Engagement Index Research Articles

Shyness, social engagement, and conversational response times in children's dyadic interactions with an unfamiliar peer

AbstractTo be a desirable social partner and develop healthy relationships with peers, a child must be able to engage with peers across a variety of contexts. Understanding the factors supporting high levels of social engagement with peers is thereby essential, requiring the development of nuanced and ecologically valid indices of social engagement. Building on recent adult work, the current study explores conversational response time as a novel index of children's social engagement with peers in a dyadic context. This study further explores relationship between conversational response time and children's shyness. Fifty‐six 9‐ to 11‐year‐old children interacted with an unfamiliar peer in an unstructured setting and completed a self‐report measure of shyness. Children's behaviour was coded for their conversational RTs and overall social engagement. Faster conversational RTs were significantly related to children's own social engagement and marginally related to their partners' engagement. Moreover, higher shyness in children's partners predicted faster conversational RTs in children themselves. New directions for using conversational RT as an index of children's social engagement and implications for accounts children's social development are discussed.

Employee engagement index: A graph‐theoretic matrix approach

AbstractIn today's fast‐paced business environment, organizations are increasingly recognizing the critical role of employee engagement in attaining long‐term success and competitiveness. Industries increasingly utilize employee engagement systems to improve public perceptions by incorporating human resource management practices, psychological ownership, job crafting, and organizational citizenship behaviors. These elements are focused on reducing the effects of employee turnover. Therefore, this article aims to represent the factors and subfactors influencing employee engagement and develop an employee engagement index. In this research, an employee engagement index was formulated and the positive impact of factors influencing employee engagement was evaluated using a graph‐theoretic and matrix approach (GTMA). This index measures the number of factors in an organization conducive to creating an engaging environment among employees. It gives information about aspects at the system and subsystem levels. A step‐by‐step procedure for implementing methodology is provided, along with an example that may assist an organization.

Performance and symptom validity indicators among children undergoing cognitive surveillance following treatment for craniopharyngioma.

Performance validity tests (PVTs) and symptom validity tests (SVTs) are essential to neuropsychological evaluations, helping ensure findings reflect true abilities or concerns. It is unclear how PVTs and SVTs perform in children who received radiotherapy for brain tumors. Accordingly, we investigated the rate of noncredible performance on validity indicators as well as associations with fatigue and lower intellectual functioning. Embedded PVTs and SVTs were investigated in 98 patients with pediatric craniopharyngioma undergoing proton radiotherapy (PRT). The contribution of fatigue, sleepiness, and lower intellectual functioning to embedded PVT performance was examined. Further, we investigated PVTs and SVTs in relation to cognitive performance at pre-PRT baseline and change over time. SVTs on parent measures were not an area of concern. PVTs identified 0-31% of the cohort as demonstrating possible noncredible performance at baseline, with stable findings 1 year following PRT. Reliable digit span (RDS) noted the highest PVT failure rate; RDS has been criticized for false positives in pediatric populations, especially children with neurological impairment. Objective sleepiness was strongly associated with PVT failure, stressing need to consider arousal level when interpreting cognitive performance in children with craniopharyngioma. Lower intellectual functioning also needs to be considered when interpreting task engagement indices as it was strongly associated with PVT failure. Embedded PVTs should be used with caution in pediatric craniopharyngioma patients who have received PRT. Future research should investigate different cut-off scores and validity indicator combinations to best differentiate noncredible performance due to task engagement versus variable arousal and/or lower intellectual functioning.

Viewer Engagement in Response to Mixed and Uniform Emotional Content in Marketing Videos-An Electroencephalographic Study.

This study presents the results of an experiment designed to investigate whether marketing videos containing mixed emotional content can sustain consumers interest longer compared to videos conveying a consistent emotional message. During the experiment, thirteen participants, wearing EEG (electroencephalographic) caps, were exposed to eight marketing videos with diverse emotional tones. Participant engagement was measured with an engagement index, a metric derived from the power of brain activity recorded over the frontal and parietal cortex and computed within three distinct frequency bands: theta (4-8 Hz), alpha (8-13 Hz), and beta (13-30 Hz). The outcomes indicated a statistically significant influence of emotional content type (mixed vs. consistent) on the duration of user engagement. Videos containing a mixed emotional message were notably more effective in sustaining user engagement, whereas the engagement level for videos with a consistent emotional message declined over time. The principal inference drawn from the study is that advertising materials conveying a consistent emotional message should be notably briefer than those featuring a mixed emotional message to achieve an equivalent level of message effectiveness, measured through engagement duration.

Assessing the Impact of Social Determinants of Health on HIV Care Engagement in the Southern United States: A Cross-Sectional Study.

Recent studies have shown social determinants of health (SDOH) to impact HIV care engagement. This cross-sectional study (Oct 20-Apr 21) assessed the impact of a range of SDOH on HIV care engagement using data from HIV Care Connect, a consortium of three HIV care facility-led programs (Alabama, Florida, Mississippi). The exposures were captured using the PRAPARE (Protocol for Responding to and Assessing Patient Assets, Risks, and Experiences) scale. The outcome was captured using the Index of Engagement in HIV Care scale. Participants (n = 132) were predominantly non-White (87%) and male (52%) with a median age of 41 years. Multivariable logistic regression adjusted for various sociodemographics showed lower HIV care engagement to be associated with being uninsured/publicly insured, having 1-3 unmet needs, socially integrating ≤five times/week, and having stable housing. Factors such as unmet needs, un-/underinsurance, and social integration may be addressed by healthcare and community organizations.

Evaluating the Potential of Mesh Networks in Enhancing Rural Connectivity based on Internet of Thing

Rural communities struggle to connect to the internet, a phenomenon known as the digital divide. Mesh networks, with improved access in rural regions, might help to tackle this problem. From a social, economic, and scientific standpoint, this study investigated whether mesh networks may improve rural connectivity. This project developed and implemented methodologies to assess community participation, cost, and network coverage. Five well-known methods were pitted against these ones. Locals are working on a mesh node placement project in a rural location with diverse topography. In terms of network coverage, the Network Coverage Assessment revealed that the proposed approach frequently outperformed the most recent approaches. Finding the ideal locations for mesh nodes helped to tackle challenges in rural regions. After putting the strategy into effect, the Cost-Effectiveness Analysis revealed a positive ROI. Many alternative options seemed unprofitable. On the Community Engagement Index, the recommended method performed better than others. Participating in network activities with individuals from the local community helps to foster ownership and shared accountability.

Functional Outcome of Unilateral Peroneus Longus Autograft in Arthroscopic Anterior Cruciate Ligament Reconstruction

Objective: To evaluate the functional outcome of unilateral peroneus longus autograft in arthroscopic anterior cruciate ligament reconstruction Study Design: Cross-sectional study. Place and Duration of Study: Orthopedic Department, Combined Military Hospital, Lahore Pakistan, from Jul 2020 to Jun2021. Methodology: We included all the patients who underwent ipsilateral peroneus longus autograft for anterior cruciate ligament reconstruction. Fixation was achieved with a bio-absorbable screw on the tibial side and an endobutton on the femoral side. Lateral or medial menisectomy was performed according to the requirement. Post-op X-rays were done to assess the position of the endobutton and tibial tunnel. Eight millimetres tunnels were drilled, and the tendon was tailored accordingly. Results were assessed for pain, infection, range of motion and instability after three months of surgical procedure. Results: A total of 52 patients were included in the final analysis. The mean age of the study participants was 33.36±6.353 years. At the end of three months, pain 6(11.5%) and restricted range of motion 6(11.5%) were the common untoward outcomes reported by the patients. High body mass index and lack of engagement in physiotherapy had a statistically significant relationship with the presence of untoward outcomes in our study (p-value<0.05). Conclusion: Peroneus longus is a strong, robust autograft for anterior cruciate ligament reconstruction with excellent functional results. Very few patients had untoward effects, and those, too, were of mild intensity. Patients with high body mass index and those not engaging in physiotherapy emerged as high-risk patients for having untoward effects after the surgery.

1609. Engagement in Care, Awareness, and Interest in Long-Acting Injectable Anti-Retroviral Therapy

Abstract Background Long Acting Injectable (LAI) therapy to treat HIV is now a viable alternative to daily oral medications. The success of early roll-out of LAI to eligible patients requires a better understanding of patients’ awareness and interest in this novel therapy. Methods We administered an electronic survey to patients attending an urban HIV clinic in the US South (Duke University). Eligible participants were 18+ years old with a most recent HIV-1 viral load < 200 copies/ml, without any evidence of genotypic resistance to LAI components or chronic hepatitis B. Survey recipients were asked questions on their current treatment, their awareness and interest in LAI, and were asked to rate common benefits and concerns associated with LAI. After probing awareness of LAI, patients were provided further details on LAI for consideration for the rest of the survey. The survey also included the 3-item Brief Index of Engagement in HIV Care, a patient-reported measure of engagement in HIV care that has predicted future retention in care outcomes. Results Between January-April 2023, 480 patients were screened; 319 were found to be eligible, and 159 (50%) completed the survey. 73% were male; 44% Black, 7% Latinx; mean age was 49. The majority (119, 76%) were aware of injectable treatments, and 87 (56%) were interested in LAI. Among proposed benefits of injectables, ease of travel without pills, fewer medication interactions, and lack of daily pill-taking were most appealing. Among proposed concerns with injectables, out of pocket cost and insurance coverage of the new medicine were most worrisome. Black patients were more likely to be interested in LAI, and interested patients tended to be younger, single, and more recently diagnosed with HIV. Overall, patients surveyed were highly engaged in care (Mean 4.5/5, SD: 0.5)., but engagement was not predictive of awareness or interest in LAI. This table summarizes and compares the key patient characteristics between the patients who rated themselves interested or not interested in LAI Conclusion As we roll out LAI in real world settings, it will be helpful to characterize which patients are most interested in order to optimize uptake and benefit. Ease of travel without pills, not having to remember daily doses, and fewer medication interactions were the most appealing reasons, while concerns about both insurance coverage and out of pocket cost will need to be addressed. Disclosures Mehri McKellar, MD, Gilead Sciences, Inc: Grant/Research Support

EZH2 Inhibitors Enhance CART Cell Quality, Efficacy, In Vivo Homing, Tumor Cell Binding and Killing of Fully Syngeneic Primary B Cell Lymphomas, As Well As Reprogramming Lymphoma Cells to a Highly Immunogenic and T Cell Adherent Phenotype

Although having efficacy in a subset of diffuse large B cell lymphoma (DLBCL) patients, cellular immunotherapies are currently administered without guidance as to whether the underlying biology or immunology are conducive to durable response. Moreover, mechanisms explaining CART resistance in DLBCLs remain largely unknown. One critical missing link to address these unmet needs are syngeneic animal models precisely reflecting the genetics and immunology of human DLBCLs. To overcome these hurdles, we developed a suite of genetically engineered mouse models (GEMM) faithfully recapitulating different types of DLBCL. A retrospective study showed that C3/EZB DLBCLs, featuring EZH2 mutations and BCL2 translocation, experienced inferior outcomes after CART therapy. We reported that Ezh2 mutations cause aberrant repression of genes required for productive immune synapses with T cells. We hypothesized that this phenotype limits CART cell activity in vivo, and that EZH2 inhibitors could overcome CART resistance. We generated EZB GEMMs with conditional expression of Ezh2 Y641F and BCL2 in germinal center (GC) B cells. These mice developed T cell depleted lymphomas, histologically similar to human C3/EZB DLBCLs. We generated several EZB cell lines from these mice, which recapitulated the epigenetic, transcriptional, histological, and immune microenvironment of EZB DLBCLs in humans when engrafted in immunocompetent recipients. Strikingly, treating EZB cells with EZH2 inhibitor tazemetostat (taz) ex vivo reprogrammed them to re-express the full spectrum of T cell engagement genes such as ICOSL, ITGB7, 4-1BBL, and OX40L and rendered them highly immunogenic. For example, mixing endogenous T cells with taz pre-treated EZB cells yielded markedly enhanced killing (p<0.001). Taz pre-treated EZB cells failed to engraft in syngeneic mice due to immunological rejection, but caused fatal DLBCL in Rag1-/- mice. EZB cell lines did not undergo proliferation arrest after taz ex vivo, but showed a significant reduction in tumor burden (p<0.05) when treated in vivo, along with a 3-fold increase in tumor CD4 and CD8 cells (p<0.05), and 50% reduction in Tregs (p<0.01). Taz also increased the proportion of naïve/memory CD8 and reduced effector CD8 cells. EZH2 inhibitors therefore mediate their effects at least in part through immunological mechanisms. We next examined whether taz had any deleterious effect on CART cells. Pre-treating donor mice with taz prior to harvesting T cells yielded significant increase in memory CD8 CART cells after transduction (p<0.05). Taz pre-treated CART cells displayed superior killing of EZB cells (p<0.001) and proliferative capacity ex vivo (p<0.001). Infusing taz pre-treated CART cells in EZB mice resulted in significantly reduced tumor burden in vivo (p<0.001) and reduction in PD1+CD38+ exhausted CD8 CART cells (p<0.001). On the other hand, pre-treatment of EZB cells (but not CART cells) with taz ex vivo enhanced CART cell killing by 3-fold (p<0.001). Administering CART cells in vivo in EZB mice after taz treatment significantly prolonged their survival (100% vs 30%, p<0.01) and was associated with significant reduction in tumor burden assessed by IVIS and post-mortem examination. Therefore, EZH2 inhibition enhances CART cell activity through direct effects on CART cells, in addition to making EZB immunogenic. Finally, to directly demonstrate the functional consequence of rendering EZB lymphomas immunogenic on CART performance in vivo, we performed intravital 2-photon imaging of popliteal lymph nodes using dTomato labeled CART cells and GFP+ EZB lymphomas. Remarkably, pre-treatment of EZB cells with taz, doubled the recruitment of CART cells into lymphomas (p<0.001) and significantly enhanced the CART to EZB lymphoma cell surface engagement index (strength and duration of binding, p<0.001). This was associated with increased killing, and CART-engaged lymphoma cells were observed to be ingested/engulfed or phagocyted by tumor resident macrophages. Collectively, EZH2 inhibitors yield a potent boost to CART mediated anti-lymphoma effects by enhancing CART cell functions and B cell immunogenicity, which would likely yield a significant clinical benefit for these patients where CART cells are less active. These results prompted us to initiate a clinical trial evaluating the safety and efficacy of this combination in B cell lymphomas (NCT05934838).

The Index of Engagement in PrEP Care: Evaluation of Psychometric Properties and Predictive Potential.

The Index of Engagement in HIV Care is a psychometrically valid 10-item self-report measure with predictive power to classify individuals to higher and lower odds of disengaging from HIV care. Given high rates of disengagement from preexposure prophylaxis (PrEP) care, we adapted the HIV Index to PrEP. We evaluated the psychometric properties of the PrEP-Index in a cross-sectional validation among PrEP-eligible persons seen in an HIV Prevention Program and conducted exploratory analysis to assess its potential utility as a prognostic tool. The PrEP Index contains 10 items with answers ranging from (1) not at all to (5) extremely. Possible PrEP-Index scores ranged from 10 to 50, with higher sum scores representing higher levels of engagement. Study participants were cisgender men who have sex with men, and racially and ethnically diverse (non-Hispanic White = 39.2%). Factor analyses supported the 1-factor structure. Among 347 respondents, 118 individuals (34.0%) were available for predictive validity analysis. The PrEP Index score was positively associated with visit constancy at 6 months ( = 0.2261; 95% confidence interval: 0.0363 to 0.4051). Finally, a patient scoring 45 on the PrEP-Index will be classified as not returning within 6 months (sensitivity = 0.73, specificity = 0.65). The PrEP-Index is a psychometrically valid and reliable scale that demonstrates potential utility in identifying individuals at elevated risk of falling out of PrEP care by 6 months, the time point by which the majority of PrEP discontinuations occur. The PrEP-Index could be a useful clinical prognostic tool to allow for efficient resource targeting by clinics to improve engagement in PrEP care.

Neurophysiological responses to emotional faces predict dynamic fluctuations in affect in adolescents.

The ability to accurately identify and interpret others' emotions is critical for social and emotional functioning during adolescence. Indeed, previous research has identified that laboratory-based indices of facial emotion recognition and engagement with emotional faces predict adolescent mood states. Whether socioemotional information processing relates to real-world affective dynamics using an ecologically sensitive approach, however, has rarely been assessed. In the present study, adolescents (N = 62; ages 13-18) completed a Facial Recognition Task, including happy, angry, and sad stimuli, while EEG data were acquired. Participants also provided ecological momentary assessment (EMA) data probing their current level of happiness, anger, and sadness for 1-week, resulting in indices of emotion (mean-level, inertia, instability). Analyses focused on relations between (1) accuracy for and (2) prolonged engagement with (LPP) emotional faces and EMA-reported emotions. Greater prolonged engagement with happy faces was related to less resistance to changes in happiness (i.e., less happiness inertia), whereas greater prolonged engagement with angry faces associated with more resistance to changes in anger (i.e., greater anger inertia). Results suggest that socioemotional processes captured by laboratory measures have real-world implications for adolescent affective states and highlight potentially actionable targets for novel treatment approaches (e.g., just-in-time interventions). Future studies should continue to assess relations among socioemotional informational processes and dynamic fluctuations in adolescent affective states.

Engaged Hawks and Quiet Doves: Introducing the National Defense Engagement Index

Members of Congress reveal their preferences on an issue, not only in how they vote, but also how they spend their time. I introduce and validate a new measure of Congressional engagement in national defense, based on the amount of time and legislative energy a member spends on defense issues. I demonstrate the utility of this index through the reexamination of two key puzzles in the literature on Congressional defense preferences: how veterans and members with military interests vote relative to their peers. Using the National Defense Engagement Index (NDEI) I find that both veterans and members who have military industry in their districts are much more likely to be engaged with defense than other members of Congress. These results help to resolve discrepancies in previous literature and suggest the benefit of investigating member engagement as a key part of research on Congressional behavior.

Green Tweets or Not? The Sustainable Commitment of Higher Education Institutions

Higher education organizations are increasingly playing a key role in promoting Sustainable Development within society by disclosing information about applied strategies and achieved sustainable performance via social media. Consequently, platforms like Twitter have evolved into decisive tools for fostering accountability, establishing legitimacy, and displaying engagement to environmental sustainability. First, this paper aims to analyze the impact of published sustainable content on Twitter on the stakeholders’ online engagement level within British green universities ranked by the People & Planet University League. Second, the study intends to investigate the influencing factors that enhance online interactions. To attain the purpose a theoretical framework was established and a text mining analysis of 145,941 tweets was conducted to construct both a sustainable and a general online engagement index. Finally, a multivariate regression analysis was employed to create two models based on content type. The results reveal a heightened interest in engaging with sustainable content shared on the official Twitter profiles of the sampled universities in comparison to general information tweets. Furthermore, the findings indicate that organizational attributes, reputational factors, and considerations related to strategy design and implementation of sustainable policies, along with the sentiment polarity of the disseminated content, contribute to elucidating the attained level of online engagement. These factors work together to involve stakeholders in the pursuit of sustainable development goals within Green Universities.

A Mixed-Methods Feasibility Study of a Gamified Therapy Prescription App for Children with Neurodisability

Aim Determine the feasibility of a gamified therapy (occupational therapy, physiotherapy, speech pathology) prescription app developed for children with neurodisability for delivering school and home therapy programs (the Zingo app). Method A mixed-methods feasibility study was conducted with children (and their parents, therapists, and teachers) with neurodisability (n = 8, female= 5) who were prescribed a 4-week individualized therapy program by their usual treating therapist using Zingo. Primary outcome measures were program adherence, engagement, app quality, and user experience, collected with quantitative and qualitative methods. Results Mean adherence to the program was 58.0% (SD 27.2). Our combined Engagement Index (EI) score was 74.4% (SD 11.7). App quality measured using Mobile Application Rating Scale- User version was 4.6/5 (SD 0.7, n = 6) for parents, 4.6/5 (SD 0.5, n = 5) for teachers, and 4.4/5 (SD 0.6, n = 6) for therapists. Thematic analysis of semi-structured interviews yielded a primary theme of “app as motivator” for therapy. Conclusions Adherence findings were affected by COVID-19 outbreak however remain comparable with other studies in this cohort. EI findings compared favorably with other studies. The findings are supportive of the feasibility of Zingo for delivering home and school therapy programs for children with neurodisability and was found to motivate therapy program completion.

Citizen engagement and dialogic accounting through social media: a study of Italian regions

PurposeThis exploratory study aims to investigate the use of Facebook as a dialogic accounting tool for promoting citizen engagement in Italian regions.Design/methodology/approachThis study adopts a mixed methodology. Indeed, it first collects some quantitative data to construct an engagement index for the Facebook pages of the Italian regions, and then it performs a content analysis of some posts while also examining the tenor of the related comments and the level of interaction between regions and citizens.FindingsThe Italian regions have mainly used their Facebook pages for public communication purposes rather than for public participation. Therefore, they have conceived social pages more as an instrument of self-legitimisation and thus monologic accounting and have rarely considered them as a tool for engaging citizens who, in turn, showed low interest in participating in online debates. Nature and environment, tourism promotion and sport were the most engaging content types. Findings also confirm that posting many messages does not automatically increase engagement.Originality/valueThis study is one of the first to investigate the potential of social media from a dialogic accounting perspective, especially in the public sector. Additionally, it focuses on regions which are understudied in the literature, although they are critical actors in implementing public policies. Last but not least, this study offers a framework that integrates the literature on the use of social media for citizen engagement and research on such platforms as dialogic accounting tools.

Enhancing Retail Transactions: A Data-Driven Recommendation Using Modified RFM Analysis and Association Rules Mining

Retail transactions have become an integral part of the economic cycle of every country and even on a global scale. Retail transactions are a trade sector that has the potential to be developed continuously in the future. This research focused on building a specified and data-driven recommendation system based on customer-purchasing and product-selling behavior. Modified RFM analysis was used by adding two variables, namely periodicity and customer engagement index; clustering algorithm such as K-means clustering and Ward’s method; and association rules to determine the pattern of the cause–effect relationship on each transaction and four types of classifiers to apply and to validate the recommendation system. The results showed that based on customer behavior, it should be split into two groups: loyal and potential customers. In contrast, for product behavior, it also comprised three groups: bestseller, profitable, and VIP product groups. Based on the result, K-nearest neighbor is the most suitable classifier with a low chance of overfitting and a higher performance index.

Eye-Tracking–Based Measurement of Social Visual Engagement Compared With Expert Clinical Diagnosis of Autism

In the US, children with signs of autism often experience more than 1 year of delay before diagnosis and often experience longer delays if they are from racially, ethnically, or economically disadvantaged backgrounds. Most diagnoses are also received without use of standardized diagnostic instruments. To aid in early autism diagnosis, eye-tracking measurement of social visual engagement has shown potential as a performance-based biomarker. To evaluate the performance of eye-tracking measurement of social visual engagement (index test) relative to expert clinical diagnosis in young children referred to specialty autism clinics. In this study of 16- to 30-month-old children enrolled at 6 US specialty centers from April 2018 through May 2019, staff blind to clinical diagnoses used automated devices to measure eye-tracking-based social visual engagement. Expert clinical diagnoses were made using best practice standardized protocols by specialists blind to index test results. This study was completed in a 1-day protocol for each participant. Primary outcome measures were test sensitivity and specificity relative to expert clinical diagnosis. Secondary outcome measures were test correlations with expert clinical assessments of social disability, verbal ability, and nonverbal cognitive ability. Eye-tracking measurement of social visual engagement was successful in 475 (95.2%) of the 499 enrolled children (mean [SD] age, 24.1 [4.4] months; 38 [8.0%] were Asian; 37 [7.8%], Black; 352 [74.1%], White; 44 [9.3%], other; and 68 [14.3%], Hispanic). By expert clinical diagnosis, 221 children (46.5%) had autism and 254 (53.5%) did not. In all children, measurement of social visual engagement had sensitivity of 71.0% (95% CI, 64.7% to 76.6%) and specificity of 80.7% (95% CI, 75.4% to 85.1%). In the subgroup of 335 children whose autism diagnosis was certain, sensitivity was 78.0% (95% CI, 70.7% to 83.9%) and specificity was 85.4% (95% CI, 79.5% to 89.8%). Eye-tracking test results correlated with expert clinical assessments of individual levels of social disability (r = -0.75 [95% CI, -0.79 to -0.71]), verbal ability (r = 0.65 [95% CI, 0.59 to 0.70]), and nonverbal cognitive ability (r = 0.65 [95% CI, 0.59 to 0.70]). In 16- to 30-month-old children referred to specialty clinics, eye-tracking-based measurement of social visual engagement was predictive of autism diagnoses by clinical experts. Further evaluation of this test's role in early diagnosis and assessment of autism in routine specialty clinic practice is warranted. ClinicalTrials.gov Identifier: NCT03469986.

Medical mistrust of health systems as a moderator of resilience and self-reported HIV care engagement in Black and Latinx young adults living with HIV.

To study resilience and its association with HIV care engagement in a sample of young adult Black and Latinx people living with HIV (PLWH) in the United States and to test if a systems-level barrier, medical mistrust, would moderate the resilience-engagement association. Between April and August 2021, we recruited participants through social media and dating apps (N = 212) and verified age and HIV status through a review process of digital text-messaged and emailed photos. Participants completed a one-time online survey consisting of the Connor-Davidson Resilience Scale, The Index of Engagement in HIV Care, and the Medical Mistrust Index. We ran a regression-based moderation analysis using the Johnson-Neyman Technique to estimate regions of significance. The sample (N = 212) was 80.5% Black and 19.5% Latinx with a mean age of 25.8 years (SD = 2.84). Higher resilience scores were associated with higher HIV care engagement scores (b = 0.72, p = .003), and medical mistrust moderated this relationship as evidenced by a mistrust by resilience interaction (b = -0.16, p = .01). Our regions of statistical significance showed that as mistrust increased, the size of the resilience-engagement association decreased. Resilience may be a protective factor associated with greater participation and sense of connection to HIV care, but is diminished by mistrust of the medical system at large. This suggest that systems-level changes, in addition to individual-level interventions, are needed to address medical mistrust to fully harness the resilience of young PLWH. (PsycInfo Database Record (c) 2024 APA, all rights reserved).

How does the development of COVID-19 affect the public's engagement to fake news rebuttal microblogs?

COVID-19 infodemics are intertwined with the dynamic development of the pandemic. During infodemics, the challenges and difficulties are to reveal the dynamic evolution of public’s engagement to fake news rebuttals information and break through the bottleneck of previous static research. Motivated by this, fake news rebuttals engagement index (FNREI) is proposed to state the public engagement towards COVID-19 related fake news rebuttals. A total of 19,603 fake news rebuttals microblogs from Weibo are divided into four categories by latent dirichlet allocation (LDA): “status and confirmed cases of COVID-19″, ”transmission mode and living conditions of coronavirus“, ”prevention and detection of COVID-19″ and “overseas fake news and derivative events”. Time-varying parameter vector auto-regressive model (TVP-VAR) is used to explore the time-varying impact of the COVID-19 life cycle and the appearance of virus mutation (Delta, Omicron) on four categories of FNREI time series. The research results suggest that under the impact of different major events during the COVID-19 life cycle, the public's engagement to different categories of COVID-19 related fake news has different priorities, its duration and intensity is dynamically changing. This study explores the evolution of individuals’ engagement to fake news rebuttals information during the COVID-19 and provides a basis for improving fake news governance effectiveness.

Trajectories of early adolescents' perceptions of school motivation and effort during the pandemic in Perú: A four time point longitudinal observational study

In this longitudinal, observational study, following 883 adolescents (aged 11–15 years, grades 6th - 8th) we tracked changes in perceived school motivation and effort across four time points during the two years of remote education in Perú as a consequence of COVID-19 (retrospective reports before the pandemic, May 2020, July 2021, and November 2021). Compared to before the pandemic, levels of perceived school motivation and effort dropped sharply in May 2020 and continued to decrease across 2 years. Perceived school motivation was positively associated with perceived school effort at almost all time points. Furthermore, students with lower levels of perceived school motivation had a steeper decline in perceived school effort. In a subsample of 380 students in 8th grade, perceived school effort in July 2021 predicted objective math performance in November 2021. Our findings suggest that COVID-19 has further compounded decreases in subjective and objective indices of school engagement and performance that are typically observed in early adolescence. Our results from a large sample of low- to middle-class Peruvian adolescents highlight the experiences of youth in a country that had particularly long school closures, and that is under-represented in the literature.