Between a Rock and a Hard Place: The Power and Powerlessness of Transnational Narratives among Gay Martinican Men

In Martinique, self-identified gay men often tell each other stories about gay communities in other societies. France and Martinique are central characters in these stories but their presence is largely negative: life in the former is criticized for its economic or racial hardships and life in the latter is criticized for homophobia, hypocrisy, and smallness, creating a frustrating catch-22 for these men. However, in these narratives Quebec often emerges as an ideal destination of racial and sexual freedom. In this paper, I argue that Quebec is signified as utopic in terms that are antithetical and therefore profoundly connected to impressions of social life in France and Martinique. At the same time, however, I maintain that these narratives also reveal common threads in the African-pan-American diasporic experience. Furthermore, these men's experiences of "gay" life in other countries demonstrate their awareness of a "global gay" identity, albeit one that is commercially and ideologically centered in Euro-American societies, [homosexuality, Martinique, transnationalism, diaspora, race]     

The Power of Association: Its Impact on Willingness to Buy GM Food

Affect, associations, and images associated with food technologies may be important factors influencing consumers’ perception of and willingness to accept new food technologies. The aim of the present study was to investigate free associations evoked by the term “biotechnology” and how they influence behavior. Therefore, participants (N = 632) were asked to name three associations they had in mind when confronted with the term “biotechnology.” After that, respondents indicated how positive or how negative these associations were. Additionally, an equivalent gain task was used to measure participants’ behavioral intentions related to genetically modified (GM) chocolate. Results of a log-linear analysis and a correspondence analysis suggest that attitudes toward biotechnology result in a wide range of associations. Participants having negative attitudes mentioned images related to the environment and industry more often compared with participants having positive attitudes. Results of the equivalent gain task show that willingness to buy GM chocolate can be predicted by the subjects’ three reported associations (p < .001), as well as by their gender (p = .003). The model explains 33.5% of the variance. Affect related to people's associations with gene technology strongly influenced their acceptance of GM foods.     

The Impact of Perceived Social Power and Dangerous Context on Social Attention

Past research has shown that position in a social hierarchy modulates one''s social attention, as in the gaze cueing effect. While studies have manipulated the social status of others with whom the participants interact, we believe that a sense of one''s own social power is also a crucial factor affecting gaze following. In two experiments, we primed the social power of participants, using different approaches, to investigate the participants'' performance in a subsequent gaze cueing task. The results of Experiment 1 showed a stronger gaze cueing effect among participants who were primed with low social power, compared to those primed with high social power. Our predicted gender difference (i.e., women showing a stronger gaze cueing effect than men) was confirmed and this effect was found to be dominated by the lower social power condition. Experiment 2 manipulated the level of danger in the context and replicated the joint impact of gender and one''s perceived social power on gaze cueing effect, especially in the low danger context, in comparison to the high danger context. These findings demonstrate that one''s perceived social power has a concerted effect on social attention evoked by gaze, along with other factors such as gender and characteristics of the environment, and suggest the importance of further research on the complex relationship between an individual''s position in the social hierarchy and social attention.     

Impact of Altitude on Power Output during Cycling Stage Racing

Purpose

The purpose of this study was to quantify the effects of moderate-high altitude on power output, cadence, speed and heart rate during a multi-day cycling tour.

Methods

Power output, heart rate, speed and cadence were collected from elite male road cyclists during maximal efforts of 5, 15, 30, 60, 240 and 600 s. The efforts were completed in a laboratory power-profile assessment, and spontaneously during a cycling race simulation near sea-level and an international cycling race at moderate-high altitude. Matched data from the laboratory power-profile and the highest maximal mean power output (MMP) and corresponding speed and heart rate recorded during the cycling race simulation and cycling race at moderate-high altitude were compared using paired t-tests. Additionally, all MMP and corresponding speeds and heart rates were binned per 1000m (<1000m, 1000–2000, 2000–3000 and >3000m) according to the average altitude of each ride. Mixed linear modelling was used to compare cycling performance data from each altitude bin.

Results

Power output was similar between the laboratory power-profile and the race simulation, however MMPs for 5–600 s and 15, 60, 240 and 600 s were lower (p ≤ 0.005) during the race at altitude compared with the laboratory power-profile and race simulation, respectively. Furthermore, peak power output and all MMPs were lower (≥ 11.7%, p ≤ 0.001) while racing >3000 m compared with rides completed near sea-level. However, speed associated with MMP 60 and 240 s was greater (p < 0.001) during racing at moderate-high altitude compared with the race simulation near sea-level.

Conclusion

A reduction in oxygen availability as altitude increases leads to attenuation of cycling power output during competition. Decrement in cycling power output at altitude does not seem to affect speed which tended to be greater at higher altitudes.     

The Dark Side of Humanity: The Work of Robert Herte and Its Legacy

The Dark Side of Humanity: The Work of Robert Herte and Its Legacy, Robert Parkin. Amsterdam: Harwood Academic Publishers, 1996. 226 pp.     

Humanity at the Edge: The Moral Laboratory of Feeding Precarious Lives

At the heart of anthropology and the social sciences lies a notion of human existence according to which humans and animals share the basic need for food, but only humans have the capacity for morality. Based on fieldwork in a pig laboratory, a neonatal intensive care unit (NICU), and a dementia nursing home, we follow practices of feeding precarious lives lacking most markers of human personhood, including the exercise of moral judgment. Despite the absence of such markers, laboratory researchers and caregivers in these three sites do not abstain from engaging in questions about the moral status of the piglets, infants, and people with dementia in their care. They continually negotiate how their charges belong to the human collectivity and thereby challenge the notion of ‘the human’ that is foundational to anthropology. Combining analytical approaches that do not operate with a fixed boundary between human and animal value and agency with approaches that focus on human experience and virtue ethics, we argue that ‘the human’ at stake in the moral laboratory of feeding precarious lives puts ‘the human’ in anthropology at disposal for moral experimentation.     

Vicarious Group-Based Rejection: Creating a Potentially Dangerous Mix of Humiliation,Powerlessness, and Anger

Rejection can convey that one is seen as inferior and not worth bothering with. Is it possible for people to feel vicariously rejected in this sense and have reactions that are similar to those following personal rejection, such as feeling humiliated, powerless, and angry? A study on personal rejection was followed by two main studies on vicarious group-based rejection. It was found that merely observing rejection of ingroup members can trigger feelings of humiliation that are equally intense as those experienced in response to personal rejection. Moreover, given that the rejection is explicit, vicariously experienced feelings of humiliation can be accompanied by powerlessness and anger. Potentially, this combination of emotions could be an important source of offensive action against rejecters.     

The Impact of Nutrition on Cognition in the Elderly

The possibility that nutritional manipulation may protect against cognitive decline and dementia is an inviting prospect. However data supporting a beneficial effect of a particular dietary pattern is limited. Although studies have demonstrated a health benefit to dietary plans that are high in fiber, whole grains, natural sugar and fish while maintaining lower intake in meat dairy and poultry, the ability to identify the most salient factors of these diets have been unsuccessful. Several aspects of diet have been studied in detail and provided support for potential mechanisms for improving cognition. Clinical trials have explored these mechanisms through supplementation studies with minimal benefits being observed. Continuing work to hone the mechanisms and refine our knowledge of dietary benefits is described. Special issue dedicated to John P. Blass.     

The Impact of Blood Rheology on Drug Transport in Stented Arteries: Steady Simulations

Background and Methods

It is important to ensure that blood flow is modelled accurately in numerical studies of arteries featuring drug-eluting stents due to the significant proportion of drug transport from the stent into the arterial wall which is flow-mediated. Modelling blood is complicated, however, by variations in blood rheological behaviour between individuals, blood’s complex near-wall behaviour, and the large number of rheological models which have been proposed. In this study, a series of steady-state computational fluid dynamics analyses were performed in which the traditional Newtonian model was compared against a range of non-Newtonian models. The impact of these rheological models was elucidated through comparisons of haemodynamic flow details and drug transport behaviour at various blood flow rates.

Results

Recirculation lengths were found to reduce by as much as 24% with the inclusion of a non-Newtonian rheological model. Another model possessing the viscosity and density of blood plasma was also implemented to account for near-wall red blood cell losses and yielded recirculation length increases of up to 59%. However, the deviation from the average drug concentration in the tissue obtained with the Newtonian model was observed to be less than 5% in all cases except one. Despite the small sensitivity to the effects of viscosity variations, the spatial distribution of drug matter in the tissue was found to be significantly affected by rheological model selection.

Conclusions/Significance

These results may be used to guide blood rheological model selection in future numerical studies. The clinical significance of these results is that they convey that the magnitude of drug uptake in stent-based drug delivery is relatively insensitive to individual variations in blood rheology. Furthermore, the finding that flow separation regions formed downstream of the stent struts diminish drug uptake may be of interest to device designers.     

The Impact of Lymphopenia on Delirium in ICU Patients

BackgroundImmunosuppressed states may predispose patients to development of acute brain injury during times of critical illness. Lymphopenia is a non-specific yet commonly used bedside marker of immunosuppressed states.MethodsWe examined whether lymphopenia would predict development of acute brain dysfunction (delirium and/or coma) in 518 patients enrolled in the Bringing to Light the Risk Factors and Incidence of Neuropsychological Dysfunction in ICU Survivors (BRAIN-ICU) study in medical and surgical ICUs of a tertiary care, university-based medical center. Utilizing proportional odds logistic regression and Cox proportional hazards survival analysis, we assessed the relationship between pre-enrollment lymphocytes and subsequent cognitive outcomes including delirium- and coma-free days (DCFDs) and 30-day mortality.ResultsThere were no statistically significant associations between lymphocytes and DCFDs (p = 0.17); additionally, the relationship between lymphocytes and mortality was not statistically significant (p = 0.71). Among 259 patients without history of cancer or diabetes, there was no statistically significant association between lymphocytes and DCFDs (p = 0.07).Conclusionlymphopenia, a commonly used bedside marker of immunosuppression, does not appear to be a marker of risk for acute brain injury (delirium/coma) or 30-day mortality in general medical/surgical ICU patients.     

The Structure of Manufacturing Systems: Insights on the Impact of Variability

A classic issue in manufacturing strategy is positioning, that is, the appropriate structure for the manufacturing system. At its simplest, the choice is between a job shop and a flow line; but if the system has to produce a variety of different products,then it also is necessary to decide on focus, the degree of specialization. While effective use of resources is essential, it also is necessary to consider the ability of the system to cope with variability and disturbances. Using a variety of queueing models of manufacturing systems, it is possibleto get some useful insights into positioning and focus.     

The Impact of Sediment Characteristics on PCB-dechlorinating Cultures: Implications for Bioaugmentation

Polychlorinated Biphenyl (PCB)-dechlorinating cultures with complimentary activities, previously derived from estuarine Baltimore Harbor (B), marine Palos Verdes (P), and riverine Hudson River (H) sediments, were mixed and then inoculated into sterile sediments from the same sources. In the treatments containing sterile B sediment, the different inocula had limited impact on the bacterial community development and on dechlorination patterns, all of which were similar. In treatments containing sterile P or H sediment, however, different inocula resulted in significantly different PCB dechlorination patterns and bacterial communities. The B sediment appeared to support not only the most extensive and rapid dechlorination of the three sediments, but also supported a more diverse bacterial community. This was thought to be a result of nutritional richness, as it was high in organic carbon and micronutrients such as zinc and cobalt. Although mixing three PCB-dechlorinating cultures was able to produce a culture capable of enhanced PCB-dechlorinating activity as compared to single cultures, some activities were lost upon culture transfer. This indicates that care must be taken to establish robust PCB-dechlorinating cultures capable of extensive dechlorination prior to pursuing bioaugmentation. In addition, our results indicate that the concentration and availability of macro-and micronutrients could have a significant impact on the microbial community structure, and thus a thorough characterization of the sediment at contaminated sites is essential for implementing bioaugmentation for PCB bioremediation.