Correlation Between Handgrip Strength and Functional Fitness Among Older Adults

Please refer to the pdf version of the abstract located adjacent to the title

Promoting Asset Based Approaches for Health and Wellbeing: Exploring a Theory of Change and Challenges in Evaluation

This project sought to explore two key areas that are critical for moving to a more systematised approach to asset based action for health. These two areas are: 1. The need to develop further a Theory of Change for asset based approaches aligned to an asset model for health 2. The requirement to understand how to measure and illustrate impact and benefit from asset based approaches. Following work to develop an understanding of practice, through site visits, interviews and a think piece event, a new Theory of Change for asset-based working is presented. A rapid review of published and grey literature was also conducted to map and categorise evaluation approaches and measures used in asset-based programmes. The map of literature (33 studies) showed that a variety of methodologies and evaluation strategies are used in asset-based practice. Seven clusters were identified: Asset Based Community Development; Asset Mapping; Community-based evaluation; Conceptual frameworks for measurement; Resilience; Salutogenesis; Other

Slow escaping points of quasiregular mappings

This article concerns the iteration of quasiregular mappings on Rd and entire functions on C. It is shown that there are always points at which the iterates of a quasiregular map tend to infinity at a controlled rate. Moreover, an asymptotic rate of escape result is proved that is new even for transcendental entire functions. Let f:Rd→Rd be quasiregular of transcendental type. Using novel methods of proof, we generalise results of Rippon and Stallard in complex dynamics to show that the Julia set of f contains points at which the iterates fn tend to infinity arbitrarily slowly. We also prove that, for any large R, there is a point x with modulus approximately R such that the growth of |fn(x)| is asymptotic to the iterated maximum modulus Mn(R,f)

Supporting induction: relationships count

This article examines the structural changes to the induction of teachers in Scotland using the perceptions of a group of final year student teachers. This group would be the first probationer teachers to experience revised arrangements for new teacher induction in 37 years. Their preferences and concerns are highlighted, as the new procedures roll out in schools nationwide, in an attempt to stress the importance of relationships to the success of the induction scheme. The argument put forward in this article is based on the notion that personal intelligence is central to effective relationships and therefore crucially important in the context of this mentoring relationship. The views of our sample provide evidence to suggest that the quality of interactions between the mentor and the probationer teacher are paramount in providing a good induction experience. These views are substantiated by experiences in England and in induction literature elsewhere. A synthesis of this evidence is used to make recommendations for those involved in supporting induction in schools, local authorities or teacher education institutions

Geology of Caphouse Colliery, Wakefield, Yorkshire, UK

The National Coal Mining Museum in West Yorkshire affords a rare opportunity for the public to visit a former colliery (Caphouse) and experience at first hand the geology of a mine. The geology at the museum can be seen via the public tour, limited surface outcrop and an inclined ventilation drift, which provides the best geological exposure and information. The strata encountered at the site are c. 100 m thick and are of latest Langsettian (Pennsylvanian) age. The ventilation drift intersects several coal seams (Flockton Thick, Flockton Thin, Old Hards, Green Lane and New Hards) and their associated roof rocks and seatearths. In addition to exposures of bedrock, recent mineral precipitates of calcium carbonates, manganese carbonates and oxides, and iron oxyhydroxides can be observed along the drift, and there is a surface exposure of Flockton Thick Coal and overlying roof strata. The coals and interbedded strata were deposited in the Pennine Basin in a fluvio-lacustrine setting in an embayment distant from the open ocean with limited marine influence. A lacustrine origin for mudstone roof rocks of several of the seams is supported by the incidence of non-marine bivalves and fossilized fish remains whilst the upper part of the Flockton Thick Coal consists of subaqueously deposited cannel coal. The mudstones overlying the Flockton Thick containing abundant non-marine bivalves are of great lateral extent, indicating a basin-wide rise of base level following coal deposition that may be compared with a non-marine flooding surface

Hyperbolic entire functions and the Eremenko–Lyubich class: Class B or not class B?

Hyperbolicity plays an important role in the study of dynamical systems, and is a key concept in the iteration of rational functions of one complex variable. Hyperbolic systems have also been considered in the study of transcendental entire functions. There does not appear to be an agreed definition of the concept in this context, due to complications arising from the non-compactness of the phase space. In this article, we consider a natural definition of hyperbolicity that requires expanding properties on the preimage of a punctured neighbourhood of the isolated singularity. We show that this definition is equivalent to another commonly used one: a transcendental entire function is hyperbolic if and only if its postsingular set is a compact subset of the Fatou set. This leads us to propose that this notion should be used as the general definition of hyperbolicity in the context of entire functions, and, in particular, that speaking about hyperbolicity makes sense only within the Eremenko–Lyubich classB of transcendental entire functions with a bounded set of singular values. We also considerably strengthen a recent characterisation of the class B, by showing that functions outside of this class cannot be expanding with respect to a metric whose density decays at most polynomially. In particular, this implies that no transcendental entire function can be expanding with respect to the spherical metric. Finally we give a characterisation of an analogous class of functions analytic in a hyperbolic domain

A comparison of the development of audiovisual integration in children with autism spectrum disorders and typically developing children

This study aimed to investigate the development of audiovisual integration in children with Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD). Audiovisual integration was measured using the McGurk effect in children with ASD aged 7–16 years and typically developing children (control group) matched approximately for age, sex, nonverbal ability and verbal ability. Results showed that the children with ASD were delayed in visual accuracy and audiovisual integration compared to the control group. However, in the audiovisual integration measure, children with ASD appeared to ‘catch-up’ with their typically developing peers at the older age ranges. The suggestion that children with ASD show a deficit in audiovisual integration which diminishes with age has clinical implications for those assessing and treating these children

Teacher induction: personal intelligence and the mentoring relationship

This article is aimed at probationer teachers in Scotland, their induction supporters, and all those with a responsibility for their support and professional development. It argues that the induction process is not merely a mechanistic one, supported only by systems in schools, local authorities and the General Teaching Council for Scotland (GTCS), but a more complex process where the relationship between the new teacher and the supporter is central to its success. In particular, the characteristics and skills of the induction supporter in relation to giving feedback are influential. This applies to feedback in all its forms – formative and summative, formal and informal. The ability of the probationer to handle that feedback and to be proactive in the process is also important

Rigidity of escaping dynamics for transcendental entire functions

We prove an analog of Boettcher's theorem for transcendental entire functions in the Eremenko-Lyubich class B. More precisely, let f and g be entire functions with bounded sets of singular values and suppose that f and g belong to the same parameter space (i.e., are *quasiconformally equivalent* in the sense of Eremenko and Lyubich). Then f and g are conjugate when restricted to the set of points which remain in some sufficiently small neighborhood of infinity under iteration. Furthermore, this conjugacy extends to a quasiconformal self-map of the plane. We also prove that this conjugacy is essentially unique. In particular, we show that an Eremenko-Lyubich class function f has no invariant line fields on its escaping set. Finally, we show that any two hyperbolic Eremenko-Lyubich class functions f and g which belong to the same parameter space are conjugate on their sets of escaping points.Comment: 28 pages; 2 figures. Final version (October 2008). Various modificiations were made, including the introduction of Proposition 3.6, which was not formally stated previously, and the inclusion of a new figure. No major changes otherwis

Battling the tides: the Severn Estuary wetlands during the prehistoric, Roman and medieval periods

This is the author accepted manuscript. The final version is available from ArchaeoPress via the ISBN in this recordThis paper will review how human communities changed from simply exploiting the rich natural resources of the Severn Estuary’s wetlands during the prehistoric period, through to modification and then transformation as the coastal marshes were reclaimed over the course of the Roman and medieval periods. This intensification of wetland utilisation can in part be accounted for by a ‘push in the margins’ driven by expanding population and the need for more agricultural land, but it was also affected by other social and economic factors that sometimes prevented reclamation such as the rich natural resources of intertidal marshes occasionally being more highly valued than agricultural land. Indeed, the model of wetland exploitation, modification, and transformation is itself in need of revision as we become increasingly aware that the history of human endeavour in wetland landscapes has not been one of unilinear success. Instead, periods extensification (the reclamation of new land) intensification (such as increased arable cultivation) have been interspersed with episodes of retreat when reclaimed land was abandoned and the estuarine tides recovered some of what they had lost