Flanders Belgium Research Articles

People, personalisation, prominence: A framework for analysing the PSM shift to digital portals and interrogating universality across contexts

In the context of enhanced platformisation, Public Service Media (PSM) are once again forced to rethink the ways in which they achieve core public values. To this end, PSM have been prioritising the development of their own video-on-demand portals. To contribute to ongoing research, we propose a theoretical framework that can be applied by future PSM work, based on the operationalisation of platformisation in PSM policy documents and strategy. We identify the shared priorities across ten media organisations in seven media markets: Belgium—Flanders and Wallonia-Brussels, Canada, Denmark, Italy, Poland, and the UK. The study is based on the qualitative analysis of 61 documents, outlining the PSM remit and how they report and present themselves to governments, collaborators, and audiences, contextualised by ongoing national and regional debates. Findings confirm that the framework of people, personalisation, and prominence can serve as a useful theoretical basis for understanding and interrogating universality across contexts.

P167: Informal activities may explain improved depressive symptoms and resilience in nursing home residents: A cross-sectional study in Dutch and Flemish nursing homes

Objective:Pleasant, meaningful, recreational or other activities are often used in depression treatment in nursing home (NH) residents. Residents may also undertake such activities alongside or without a treatment (informal activities). It is not clear if such informal activities can partially explain treatment effects. Our aim was to explore associations of depressive symptoms and resilience with informal activities in residents.Methods:We calculated product scores of frequency and pleasantness for activities from 18 activity clusters in NH residents (AIM, Activities to Improve Mood inventory, Knippenberg et al., in prep). The Geriatric Depression Scale, 8 items (GDS-8, Jongenelis et al., 2007) and the Brief Resilience Scale (BRSnl, Dutch translation, Leontjevas et al., 2014) were administered when interviewing residents. Professional caregivers filled out the Nijmegen Observer Rated Depression scale (NORD, Leontjevas et al., 2011). Spearman’s rho’s of 0.20 to 0.39 and of 0.40 to 0.60 were regarded as weak and moderate, respectively.Results:277 Dutch speaking NH residents (male, N=104, 38%), from Flanders Belgium (male, N=137, 49.5%) and the Netherlands participated in the study. We found positive weak associations between the self-reported and observer-rated depression scales (GDS-8 and NORD), and between the AIM total score and resilience (BRSnl). Negative weak associations were found for both depression scales and resilience, and for the depression scales and AIM. Individual AIM clusters showed positive weak to moderate associations between resilience and activities stimulating cognition (e.g. reading, puzzling), activities related to nature (e.g. walking in a park, activities with animals), or doing something meaningful for others (e.g. helping with daily routines or volunteering). Regarding depression, next to the three mentioned clusters, negative weak to moderate associations were also found for craft activities, social activities, and showing a positive mindset (e.g. humour, giving compliments).Conclusion:The results underscore the value of activities that residents may undertake on their own alongside or without a treatment. More research is needed to understand whether informal activities alongside or without a treatment may explain intervention effects (e.g. placebo effects) on depression or resilience, and how these activities may be used to improve treatment protocols.

Competencies of Sustainability Professionals: An Empirical Study on Key Competencies for Sustainability

This paper presents an empirical study on key competencies for sustainable development. Over a period of two years, we collected empirical data on competencies of senior sustainability professionals by using an action research approach. Data collection took place in Belgium Flanders via an elaborate iterative action-reflection process including an interactive workshop, interviews, and an online survey. Our analysis provides strong empirical evidence for the existence of two complementary competency clusters, namely sustainability research competencies and sustainability intervention competencies. Together they enable the profound analysis and understanding of sustainability issues and ensure the ability to devise solutions and foster change towards sustainability. Furthermore, we shed a first light on the interaction of these competency clusters and their link with the practitioners’ topical knowledge and lived experience. This study bridges the divergence in literature between theoretically and empirically driven research and offers novel insights on sustainability competencies for the fields of sustainability science, human resource management, and higher education.

Solitary, merge or collaborate. Determinants of collaboration of elderly care organizations: a case survey approach

Introduction : Traditionally, elderly care organizations play a pivotal role in integrating care for an ageing population, but recently this role has been challenged due to competition from other service providers, such as for-profit organizations, hospitals, home- and primary care organizations. In addition, the increasing complexity of current health care, combined with ageing and housing issues as well as rising co-morbidity in Belgium leads to a rising demand for collaboration. Not only do elderly care organizations have to deal with more and more tasks that are unique, but also are resources distributed across various service providers. As such, elderly care organizations are moving slowly from managing mainly physical assets such as housing facilities towards more intellectual and relational capacities and treatment services resulting into shared service centers and tailor-made health and social care solutions. Theory/methods : Although a number of factors have been proposed how to integrate health- and social care service delivery, collaboration pervades most discussions. We argue in this article that elderly care organizations follow a combination of three underlying strategic motives based on effectiveness, efficiency and legitimacy criteria to make a conscious, intentional decision to establish a relationship with other organizations for explicitly formulated purposes. We conceptualize these relationships as three ideal types: solitary, merger or collaboration and propose that the presence or absence of these types is explained by a combination of the changing nature in the task, the organizational configuration and its interdependency on others in the external environment. The article presents a case survey approach of 18 elderly care organizations. Data were collected in a five months period of time by using semi-structured interviews of key representatives and a survey. In addition, five workshops were organized and secondary data on elderly care organizations was collected. We applied Fuzzy-Set Qualitative Comparative analysis to analyze what, if any, combination of determinants explains whether elderly care organizations act solitary, merge or collaborate. Results, conclusion and discussion : Implications of the findings for elderly care organizations are discussed in light of the rising health care issues and increasing competition in Flanders Belgium. In particular, we are interested in which combinatory recipes, if any, of task, organizational configuration, and interdependency explain the presence or absence of a particular ideal type of collaboration. Furthermore, future recommendations are presented to further the development of how elderly care organizations can deal with their changing role in the healthcare system.

Environmental Impact Assessment (EIA) of Effluents from Constructed Wetlands on Water Quality of Receiving Watercourses

The amount of animal manure produced in Flanders—Belgium by intensive animal farming generates a surplus that needs to be treated in order to achieve quality objectives set by the Nitrates Directive (91/676/EEC) and the European Water Framework Directive (2000/60/EU). After the physical separation and biological nitrification/denitrification processes, the liquid fraction of manure can be cost-efficiently and effectively treated by constructed wetlands (CWs). However, current discharge criteria limits do not evaluate whether nutrient loads from specific point sources (such as CWs) affect the water quality of their receiving waterway. Thus, we investigated whether a site-specific analysis, based on local environmental conditions, would yield more relevant discharge thresholds. In the present study, a standardized framework was developed for environmental impact assessment (EIA) of effluents from CWs on the water quality of receiving watercourses. This framework was tested as a case study on a manure treatment installation located in Langemark—Belgium. The effect of different impact scenarios on water quality and flow of the effluent and the receiving waterway was studied. Standardized EIA guidelines and sensitivity analyses were applied to determine the expected impacts of total nitrogen (TN), total phosphorous (P), chlorides (Cl−) and sulphates (SO4 2−) on the receiving watercourse. From this study, we concluded that the methodology currently applied requires adaptation when assessing the discharge from wetlands as current estimations of impact are overly conservative when compared with actual impact. In addition, results showed that expected impact might be mitigated by differentiating discharge limits between dry and wet periods.

Epidemiology of pertussis in children of Flanders Belgium: can healthcare professionals be involved in the infection?

Pertussis is a communicable disease whose registration incidence in the Flemish region of Belgium has increased since 2003. Originally, this increment was obvious only in the province of Antwerp, but since 2012, there has also been an increase in the registered cases of pertussis in other Flemish provinces. The overall registration incidence for pertussis in Flanders was 5·6 per 100 000 in 2012. The majority of these cases were identified among young children, but older children and adults were also affected. Increased awareness, new diagnostic tools, better registration, waning immunity, and circulation of new strains were most likely associated with the increase in reporting. Although many of the pertussis infections we studied occurred within family units, several healthcare workers who had been in contact with young children were also identified as sources of pertussis. A number of these were index cases, while others were secondary infections. Finally, a fatal neonatal pertussis case is presented to illustrate the severity of the disease in young unvaccinated children.

Official reporting and newspaper coverage of road crashes: A case study

This paper describes a case study in Flanders–Belgium on the reporting rate of road crashes. Crash data from three sources were compared: official crash data, data retrieved from an insurance company and newspaper articles. A sample of 140 injury crashes with motorcyclists from an insurance company was used as the reference category. The purpose was to explore factors that contribute to the likelihood of crashes (not) to be reported in official statistics and newspapers. Logistic regression analyses and chi-square tests were used to reveal differences in reporting rate according to some variables. About 80% of the crashes with severe injuries were reported in the official statistics whereas the reporting rate for crashes with slightly injured was about 55%. Newspapers covered about 50% of crashes with severe injuries. The reporting rate in both official statistics and newspapers increased with the severity of the crash.

Food-related family lifestyle associated with fruit and vegetable consumption among young adolescents in Belgium Flanders and the Veneto Region of Italy

The present paper examined the relationship between fruit and vegetable consumption and food-related family lifestyle (dinner with parents, family food rules, and television viewing behaviors) in a sample of 14,407 adolescents from Belgium Flanders ( N = 7,904) and the Veneto Region of Italy ( N = 6,503) using multilevel binary logistic regression analyses. The data are part of the Health Behavior in School-aged Children cross-sectional survey. Daily dinner with parents, having more strict family food rules, and low television viewing behaviors were associated with daily fruit and vegetable intake. Watching television during meals was not associated with the outcome variables.

Soft drink consumption in adolescence: associations with food-related lifestyles and family rules in Belgium Flanders and the Veneto Region of Italy

The number of studies among adolescents that focus on several lifestyle behaviours and family rules as determinant of soft drink consumption are limited. The aim of this study is to investigate the associations between daily soft drink consumption, food-related lifestyles and family rules in adolescence. The data are part of the Health Behavior in School-aged Children (HBSC) cross-sectional survey. Adolescents between 11 and 16 years of age were included, resulting in a final sample of 14 407 adolescents representative of Belgium Flanders (N = 7904) and the Veneto Region of Italy (N = 6503). Binary logistic regression was used to test the association between soft drink consumption and food-related lifestyle (breakfast habits, family meals, snacking, meals in fast food restaurants and television viewing) and family rules (restriction and obligation rules) by region and gender. Each independent variable is significantly associated with daily soft drink consumption, despite some sub-groups exceptions. When we entered all the variables into the same statistical model, the positive association with daily soft drink consumption remained significant for frequent meals in fast food restaurants, television variables and low restriction rules. Breakfast during weekdays, evening meal with parents and obligation rules remained significant only in specific sub-groups and not the entire sample. Finally, the association with breakfast with parents and during the weekend disappeared. These findings suggest that considering gender and cultural differences, involving parents and limiting adolescents' exposure to television would increase the effectiveness of interventions aimed to reduce soft drink consumption in adolescence.

Evaluation and participation in secondary education: Designing and validating a self-evaluation instrument for teachers to solicit feedback from pupils

This paper describes the validation of a self-evaluation instrument for teachers in secondary education to solicit feedback from their pupils regarding specific aspects of the teacher's practice in class. This 92-item instrument – Teachers Learn from Pupils-Secondary Education (TLP-SE) – assesses 10 relevant classroom environment dimensions: effective learning time, structured instruction, monitoring pupil's progress, feedback, high expectations, reinforcement, work climate in class, promoting self-reliance, harmonic personality development, and recognizing autonomy. A sample of 1140 secondary education pupils (c.q. 69 classes) from Belgium–Flanders responded to TLP-SE. The instrument could be of interest for the larger community of teachers in secondary education since it combines teacher self-evaluation and pupil participation. Moreover, separate analyses of unidimensionality, validity, and reliability provide evidence of the sound psychometric properties of this self-evaluation instrument.

ROLES OF ENGOS IN NITRATE CONFLICT MANAGEMENT: CASE STUDY: THE NETHERLANDS AND FLANDERS, BELGIUM

In developed countries, conflicts between environmental interests and agricultural emissions can not be avoided. Within the legal formal perspective, it is often assumed that all environmental conflicts are solved through the legal-formal system. In reality, however, the conflict between environmental concern and agricultural practices is complicated by wide variety of interests and mere legal formal approaches will not be adequate to solve them. This conflict as it relates to nitrate emissions will be referred to herein as the ‘nitrate conflict’. The role of civil society, in this case the Environmental Non-Governmental Organizations (ENGOs), are often neglected in the nitrate conflict management. This study will document and analyze nitrate con.ict management in the Netherlands and Flanders Belgium, on the roles of ENGOs regarding the issue. Moreover, the research will emphasize the important role of ENGOs in civic engagement in developing democratic and just environmental management.

Recurrence risk of MS in relatives of patients in flanders Belgium

Recurrence risk of MS in relatives of patients in flanders Belgium