Trends In Well-being Research Articles

Trends in Adolescent Health Risk Behaviors and Wellbeing: A 10 Year Observation from the EDIT Surveillance of Tuscany Region, Italy.

Background: The aim of this study was to evaluate the trends of prevalence of health risk behaviors (HRBs) and health conditions over a 10 year period (2008–2018) in a representative sample of adolescents of Tuscany Region, Italy. Methods: This was a repeated cross-sectional (four survey waves) study. The prevalence of 17 HRBs and health conditions were analyzed by age, sex, and socioeconomic status (SES). Results: A total of 21,943 students were surveyed. During the study period, decreases in smoking participation, cocaine use, driving under the influence of alcohol and drugs, and problem gambling were observed, while alcohol abuse and at-risk sexual behaviors remained unchanged or increased. Males resulted more frequently involved in most of the HRBs, while females more frequently reported physical inactivity, regular smoking, and not using a condom. Female participation in smoking and alcohol abuse behaviors, fruit and vegetable consumption, and bullying worsened over the study period. Smoking, poor dietary habits, physical inactivity, high distress level, and obesity were more frequently observed in low-SES students than in high-SES students. Conclusions: The findings showed different tendencies in adolescent participation in HRBs over the last decade; concerning trends in at-risk sexual behaviors and alcohol consumption and females’ risk-taking behavior on the rise require careful monitoring.

Mental Health and Well-Being Trends Through the First Year-and-a-Half of the COVID-19 Pandemic: Results from a Longitudinal Study of Young Adults in the USA.

This study examined longitudinal trajectories of young adults’ mental health and well-being before and throughout the first year-and-a-half of the COVID-19 pandemic. Repeated assessments of a young adult community cohort (N = 656; Mage = 25.6 years; 59.3% female) were conducted beginning prior to COVID-19 (January 2020) and extending through August 2021. Multilevel spline growth models estimated changes in three segments: (a) from pre-pandemic to April/May 2020, (b) from April/May 2020 to September 2020, and (c) from September 2020 to August 2021. Depression symptoms and loneliness increased significantly in the first segment, plateaued slightly, then decreased significantly across the final segment. Anxiety symptoms were unchanged across the first two segments, but significantly decreased in the final segment. Satisfaction with life decreased significantly across the first two segments, and then increased significantly in the final segment. Direct comparisons of pre-pandemic scores (January 2020) to the last follow-up (July or August 2021) showed a return to pre-pandemic levels of depression symptoms, loneliness, and satisfaction with life, as indicated by non-significant differences, and significantly lower anxiety symptoms, relative to pre-pandemic. Findings support concerns for young adults’ mental health and well-being in the initial months of the COVID-19 pandemic, but also indicate that young adults’ emotional well-being, on average, may be returning to pre-pandemic levels. Supplementary InformationThe online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s11121-022-01382-4.

Caring in the time of COVID-19, longitudinal trends in well-being and mental health in carers in Ireland: Evidence from the Irish Longitudinal Study on Ageing (TILDA)

BackgroundThe COVID-19 pandemic in 2020 resulted in the older population being asked to remain at home and avoid other people outside their household. This could have implications for both receipt and provision of informal caring. ObjectiveTo determine if informal care provision by older carers changed during the first wave of the COVID-19 pandemic from pre-pandemic care and if this was associated with a change in mental health and well-being of carers. Design and settingLongitudinal nationally representative study of community dwelling adults from The Irish Longitudinal Study on Ageing (TILDA) (Waves 3-COVID-Wave 6). MethodsWe studied a cohort of 3670 adults aged ≥60 in Ireland during the COVID-19 pandemic (July-November 2020) and compared with previous data collections from the same cohort between 2014-2018. Independent variables were caregiving status and caregiving intensity, outcome measures included depressive symptoms (CES-D8), Perceived Stress (PSS4) and Quality of life (CASP12). Mixed models adjusting for socio-demographics and physical health were estimated. ResultsCaregiving increased from 8.2% (2014) to 15.4% (2020). Depression, and stress scores increased while quality of life decreased for all participants. Carers reported poorer mental health, and higher caring hours were associated with increased depression and stress and decreased quality of life scores on average, and increased depression was higher for women. ConclusionsInformal caregiving increased during the pandemic and family caregivers reported increased adverse mental health and well-being and this continued throughout the early months of the pandemic. The disproportionate burden of depression was highest in women providing higher caring hours.

Burnout and well-being in otolaryngology trainees: A systematic review.

ObjectiveTo comprehensively review the recent published literature to characterize current trends of burnout and well‐being among otolaryngology trainees.MethodsStudy design: systematic review and meta‐analysis. A comprehensive literature review from 2000 to 2021 of studies related to otolaryngology resident burnout and well‐being, as well as the general topic of well‐being among surgical residents was completed. All included studies were summarized qualitatively. For the quantitative analysis, only articles reporting a Maslach burnout inventory (MBI), modified MBI or Mini‐Z‐ Burnout assessment were included.ResultsTwenty‐five articles were included in the qualitative summary and nine articles in the quantitative analysis. In the qualitative summary, trainees were reported to have increased levels of distress and emotional hardening compared to attending otolaryngologists. Total hours worked per week and female gender were associated with worsened well‐being. Residency program strategies to improve trainee well‐being include program‐sponsored wellness activities, dedicated wellness champions, and assistance with clerical burden. Implementation of protected nonclinical time has been shown to decrease burnout and increase well‐being among trainees. Moreover, formal trainee mentorship programs have also been shown to reduce trainee burnout and stress. In the quantitative analysis, rates of trainee burnout ranged from 29.7% to 86% with an overall trend towards reduced rates of burnout from 2006 to 2021. Utilizing a weighted average, the overall burnout among otolaryngology residents was 58.6%.ConclusionsRates of burnout remain high among otolaryngology trainees. Implementing formal mentorship programs and providing protected time during regular work hours appear to be effective tools to improve resident well‐being.

Gender difference in the change of adolescents' mental health and subjective wellbeing trajectories.

Gender differences in adolescents’ mental health problems have been extensively reported. Yet, there is limited research in exploring longitudinal trends in mental health and wellbeing between boys and girls. This study investigated any emerging developmental trends of gender differences in mental health problems and subjective wellbeing for young people from early to mid-adolescence in England. A longitudinal group of 8612 young people’s mental health and subjective wellbeing trajectories were investigated between the period of ages 11/12 and 13/14. Mental health difficulties and subjective wellbeing were measured using the child self-report Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire (SDQ) and Short Warwick and Edinburgh Wellbeing Scale (SWEMWBS), respectively. Any gender difference in the change of adolescents’ mental health and subjective wellbeing over 3 year period were estimated using multi-level regression while accounting for various socio-demographic and resilience factors. Young people are at increased risk of mental health problems between the ages of 11 and 14, particularly girls. The overall difficulty levels reported by girls were significantly higher than boys across a range of mental health problems and subjective wellbeing. These developmental trends persisted after controlling for a broad range of potential confounders. Young people has shown clear signs of mental distress as they get older. This escalation was particularly evident among girls. Distress can come at the time of significant physical, emotional, and social changes in an adolescents’ life, and can be heightened during secondary school transition. This evidence highlights the importance of early intervention to reduce risk of distress.Supplementary InformationThe online version contains supplementary material available at 10.1007/s00787-022-01961-4.

Developmental Trend of Subjective Well-Being of Weibo Users During COVID-19: Online Text Analysis Based on Machine Learning Method.

Currently, the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic experienced by the international community has increased the usage frequency of borderless, highly personalized social media platforms of all age groups. Analyzing and modeling texts sent through social media online can reveal the characteristics of the psychological dynamic state and living conditions of social media users during the pandemic more extensively and comprehensively. This study selects the Sina Weibo platform, which is highly popular in China and analyzes the subjective well-being (SWB) of Weibo users during the COVID-19 pandemic in combination with the machine learning classification algorithm. The study first invokes the SWB classification model to classify the SWB level of original texts released by 1,322 Weibo active users during the COVID-19 pandemic and then combines the latent growth curve model (LGCM) and the latent growth mixture model (LGMM) to investigate the developmental trend and heterogeneity characteristics of the SWB of Weibo users after the COVID-19 outbreak. The results present a downward trend and then an upward trend of the SWB of Weibo users during the pandemic as a whole. There was a significant correlation between the initial state and the development rate of the SWB after the COVID-19 outbreak (r = 0.36, p < 0.001). LGMM results show that there were two heterogeneous classes of the SWB after the COVID-19 outbreak, and the development rate of the SWB of the two classes was significantly different. The larger class (normal growth group; n = 1,229, 93.7%) showed a slow growth, while the smaller class (high growth group; n = 93, 6.3%) showed a rapid growth. Furthermore, the slope means across the two classes were significantly different (p < 0.001). Therefore, the individuals with a higher growth rate of SWB exhibited stronger adaptability to the changes in their living environments. These results could help to formulate effective interventions on the mental health level of the public after the public health emergency outbreak.

An Investigation into Art Therapy Aided Health and Well-Being Research: A 75-Year Bibliometric Analysis.

Considering the physical, and psychological impacts and challenges brought about the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), art therapy (AT) provides opportunities to promote human health and well-being. There are few systematic analysis studies in the fields of AT, which can provide content and direction for the potential value and impact of AT. Therefore, this paper aims to critically analyze the published work in the field of AT from the perspective of promoting health and well-being, and provides insights into current research status, hotspots, limitations, and future development trends of AT. This paper adopts a mixed method of quantitative and qualitative analysis including bibliometric analysis and keyword co-occurrence analysis. The results indicate that: (1) the current studies on AT are mostly related to research and therapeutic methods, types of AT, research populations and diseases, and evaluation of therapeutic effect of AT. The research method of AT mainly adopts qualitative research, among which creative arts therapy and group AT are common types of AT, and its main research populations are children, veterans, and adolescents. AT-aided diseases are trauma, depression, psychosis, dementia, and cancer. In addition, the therapeutic methods are mainly related to psychotherapy, drama, music, and dance/movement. Further, computer systems are an important evaluation tool in the research of AT; (2) the future development trend of AT-aided health and well-being based on research hotspots, could be focused on children, schizophrenia, well-being, mental health, palliative care, veterans, and the elderly within the context of addressing COVID-19 challenges; and (3) future AT-aided health and well-being could pay more attention to innovate and integrate the therapeutic methods of behavior, movement, and technology, such as virtual reality and remote supervision.

Religiosity Among Young-Adult Baby Boomers: Associations With Psychological Well-Being Over 45 Years

Past studies on the influence of religiosity on psychological well-being tended to be cross-sectional in nature and neglected generational differences. In this study, we assess how religiosity in early adulthood (mean age = 19) affects baby-boomers’ psychological well-being over the life course. We used waves 1 to 9 or 45 years of survey data from the Longitudinal Study of Generations (LSOG) (N=798), a sample of Southern Californians. First, we used latent class analyses on five domains to identify three typologies of baby boomers’ religiosity in early adulthood. We call these typologies “strongly religious,” “weakly religious,” and “personally religious.” Then, we used latent growth curve modelling to ascertain the influence of these religiosity typologies on psychological wellbeing from waves 1 to 9, controlling for time-invariant (religious affiliation, age, sex, race, parental income) and varying (religious salience, education, marital status, and annual income) factors. We found that the strongly religious have a consistently upward psychological wellbeing trend throughout the study period whereas wellbeing started to decline for the weakly religious and personally religious at around wave 6, on when they were about mid-40s to almost 50. We provide evidence that religiosity in early adulthood – a period in life characterized by the exploration of various options for the future brought about by greater personal freedom – positively influences baby boomer’s psychological wellbeing over the life course.

Campus sport experience as catalyst for college student adjustment and well-being

ABSTRACT Interest in college students’ adjustment is rising along with the expansion of the well-being trend. In particular, when individuals first enter a university, they are under stress and experience various challenges due to the new environment and tasks. While participating in and spectating sports provide numerous benefits at individual, interpersonal, institutional, community, and societal levels, the impact of sport-related experiences on well-being in the context of college students’ campus experiences has not been comprehensively addressed. Taking the findings into account, the purpose of this study was to investigate the impacts of participant and spectator sport experience on college student well-being through college adjustment and college life satisfaction. A total of 304 responses were collected from students who experienced both participant and spectator sport during their first-year in college. Results showed that participating in and spectating college sport did not directly affect college students’ well-being but indirectly influence college students’ well-being via college adjustment and college life satisfaction. Given the importance of college student adjustment and college life satisfaction, the findings shed light on participant and spectator sport as imperative determinants of college life well-being as well as provide practical implications in the college setting.

Well-Being and General Anxiety Among University of Michigan Dental Students

BackgroundAnxiety is one of the most prevalent mental health conditions, affecting approximately 1 in 9 people worldwide. More specifically, dental students have been considered vulnerable to anxiety despite the fact that dental students have also reported high levels of well-being. Therefore, we hypothesize that University of Michigan School of Dentistry (UMSOD) dental students pose high levels of well-being but suffer from anxiety. Our objective is to measure anxiety and well-being levels among UMSOD dental students for 2 consecutive academic years.MethodsDental students (N = 609) were surveyed for well-being and general anxiety levels. To assess well-being and anxiety levels we used the World Health Organization–Five Well-Being Index (WHO-5) questionnaire and the General Anxiety Disorder 7-item (GAD-7) scale, respectively. Surveys were sent through Qualtrics. For statistical analysis, chi-square and t test were used at p &amp;lt; 0.05.ResultsThe mean well-being score among dental students was 12.26 (SD = 1.14). In the first survey moment for anxiety, which coincided with the week before the spring break in 2017, approximately 39% of the respondents (n = 255) scored 10 or higher on the GAD-7, which means moderate anxiety. In the second survey moment, the week after the spring break week in 2017, we found a slight but not significant reduction in anxiety levels, with approximately 32% of the responses (n = 109) of the dental students scoring 10 or higher on the GAD-7. Incoming first-year dental students before starting the dental school program presented well-being mean of 18 (SD = 0.60). Only 13% of incoming first-year dental students scored 10 or higher on anxiety before starting the school program. By the fall term, the well-being mean among incoming first-year dental students dropped to 13.29 (SD = 1.32), and 22% of the incoming first-year dental students scored 10 or higher in the GAD-7.ConclusionsUniversity of Michigan School of Dentistry dental students posed poor well-being and moderate anxiety. Incoming first-year dental students posed higher well-being and lower anxiety levels before starting the dental education program. However, as the academic year developed, incoming first-year dental students suffered a decrease in well-being and an increase in anxiety levels. Our study indicates a trend of poor well-being and high anxiety among UMSOD dental students.

Understanding the potential and pitfalls of digital phenotypes to measure population mental health and wellbeing

BackgroundDigital phenotypes such as social media data are increasingly being used to infer supposed trends in population mental health and wellbeing. These methods are attractive for their potential scale and timeliness. However, many methodological aspects need investigation to establish if these approaches could be applied successfully. We aim to explore these challenges by linking digital phenotypes to high-quality epidemiological data in a birth cohort study. MethodsWe retrospectively linked social media data from Twitter for 661 consenting participants in the Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children, a multigenerational population cohort study. Participants volunteered their Twitter usernames, after a series of focus groups with 14 cohort participants about the acceptability of social media data linkage. Twitter data were used to test the effectiveness of inferring mental health and wellbeing from a range of sentiment analysis algorithms in combination with behavioural and temporal features. These methods were evaluated with participant-level survey data collected during the COVID-19 pandemic (April 9, 2020, to July 3, 2020), including with the Warwick Edinburgh Mental Wellbeing Scale, the General Anxiety Disorder-7 scale, and the Mood and Feelings Questionnaire. Ethical approval for the study was obtained from the Avon Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children Ethics and Law Committee, and informed consent was obtained from participants. FindingsTwitter provides a specific Application Programming Interface for academic research, granting free access to the full history archive and thus enabling the collection of data from cohorts. The focus groups determined that data linkage with Twitter and subsequent sharing is acceptable when data are anonymised. However, publicly available data such as Twitter data can be easily identifiable, and we are therefore exploring methods that would preserve privacy more effectively for data sharing. Our initial results show that temporal features have a key influence on the sensitivity and specificity of a model for the inference of wellbeing, anxiety, and depression when used in combination with textual and behavioural features. This influence varies depending on the specific outcome measure. Ongoing analyses will establish whether extrapolating successful models to alternative population samples is possible. InterpretationEarly results suggest that different mental health and wellbeing outcomes require individual models with uniquely tuned features. Cohort studies are a rich source of training data, but attention must be given to adequate anonymisation practices. FundingThis work was supported by the Health Foundation, the Alan Turing Institute, a Philip Leverhulme Prize to CMAH, and the Medical Research Council.

Determinants of Shielding Behavior During the COVID-19 Pandemic and Associations With Well-being Among National Health Service Patients: Longitudinal Observational Study.

BackgroundThe UK National Health Service (NHS) classified 2.2 million people as clinically extremely vulnerable (CEV) during the first wave of the 2020 COVID-19 pandemic, advising them to “shield” (to not leave home for any reason).ObjectiveThe aim of this study was to measure the determinants of shielding behavior and associations with well-being in a large NHS patient population for informing future health policy.MethodsPatients contributing to an ongoing longitudinal participatory epidemiology study (Longitudinal Effects on Wellbeing of the COVID-19 Pandemic [LoC-19], n=42,924) received weekly email invitations to complete questionnaires (17-week shielding period starting April 9, 2020) within their NHS personal electronic health record. Question items focused on well-being. Participants were stratified into four groups by self-reported CEV status (qualifying condition) and adoption of shielding behavior (baselined at week 1 or 2). The distribution of CEV criteria was reported alongside situational variables and univariable and multivariable logistic regression. Longitudinal trends in physical and mental well-being were displayed graphically. Free-text responses reporting variables impacting well-being were semiquantified using natural language processing. In the lead up to a second national lockdown (October 23, 2020), a follow-up questionnaire evaluated subjective concern if further shielding was advised.ResultsThe study included 7240 participants. In the CEV group (n=2391), 1133 (47.3%) assumed shielding behavior at baseline, compared with 633 (13.0%) in the non-CEV group (n=4849). CEV participants who shielded were more likely to be Asian (odds ratio [OR] 2.02, 95% CI 1.49-2.76), female (OR 1.24, 95% CI 1.05-1.45), older (OR per year increase 1.01, 95% CI 1.00-1.02), living in a home with an outdoor space (OR 1.34, 95% CI 1.06-1.70) or three to four other inhabitants (three: OR 1.49, 95% CI 1.15-1.94; four: OR 1.49, 95% CI 1.10-2.01), or solid organ transplant recipients (OR 2.85, 95% CI 2.18-3.77), or have severe chronic lung disease (OR 1.63, 95% CI 1.30-2.04). Receipt of a government letter advising shielding was reported in 1115 (46.6%) CEV participants and 180 (3.7%) non-CEV participants, and was associated with adopting shielding behavior (OR 3.34, 95% CI 2.82-3.95 and OR 2.88, 95% CI 2.04-3.99, respectively). In CEV participants, shielding at baseline was associated with a lower rating of mental well-being and physical well-being. Similar results were found for non-CEV participants. Concern for well-being if future shielding was required was most prevalent among CEV participants who had originally shielded.ConclusionsFuture health policy must balance the potential protection from COVID-19 against our findings that shielding negatively impacted well-being and was adopted in many in whom it was not indicated and variably in whom it was indicated. This therefore also requires clearer public health messaging and support for well-being if shielding is to be advised in future pandemic scenarios.

Family Policy and Child Well-Being: The Case of Montenegro in the European Perspective.

Family policies and family support measures have been identified as having major implications for child well-being, particularly through their role in influencing parental and family resources, circumstances and behaviour. The official approach to family policies focuses on opportunities for families to balance their work and family duties and care for their children. This paper analyses the type of policies available in Montenegro compared to the European Union. Potentially, Montenegro will become an EU member state, thus it is important to take a look at Montenegrin practice, as children should have equal life chances and protection of their well-being. Having a solid legal framework per se does not necessarily result in significant positive outcomes, and this paper analyses whether children in Montenegro have the same opportunities for development, in the context of family policies, as their counterparts in the rest of Europe. The focus of the paper will be on the criteria that define family rights and obligations, eligibility, availability and use of family policies in Montenegro. Based on the specific measures and datasets examined, the analysis considers the degree to which a period of family policy investment in Montenegro has been accompanied by improvements in child well-being and family resources, and undertakes comparisons in these regards with EU-wide family policy and child well-being trends. The paper uses a welfare state theoretical approach, with the focus on social investment and relevant data on children’s well-being obtained from the Eurostat, the OECD and the official national statistics.

Using word analysis to track the evolution of emotional well-being in nineteenth-century industrializing Britain

Happiness economics theorizes that economic growth is only tenuously connected to happiness. This article tests this theory on historical evidence by quantifying the trend in emotional well-being (EWB) of British men during the period of rapid industrialization between 1800 and 1900, using a digitized corpus of 19,682 pamphlets published in Britain during this period and held by JSTOR. EWB is measured between these years using a sentiment analysis method of quantifying the frequency over time of a set of positive-valence (“happy”) word groups relative to negative-valence (“sad”) word groups in the corpus, finding that it remains trendless throughout. This method thereby also provides insight into the quality of life of men during the Industrial Revolution.

Big-data Analytics: Exploring the Well-being Trend in South Korea Through Inductive Reasoning

To understand a trend is to explore the intricate process of how something or a particular situation is constantly changing or developing in a certain direction. This exploration is about observing and describing an unknown field of knowledge, not testing theories or models with a preconceived hypothesis. The purpose is to gain knowledge we did not expect and to recognize the associations among the elements that were suspected or not. This generally requires examining a massive amount of data to find information that could be transformed into meaningful knowledge. That is, looking through the lens of big-data analytics with an inductive reasoning approach will help expand our understanding of the complex nature of a trend. The current study explored the trend of well-being in South Korea using big-data analytic techniques to discover hidden search patterns, associative rules, and keyword signals. Thereafter, a theory was developed based on inductive reasoning - namely the hook, upward push, and downward pull to elucidate a holistic picture of how big-data implications alongside social phenomena may have influenced the well-being trend.

Analyzing households' consumption in Russia through cyclicality

Subject. The economic position of households is determined by expenditures out of public income. The standard of living of people correlates with phases of the cyclical development of economy. Objectives. We examine the consumption in Russia, considering the nominal and real income of the Russian people, expenditures incurred for the ultimate consumption. We also trace how standards of living change, as well as trends in the consumer demand in Russia during the economic crisis. Methods. Studying households' consumption in Russia given the economic cyclicality, we applied methods of logic and statistical analysis. Results. As the crisis aggravated in Russia during the coronavirus pandemic in 2019–2020, Russia's GDP insignificantly decreased by 3.1 percent, however households' consumption dropped by 8.6 percent. The consumer demand was found to distort in Russia, as people consumer less non-food products and tend to decline expensive food products. Such consumption trends stems from a decrease in income and, consequently, expenditures as people working as employees have their salaries cut and jobs become more scarce during the COVID-19 pandemic. Conclusions and Relevance. It is vital to bring the economy to its recovery and raise the standard of living by developing the middle class, which considerably shrank during the pandemic. Negative trends in people's wellbeing somewhat preserved macroeconomic indicators of the Russian economic development, since net export increased, currency remained within the countries because people mainly spend less on food and traveling. However, the Russian policy for economic development should pursue interests of the people, whose standard of living should be a priority.

FIXMYPOSE: Pose Correctional Captioning and Retrieval

Interest in physical therapy and individual exercises such as yoga/dance has increased alongside the well-being trend, and people globally enjoy such exercises at home/office via video streaming platforms. However, such exercises are hard to follow without expert guidance. Even if experts can help, it is almost impossible to give personalized feedback to every trainee remotely. Thus, automated pose correction systems are required more than ever, and we introduce a new captioning dataset named FixMyPose to address this need. We collect natural language descriptions of correcting a “current” pose to look like a “target” pose. To support a multilingual setup, we collect descriptions in both English and Hindi. The collected descriptions have interesting linguistic properties such as egocentric relations to the environment objects, analogous references, etc., requiring an understanding of spatial relations and commonsense knowledge about postures. Further, to avoid ML biases, we maintain a balance across characters with diverse demographics, who perform a variety of movements in several interior environments (e.g., homes, offices). From our FixMyPose dataset, we introduce two tasks: the pose-correctional-captioning task and its reverse, the target-pose-retrieval task. During the correctional-captioning task, models must generate the descriptions of how to move from the current to the target pose image, whereas in the retrieval task, models should select the correct target pose given the initial pose and the correctional description. We present strong cross-attention baseline models (uni/multimodal, RL, multilingual) and also show that our baselines are competitive with other models when evaluated on other image-difference datasets. We also propose new task-specific metrics (object-match, body-part-match, direction-match) and conduct human evaluation for more reliable evaluation, and we demonstrate a large human-model performance gap suggesting room for promising future work. Finally, to verify the sim-to-real transfer of our FixMyPose dataset, we collect a set of real images and show promising performance on these images. Data and code are available: https://fixmypose-unc.github.io.

Well-being and mental stress in the population study of women in Gothenburg, Sweden: cohort comparisons from 1980 to 2016 of 36-year trends and socioeconomic disparities in 38-and 50-year old women

BackgroundWomen’s lives have dramatically changed in recent decades as evidenced by trends in educational attainment, employment outside the home, income, and other socioeconomic factors. Self-reported health in 18–70 year old women has been reported to be significantly lower than in men. In Sweden, the 2005 National Public Health Report showed that stressful work environments have become more common, especially for women. The purpose of the study was to monitor trends in well-being and perceived mental stress in the populations of 38- and 50-year-old women and to examine associations with socioeconomic position (SEP).SubjectsIn 1980, 2004, and 2017, population-based samples of 38- and 50-year old women were recruited into the Prospective Population Study of Women in Gothenburg (PPSWG), Sweden. This population-based study included participants from selected birth cohorts to participate in health examinations, at similar ages and with similar protocols on each occasion.MethodsBirth cohort comparisons between three representative samples of 38- and 50-year-old women. Well-being (scale 1–7) and perceived mental stress (scale 1–6) based on questionnaires were the main outcomes studied in relation to time. Socioeconomic position (SEP) based on socio-occupational group, i.e. occupational and educational level combined, were examined as correlates of well-being and mental stress at different points in time.ResultsPerception of good well-being increased in generations of 50-year-old women between 1980 to 2016, but no significant time trends were seen in 38-year-old women. Perception of high mental stress increased between 1980 and 2016, for both 38-and 50-year-old women. Belonging to a low socio-occupational group was associated with lower perceived well-being in 1980 but not in 2016. Belonging to a low socio-occupational group was not associated with perceived mental stress at any examination.ConclusionsContemporary women of today have generally higher perceptions of well-being but also higher mental stress regardless of belonging to low or high socio-occupational group. Associations between poor well-being and belonging to a low socio-occupational group that were observed in 1980 and 2004 were not observed in 2016.The Prospective Population Study of Women in Gothenburg, Sweden was approved by the ethics committee of University of Gothenburg (Dnr 65–80; Ö564–03; 258–16). The studies comply with the Declaration of Helsinki and informed consent has been obtained from the subjects.

The effect of backside elements on the light emission of a plastic optical fiber assembly

With the recent increase in leisure time and wellbeing trends, the number of individuals who enjoy nighttime leisure activities has rapidly increased. Thus, the demand for luminous night safety clothing ensuring safety and that is also fashionable is increasing. Although higher visibility is important, studies on the influence of the backside elements of optical fiber materials on light emission are limited. The main components of the plastic optical fiber assembly in this study are the plastic optical fiber and backside elements, consisting of retroreflective material, and the backside sheet. The effects of the four types of retroreflective material, which are low, medium, high, and ultra-high luminance types, and the color of the backside sheet, white or black, on the luminance of the plastic optical fiber assembly are evaluated in bright, dusky, and dark environments. The results are analyzed using the statistical analysis software, SPSS 20.0. In the dusky environment, the plastic optical fiber assembly with prism material (80.78 ± 2.17) exhibits the highest luminance. However, there was no difference between the plastic optical fiber assembly with high- (38.52 ± 1.27) and medium-retroreflective material (36.76 ± 0.68). In the dark environment, the plastic optical fiber assembly with the prism material shows the highest luminance (66.83 ± 0.24), and there is no difference between the plastic optical fiber assembly with the low- (24.43 ± 0.42), medium- (24.63 ± 0.36), and high-retroreflective material (25.12 ± 0.42). Also, the luminance of the plastic optical fiber assembly with the white backside sheet is higher than that with the black backside sheet for all retroreflective material in dusky and dark environments. In summary, the optimal constitution of a plastic optical fiber assembly’s backside element is the retroreflective material of a prism type with the white backside color.

Implementation of a Multimedia Computing Healthcare Service Using a Voice Signal-Analysis Module and IR-UWB

As the population ages and the number of people with chronic diseases increases, society is changing from the existing diagnostic- and treatment-oriented medical services to preventive- and management-oriented medical services. This paradigm is named Ubiquitous Smart Healthcare. Various multimedia-based healthcare services are becoming especially key to health management in the smart age. In other words, technology, research, and integration of multimedia healthcare services, such as video data, voice data, IoT networks, and the like, are proceeding. Due to well-being trends and lifestyles of the aging society, medical services are rapidly becoming ubiquitous, in which the individual and the medical professional cooperate closely in hospital-centered treatment services to provide health management and promotion, and prevention of diseases. To realize this, various bio-signal measurement techniques based on multimedia are being studied and applied. Therefore, in this paper, we propose a remote voice signal-measurement system that combines two Impulse Radio Ultra Wide Band (IR-UWB) systems to provide a capable IR real-time location service, and we design and implement them. Also, we can reduce the complexity of existing voice signal–measurement algorithms, and we optimize the system by proposing a filter suitable for voice signal–measurement algorithms. As a result, we confirm that the voice signal can be measured by extending the measurement distance (based on wireless communications) by only about 3 m to 10 m. By applying the measurement and analysis method for voice-signal data in the wireless communication system environment, a healthcare service with improved reliability can be applied. In particular, it is possible to provide a multimedia healthcare computing environment in which new diagnostic data can be found and utilized in the field of multimedia-based healthcare service technology.