Big Conversion Research Articles

“It's a big conversation”: Views of service personnel on systemic barriers to preventing smoking relapse among pregnant and postpartum Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander women – A qualitative study

BackgroundProviding smoking cessation care has not successfully prevented women who quit smoking during pregnancy from relapsing due to multi-level barriers. AimThis paper explores systemic barriers to providing smoking cessation care, focusing on relapse prevention among pregnant and postpartum Aboriginal and Torres Strait Islander women (hereafter Aboriginal). MethodsTwenty-six interviews were conducted between October 2020 and July 2021 with health professionals, health promotion workers and managers working in Aboriginal smoking cessation across six Australian states and territories. Data were thematically analysed. FindingsThemes emerging from the data included: (a) limited time, competing priorities and shortage of health professionals; (b) a need for more knowledge and skills for health professionals; (c) influences of funding allocations and models of smoking cessation care; (d) lack of relevance of anti-tobacco messages to pregnancy and postpartum relapse; and (e) ways forward. Several barriers emerged from policies influencing access to resources and approaches to smoking cessation care for Aboriginal women. Individual-level maternal smoking cessation care provision was often under-resourced and time-constrained to adequately meet Aboriginal women's needs. Identified needs for health professionals included more time, knowledge and skills, better cultural awareness for non-Indigenous health professionals, and salient anti-tobacco messages for pregnant women related to long-term cessation. ConclusionTo drive smoking cessation in pregnant and postpartum Aboriginal women, we recommend adequately reimbursing midwives and Aboriginal Health Workers/Professionals to allow them to provide intensive support, build confidence in Quitline, continue health professionals’ capacity-building and allocate consistent funding to initiatives that have been efficacious with Aboriginal women.

One Big Conversation: The EU's Climate Diplomacy across the International Regime Complex on the Paris Agreement Negotiations

AbstractThe EU participates in many international fora related to climate change (for example UNFCCC, G20, Montreal Protocol), which collectively constitute the international regime complex on climate change (IRCCC). Using the case study of negotiations on the Paris Agreement, this paper addresses the question How and why did the EU use the different fora of the IRCCC to achieve its objectives in the Paris Agreement negotiations? It finds that the EU used the IRCCC in four main ways: employing typical multilateral negotiating activities, overcoming specific issues of the Paris Agreement negotiations, creating political momentum, and ensuring cross‐fora coordination. These uses correspond with the level of political authority of participants and the level of climate‐specialization in a given forum.

Co-Creation and Collaboration Key To Making an Impact

What big conversations need to happen to help us inspire the next generation of engineers? Asks Dr Hilary Leever, CEO of Engineering UK

The Iceman Cometh

The Iceman Cometh

The Nursing Salon Experience: A Salon for Nurses of Color.

Nursing salons are an opportunity for collegiality, comfort, collaboration, connectivity, and conversations about what's on the hearts and minds of the participants. The Nurses of Color Nursing Salon is a first endeavor in Minnesota to host a salon that provides a safe space for nurses and other health-care professionals of color to have conversations about their experiences with racism, discrimination, and institutionalized supremacy. Since the inception of the Nurses of Color salon on Juneteenth 2018, the hosts and their participants have created lively gatherings where all have engaged in big conversations about the challenges they face as nurses of color, and about racism past and present. The sacred space of the salon has fostered a renewal of their spirits and a restoration of their endless passion for what and who we are as nurses.

Charles Bowden Saying Yes

Charles Bowden Saying Yes* Aengus Anderson (bio) December 12, 2012, was one of those bright winter days where the sun seems to bleed the landscape of color, leaving Las Cruces, in my memory, as little more than a sequence of drab boxes under a chalky sky. It was early afternoon and Charles Bowden was reclining in a chair, glass of red wine in hand, looking out a large window and telling me about birds. Not knowing where his story would go, I rushed to set up my recording gear. Most interviews are narrow and targeted. Often, they have a subject that you can meaningfully explore within the confines of a magazine article or a four-minute radio story. The interview that follows is nothing like that, so it deserves a little bit of context. I am an independent radio producer and I had come to Las Cruces to ask Chuck three questions: What is the crisis of the present, assuming there is one? What would a better future look like? What beliefs led to your definition of "the good"? Those questions were the core of The Conversation, a podcast I produced from 2012 to 2016. The Conversation was motivated by a long-standing personal belief that our institutions and social norms have fallen far out of step with the realities of our world, from economics to the environment. This belief made me wonder about how large systems of thought change, so I launched The Conversation with a conjecture: There are moments in history when status quo ideas fail to address a society's changing needs. This failure usually ends badly but, despite that, some historians will see an efflorescence of new ideas amidst the chaos. For some of the best transformative moments, think of the intellectual ferment of classical Greece, the Meiji Restoration in Japan, or the American Revolution, all of which saw the birth of ideas that [End Page 188] seemed radical to contemporaries and natural to later generations. I was interested in those moments. Were they real or the constructions of excitable historians? And if they were real, could we be living in one? Did we need to be? To explore the idea, I traveled America and recorded in-person interviews with a cross-section of our most interesting thinkers. Some resonated with me personally and influence my thought to this day, such as Wes Jackson of the Land Institute, artist Frances Whitehead, or ecological philosopher Timothy Morton. Others challenged my assumptions, such as Max Moore, who runs the cryonics facility Alcor Life Extension, or Robert Zubrin of the Mars Society, who was one of the strongest techno-utopian voices in the series. I tried to steer away from the most obvious pundits and celebrity-intellectuals because, I reasoned, they had platforms already and were unlikely to want to mar their chiseled public images by veering off script for an interview about a raft of subjects outside of their expertise or their deepest personal beliefs. The interviews were open-ended, oscillating between the global and the personal. These sorts of sprawling, uninhibited conversations about our collective future are taboo in the media—they're too long for our attention span, too technical for our facile understanding of the world, and too vague to be reduced to a few pithy lessons from a TED talk. They also seem embarrassingly naïve, an activity best left to the smoke-filled dorm rooms of college students. But the big conversation about our future and our beliefs is just as important today as at the most fraught moments of our past. After almost nine months and sixty interviews, I felt that The Conversation needed Chuck Bowden. Many of my other interviewees lived in major cities and thought about the world from within the cocoons of corporations, nonprofits, or academic institutions. True, some of them were concerned about poverty, violence, or the economic casualties of the global economy, but they were all a long way from Juárez. I wanted Chuck's voice in the project, not because I didn't value the other contributions, but because I hoped he would stride through the series like an Old Testament prophet, yelling about what...

Reorganization of Plan Technology and Problem of the Fishery Communities Planning and Building in the Big Conversion Phase: Inspection from Lifology of Fishery Communities Planning

Reorganization of Plan Technology and Problem of the Fishery Communities Planning and Building in the Big Conversion Phase: Inspection from Lifology of Fishery Communities Planning

Big conversation needed on social care inspection

Big conversation needed on social care inspection

Nursery Management: Ofsted Big Conversation - Speaking up for thesector

Since it began last September, the Ofsted Big Conversation has been gaining momentum in its quest to improve the inspection process. Karen Faux charts its progress.

Big Conversation highlights Ofsted inspection concerns

Big Conversation highlights Ofsted inspection concerns

Midcounties' employees get a voice in big and small conversations

PurposeThis paper aims to detail some of the policies that have helped Midcounties Co‐operative to become one of the Sunday Times Best Companies to Work For.Design/methodology/approachIt underlines the importance of good internal communications and employee development.FindingsIt observes that the society's graduate program provides an opportunity for students with a 2:2 honours degree or better to gain experience across the society. They undertake six, four‐month placements in different areas of the business. The graduates also carry out a project relevant to their placements.Practical implicationsThe paper describes the experiences of a number of people on the society's graduate program and reveals that training opportunities are among the reasons that employees rate the company as good to work for.Social implicationsIt reveals that employees are allowed to spend up to three paid days a year volunteering.Originality/valueThe paper shows why employees rate highly the experience of working at Midcounties Co‐operative.

NHS England to host ‘big conversation’ on primary care

NHS England to host ‘big conversation’ on primary care

Promoting professionalism: have you had the conversation?

British Journal of Healthcare AssistantsVol. 6, No. 4 PolicyPromoting professionalism: have you had the conversation?Rhidian HughesRhidian HughesSearch for more papers by this authorRhidian HughesPublished Online:16 Aug 2013https://doi.org/10.12968/bjha.2012.6.4.198AboutSectionsView articleView Full TextPDF/EPUB ToolsAdd to favoritesDownload CitationsTrack CitationsPermissions ShareShare onFacebookTwitterLinked InEmail View article References Health Professions Council (2011) Professionalism in Healthcare Professionals. Health Professions Council, London Google ScholarHughes, R (2011) Regulating the workforce. British Journal of Healthcare Assistants 5(4): 198–199 Link, Google ScholarSecretary of State for Health (2011) Enabling Excellence: Autonomy and Accountability for Healthcare Workers, Social Workers and Social Care Workers. Cm 8008. London: Stationery Office Google ScholarSkills for Health (2012) Work on national minimum training standards and code of conduct due to begin in April (press release). http://tinyurl.com/SfHstandards (accessed 2 April 2012) Google ScholarMiddleton, K (2012) Professionalism–the Big Conversation. http://tinyurl.com/karenmiddleton (accessed 2 April 2012) Google Scholar FiguresReferencesRelatedDetailsCited byProfessionalism and what it means for you12 September 2015 | British Journal of Healthcare Assistants, Vol. 9, No. 9Influencing organisational culture: a leadership challenge25 June 2015 | British Journal of Nursing, Vol. 24, No. 12Unregistered does not have to mean unprofessional16 August 2013 | British Journal of Healthcare Assistants, Vol. 7, No. 3 1 April 2012Volume 6Issue 4ISSN (print): 1753-1586ISSN (online): 2052-4420 Metrics History Published online 16 August 2013 Published in print 1 April 2012 Information© MA Healthcare LimitedPDF download

Tracking dynamic land-use change using spatially explicit Markov Chain based on cellular automata: the case of Tehran

The main objective of this research is to, first, monitor urban sprawl in the metropolis of Tehran and, second, to assess the CA–Markov model in the simulation of land-use change. Land-use changes generally occur in developing countries through new building construction. The rapid pace of this development has brought forward a number of research activities involving new applications for modelling this phenomenon. In this research, urban sprawl is examined in the urban fringe of Tehran and, subsequently, the CA–Markov model is implemented in order to evaluate the model. The CA–Markov model is a spatially explicit model for land-change modelling, which has not been implemented very frequently to track urban expansion. This model, however, which is an integrated module of both cellular automata and Markov Chain models, predicts forthcoming changes over time, based on the past use of land in the research area. Urban expansion between 1986 and 2006 was simulated through employing the model in the metropolis of Tehran in order to calibrate and customise the model through a training phase. Consequently, the optimal rules to achieve the most accurate results were retrieved and input to simulate future land-use situations, i.e. 2016 and 2026. The achieved results represent a big conversion of green areas and open lands to built-up areas.

Monitoring of rice cropping intensity in the upper Mekong Delta, Vietnam using time-series MODIS data

Information on rice growing areas is important for policymakers to devise agricultural plans. This research explores the monitoring of rice cropping intensity in the upper Mekong Delta, Vietnam (from 2001 to 2007) using time-series MODIS NDVI 250-m data. Data processing includes three steps: (1) noise is filtered from the time-series NDVI data using empirical mode decomposition (EMD); (2) endmembers are extracted from the filtered time-series data and trained in a linear mixture model (LMM) for classification of rice cropping systems; and (3) classification results are verified by comparing them with the ground-truth and statistical data. The results indicate that EMD is a good filter for noise removal from the time-series data. The classification results confirm the validity of LMM, giving an overall accuracy of 90.1% and a Kappa coefficient of 0.7. The lowest producer and user accuracies were associated with single crop rain-fed rice class due to the mixed pixel problems. A strong yearly correlation at the district level was revealed in the MODIS-derived areas ( R 2 ⩾ 0.9). Investigation of interannual changes in rice cropping intensity from 2001 to 2007 showed a remarkable conversion from double to triple crop irrigated rice from 2001 to 2003, especially in the Thoai Son and Phu Tan districts. A big conversion from triple crop rice back to double crop rice cultivation was also observed in Phu Tan from 2005 to 2006. These changes were verified by visual interpretation of Landsat images and examination of NDVI profiles.

NGN 기반환경 에서의 VoIP QoS 관리체계 모델 설계

QoS(Quality of Service) is defined as collective effect of performance which determines the degree of satisfaction of a user of the service by ITU-T Rec. E.800. While the use of VoIP(Voice Over Internet Protocol) has been widely implemented, persistent problems with QoS are a very important sue which needs to be solved. This research is finding the assignment of VoIP QoS to deduct how to manage the control system and presenting the QoS control process and framework under NGN(Next Generation Network) environment. The trial framework is the modeling of the QoS measurement metrics, instrument, equipment, method of measurement, the series of cycle & the methodology about analysis of the result of measurement. This research underlines that the vulnerability of the VoIP protocol in relation to its QoS can be guaranteed when the product quality and management are controlled and measured systematically. Especially it`s very important time to maintain the research about VoIP QoS measurement and control because the big conversion of new network technology paradigm is now spreading. In addition, when the proposed method is applied, it can reduce an overall delay and can contribute to improved quality, in relation to signal, voice processing, filtering more effectively.

Invitation to Pluralist Public Philosophy

Schumaker, Paul . From Ideologies to Public Philosophies: An Introduction to Political Theory . Malden , MA : Blackwell Publishing , 2008 . ISBN: 978-1-4051-6835-9 ( 504 pp. , $49.95 ). Schumaker's book is a lucid and engaging introduction into the universe of political ideas. While primarily designed as a textbook, anyone interested in learning and thinking more deeply about political ideologies would benefit from reading it. The book does not aim to provide a detailed history of political thought or a comprehensive survey of canonical political thinkers. Rather, it presents the reader with descriptions of a variety of ideologies and their answers to fundamental political questions. By offering a rich repertoire of perspectives, and by encouraging critical comparative analysis, the book helps its readers-come up with their unique political outlooks. The book is organized in a rather unusual way. It opens with a general overview of the major ideologies of the past two centuries (e.g., classical liberalism, contemporary conservatism, fascism) and a wide array of current quasi-ideologies (e.g., democratic socialism, cosmopolitanism, Islamic fundamentalism). Each quasi-ideology is treated under one of four major headings: radical left, radical right, extreme left, and extreme right. After these introductory chapters, the book segues into a discussion of the various philosophical assumptions underlying these ideologies. Each chapter in this section of the book is devoted to the answers these ideologies provide to one specific and essential philosophical question, such as the problem of ontology (e.g., “Is ultimate reality essentially material, ideational, or supernatural?”), of human nature (“What are the basic human motivations?”), or of society (“What are the features of a good society?”). Examining the philosophical foundations on which political ideologies are built enables the reader to both understand and assess these ideologies more accurately. Finally, the last part of Schumaker's work is reserved for the so-called “perennial questions” of politics and the way these are approached by the various ideologies and quasi-ideologies previously discussed in the book. These questions range from the limits of government to the nature of rulers, from the desirability of change to the ideal distribution of wealth. The way the book is organized—by philosophical questions rather than by ideologies—renders some chapter-to-chapter repetition inevitable. While this might prove disruptive to more advanced readers, it is likely to facilitate and reinforce the learning of the basics of political thought for novice students. Given the increasingly polarized political environment in the United States, one major virtue of the book is the author's efforts to highlight the commonalities shared by liberals and conservatives, as well as the adherents of other ideologies that the author describes as “friends of pluralism.” Schumaker defines pluralism as “a public philosophy that affirms the legitimacy of many interests, identities, and ideas that often compete with one another and emphasizes democratic procedures for reconciling differences, if only tentatively and temporarily” (p. xiv). Pluralism, according to the author, is the most basic philosophy guiding politics in the United States and in many other countries today. Communism, fascism, or various forms of religious fundamentalism, on the other hand, reject the basic tenets of pluralism. As long as ideologies do not claim a monopoly on the nature of truth and the ingredients of the good life, they can safely be regarded as residing within the domain of pluralism. According to the author, a broad consensus is achievable within this domain through negotiations and democratic processes, even among people with initially different ideas. This, Schumaker explains, requires shedding dogmatism, absolutism, and rigidity, and cultivating empathy and tolerance instead. Admittedly, these are lofty goals easier said than achieved. Nevertheless, with its clear-headed, civil, critical (yet balanced) discussion of these crucial issues, the book inspires a sense of its possibility. Schumaker conceives of politics as one big conversation, and with this book, he invites the readers to enter it—as informed citizens, who are capable of respectfully listening to different voices that seek to be heard and thoughtfully evaluating their merits and limits. We believe it is an invitation worth accepting. PELIN KESEBIR (kesebir@illinois.edu) is a PhD candidate in Social Psychology at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. She holds a BA degree in International Relations and attended the 2007 Summer Institute in Political Ideology. CHI-YUE CHIU (cychiu@illinois.edu) is a professor of Psychology at the University of Illinois and a Business professor at the Nanyang Technological University. His research addresses the co-evolution of society, culture, and human psychology.

One Big Conversation: The Australia 2020 Summit

One Big Conversation: The Australia 2020 Summit

Third harmonic generation in undoped and X doped ZnO films (X: Ce, F, Er, Al, Sn) deposited by spray pyrolysis

There is a current interest in research of wide band gap semiconductor materials for the purposes of third order nonlinear optical properties in view of optoelectronics applications. Materials for nonlinear optics should present important changes of nonlinear intensity, dependence on changes of nonlinear refractive index, short response time, and weak absorption losses. We report the results of the third order nonlinear optical susceptibilities of undoped and doped (cerium, fluorine, erbium, aluminum, and tin) zinc oxide films using the third harmonic generation technique at 1064 nm wavelength region in picoseconds regime. Thin films were grown on glass substrate by the spray pyrolysis technique at different temperatures of substrates and characterized by using the x-ray diffraction, scanning electron microscope, transmission, and photoluminescence. A strong third harmonic signal was obtained from the studied films with a good crystallinity and roughness. We have found that at high conductivity, there is a big conversion of the third harmonic signal at different dopants and at an appropriate concentration. We might say that the morphology and the crystalline quality of the films are the main factors for this high conversion.

Constructed wetlands effluent for streamflow augmentation in the Besòs River (Spain)

There is nowadays a tendency in the south of Europe to recover the natural features of urban rivers as much as possible. The final part of the Besòs River (Spain) flows inside a heavily industrialized area in greater Barcelona. Following a classical model in the 1970s, the river was canalized, theoretically to reduce the high flow impact but in practice to gain flat areas where building was easy. The result was many artificially created impervious areas which made infiltration difficult, and the invasion of the river-related high-flow zones by industrial facilities and urbanized areas. Additionally, for several decades, the Besòs River was the most altered fluvial basin of Catalonia. Trying to improve the really bad conditions of that section of the river, a big conversion of part of its final section was undertaken in the 1990s. There, the low flow concrete channel was re-naturalized, bending it, and in the reclaimed bed surface an urban park and a tertiary wastewater treatment system were implemented. After treatment, the effluent directly enters the river, thus improving water quality. Water from the tertiary treatment, constructed wetlands, has the following percentage of removal if compared with the effluent of the activated sludge facility: 40% for suspended solids; 62% for COD; 20% for NH + 4-N; 58% for P; and 1.1 log U/100 mL for fecal coliforms.