Effects of Access to Information on Health Literacy in Pregnant Women

AIM: This study aims to analyze the effect of access to information, the ability to understand, assess and practice the health literacy of pregnant women. METHODS: This study uses cross-sectional design for the population of pregnant women and uses a lameshow formula to find a sample of 399. Data collection uses questionnaires and the results are processed using the t-test to find the significance of correlation and test the effect of R2 to find out the effect magnitude. RESULTS: Correlation test results showed 3 of 4 variables correlated with health literacy with a value >1.96 yaitu understand (X1.2) (R2 = 0.65), assessment (X1.3) (R2 = 0.80), and application (X1.4) (R2 = 0.57). The ability to judge variable is proven to explain the practice of health literacy by 80%, and the rest is determined by other variables. CONCLUSIONS: Health literacy has been recognized as one of the determinants of health and has become one of the goals of public health development for prevention and efforts to overcome risks in pregnancy.

Which emphasis technique to use? Perception of emphasis techniques with varying distractors, backgrounds, and visualization types

Emphasis effects are visual changes that make data elements distinct from their surroundings. Designers may use computational saliency models to predict how a viewer’s attention will be guided by a specific effect; however, although saliency models provide a foundational understanding of emphasis perception, they only cover specific visual effects in abstract conditions. To address these limitations, we carried out crowdsourced studies that evaluate emphasis perception in a wider range of conditions than previously studied. We varied effect magnitude, distractor number and type, background, and visualization type, and measured the perceived emphasis of 12 visual effects. Our results show that there are perceptual commonalities of emphasis across a wide range of environments, but also that there are limitations on perceptibility for some effects, dependent on a visualization’s background or type. We developed a model of emphasis predictability based on simple scatterplots that can be extended to other viewing conditions. Our studies provide designers with new understanding of how viewers experience emphasis in realistic visualization settings.

EXPRESS: Are better young readers more likely to confuse their mother with their mohter?

One of the most replicated effects in the contemporary word recognition literature is the transposed-letter effect (TL-effect): pseudowords created by the transposition of two letters (e.g., MOHTER) are often misread as the real word. This effect ruled out those accounts that assume that letter position is encoded accurately and led to more flexible coding schemes. Here, we examined whether reading skill modulates this effect. The relationship between reading skill and the TL-effect magnitude is a contentious issue both empirically and theoretically. The present lexical decision experiment was designed to shed some light on the relationship between reading skill and the TL-effect magnitude with a large sample of Grade 6 children. To that end, we conducted both multiple regression and path analyses. Results showed that a specific aspect of reading skills (pseudoword reading) negatively correlates with the TL-effect's magnitude in the error data (i.e., MOHTER is less wordlike for better readers). This finding highlights the need for a comprehensive visual word recognition model that includes individual variability and the multidimensional character of reading in school-age children.

Exploring Shared Effects of Multisensory Impairment, Physical Dysfunction, and Cognitive Impairment on Physical Activity: An Observational Study in a National Sample

Multisensory, physical, and cognitive dysfunction share age-related physiologic disturbances and may have common health effects. We determined whether the effect of multisensory impairment on physical activity (PA) is explained by physical (timed up and go) or cognitive (Short Portable Mental Status Questionnaire) dysfunction. A National Social Life, Health, and Aging Project participant subset (n = 507) underwent objective sensory testing in 2005–2006 and wrist accelerometry in 2010–2011. We related multisensory impairment to PA using multivariate mixed-effects linear regression and compared the effect magnitude after adjusting for physical then cognitive dysfunction. Worse multisensory impairment predicted lower PA across three scales (Global Sensory Impairment: β = −0.04, 95% confidence interval [−0.07, −0.02]; Total Sensory Burden: β = −0.01, 95% confidence interval [−0.03, −0.003]; and Number of Impaired Senses: β = −0.02, 95% confidence interval [−0.04, −0.004]). Effects were similar after accounting for physical and cognitive dysfunction. Findings suggest that sensory, physical, and cognitive dysfunction have unique mechanisms underlying their PA effects.

The complexity of co-limitation: nutrigenomics reveal non-additive interactions of calcium and phosphorus on gene expression in Daphnia pulex

Many lakes across Canada and northern Europe have experienced declines in ambient phosphorus (P) and calcium (Ca) supply for over 20 years. While these declines might create or exacerbate nutrient limitation in aquatic food webs, our ability to detect and quantify different types of nutrient stress on zooplankton remains rudimentary. Here, we used growth bioassay experiments and whole transcriptome RNAseq, collectively nutrigenomics, to examine the nutritional phenotypes produced by low supplies of P and Ca separately and together in the freshwater zooplankter Daphnia pulex . We found that daphniids in all three nutrient-deficient categories grew slower and differed in their elemental composition. Our RNAseq results show distinct responses in singly limited treatments (Ca or P) and largely a mix of these responses in animals under low Ca and P conditions. Deeper investigation of effect magnitude and gene functional annotations reveals this patchwork of responses to cumulatively represent a co-limited nutritional phenotype. Linear discriminant analysis identified a significant separation between nutritional treatments based upon gene expression patterns with the expression patterns of just five genes needed to predict animal nutritional status with 99% accuracy. These data reveal how nutritional phenotypes are altered by individual and co-limitation of two highly important nutritional elements (Ca and P) and provide evidence that aquatic consumers can respond to limitation by more than one nutrient at a time by differentially altering their metabolism. This use of nutrigenomics demonstrates its potential to address many of the inherent complexities in studying interactions between multiple nutritional stressors in ecology and beyond.

Modelling Internet of Things (IoT) driven global sustainability in multi-tier agri-food supply chain under natural epidemic outbreaks

The resilience of Agri-Food Supply Chain (AFSC) due to recent epidemics outbreak (COVID-19, SARS-CoV-2) has not been matching with, globalisation of AFSC, and complicated networking system of AFSC and thus poses huge global sustainable issues. Thus, the aim of this research is the modelling of the sustainable AFSC secure mechanism managed through different emerging application of Internet of Things (IoT) technology (Blockchain, Robotics, Big data analysis and Cloud computing). Competitive Supply Chain Management (SCM) needs cautious incorporation of multi- tiers suppliers, specifically during dealing with globalised sustainability issues. Firms have been advancing towards their multi suppliers for driving social and environments and economical practices. This paper also studies the interrelationship and their cause and effect magnitude among various enablers contributing to IoT based food secure model. The methodology used in the paper is Interpretative Structural Modelling (ISM) for establishing interrelationship among the variables and Fuzzy-Decision-Making Trial and Evaluation Laboratory (F-DEMATEL) to provide the magnitude of the cause‒effect strength of the hierarchical framework. Finally, this paper has limitation of taking only factors related to food security system by considering present natural epidemics of COVID-19. In future, other dimensions of AFSC may be considered based on COVID-19 epidemics effect on AFSC.

Low Traffic Neighbourhoods, Car Use, and Active Travel: evidence from the People and Places survey of Outer London active travel interventions

This paper reports on analysis of active travel interventions in Outer London. We find stronger impacts of effects (decreased car ownership and use, increased active travel) in intervention areas where Low Traffic Neighbourhoods (LTNs) were introduced. Decreased car ownership and use is only found in such areas. Sample size for LTN areas is small and hence uncertainty about effect magnitude is large, but effect direction is consistent. This suggests that to reduce car use as well as increase active travel, LTNs are an important part of the intervention toolbox.

The metaperceptual function: Exploring dissociations between confidence and task performance with type 2 psychometric curves

Confidence can dissociate from perceptual accuracy, suggesting distinct computational and neural processes underlie these psychological functions. Recent investigations have therefore sought to experimentally isolate metacognitive processes by creating conditions where perceptual sensitivity is matched but confidence differs (“matched-performance / different-confidence”; MPDC). Despite these endeavors’ success, much remains unknown about MPDC effects and how to best harness them in experimental settings. Here we developed a principled approach to comprehensively characterizing MPDC effects through analyzing metaperceptual (i.e., type 2 psychometric) functions relating objective performance to subjective confidence across widely varying performance levels and experimental manipulations. We found that MPDC effect magnitude depends on stimulus properties, observers’ sensitivity level, and critically on trial type order (blocked or interleaved across stimulus property variations). Our findings provide the first comprehensive exploration of MPDC effects, offer a prescriptive guide to metaperceptual analysis, and suggest optimal experimental paradigms for experimentally isolating metacognition and awareness in future studies.

The importance of timing of a population level intervention on COVID-19 mortality

COVID-19 poses an immense and immediate threat to global public health. Population level interventions (PLIs) impact this threat, with estimable large effects on reducing mortality. Many countries worldwide have currently zero/low mortality and many have yet to implement such PLIs. The importance of timing of PLI implementation on mortality outcomes is poorly understood. We extracted cumulative daily country-specific COVID-19 mortality for France, Germany, Italy, Spain and the UK to examine country-specific mortality trends and found that all five countries experienced COVID-19 mortality epidemics initially of exponential nature. We estimated the magnitude of effect on mortality of the nationwide PLI implemented on day 18 of Italy’s mortality epidemic and assessed the importance of timing of PLI implementation by computing the effect of implementation of a PLI of this magnitude at various times on subsequent mortality. The nationwide PLI in Italy saved an estimated 6,170 lives by day 30 of the Italian epidemic. Implementing a PLI with this effect magnitude in a country of 60 million people on the day of the first death, and on days 7, 10, 14 and 17 thereafter, compared to implementation on day 18, resulted in substantially greater numbers of lives saved. Implementation on day 1 resulted in an additional 3,477 lives saved, 6,955 intensive care unit admissions and 52,162 hospital admissions prevented, beyond that achieved by implementation on day 18. PLI implementation earlier than day 18 substantially enhances benefit. Intervention on the day of the first mortality event in a country achieves the greatest benefit.