Agential Conversations: Interviewing Postdoctoral Life Scientists and the Politics of Mundane Research Practices

Science and Technology Studies (STS) projects often aim at understanding social problems and epistemic challenges in science and, more generally, in the technoscientific worlds we inhabit. However, it is often unclear if and how these projects can help address the problems they identify. Scholars such as Donna Haraway, John Law, and Karen Barad have argued that STS methods always interfere with the contexts they study. Combining this insight with recent feminist scholarship on the politics of care in technoscience suggests that a better understanding of how our research practices already interfere can help us attune our methods in order to promote care as part our research practices. One avenue to investigate this hypothesis is to return to a completed study and reconstruct how its research methods have created interference effects that promoted or could promote care for the problems the study identified. In the case at hand, the methods investigated are interviews with life scientists in Austria and the USA. The problem they defined is that current career rationales in the life sciences, which foreground individualism, mobility, and competition hinder collaboration, teamwork, and mentoring, strain group cohesion, and tend to exclude certain groups. Reframing the research interviews as ‘agential conversations’ that interfered with the contexts they sought to understand shows how the interviews also created situated moments of reflection, connection, and disruption that could serve as a basis for responding to these problematic conditions affecting researchers in the life sciences and beyond.     

Limited effects of pre‐existing maternal antisocial behaviours on infant neurodevelopment: A pilot study

Antisocial behaviour disorders (ABDs) are among the most costly and treatment resistant of all psychiatric syndromes. Select neurodevelopmental abnormalities have been labelled a risk factor for ABDs, but it is unknown if maternal ABDs are associated with early neurodevelopmental abnormalities. This study tested whether infants of ABD mothers had more neurodevelopmental abnormalities than mothers with no psychiatric disorder (ND). Thirty‐nine pregnant women (49% with ABDs; 51% no psychiatric disorder) were recruited from the community. Infant neurodevelopment was assessed at ≤1 and 8 weeks using the Neonatal Behavioural Assessment Scale and at 16 weeks of age using the Bayley Scales of Infant and Toddler Development‐III. There was no significant group difference at ≤8 weeks. At 16 weeks, ABD mothers rated their infants higher on the Adapted Behaviours subscale, specifically on the leisure and self‐directed scales, when corrected for substance use and socio‐economic status. This pilot study found higher maternal ratings of Adapted Behaviours at 16 weeks, which may be due to unrealistic expectations about infant development.

Highlights

• Maternal Antisocial behaviour disorders (ABDs) do not impact early infant neurodevelopment at ≤ 8 weeks old as measured by standardized assessment.
• Mothers with ABDs view their infants at 16 weeks as better adapted than women without any psychiatric disorder.
• Specifically, mothers with ABDs reported their infants as better adapted on the leisure and self‐direction subscales of the Bayley Scales of Infant and Toddler Development‐III. This finding may be due to less knowledge about normal infant adaptive behavior.

     

Impact of Appointment Waiting Time on Attendance Rates at a Clinical Cancer Genetics Service

The increase in demand for clinical cancer genetics services has impacted the ability to provide services timeously. Given limited resources, this often results in extended appointment waiting times. Over the last 3 years, the Cancer Genetics Service at the National Cancer Centre Singapore has continued to experience a steady increase in demand for its service. Nevertheless, significant no-show rates have been reported. This study sought to determine whether an association exists between appointment waiting times and attendance rates. Data was gathered for all participants meeting inclusion criteria. Attendance rates and appointment waiting times were calculated. The relationship between mean waiting times for those who did and did not attend their scheduled appointments was evaluated using Welch’s t test and linear regression model. The results showed a significant difference in mean appointment waiting times between patients who did and did not attend (32.66 versus 43.50 days respectively; p?<?0.0001). Furthermore, patients who waited for longer than 37 days were significantly less likely to attend. No-show rates increased as the waiting time increased, at a rate of 19.60% per 20 days and 21.40% per 30 days. In conclusion, appointment waiting time is a significant predictor for patient attendance. Strategies to ensure patients receive an appointment within the necessary timeframe at the desired setting are important to ensure that individuals at increased cancer risk attend their appointments in order to manage their cancer risks effectively.     

Group size,partner choice and collaborative actions in male Indo-Pacific bottlenose dolphins (Tursiops aduncus)

Animal Cognition - Due to the diversity of the phenomenon, dolphin cooperation has attracted considerable research interest in both wild populations and those under human care. Dolphins cooperate...     

Gender Differences in Biobehavioral Aftereffects of Stress on Eating,Frustration, and Cardiovascular Responses1

Eating, persistence, and cardiovascular responses were evaluated after exposure to a 25‐min noise stressor with or without perceived control. Participants were healthy men (n = 29) and women (n = 34), aged 21 to 45 years. There were no group differences in cognitive task performance or blood pressure during the stressor. However, perceived control resulted in lower mean blood pressure and heart rate after cessation of the stressor for men and women. Women without perceived control displayed greater frustration levels following the stressor, and frustrated women ate more bland food than did nonfrustrated women. Perceived control and frustration did not affect food consumption among men following the stressor. These findings indicate that there are health‐relevant gender differences in biobehavioral responses that occur in the aftermath of stressor exposure. In addition, perceived control was especially important for women to attenuate the behavioral and biological effects of stressor exposure.     

Maternal Depression,Maternal Expressed Emotion,and Youth Psychopathology

Across development, maternal depression has been found to be a risk factor for youth psychopathology generally and youth depression specifically. Maternal Expressed Emotion (EE) has been examined as a predictor of outcome among youth with depression. The present study explored the associations between youth psychopathology and two predictors–maternal depression within the child’s lifetime and maternal EE–in a study of children at risk for depression. One hundred and seventy-one youth, ages 8–12, and their mothers participated. To assess maternal and youth psychopathology, dyads were administered structured diagnostic assessments, and mothers and children completed self-report measures of their own depressive symptoms. In addition, mothers completed the Achenbach Child Behavior Checklist–Parent Report Version (CBCL) for their children. Maternal EE was assessed based on the Five Minute Speech Sample. History of maternal depression was associated with high maternal EE, and the combination of maternal depression history and maternal EE was associated with children’s own reports of higher depressive symptoms. Current maternal depressive symptoms were associated with mothers’ reports of children’s Internalizing scores on the CBCL, and maternal depression history, current maternal depressive symptoms, and maternal EE were strongly associated with mothers’ reports of children’s Externalizing and Total Problem scores on the CBCL. History of maternal depression and a rating of high or borderline Critical EE (characterized by maternal critical comments and/or reports of a negative relationship) were independently associated with children’s depression diagnoses.     

Building Opportunity: Developing City Systems to Expand and Improve After School Programs

A growing body of research is examining the strengths and weaknesses of specific after school programs and their effect on youth outcomes. Few reviews, however, have sought to examine the components of citywide system-building—to understand intentional efforts to develop, support and sustain high quality after school programming across a community. Beginning in the mid-1990s and continuing through the present, private funders, public officials and program practitioners in cities across America have joined together to build systems to support the expansion and improvement of after school programs at the city-level. This paper presents the community context and underlying principles that drove the development of Baltimore’s After-School Strategy; articulates a set of system components derived from this experience and the available literature; and lays out future work to expand high quality after-school opportunities for youth in Baltimore and in other distressed urban environments.