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Background: Process evaluations are increasingly integrated into randomised controlled trials (RCTs) of complex interventions to document their delivery and interactions with local systems and dynamics, helping understand observed health outcomes. Yet process evaluations often struggle to assess relevant contextual determinants, leaving much of the important role of "context" in shaping an intervention's mechanisms opaque in many studies. A lack of easily adapted data collection methods to help define and operationalise indicators of context likely contributes to this., Methods: We present a method to help structure measures of context in process evaluations and describe its use in two very different settings. The "Context Tracker" is an innovative tool for use within trials and quasi-experiments to more systematically capture and understand key dimensions of context. It was developed in Zimbabwe as part of a cluster randomised controlled trial and then adapted for a quasi-experimental evaluation in the UK. Both studies provided harm reduction and health services for marginalised and hard-to-reach populations., Results: We developed the Context Tracker to be both standardised (i.e. formatted and applied in the same way across study sites) and flexible enough to allow unique features to be explored in greater detail. Drawing on the Context and Implementation of Complex Interventions (CICI) and Risk Environments frameworks, we mapped 5 domains across micro, meso and macro levels in a simple table and used existing evidence and experience to predict factors likely to affect delivery of and participation in intervention components. We tracked these over time across study sites using routine programme statistics, observation and qualitative methods. The Context Tracker enables identification and comparison of facilitators and barriers to implementation, variations in engagement with interventions, and how mechanisms of action are (or are not) triggered in different settings., Conclusions: The Context Tracker is one example of how evidence-based contextual determinants can be used to guide data collection and analysis within process evaluations. It is relevant in low- and high-income settings and applicable to both qualitative and quantitative analyses. While perhaps most useful to process evaluations of complex interventions targeting marginalised communities, the broader approach would benefit a more general research audience., Competing Interests: Declarations Ethics approval and consent to participate The AMETHIST study received ethical approval from the Medical Research Council of Zimbabwe (MRCZ/A/2559), Liverpool School of Tropical Medicine (19-115RS) and London School of Hygiene and Tropical Medicine (19123). The SIPP study received ethical approval from the London School of Hygiene & Tropical Medicine Research Ethics Committee (28102). Consent for publication Not applicable. Competing interests The authors declare that they have no competing interests., (© 2024. The Author(s).)

Acoustic playback is commonly used to study wild birds, with applications as diverse as investigating behaviours, ascertaining the presence of rare and elusive species, and attracting individuals to a location. The number of studies employing playback is growing larger every year because it is easy to apply, increasingly affordable and very effective. However, the way that it is used and reported varies significantly across researchers and species. This lack of a protocol for reporting acoustic playbacks inevitably slows the progress of the field, as studies cannot be easily compared. In 1991, some of the most knowledgeable researchers in the field of animal communication met at a North Atlantic Treaty Organization (NATO) Advanced Research Workshop (ARW) at Thornbridge Hall in the UK to consider the design of playback experiments. The proceedings of the meeting were published in 1992 and contain crucial guidelines regarding this use of playback. In this paper we review the literature for papers published since that milestone that use acoustic playback in ornithological fieldwork contexts. We use the RepOrting standards for Systematic Evidence Syntheses (ROSES) to evaluate the description of the methods used. The main goal of this review paper is to identify a shared set of rules for employing and reporting the playback technique in such contexts to promote reproducibility and comparability. We found 625 peer‐reviewed articles in three on‐line databases, of which 419 reported field (rather than captive) studies employing avian playback. The biggest hindrance to reproducibility is the availability of the acoustic tracks used by authors; 4% (15 articles) of our sample made their tracks publicly available. We found that only one article provided enough details for their playback application to be fully reproducible. Further, only five articles (0.92%) provided enough information for reproducibility, even if we assume information about track preparation and recording details to be unnecessary when tracks are available. Based on our synthesis of the literature, we provide a set of recommendations for the reporting of playback uses to promote reproducibility, including sample paragraphs of description as supplementary material. We strongly recommend that tracks used for such experiments are deposited in dedicated on‐line repositories for the use of other researchers. While our focus is avian fieldwork applications of the playback technique, we believe that our findings can be easily transferred to other animal systems subject to acoustic playback. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Screen time is increasingly pervasive in children's lives and, despite shifts in screen usage, television remains pre-eminent, especially for young children. As such, viewing content merits investigation. The current study applied a novel coding scheme to assess the relative prominence of prosocial and antisocial content in 90 programmes watched by a sample of 180 British two-year-old children. As well as providing a framework for future use in television research, our study highlights the wide variance of prosociality in children's programming. Future directions for coding and research are discussed. IMPACT SUMMARY a. Prior State of Knowledge: Children's television content has been under scrutiny for decades. Studies involving researcher-chosen content have shown links between prosocial content and young children's prosocial behaviour, as well as between antisocial content and aggressive behaviour. b. Novel contributions: The current methodological brief outlines a novel coding scheme for investigating prosocial and antisocial content that young children view in their everyday lives, taking into account prosocial and antisocial behaviour, as well as format features of the television programmes. c. Practical implications: The current work can be utilized and adapted for research in diverse disciplines by investigators interested in how prosocial and antisocial content are associated with child behavioural outcomes. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Draught beer quality is assured by the management of microbial biofilm in dispense lines through regular and effective line cleaning with alkaline detergent. Here, a method is described which enables biofilm formation, growth and removal to be assessed in 96 well polyvinyl chloride microplates. Draught beer (and cider) microflora formed reproducible biofilms in their 'parent' beer after incubation at 15°C for seven days. Biofilm formation by four draught beer styles – keg lager, ale, stout and cask ale ‐ was assessed and was enhanced by periodic replenishment with fresh beer. The rate of biofilm formation by microflora from keg beers decreased with increasing temperature whereas with cask ale it increased. Oxygen enhanced biofilm formation with microflora from cask ale but not keg. Simulation of line cleaning in microplates with a proprietary alkaline solution failed to kill all microflora and the microorganisms regrew in all four beer styles. Further, the line cleaning process was increasingly ineffective with older biofilms. It is suggested that the method reported here will help focus attention on the efficacy of line cleaning, in particular, the role of mechanical action, which contributes little to the standard manual line cleaning process in the UK. This and other investigations will hopefully contribute to the ultimate intention of improving and assuring draught beer quality. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Introduction Process mapping provides insight into systems and processes in which improvement interventions are introduced and is seen as useful in healthcare quality improvement projects. There is little empirical evidence on the use of process mapping in healthcare practice. This study advances understanding of the benefits and success factors of process mapping within quality improvement projects. Methods Eight quality improvement projects were purposively selected from different healthcare settings within the UK’s National Health Service. Data were gathered from multiple data-sources, including interviews exploring participants’ experience of using process mapping in their projects and perceptions of benefits and challenges related to its use. These were analysed using inductive analysis. Results Eight key benefits related to process mapping use were reported by participants (gathering a shared understanding of the reality; identifying improvement opportunities; engaging stakeholders in the project; defining project's objectives; monitoring project progress; learning; increased empathy; simplicity of the method) and five factors related to successful process mapping exercises (simple and appropriate visual representation, information gathered from multiple stakeholders, facilitator’s experience and soft skills, basic training, iterative use of process mapping throughout the project). Conclusions Findings highlight benefits and versatility of process mapping and provide practical suggestions to improve its use in practice. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Manuscript Type Review Research Question/Issue The article is concerned with the prevalence, character, and development of qualitative research within the field of corporate governance. The paper provides an overview of published qualitative research in the field of corporate governance based on a structured literature search of papers published in scholarly peer-reviewed journals between 1986 and 2011. Research Findings/Insights A fine-grained search based on key words resulted in a sample of 78 qualitative corporate governance studies. A review and content analysis of these studies show that qualitative studies in governance have grown in number since the 1990s, but remain a small fraction of the published work on corporate governance. Studies are mostly developed by UK and European scholars, published in European journals and tend to explore boards of directors more than other governance related actors and mechanisms. These studies utilize a range of disciplines, predominantly management, adopting a wide range of methods, the most prevalent being that of the interview, often in combination with other methods to get a better account of the empirical phenomenon. Theoretical/Academic Implications The search reveals an eclectic range of theories, spanning several disciplines, which is serving to generate, elaborate, and refine theorizing about corporate governance and the associated meanings, mechanisms, processes and relationships. There is much scope and need for more qualitative studies of significant rigor and relevance which explore the array of interactions and processes involved in corporate governance, across different levels of analysis and contexts. Practitioner/Policy Implications After over two decades of research and reform of corporate governance, problems of practice remain, and corporate governance prescription via codes and other forms of regulation is increasing in search of better governance. Qualitative research can assist policy-makers and practitioners to develop more efficient governance mechanisms, by shedding light on the efficacy of policy prescription. Qualitative research provides a basis for rethinking and challenging some of the dominant assumptions and meanings about how governance actors and institutions actually function. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The paper explores the promotion of method in nineteenth-century British geography. Attention is paid to the emphasis accorded scientific instruments in a period when scientific subjects were, in practice and in personnel, 'disciplining' themselves. The role ascribed to scientific instruments and method is examined with reference to the work in the Royal Geographical Society of Julian R. Jackson and his What to observe, or the traveller's remembrancer (1841), and William Hamilton's essay on geographical methods in John Herschel's Manual of scientific enquiry (1849). These works are further explored with reference to two related texts, the Society's Hints to travellers (Raper and Fitzroy 1854) and Francis Galton's The art of travel (1855). The paper for the first time brings together evidence for the place of scientific instruments within geography's methodological pronouncements with scholarship in the history of technology and the history of science. In doing so, the paper highlights the importance of critical histories of geography's methods, instruments and associated practices. The conclusion addresses the implications of such research for providing yet richer histories of geography that might address not just the subject's cognitive content and institutional context but matters of epistemological procedure, moral conduct and authorial regimen in relation to precision instrumentation. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Building on the range of methods available to the roaming sociological imagination, curating sociology is concerned with instituting 'live' public encounters. Contending that there are practices in the history of sociology that can be considered instances of curating sociology, this article makes a case for harnessing these to inventive research processes today. The discussion in this article draws attention to recent developments in curating before excavating a selection of practices within sociology upon which we can reflexively build live methods with consideration to creative collaborations, publicness and exhibiting as research. Each of these involves a degree of mutation within the craft of sociology. By way of illustration, the final section of the article explores an in-depth case study of curating sociology for the Noise of the Past project, which involved us, as sociologists, collaborating with creative practitioners and 'curating' a large-scale public event. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This photo essay places into dialogue practices of photographing urban space and the market research practices of the U.K. outdoor advertising industry. It explores photography as a method for accessing understandings of cities, and it examines ways of analyzing the interplay between photographic practices and data gathered through ethnography. Through personal reflections on the research process, the essay considers the spatial practices of the outdoor advertising industry and how its billboards and panels act to space out cities and city imaginaries. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Abstract: This paper presents the results of a multi-isotopic (oxygen, strontium, carbon and nitrogen isotopes) investigation of population and dietary diversity in Roman Gloucester, focusing on individuals found in a late 2nd century AD mass burial pit at London Road, and comparing them to those found in the nearby cemetery. There were no statistical differences in isotopic composition between mass grave and cemetery burials, suggesting, in agreement with the osteological evidence, that the mass burial was the result of a catastrophic event, probably an epidemic disease. Strontium and oxygen isotope analysis demonstrated considerable diversity in the origins of the Gloucester population, with evidence for both UK and non-UK individuals. Diet was predominately terrestrial and similar to that of other Romano-British populations. Elevated δ13Cdentine ratios in some individuals are correlated with raised δ18Op values and are therefore probably due to childhoods spent in warmer climates, rather than dietary variation. Given the geological complexity of the Gloucester area, this study also provides new biosphere 87Sr/86Sr data for the wider region. A technical Appendix gives details of the analytical methods employed by the NERC Isotope Geosciences Laboratory (NIGL) for the measurement of oxygen stable isotope ratios in biogenic phosphate (δ18Op). It also evaluates different phosphate oxygen-drinking water conversion equations using data from Britain. [Copyright &y& Elsevier]

This article discusses the extent to which methods normally associated with corpus linguistics can be effectively used by critical discourse analysts. Our research is based on the analysis of a 140-million-word corpus of British news articles about refugees, asylum seekers, immigrants and migrants (collectively RASIM). We discuss how processes such as collocation and concordance analysis were able to identify common categories of representation of RASIM as well as directing analysts to representative texts in order to carry out qualitative analysis. The article suggests a framework for adopting corpus approaches in critical discourse analysis. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Aim: Near-patient blood glucose monitoring is an essential component of neonatal intensive care but the analysers currently used are unreliable and inaccurate. The aim of this study was to compare a new glucose electrode-based analyser (EML 105) and a non-wipe reflectance photometry method (Advantage) as opposed to a recognized laboratory reference method (Hexokinase). We also investigated the effect of sample route and haematocrit on the accuracy of the glucose readings obtained by each method of analysis.Methods: Whole blood glucose concentrations ranging from 0 to 3.5 mmol/l were carefully prepared in a laboratory setting and blood samples from each respective solution were then measured by EML 105 and Advantage analysers. The results obtained were then compared with the corresponding plasma glucose reading obtained by the Hexokinase method, using linear regression analysis. An in vivo study was subsequently performed on 103 neonates, over a 1-y period, using capillary and venous whole blood samples. Whole blood glucose concentration was estimated from each sample using both analysers and compared with the corresponding plasma glucose concentration estimated by the Hexokinase method. Venous blood was centrifuged and haematocrit was estimated using standardized curves. The effect of haematocrit on the agreement between whole blood and plasma glucose was investigated, estimating the degree of correlation on a scatterplot of the results and linear regression analysis.Results: Both the EML 105 and Hexokinase methods were highly accurate, in vitro, with small proportional biases of 2% and 5%, respectively. However, in vivo, both study analysers overestimated neonatal plasma glucose, ranging from at best 0.45 mmol/l (EML 105 venous) to 0.69 mmol/l (EML capillary). There was no significant difference in the agreement of capillary (GD = 0.12, 95% CI, [-0.32,0.08], p = 0.2) or venous samples (GD = 0.05, 95% CI. [0.09, 0.19], p = 0.49) with plasma glucose when analysed by either study method (GD = glucose difference between study analyser and reference method) However, the venous samples analysed by EML 105 estimated plasma glucose significantly better than capillary samples using the same method of analysis (GD = 0.24, 95% CI. [0.09,0.38], p < 0.01). The relationship between haematocrit and the resultant glucose differences was non-linear with correlation coefficients of r = -0.057 (EML 105 capillary), r = 0.145 (EML 105 venous), r = -0.127 (Advantage capillary) and r = -0.275 (Advantage venous). There was no significant difference in the effect of haematocrit on the performance of EML 105 versus Advantage, regardless of the sample route.Conclusion: Both EML 105 and Advantage overestimated plasma glucose, with no significant difference in the performance of either analyser, regardless of the route of analysis. Agreement with plasma glucose was better for venous samples but this was only statistically significant when EML 105 capillary and venous results were compared. Haematocrit is not a significant confounding factor towards the performance of either EML 105 or Advantage in neonates, regardless of the route of sampling. The margin of overestimation of blood glucose prohibits the recommendation of both EML 105 and Advantage for routine neonatal glucose screening. The consequences include failure accurately to diagnose hypoglycaemia and delays in the instigation of therapeutic measures, both of which may potentially result in an adverse, long-term, neurodevelopmental outcome. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

This brief paper considers recent debates about the public policy relevance of geography. Previous writings on the topic have highlighted problems in the discipline itself as well as criticizing the lack of policy relevance of much geographical research rather than offer up much in the way of remedy or prescription. This paper argues that an experimental approach to geographical research design could help make the discipline more policy relevant. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Public health is said to lack methodological diversity and creativity in media analysis. Although the framing paradigm offers important conceptual and operational insights for undertaking media analysis in public health research, frames are described as "elusive" to measure with their analysis a "methodological black box." With this article, we aim to foster creative thinking around media analysis in public health and to make the "black box" of framing analysis more transparent, by illustrating the innovation and application of a qualitative framing analysis technique in original public health research. We provide a "how to" guide for this framing analysis method and use data to illustrate methodological challenges encountered during the research. The findings drawn from this method are contrasted with findings gained from thematic analysis applied to the same data. The article concludes by considering the benefits of this type of framing analysis within public health scholarship.

The article looks at cross sectional studies and their importance in the health and social care sector. It offers a description of cross sectional studies, along with their use in the establishment of the prevalence of a health outcome or cause of disease. The use of cross sectional studies in collecting simple waiting time data is also noted, with an emphasis on its advantages and disadvantages.