Sibling Separation and Placement Instability for Children in Foster Care

U.S. foster care policy prioritizes keeping siblings together while in foster care. However, prior research on the effects of sibling placement is limited in sample, measures, and research design. In this study, we use data on 2,297 children from an urban county in years 2015–2019 and assess how sibling separation is associated with placement instability. We use multilevel parametric hazard modeling with adjustments for child, sibling, and placement characteristics. Findings indicate that children placed with at least one sibling are less likely to experience a placement move and are specifically less likely to experience a non-progress move (e.g., moves due to problems or negative experiences in their foster home). For larger sibling groups, sibling separation was not consistently associated with placement instability and there was little difference in placement instability for children placed with some versus all siblings. Results were robust to differences in measurement and model specification. Black or Hispanic race/ethnicity was also associated with increased risk of instability, and associations between sibling separation and instability were stronger for Black children, implying enhanced efforts to maintain sibling groups may be especially beneficial for Black children. Overall, findings provide support for the continuation and expansion of policies promoting sibling placement.

Identification of slit3 as a locus affecting nicotine preference in zebrafish and human smoking behaviour

To facilitate smoking genetics research we determined whether a screen of mutagenized zebrafish for nicotine preference could predict loci affecting smoking behaviour. From 30 screened F3 sibling groups, where each was derived from an individual ethyl-nitrosurea mutagenized F0 fish, two showed increased or decreased nicotine preference. Out of 25 inactivating mutations carried by the F3 fish, one in the slit3 gene segregated with increased nicotine preference in heterozygous individuals. Focussed SNP analysis of the human SLIT3 locus in cohorts from UK (n=863) and Finland (n=1715) identified two variants associated with cigarette consumption and likelihood of cessation. Characterisation of slit3 mutant larvae and adult fish revealed decreased sensitivity to the dopaminergic and serotonergic antagonist amisulpride, known to affect startle reflex that is correlated with addiction in humans, and increased htr1aa mRNA expression in mutant larvae. No effect on neuronal pathfinding was detected. These findings reveal a role for SLIT3 in development of pathways affecting responses to nicotine in zebrafish and smoking in humans.

Finding Maternal Siblings in Birth Registration Data to form a Pregnancy Spine – Data Linkage & Graph Based Methods for Unknown Cluster Sizes

IntroductionWe have developed an innovative methodology to link maternal siblings within 2000 – 2005 England and Wales Birth Registration data, to form a Pregnancy Spine, a unification of all births to each unique mother. Key challenges in this many-many linkage scenario: Blocking (reduction of record pair comparisons) Cluster resolution Objectives and ApproachProbabilistic data linkage (Python) was followed by generation of clusters (using igraph in R) and graph theory community detection techniques. To optimise geographical blocking and increase accuracy, we incorporated Internal Migration data to map the likely geographic movement of mothers between births. Maternal sibling clusters were modelled as a graph and the structure of clusters was optimised using community detection methods to link, split and evaluate sibling groups. Additionally, we incorporated additional childhood statistics data relating to child date of birth to evaluate likely accuracy of sibling pairs and remove false edges (links). ResultsOur development has resulted in a new blocking method and cluster resolution method. In addition, we developed new ways to assess and measure the accuracy of sibling groups, beyond traditional classifier metrics, and infer error rates. We applied our method to Registration Data used in earlier studies for QA of our methods. Using this, and by comparing against other statistics on maternal sibling composition we will present results which show that a high degree of accuracy (precision / recall and new checks) was obtained for precision, recall, and other evaluation metrics. Conclusion/ImplicationsThese methods will improve other linkage projects with unknown clusters sizes; for de-duplicating datasets, linkage of multiple datasets, or incorporation of data from a longer time-period through longitudinal linkage. To this Spine, researchers can now append and link other data sources to answer questions about maternal and child health outcomes.

Diet

Four methods were used to document the diet of cheetahs: incidental observations, radio tracking, tracking, spoor, and continuous follows. A combination of continuous follows and tracking spoor gave the best results. Steenbok were the most frequently killed species, but they did not dominate the diet in the same way as Thomson’s gazelle do in the Serengeti. Coalition males have a different diet profile from single males, single females, females with cubs, and sibling groups. For all but single males, the relative occurrence of prey species in the diet reflected its dietary importance in terms of kilograms of meat obtained. Gemsbok calves and adult ostrich were important prey for coalition males and springhares were important for single males. Three individual prey specializations for females were found; namely springbok specialists, steenbok/duiker specialists, and intermediates. Contrary to an earlier study, springbok were not found to be the most important prey species.

Hunting behaviour

Factors affecting hunting success, such as detection of prey, distances from which prey was charged and chased, and escape tactics of prey, were studied. Overall hunting success was 33.4 %. Hares were easier to catch than springhares, but springhares provided a larger meal and were more abundant. There was higher hunting success for steenbok and duiker than for springbok, and springbok hunts were energetically more expensive. However, this was offset by springbok providing a larger amount of food per kill. The amount of meat eaten from gemsbok calves and adult ostrich was similar, but ostrich were more vigilant and difficult to approach and less common than gemsbok. There were no differences in overall hunting success between cheetah demographic groups. The benefit of cooperative hunting to coalition males was that it enabled them to kill larger prey and allowed females with cubs and sibling groups to hone young cheetahs’ hunting skills.

‘Having my own room would be really cool’: Children’s rooms as the social and material organizing of siblings

In this article, the authors examine how materiality can be understood as a co-creator and significant carrier of social processes. They focus on the ways children in large sibling groups relate to bedrooms and identify the logics at play when the organizing of children’s bedrooms and siblings are interwoven. Children have dreams and expectations of establishing a space by way of having their own room and stuff, and they implement this desire for ownership through specific strategies to obtain material presence and leave territorial marks, which afford them positioning and recognition within sibling relations and families. The authors’ analysis clearly shows that children gain material weight across households with varying material resources and different socio-cultural views on how to allocate these resources. It also shows that processes surrounding the material constitution of siblingships are embedded in a child-focused society with strong cultural norms about what constitutes a good life for children.