Helper Network Research Articles

Examining Care Network Characteristics in Older Adults' Relocation to Residential Care Settings.

When older adults face increasing care needs or limited support, remaining safely and comfortably at home becomes challenging. Extant research has primarily concentrated on characteristics of the older adult or their primary caregiver on nursing home admission. This study examines the risk of older adults transitioning to residential care (e.g., assisted living, nursing home), focusing on the influence of their care network or involvement of multiple helpers. Using the National Health and Aging Trends Study, we conducted competing risk regression models that account for mortality, following 7,085 initially community-dwelling older adults across Rounds 1-9 (2011-2019). We assessed network composition, size, shared tasks, and the number of in-network specialists or generalists while controlling for individual sociodemographic and health factors. Individuals with care networks that shared medical tasks had the highest risk of moving to a residential care setting, followed by those sharing household tasks. Conversely, shared mobility or self-care and transportation responsibilities were associated with lower risks. Having more generalists, but not specialists, increased the risk. Larger networks were associated with heightened risk, although having close family members like a spouse was protective. The findings underscore that care network characteristics are critical to older adults' ability to age in place. Specifically, older adults with larger networks, lacking a spouse or child, and providing complex care are at greater risk for relocating. Understanding care networks can guide interventions related to care network coordination and resource allocation to help avoid or postpone a residential care move.

Direct recognition of pathogen effectors by plant NLR immune receptors and downstream signalling.

Plants deploy extracellular and intracellular immune receptors to sense and restrict pathogen attacks. Rapidly evolving pathogen effectors play crucial roles in suppressing plant immunity but are also monitored by intracellular nucleotide-binding, leucine-rich repeat immune receptors (NLRs), leading to effector-triggered immunity (ETI). Here, we review how NLRs recognize effectors with a focus on direct interactions and summarize recent research findings on the signalling functions of NLRs. Coiled-coil (CC)-type NLR proteins execute immune responses by oligomerizing to form membrane-penetrating ion channels after effector recognition. Some CC-NLRs function in sensor–helper networks with the sensor NLR triggering oligomerization of the helper NLR. Toll/interleukin-1 receptor (TIR)-type NLR proteins possess catalytic activities that are activated upon effector recognition-induced oligomerization. Small molecules produced by TIR activity are detected by additional signalling partners of the EDS1 lipase-like family (enhanced disease susceptibility 1), leading to activation of helper NLRs that trigger the defense response.

Networks in lockdown: The consequences of COVID-19 for social relationships and feelings of loneliness

This paper studies social network changes during the COVID-19 crisis in the Netherlands and their relation to perceived loneliness for the younger and the older cohorts. Arguments from opportunity theory and social capital theory are used to formulate hypotheses on network changes during the pandemic. Core discussion networks and networks with practical helpers from two representative cohorts (18–35 years of age and 65+ years of age, n = 1342 participants in both waves) during the lockdown in May 2020 are compared with networks of the same respondents in May 2019. We find that networks became smaller and more focused on stronger ties, while weaker ties more often decayed. Feelings of loneliness incsreased on average for all respondents and in particular for those who live alone or have a disadvantaged socioeconomic position. Importantly, the decrease in the number of the practical helper network, that is, decline in relatively weaker ties, affects experiences of loneliness in both groups.

Action Diana Budisavljević: The largest operation to rescue children in the Independent State of Croatia during World War II

This article deals with an almost forgotten and recently ‘rediscovered’ story of the autonomous humanitarian operation of Diana Budisavljevic, an Austrian woman who initiated one of the largest and most complex humanitarian operations in Europe during the Second World War. Thanks to her extensive network of staff and helpers, she led a large-scale rescue operation of some 10,000 mainly Serbian children from concentration camps in fascist independent Croatia. She provided support and shelter and kept evidence of 12,000 abandoned children. Despite the success of Action Diana Budisavljevic, this extraordinary story remained hidden from the outside world for almost 60 years.

Adverse Consequences of Unmet Needs for Care in High-Need/High-Cost Older Adults.

We explore adverse consequences of unmet needs for care among high-need/high-cost (HNHC) older adults. Interviews with 4,024 community-dwelling older adults with ADL/IADL/mobility disabilities from the 2011 National Health and Aging Trends Study (NHATS). Reports of socio-demographics, disability compensatory strategies, and adverse consequences of unmet needs in the past month were obtained from older adults with multiple chronic conditions (MCC), probable dementia (DEM), and/or near end-of-life (EOL) and compared older adults not meeting these criteria. Older adults with MCC (31.6%), DEM (39.6%), and EOL (48.7%) reported significantly more adverse consequences than low-need older adults (21.4%). Persons with MCC and DEM (53.4%), MCC, and EOL (53.2%), and all three (MCC, DEM, EOL, 65.6%) reported the highest levels of adverse consequences. HNHC participants reported more environmental modifications, assistive device, and larger helper networks. HNHC status independently predicted greater adverse consequences after controlling for disability compensatory strategies in multivariate models. Adverse consequences of unmet needs for care are prevalent among HNHC older adults, especially those with multiple indicators, despite more disability-related compensatory efforts and larger helper networks. Helping caregivers provide better informal care has potential to contain healthcare costs by reducing hospitalization and unplanned readmissions.

Caching Placement in Stochastic Wireless Caching Helper Networks: Channel Selection Diversity via Caching

Content delivery success in wireless caching helper networks depends mainly on cache-based channel selection diversity and network interference. For given channel fading and network geometry, both channel selection diversity and network interference dynamically vary according to what and how the caching helpers cache at their finite storage space. We study probabilistic content placement (or caching placement) to desirably control cache-based channel selection diversity and network interference in a stochastic wireless caching helper network, with sophisticated considerations of wireless fading channels, interactions among multiple users such as interference and loads at caching helpers, and arbitrary memory size. Using stochastic geometry, we derive optimal caching probabilities in closed form to maximize the average success probability of content delivery and propose an efficient algorithm to find the solution in a noise-limited network. In an interference-limited network, based on a lower bound of the average success probability of content delivery, we find near-optimal caching probabilities in closed form to control the channel selection diversity and the network interference. We numerically verify that the proposed content placement is superior to other comparable content placement strategies.

Secure Degrees of Freedom of Multiuser Networks: One-Time-Pads in the Air via Alignment

We revisit the recent secure degrees of freedom (s.d.o.f.) results for one-hop multiuser wireless networks by considering three fundamental wireless network structures: Gaussian wiretap channel with helpers, Gaussian multiple access wiretap channel, and Gaussian interference channel with secrecy constraints. We present main enabling tools and resulting communication schemes in an expository manner, along with key insights and design principles emerging from them. The main achievable schemes are based on real interference alignment, channel prefixing via cooperative jamming, and structured signalling. Real interference alignment enables aligning the cooperative jamming signals together with the message carrying signals at the eavesdroppers to protect them akin to one-time-pad protecting messages in wired systems. Real interference alignment also enables decodability at the legitimate receivers by rendering message carrying and cooperative jamming signals separable, and simultaneously aligning the cooperative jamming signals in the smallest possible subspace. The main converse techniques are based on two key lemmas which quantify the secrecy penalty by showing that the net effect of an eavesdropper on the system is that it eliminates one of the independent channel inputs; and the role of a helper by developing a direct relationship between the cooperative jamming signal of a helper and the message rate. These two lemmas when applied according to the unique structure of individual networks provide tight converses. Finally, we present a blind cooperative jamming scheme for the helper network with no eavesdropper channel state information at the transmitters that achieves the same optimal s.d.o.f. as in the case of full eavesdropper channel state information.

Asynchronous stochastic Boolean networks as gene network models.

Logical models have widely been used to gain insights into the biological behavior of gene regulatory networks (GRNs). Most logical models assume a synchronous update of the genes' states in a GRN. However, this may not be appropriate, because each gene may require a different period of time for changing its state. In this article, asynchronous stochastic Boolean networks (ASBNs) are proposed for investigating various asynchronous state-updating strategies in a GRN. As in stochastic computation, ASBNs use randomly permutated stochastic sequences to encode probability. Investigated by several stochasticity models, a GRN is considered to be subject to noise and external perturbation. Hence, both stochasticity and asynchronicity are considered in the state evolution of a GRN. As a case study, ASBNs are utilized to investigate the dynamic behavior of a T helper network. It is shown that ASBNs are efficient in evaluating the steady-state distributions (SSDs) of the network with random gene perturbation. The SSDs found by using ASBNs show the robustness of the attractors of the T helper network, when various stochasticity and asynchronicity models are considered to investigate its dynamic behavior.

How one trust developed its network of helpers

How one trust developed its network of helpers

Friends, family, or fools: Entrepreneur experience and its implications for equity distribution and resource mobilization

Who helps entrepreneurs raise the resources they need and how much equity does an entrepreneur distribute in return? We use a sample of 611 entrepreneurs in the U.S. to examine why some entrepreneurs are more likely than others to distribute ownership selectively to helpers. We find that entrepreneurs with specific industry experience and start-up experience are able to provide ownership more selectively and raise more resources from their helpers. We refine the categorization of social ties further to make a distinction between professional and familial ties to show that the ownership distribution and types of resource contributions vary by the mix of ties in the entrepreneur's helper network. Our findings have implications for theories of resource assembly, social structure and entrepreneurship, and organization design.

Po drugiej stronie bramy

The article tells the story of three neighboring families domiciled on Łowicka Street in Warsaw during the war – the Palesters, the Proners and the Grundgands. Henryk Palester lived in his own flat throughout the war even though he was of Jewish origin. His wife Maria cooperated with “Żegota” (Council for Aid of Jews) including Irena Sendler. She helped save, among others, her neighbor and friend Maria Proner. Janina Grundgand organized a whole network of flats and helpers. The article features fragments of the accounts and diaries of a few people she saved. The image that emerges is that of an extraordinarily brave, energetic and good woman, who not only helped to obtain papers, provided shelter and organized means of support, but also offered psychical support, self-confidence, feeling of security and hope. In turn, the neighbors, who remember Janina Grundgand (then Kulwiec) from the post-war period, recall her as an unfriendly, arrogant and selfish person and one with which they could not live under the same roof.

“The Kind Cooperation of Many Local Friends”: Deemster J. F. Gill's Search for Manx Folk Singers (1895–1898)

The activities of the Gill brothers—W. H. Gill (1839–1923) and Deemster J. F. Gill (1842–99)—as folksong collectors and editors in the Isle of Man in the 1890s have been largely overlooked to date. Instead, it is the other collectors of folksong in this period, namely Dr John Clague (1842–1908) and A. W. Moore (1853–1909), who have received the greater attention and acclaim. However, the recently released private papers of Deemster J. F. Gill allow for a reassessment of the work of both brothers in the area of folksong collecting and publishing. This paper deals with the preparations the brothers made for their collecting trips about the island in 1895 and 1898. It is evident from Deemster Gill's correspondence discussed here that he built up a network of helpers who were willing to find potential singers for him and his brother, besides affording them other kinds of assistance in the work of collecting. The members of the Demester's circle of helpers can all be clearly identified, allowing us to see just who was supporting folksong collecting in this period in the Isle of Man.

Use of Professional and Informal Support by African Americans and Caribbean Blacks With Mental Disorders

This study investigated the use of professional services and informal support among African Americans and Caribbean blacks with a lifetime mood, anxiety, or substance use disorder. Data were from the National Survey of American Life. Multinomial logistic regression was used to test the utilization of professional services only, informal support only, both, or neither. Analyses controlled for sociodemographic characteristics, disorder-related variables, and family network variables. The analytic sample included 1,096 African Americans and 372 Caribbean blacks. Forty-one percent used both professional services and informal support, 14% relied on professional services only, 23% used informal support only, and 22% did not seek help. There were no significant differences in help seeking between African Americans and Caribbean blacks. Having co-occurring mental and substance use disorders, having a severe disorder in the past 12 months, having more people in the informal helper network, and being female increased the likelihood of using professional services and informal supports. When men sought help, they were more likely to rely on informal helpers. Marital status, age, and socioeconomic status were also significantly related to help seeking. The significant proportion of black Americans with a mental disorder who relied on informal support alone, professional services alone, or no help at all suggests potential unmet need in this group. However, the reliance on informal support also may be evidence of a strong protective role that informal networks play in the lives of African Americans and Caribbean blacks.

Use of Professional and Informal Support by African Americans and Caribbean Blacks With Mental Disorders

This study investigated the use of professional services and informal support among African Americans and Caribbean blacks with a lifetime mood, anxiety, or substance use disorder. Data were from the National Survey of American Life. Multinomial logistic regression was used to test the utilization of professional services only, informal support only, both, or neither. Analyses controlled for sociodemographic characteristics, disorder-related variables, and family network variables. The analytic sample included 1,096 African Americans and 372 Caribbean blacks. Forty-one percent used both professional services and informal support, 14% relied on professional services only, 23% used informal support only, and 22% did not seek help. There were no significant differences in help seeking between African Americans and Caribbean blacks. Having co-occurring mental and substance use disorders, having a severe disorder in the past 12 months, having more people in the informal helper network, and being female increased the likelihood of using professional services and informal supports. When men sought help, they were more likely to rely on informal helpers. Marital status, age, and socioeconomic status were also significantly related to help seeking. The significant proportion of black Americans with a mental disorder who relied on informal support alone, professional services alone, or no help at all suggests potential unmet need in this group. However, the reliance on informal support also may be evidence of a strong protective role that informal networks play in the lives of African Americans and Caribbean blacks.

Den talande kroppen. Om samhällets beredskap att hantera sexuella övergrepp på barn

This essay explores giris' and women's disclosure and society's readiness to handle child sexual abuse. Disclosure and readiness is analysed both on an institutional and individual level. By tuming to empirical research on sexual abuse, women's stories about disclosure and concepts used in feminist ethics and moral philosophy, the author problematizes the questions of if, how and where disclosure, social support and healing can take place. She argues that voice and silence, two of the central themes in 20th century feminism, are also central to the experiences of sexual abuse victims and their need for social support. The question of how victims can be discovered or assessed is reframed to a question of what one is allowed to see and speak about in our society. Both the victim and her network of potential helpers are restrained in their abilities to know what has taken place, to speak about it and to act on it. Instead of understanding effects and symptoms of sexual abuse as exclusively medical or psychological problems, they can be perceived and interpreted as embodied communication. When subdued, excluded, deprived of justice and prevented from revealing the secret, the body of the survivor speaks instead. There is some empirical evidence that society's reactions to different kinds of sexual abuse disclosure are gendered. Female survivors have estimated female therapists as being more helpful and sexually abused women are at risk of being sexually exploited by male professionals. A deeper understanding of if (and how) responses to sexual abuse disclosure are gendered is lacking. However, when healing from the trauma of sexual violence, disclosure, justice and care seem to be important aspects of social support.

Counseling for Peace in the Midst of War: Counselors from Northern Uganda Share Their Views

This paper describes the way that counselors in northern Uganda are working to promote healing and build peace in a region plagued by war since 1986. In this area where the entire community is affected by the armed conflict, the counselors work as part of a community program. This paper attempts to describe (1) the background and nature of the northern Uganda conflict, (2) how counseling was established as part of a network of community helpers, (3) the complexity of counseling in the context of conflict, (4) how counseling is contributing to building long-term peace in the area, and (5) the challenges faced by counselors and their implications for others working in areas of armed conflict.

Who cares? The size, scope, and composition of the caregiver support system.

The informal care networks of 242 impaired older people were examined in terms of the primary caregiver and secondary helpers. Most primary caregivers had at least one secondary helper; 88% identified helpers who provided hands-on help, 19% reported that helpers contributed financially, and 44% had helpers involved in care decisions. The size of the network was larger for direct care compared to financial or decision-making assistance. Almost half of primary caregivers reported that their spouse helped. It was expected that after controlling for characteristics of the primary caregiver and of the older person, that characteristics of the secondary caregiver network would influence the amount and type of primary caregiver assistance and formal care used by the older person. However, both hours and type of care by the primary caregiver were independent of size, scope, and composition of the secondary helper network. This independence suggests that efforts to alter the secondary caregiver network may have limited effects on the primary caregiver.

Size of Informal Helper Network Mobilized during a Serious Personal Problem among Black Americans

The number of informal helpers who are utilized during a serious personal problem was examined among a national sample of black adults. Kin were more prevalent in the helper network than nonkin. Multivariate analysis indicated that network size was predicted by age, gender, income, familial contact, and type of problem. An interaction between age and having a child substantiated the importance of adult children in maintaining the informal support networks of older adults. The discussion highlights the significance of the informal network in providing assistance during a personal crisis.

Recruitment and Training of the Natural Helper for Geriatric Health Outreach

This paper, using a case study methodology, will analyze the qualifications recruitment and training of volunteer geriatric health outreach workers in a black inner city community in the midwest. The outreach program known as Project GOH enhances the network of natural helpers in the community through an organized program to provide support to the elderly and their families. Recommendations are made for the development of training programs for the elderly in other communities.

Aged blacks' choices for an informal helper network.

Research on the support networks of impaired elderly adults suggests that membership in sociodemographic subgroups influences use of specific informal helpers. This study explored the relationships of sociodemographic, health, and family factors to informal helper choice among a nationally representative sample (N = 581) of older (55 years and above) blacks (National Survey of Black Americans). Nine categories of helpers were examined: spouse, son, daughter, father, mother, brother, sister, friend, and neighbor. Logistic regression analyses revealed that marital status is important in selecting the categories of sister, friend, and neighbor. Presence of children decreased the likelihood that siblings and friends would be chosen. Perceived family closeness facilitated the selection of siblings but inhibited the choice of friends. Regional differences suggest a greater likelihood of selecting the categories of sister, friend, and neighbor among Southern residents.