T-shirts Worn Research Articles

Language use in the construction of memory: A study of T-shirts inscriptions of graduating students

This paper examines the linguistic choices in the construction of memory on the T-shirts worn by graduating students at the University of Calabar and Cross River University of Technology, Calabar in Southern Nigeria. The study adopts multimodal discourse analysis and memory theories to account for the motivations behind the inscriptions, the situational meanings they communicate and the explication of the semiotic resources within the social context of the university environment. A total of 112 graduating students representing the target population participated in the study. The data were generated by means of semi-structured interviews while using audiotape recording and digital cameras as research tools to elicit the appropriate information. The findings show that the use of inscripted T-shirts has become a popular youth culture among graduating students in Nigerian universities purposively devised to re-enact memories of their complex experiences as students. As demonstrated by the participants, the T-shirt inscriptions reflect the collective (un)pleasant memories of achievement and self-fulfillment, relief and freedom, gratitude, leadership and challenges which transmitted via semiotic resources that portray peace, joy and social elevation. The messages are combined to covertly portray the deteriorating state of education in Nigeria and call for revamping strategies that could introduce a conducive environment, and a promising economy that would ease hardship on Nigerian students.

Assessing the consistency of shedder status under various experimental conditions

Shedder status is defined as the propensity of an individual to leave DNA behind on touched items or surfaces and has been suggested as one of the major factors influencing DNA transfer. However, little is known about whether shedder status is a constant property of an individual across multiple measurements or when the environmental conditions are changed. We have assessed DNA depositions of six males on 20 occasions to acquire a reference data set and to classify the participants into high, intermediate, or low shedders. This data set was also used to investigate how the probability of a correct shedder status classification changed when the number of DNA deposition measurements increased. Individual sweat rates were measured with a VapoMeter and data regarding hygiene routines were collected through a questionnaire on each sampling occasion. Next, we investigated how changes in the experimental conditions such as seasonal variation, hygiene routines, the temperature of the touched object, and repeated handling of an object influenced the DNA shedding. Additionally, we assessed DNA collected from the face and from T-shirts worn by the six participants to explore whether shedder status may be associated with the relative amount of DNA obtained from other body parts. Our results indicate that shedder status is a stable property across different seasons and different temperatures of handled objects. The relative DNA amounts obtained from repeatedly handled tubes, worn T-shirts, and from faces reflected the shedder status of the participants. We suggest that an individual’s shedder status is highly influenced by the DNA levels on other body parts than hands, accumulating on the palms by frequently touching e.g., the face or previously handled items harboring self-DNA. Assessing physiological differences between the participants revealed that there were no associations between DNA shedding and individual sweat rates.

Morphic Sensors for Respiratory Parameters Estimation: Validation against Overnight Polysomnography.

Effective monitoring of respiratory disturbances during sleep requires a sensor capable of accurately capturing chest movements or airflow displacement. Gold-standard monitoring of sleep and breathing through polysomnography achieves this task through dedicated chest/abdomen bands, thermistors, and nasal flow sensors, and more detailed physiology, evaluations via a nasal mask, pneumotachograph, and airway pressure sensors. However, these measurement approaches can be invasive and time-consuming to perform and analyze. This work compares the performance of a non-invasive wearable stretchable morphic sensor, which does not require direct skin contact, embedded in a t-shirt worn by 32 volunteer participants (26 males, 6 females) with sleep-disordered breathing who performed a detailed, overnight in-laboratory sleep study. Direct comparison of computed respiratory parameters from morphic sensors versus traditional polysomnography had approximately 95% (95 ± 0.7) accuracy. These findings confirm that novel wearable morphic sensors provide a viable alternative to non-invasively and simultaneously capture respiratory rate and chest and abdominal motions.

Sex-specific stress and biobehavioral responses to human experimenters in rats.

Important factors influencing the outcome of animal experiments in preclinical research are often overlooked. In the current study, the reaction of female and male rats toward the biological sex of a human experimenter was investigated in terms of anxiety-like behaviors and physiological stress responses, as measured by infrared (IR) thermography, circulating corticosterone (CORT) and oxytocin levels. Female rats displayed consistently exacerbated anxiety-related behaviors along with elevated body surface temperature during repeated exposure to male experimenters. Experimental stress further intensified thermal responses to a male experimenter, especially in female rats. The behavioral responses to a male experimenter in females were associated with higher circulating CORT and lower oxytocin levels. Similar responses were induced by a T-shirt worn by a human male. The findings suggest that psychophysiological responses of female rats to a male experimenter are influenced by both visual and olfactory cues. The results emphasize the need to not only consider sex differences in experimental animals, but also standardize and report the experimenter’s biological sex to avoid ambiguity in the generation and interpretation of results.

We Will Not Shut Up and Dribble: LeBron James and the Tripartite Human Being

On 15 February 2018, Fox News host Laura Ingraham ended her broadcast by responding to sharply critical comments that basketball stars LeBron James and Kevin Durant made about President Trump on the issue of race. Ingraham demanded that they “shut up and dribble,” to which James responded by creating a Twitter hashtag, #wewillnotshutupanddribble that adorned t-shirts worn during his next pregame warmup. In this essay, I contend that religion and sport come together throughout the “shut up and dribble” episode by way of a tripartite Christian anthropology of body, soul, and spirit that Ingraham is unwittingly conveying and James is adopting in his own way. This anthropology, as laid out in I Thessalonians and elsewhere, not only enables the reduction of Black human beings down to their body by silencing their souls, but also provides a framework for an athlete like LeBron James to counter these attacks.

The implications of shedder status and background DNA on direct and secondary transfer in an attack scenario

In court questions are often raised related to how trace DNA was deposited, directly during the crime or innocently for instance by secondary transfer. It is therefore of interest to have knowledge of the probability of transfer or secondary transfer in different situations. Factors that could influence transfer probabilities are background DNA and the shedder status of the involved persons. In this study, we have classified participants as high or low DNA shedders. We observed DNA transfer in a simulated attack scenario, and demonstrated that shedder status has a significant influence of transfer rates. We have examined the background DNA in samples from T-shirts worn in an area with frequent human traffic and detected multiple contributors. We further demonstrated that DNA from co-workers of a T-shirt wearer can be secondarily transferred from the environment and detected in samples, and that the composition of background DNA is correlated with the shedder status of the wearer. Finally, we have illustrated the inference with the results of transfer probabilities and a fictive case with the use of a Bayesian network.

A study of the suppression of body odour in elderly subjects by anti-fungal agents.

The suppression of body odour following the use of shampoos or soaps containing the anti-fungal agent miconazole nitrate (MCZ) has been recognized anecdotally. To determine whether MCZ could play a role in the suppression of body odour through inhibiting squalene oxidation. A prospective study recruited 54 elderly subjects residing in a nursing facility who needed bathing assistance. Subjects bathed with three types of body soap over a 6-week study period (regular soap, sample soap (soap containing MCZ), control soap; 2 weeks per type of soap). Body odour was evaluated based on olfactory assessment of the subjects and their clothing. The subjects and the examiners were blinded to the type of soap (sample or control) being used during the study. An analysis using GC/MS was also carried out to identify the volatile compounds associated with body odour. Suppression of unpleasant body odour of the neck and axilla was reported in subjects who used the sample soap. Three common volatile compounds were detected from the T-shirts worn by the subjects: 2-ethylbutanal, 6-methyl-5-hepten-2-one, and geranylacetone. The occurrence of these compounds was reduced using the sample soap. Our findings suggest that MCZ could play a role in the suppression of body odour.

Olfactory exposure to males, including men, causes stress and related analgesia in rodents.

We found that exposure of mice and rats to male but not female experimenters produces pain inhibition. Male-related stimuli induced a robust physiological stress response that results in stress-induced analgesia. This effect could be replicated with T-shirts worn by men, bedding material from gonadally intact and unfamiliar male mammals, and presentation of compounds secreted from the human axilla. Experimenter sex can thus affect apparent baseline responses in behavioral testing.

From Black Revolution to "Radical Humanism": Malcolm X between Biography and International History

From Black Revolution to Radical Humanism: Malcolm X between Biography and International History Malcolm X: A Life of Reinvention Manning Marable New York: Viking, 2011. 594 pp.Ever since his violent death at age thirty-nine, on February 21, 1965, African American activist Malcolm X has become more of a cultural icon than a properly understood historical figure, a sort of blank screen onto which a seemingly endless variety of people and groups have projected their fantasies, ideas, and visions. This, in a way, is a strange fate for someone so profoundly political.1 In popular culture, in varying national arenas, he has become a totemic posthumous presence. Around world he is nearly as likely as Che Guevara to be found on t-shirts worn by idealistic young people who actually know little if anything about him. In United States, identification of individual African with him transcends political orientation: he has been claimed as a model, for example, by Clarence Thomas, rightwing Supreme Court justice, as well as by Chuck D, leader of militant hip-hop group Public Enemy.2 He has even been adopted by parts of American mainstream: there are streets named after him, The Autobiography ofMakolm X is widely assigned in schools and colleges, and U.S. Postal Service formalized his national status by putting his image on a stamp in 1999.But it is really at international level that Malcolm's life after death has had particular resonance; recent anecdotal (and sometimes disturbing) evidence abounds. After election of Barack Obama to U.S. presidency in November 2008, alQaeda released a video featuring its then-deputy (now leader), Egyptian physician Ayman al-Zawahiri, who described president-elect Obama as a race traitor and hypocrite when compared to Malcolm X. This was not new rhetoric from alZawahiri, who had frequently held up Malcolm X (to whom he always referred by Malcolm's Arabic name, El-Hajj Malik El-Shabazz) as a paragon of honorable black Americans while attacking Colin Powell and Condoleezza Rice, during years of George W. Bush administration, as house negroes (harking back to Malcolm X's favorite pejorative description of moderate black American leaders who enjoyed support of white liberals).Toward end of his biography of Malcolm X, Manning Marable is quick to distance his subject from al-Qaeda's views of world, arguing that Malcolm would have certainly found attacks of September n, 2001, abhorrent - the negation of Islam's core tenets, as Marable puts it (487). This is a highly debatable point to which I will return. Nevertheless, al-Qaeda's embrace of Malcolm X (genuine or not) and al-Zawahiri's use of one of Malcolm's most famous speeches are revealing of a fascinating but thus far misunderstood historical development: transformation of a uniquely American public figure, seemingly product of specifically black American socio-historical circumstances, into a worldwide cultural, political, and religious symbol. In a way, al-Zawahiri's comments were already forecast more than twenty years earlier, when postrevolutionary Iranian government released a postage stamp featuring an image of Malcolm X to promote Universal Day of Struggle against Race Discrimination. These sorts of linkages between Malcolm X's politics and radical Islam were perhaps most notoriously put into action by John Walker Lindh, young white Californian from upper-class Marin County who was inspired, after reading Autobiography, to leave comfortable suburban America behind him and join Taliban forces in mountains of Afghanistan, where in 2002 he was captured by American troops.These few examples are suggestive of ways in which a full examination of Malcolm X's political and spiritual legacies can serve as a gateway for scholars seeking to understand dynamics of international history in last several decades, and particularly place of United States (and most specifically, black Americans) in a global context. …

Testing Mechanisms for Philanthropic Behaviour

This special issue of the International Journal of Nonprofit and Voluntary Sector Marketing presents a collection of nine papers testing mechanisms that drive philanthropic behaviour. By testing one or more specific mechanisms that were derived from the philanthropic literature, the authors of the papers in this special issue increase our understanding of philanthropic behaviour.

The T-shirt: canvas for signs of the times

Changes in T-shirt messages over time were compared with changes in the cultural milieu. Messages on T-shirts worn by college students on a Southeastern university campus were collected (152 messages in 1983 and 132 in 2006). The changes in US culture from the 1980s to the beginning of the twenty-first century were examined. The theoretical framework was based on the concept of the Zeitgiest. Messages were categorised and six categories were identified and named based on the content. Highly significant differences were found in distribution of messages among categories and distribution of messages between positive and negative categories for the 2 years. Messages were more likely to be negative/offensive in 2006 than in 1983, which is consistent with the declining cultural climate expressed in the Zeitgeist.

Individual Comparisons of the Levels of (E)-3-Methyl-2-Hexenoic Acid, an Axillary Odor-Related Compound, in Japanese

The (E)-3-methyl-2-hexenoic acid (E3M2H), an axillary odor-related compound, is known to occur in Caucasians. The aims of this study were to clarify whether E3M2H contributes to axillary odor in Asians and to quantify and compare individual levels of E3M2H. Quantitative determination of E3M2H was performed by means of gas chromatography-mass spectrometry of sweat extracted from the axillary areas of T-shirts worn for 24 h by Japanese subjects. The amount of E3M2H was 15.9-34.6 nmol/ml in six of 30 subjects. Our method succeeded in quantitative analysis of E3M2H from axillary sweat collected individually; we also showed that E3M2H could be detected in Asians. This is the first report in which the amount of E3M2H in axillary sweat was quantified on an individual basis and compared to reveal individual differences. The results of this study indicate that E3M2H might contribute to axillary malodor in Asians as well as Caucasians.

A “Cat Free” Zone in Schools?

Source: Almqvist C, Larsson PH, Egmar AC, et al. School as a risk environment for children allergic to cats and a site for transfer of cat allergen to homes. J Allergy Clin Immunol. 1999;103(6):1012–1017.In areas where there is little dust mite antigen, cat and dog allergens are the most common indoor sensitizers.1 Sensitization to these pets is significantly related to the presence of asthma.2 Consequently, parents of sensitized asthmatics are encouraged to remove these animals from their homes if present and to avoid any contact with these animals in other settings. These other settings include schools, which are a major site for exposure.3 In this article Almqvist et al in Stockholm looked at the possible mechanisms by which cat allergen is disseminated. They demonstrated that in those classes with few (<10%) cat owners the level of airborne Fel d 1 (cat allergen) was significantly lower than in those classes with many (>25%) cat owners, 0.59 ng/m3 vs 2.94 ng/m3 (p<.01). These levels were intermediate between Fel d 1 levels in homes with or without a cat, 19.8 ng/m3 (p<.001) and 0.15 ng/m3 (p<.001). In classes with many cat owners the airborne Fel d 1 levels did not significantly vary with the site of the sampling (ie, in the breathing zone of, nearby, or across the room from the cat owner). The levels dropped off significantly away from the breathing zone of the cat owner in classes with few cat owners. The level of Fel d 1 on new T-shirts worn by cat owners one evening and to school the next day was 3030 (900–15620) ng. The level of Fel d 1 on a new unworn T-shirt was 0.3 (0.2–2.2) ng (p<.001); this increased to 146 (86–234) ng on a non-cat owner after one day in school with cat owners. Although the airborne levels of Fel d 1 in homes of non-cat owners did not differ whether the student was in a class with few or many cat owners, the mattress levels showed a significant difference, 0.38 μg/g dust vs 0.85 μg/g dust (p<.01).Whether the airborne levels of Fel d 1 reported in the above article are sufficient to sensitize or to elicit asthma symptoms is unknown,4 but low doses of allergen can make the lungs more hyper-reactive.5,6 If this is the case, then in the future might we want to place cat allergic asthmatics in school rooms with fewer cat owners? This would be a difficult suggestion in our society. We now have tobacco smoke free environments for our children. But how far are we willing to change the environment of the group to benefit the few? I doubt that we would, or could, segregate cat owners even if we found that their breath and clothes were a danger to others. For the time being, studies must now be conducted that answer the question of whether the airborne levels of Fel d 1 reported in this article sensitize and/or provoke allergic symptoms.We won’t pussy-foot around: not only is the idea of separating children in school by their allergen exposures potentially discriminatory, it is purr-ticularly impractical.

Changes in Bone Mineral Density in Male Athletes

To the Editor. —Klesges and colleagues 1 present data that appear to have profound implications for active individuals. Male basketball players lost bone mass during a 1-year period, and it was determined that this was mediated by loss of enormous amounts of calcium through sweat. The following year, with calcium supplementation, bone mass was gained. However, before athletes rush to consume calcium supplements, several important questions must be addressed. The first questions relate to collection and analysis of sweat samples. The authors state that they followed the procedure described by Tipton et al, 2 but this does not appear to have occurred. Tipton et al 2 used the arm-bag method to collect sweat, whereas Klesges et al 1 extracted sweat from T-shirts worn under the athletes' regular jerseys. The authors do not establish that this method provides a valid estimate of sweat calcium concentration, and indeed it seems probable that

Changes in bone mineral density in male athletes

To the Editor. —Klesges and colleagues 1 present data that appear to have profound implications for active individuals. Male basketball players lost bone mass during a 1-year period, and it was determined that this was mediated by loss of enormous amounts of calcium through sweat. The following year, with calcium supplementation, bone mass was gained. However, before athletes rush to consume calcium supplements, several important questions must be addressed. The first questions relate to collection and analysis of sweat samples. The authors state that they followed the procedure described by Tipton et al, 2 but this does not appear to have occurred. Tipton et al 2 used the arm-bag method to collect sweat, whereas Klesges et al 1 extracted sweat from T-shirts worn under the athletes' regular jerseys. The authors do not establish that this method provides a valid estimate of sweat calcium concentration, and indeed it seems probable that

Human kin recognition by olfactory cues

T-shirts worn by individual children were correctly identified by the siblings and mothers of those children through olfactory cues alone. Furthermore, parents correctly distinguished between the odors of otherwise identical shirts worn by two of their own children. Bodily odors may therefore be salient stimuli for kin recognition among humans.