Assessing medical mistrust in organ donation across countries using item response theory

Although medical mistrust (MM) may be an impediment to public health interventions, no MM scale has been validated across countries and the assessment of MM has not been explored using item response theory, which allows generalisation beyond the sampled data. We aimed to determine the dimensionality of a brief MM measure across four countries through Mokken analysis and Graded Response Modelling. Analysis of 1468 participants from UK ( n = 1179), Ireland ( n = 191), India ( n = 49) and Malaysia (n = 49) demonstrated that MM items formed a hierarchical, unidimensional measure, which is very informative about high levels of MM. Possible item reduction and scoring changes were also demonstrated. This study demonstrates that this brief MM measure is suitable for international studies as it is unidimensional across countries, cross cultural, and shows that minor adjustments will not impact on the assessment of MM when using these items.

Efektivitas Iklan Layanan Masyarakat PSBB Terhadap Niat Melakukan Social Distancing di Masa Pandemi Covid 19

This research describes how Advertising Response Modelling (ARM) provides a framework to measure advertising performance by integrating several multiple measures used in copy research. The author reports the study examining how social distancing policy advertising can effect of three variables: attitude toward ads, attitude toward brand, and social distancing intention. The aims of this research were to measure the influence of cognitive response and attitude toward social distancing intention in advertising and to analyze consumer’s information processing route of an ad. Survey design research was prepared in this study. The participants in this research are consumers who social distancing intention. There are 138 participants in this research. Those participants were exposed an advertisement of social distancing policy. Then, those participants filled out the self-administered and the structure questionaire. By using ARM and One way ANOVA analysis, this research shows that advertising has influenced positively thparticipants. However, there are not significantly diffrerent between men and women participants to response the advertising.

The measurement properties and acceptability of a new parent-infant bonding tool (Me and My Baby) designed for use in a universal healthcare setting in the UK

NICE guidelines acknowledge the importance of the parent-infant relationship for child development but highlight the need for further research to establish reliable tools for assessment, particularly for parents of children under one year. This study explores the acceptability and psychometric properties of a co-developed tool, Me and My Baby (MaMB). Study design A cross-sectional design was applied. The MaMB was administered universally (in two sites) 27 with mothers during routine 6 to 8 week Health Visitor contacts. The sample comprised 467 mothers (434 MaMB completers and 33 non-completers). Dimensionality of instrument responses were evaluated via exploratory and confirmatory ordinal factor analyses. Item response modelling was conducted via a Rasch calibration to evaluate how the tool conformed to principles of fundamental measurement. Tool acceptability was evaluated via completion rates and comparing completers and non-completers demographic differences on age, parity, ethnicity, and English as an additional language. Free-text comments were summarised. Data sharing agreements and data management were compliant with the General Data Protection Regulation, and University of York data management policies. Results High completion rates suggested the MaMB was acceptable. Psychometric analyses showed the response data to be an excellent fit to a unidimensional confirmatory factor analytic model. All items loaded statistically significantly and substantially (>0.4) on a single underlying factor (latent variable). The item response modelling showed that most MaMB items fitted the Rasch model. Item reliability was high (0.94) yet the test yielded little information on each respondent, Me and My Baby (MaMB) as highlighted by the person separation index of 0.1 (=>2.0 is required to reliably discriminate between two groups). Conclusions and next steps MaMB reliably measures a single construct, likely to be infant bonding. However, further validation work is needed, preferably with enriched population samples to include higher- need/risk families. The MaMB tool may benefit from reduced response categories (from four to three) and some modest item wording amendments. Following further validation and reliability appraisal the MaMB may ultimately be used with fathers/other primary caregivers and be potentially useful in research, universal health settings as part of a referral pathway, and clinical practice, to identify dyads in need of additional support/interventions.

Temporal response modelling uncovers electrophysiological correlates of trial-by-trial error-driven learning

Humans learn from statistical regularities in the environment. We tested if prediction and prediction error may play a role in such learning in the brain. We used Error-Driven Learning (EDL) to simulate participants’ trial-by-trial learning during exposure to a bimodal distribution of non-native lexical tones. We simulated incremental trial-by-trial learning to get estimates of the degree of expectation of upcoming stimuli over the course of the experiment. The expectation estimates were combined with Temporal Response Function fitting to generate a prediction of the trial-by-trial ERP waveform. EDL simulations captured the data significantly better than chance and better than models based on either stimulus characteristics or statistical distributions. The results provide tentative evidence that trial-by-trial learning as measured in neural activity is error-driven.

Exploring river–aquifer interactions and hydrological system response using baseflow separation, impulse response modelling and time series analysis in three temperate lowland catchments

Lowland rivers and shallow aquifers are closely coupled and their interactions are crucial for maintaining healthy stream ecological functions. In order to explore river–aquifer interactions and lowland hydrological system in three Belgian catchments, we apply a combined approach of baseflow separation, impulse response modelling and time series analysis over a 30–year study period at catchment scale. Baseflow from hydrograph separation shows that the three catchments are groundwater-dominated. The recursive digital filter methods generate a smoother baseflow time series than the graphical methods, and yield more reliable results than the graphical ones. Impulse response modelling is applied with a two–step procedure. The first step where groundwater level response is modelled shows that groundwater level in shallow aquifers reacts fast to the system input, with most of the wells reaching their peak response during the first day. There is an overall trend of faster response time and higher response magnitude in the wet (October–March) than the dry (April–September) periods. The second step of baseflow response modelling shows that the system response is also fast and that simulated baseflow can capture some variations but not the peaks of the separated baseflow time series. The time series analysis indicates that components such as interflow and overland flow, contribute significantly to stream flow. They are somehow included as part of the separated baseflow, which is likely to be overestimated from hydrograph separation. The impulse response modelling approach from the groundwater flow perspective can be an optional method to estimate the baseflow, since it considers some level of the physical connection between river and aquifer in the subsurface. Further research is however recommended to improve the simulation, such as giving more weight to wells close to the river and adding more drainage dynamics to the model input.

PV Energy Communities—Challenges and Barriers from a Consumer Perspective: A Literature Review

Renewable energy sources, in particular those based on solar radiation, are growing rapidly and are planned to play an instrumental role in building power systems to reach the 2030 and 2050 energy and climate mitigation objectives. However, new actors have been introduced into the energy field, highlighting the importance of the role of citizens and communities in building such energy systems. To outline the significance of citizens in the development of solar energy communities and to describe the benefits of and barriers to their implementation so far, a comprehensive literature review has been carried out based on 64 thoroughly selected, reliable scientific publications (published within 2015–2021), revealing the latest trends, technologies and research in this field. The research focuses on four consumer interest areas: policy, economic, technical and social, covering the following subsections: policy, trading model, economic assessment, business model, energy management, demand response, modelling tools and consumer adoption. Within each subsection the conducted review seeks to answer the questions related to the further development and implementation of PV energy communities, considering consumer needs and revealing the possible solutions.

Thorough QT/QTc (TQT) study

With a number of drugs entering the market, cardiac safety remains a cause of major concern for the regulatory authorities, before approval. The incidence of drug induced arrhythmia with non-cardiovascular drugs is low, however the result is fatal, hence much focus is being given to assess the pro-arrhythmic potential of a drug. The arrhythmogenic risk of the drug is higher if the patient is on polypharmacy or has other risk factors such as an electrolyte imbalance or an underlying structural heart disease. QT prolongation can be either due to congenital causes such as Long QT syndromes (LQTS) which include Romano-Ward syndrome, Jervell and Lange-Nielson syndrome or can be acquired, which is mainly due to drugs. Several drugs such as terfenadine, astemizole, cisapride and grepafloxacin have been withdrawn from the market due to QT prolongation and development of a fatal ventricular arrythmia - torsades de pointes (TdP). This has led to implementation of guidelines to assess cardiac safety. The pro-arrhythmic risk can be assessed using thorough QT/QTc studies or exposure response modelling of intensive ECGs. This article will give an overall view of the use of QT/QTc interval as a biomarker for cardiac safety and the current guidelines for thorough QT/QTc studies which are mainly done to assess the pro-arrhythmic potential of a non-anti-arrhythmic drug.