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This study investigates the relationship between household utilization of food services and retailers and the healthfulness of purchases using data from the 2013 Food Acquisition and Purchase Survey. Overall, our findings suggest that the associations between food service or retailer utilization and the healthfulness of purchases are limited. Thus, interventions may need to be targeted to specific households based on patterns of utilization. We also find evidence for an interdependent relationship between food at home and away from home food shopping behaviors with implications for the healthfulness of purchases.

ObjectivesTo identify existing evidence concerning the cost of dissemination and implementation (D&I) strategies in community, public health and health service research, mapped with the ‘Expert Recommendations for Implementing Change’ (ERIC) taxonomy.DesignScoping review.Data sourcesMEDLINE, EMBASE, CINAHL, PsycINFO, Scopus and the Cochrane Library were searched to identify any English language reports that had been published between January 2008 and December 2019 concerning the cost of D&I strategies.Data extractionWe matched the strategies identified in each article using ERIC taxonomies; further classified them into five areas (eg, dissemination, implementation, integration, capacity building and scale-up); and extracted the corresponding costs (total costs and cots per action target and per evidence-based programme (EBP) participant). We also recorded the reported level of costing methodology used for cost assessment of D&I strategies.ResultsOf the 6445 articles identified, 52 studies were eligible for data extraction. Lack of D&I strategy cost data was the predominant reason (55% of the excluded studies) for study exclusion. Predominant topic, setting, country and research design in the included studies were mental health (19%), primary care settings (44%), the US (35%) and observational (42%). Thirty-five (67%) studies used multicomponent D&I strategies (ranging from two to five discrete strategies). The most frequently applied strategies were Conduct ongoing training (50%) and Conduct educational meetings (23%). Adoption (42%) and reach (27%) were the two most frequently assessed outcomes. The overall costs of Conduct ongoing training ranged from $199 to $105 772 ($1–$13 973 per action target and $0.02–$412 per EBP participant); whereas the cost of Conduct educational meetings ranged from $987 to $1.1–$2.9 million/year ($33–$54 869 per action target and $0.2–$146 per EBP participant). The wide range of costs was due to the varying scales of the studies, intended audiences/diseases and the complexities of the strategy components. Most studies presented limited information on costing methodology, making interpretation difficult.ConclusionsThe quantity of published D&I strategy cost analyses is increasing, yet guidance on conducting and reporting of D&I strategy cost analysis is necessary to facilitate and promote the application of comparative economic evaluation in the field of D&I research.

Environmental characteristics of early care and education centers (ECECs) are an important context for preschool-aged children’s development, but few studies have examined their relationship with children’s locomotor skills. We examined the association between characteristics of the ECEC environment with quantitatively (i.e., product-based) and qualitatively (i.e., process-based) measured locomotor skills, using the Progressive Aerobic Cardiovascular Endurance Run (PACER) and the locomotor portion of the Children’s Activity and Movement in Preschool Study (CHAMPS) motor skills protocol (CMSP), respectively. ECEC characteristics included outdoor and indoor play environment quality, outdoor and indoor play equipment, screen-time environment quality, and policy environment quality. Mean (SD) scores for the PACER (n = 142) and CSMP (n = 91) were 3.7 ± 2.3 laps and 19.0 ± 5.5 criteria, respectively, which were moderately correlated with each other (Pearson r = 0.5; p < 0.001). Linear regression models revelated that a better policy environment score was associated with fewer PACER laps. Better outdoor play and screen-time environment quality scores and more outdoor play equipment were positively associated with higher CMSP scores. ECEC environments that reflect best practice guidelines may be opportunities for locomotor skills development in preschool-aged children. ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier: NCT03261492 (8/25/17).

Slocombe, W. and Hill, J. (2007).Archive-text: an interdisciplinary dialogue. English Language Notes. 45(1) pp.21-31 RAE2008

Emotional and behavioural disturbance was assessed in 82 individuals with severe intellectual disabilities and challenging behaviour using the Diagnostic Assessment for the Severely Handicapped-II (DASH-II). Levels of disturbance were compared firstly in individuals with and without features of autism as assessed by the DASH-II, and secondly in individuals with varying severities of autism. In both cases levels of ability and overall severity of behaviour disorder were comparable across groups. Individuals with autistic features were found to have significantly higher scores than nonautistic individuals on the DASH-II organic disorder, anxiety, mania, PDD/autism and stereotypies subscales. When participants with autistic features were separated into groups of severe and moderate autism and compared with nonautistic participants, significant effects of group were found for scores on the anxiety, mood, mania, PDD/autism, schizophrenia and stereotypies subscales. Scheffé tests were conducted to further evaluate between-group differences. Item analysis showed seven DASH-II items to have a 30% or more difference between levels of endorsement in autistic and nonautistic individuals, with six further items showing a 20% or greater difference in levels of endorsement. Findings are compared to those from previous research and implications for the conceptualisation of emotional and behavioural disorders in individuals with autism are discussed.

This thesis explores the "Infomax" method of Independent Component Analysis (ICA) to accomplish blind source separation (BSS). The Infomax method separates unknown source signals from a number of signal mixtures by maximizing the entropy of a transformed set of signal mixtures and is accomplished by performing gradient ascent in MATLAB. This work specifically focuses on small numbers of two types of signals: audio signals and simple communications signals (polar non-return to zero signals). The Infomax method is found to be successful and efficient only for small numbers of signals, and improvements to the gradient ascent algorithm should be made for the Infomax algorithm to succeed for more than three signal mixtures. MATLAB implementation code is included as appendices. http://archive.org/details/independentcompo109453421 US Navy (USN) author. Approved for public release; distribution is unlimited.

The current study aimed to replicate and extend Rojahn et al. [Rojahn, J., Aman, M. G., Matson, J. L., & Mayville, E. (2003). The aberrant behavior checklist and the behavior problems inventory: Convergent and divergent validity. Research in Developmental Disabilities, 24, 391-404] by examining the convergent validity of the behavior problems inventory (BPI) and the aberrant behavior checklist (ABC) for individuals presenting with multiple complex behavior problems. Data were collected from 69 children and adults with severe intellectual disabilities and challenging behavior living in residential establishments. MANCOVA analyses showed that individuals with elevated BPI stereotyped behavior subscale scores had higher scores on ABC lethargy and stereotypy subscales, while those with elevated BPI aggressive/destructive behavior subscale scores obtained higher scores on ABC irritability, stereotypy and hyperactivity subscales. Multiple regression analyses showed a corresponding pattern of results in the prediction of ABC subscale scores by BPI subscale scores. Exploratory factor analysis of the BPI data suggested a six-factor solution with an aggressive/destructive behavior factor, four factors relating to stereotypy, and one related to stereotypy and self-injury. These results, discussed with reference to Rojahn et al. [Rojahn, J., Aman, M. G., Matson, J. L., & Mayville, E. (2003). The aberrant behavior checklist and the behavior problems inventory: Convergent and divergent validity. Research in Developmental Disabilities, 24, 391-404], support the existence of relationships between specific subscales of the two instruments in addition to an overall association between total scores related to general severity of behavioral disturbance.