonly known as “Falsafi Sufism”. At this level, the concept of “Martabat Tujuh”, a concept that talks about the creation of al-Buhanpuri’s version of the universe, is tried to be presented.

The Emmaus narrative and contemporary Christian followership – An empirical case study

This article aims to explore a ‘lived discipleship’ by determining whether and how contemporary communities of faith could implement the norms and principles reflected in the Emmaus narrative of Luke 24:13–35 within a plausible epistemological framework that might facilitate a fresh understanding of Christian followership as discipleship. This was done through an empirical case study using two focus groups as co-researchers, in order to actively listen to their respective understandings of lived theology in their unique South African contexts. The two focus groups consisted of (1) a contemporary Christian grouping of Afrikaans-speaking, active churchgoers situated in Hazeldean, a suburb in Pretoria East, Tshwane, Gauteng and (2) a contemporary Christian grouping of African, active churchgoers situated in Ivory Park, a suburb in Tembisa, Ekurhuleni, Gauteng. This article concluded that Luke 24:13–35 nudged the co-researchers to re-evaluate their contemporary understanding of discipleship and moved them to additional and new perspectives in terms of practical expressions thereof that can be best described as ‘lived followership’. A shift from perceiving Jesus in terms of an ‘act to follow’ by gaining the correct knowledge, to following Jesus as ‘a performative act’, a shift from ‘theoretical knowledge’ to ‘heart knowledge’.Contribution: This article is a part of the Festschrift for Prof. Stephan Joubert. This article plays into similar creative interdisciplinary relationship as seen in the work of Prof. Joubert, by looking at the relationship between New Testament and Practical Theology in order to improve practices of faith that is rooted in a biblical understanding of Jesus.

KNOWLEDGE AND PRACTICE STATUS OF MOTHERS AND CAREGIVERS OF CHILDREN UNDER 5 YEARS OLD IN THE PREVENTION OF HAND - FOOT - MOUTH DISEASE IN TU NANG COMMUNE, YEN CHAU DISTRICT, SON LA PROVINCE, IN 2021

Knowledge and practice of mothers and caregivers are decisive factors in the prevention of Hand,Foot and Mouth disease for children under 5 years old. A cross-sectional descriptive study was usedto assess the current status of knowledge and practice on prevention of Hand, Foot and Mouth diseaseamong mothers/carers of children under 5 years old in Tu Nang commune, Yen Chau district, SonLa province. Out of a total of 944 study subjects, 73% had correct knowledge about subjects at riskof disease, 84% knew about the danger of the disease and 81.4% knew about measures to preventthe spread. However, only 30.7% subjects had correct knowledge about taking care of children withHand, Foot and Mouth disease. The rate of using antiseptic solution for cleaning utensils of childrenis low, accounting for only 13.1%. Correct practice of handling measures when children are sickand preventing infection ranges from 30.9 to 59.4%. And most of the study subjects practiced goodenvironmental hygiene (92.8%).