Extended use of the Ariel Core Survey Data

The Ariel mission will execute an ambitious survey to measure transit and / or secondary eclipse spectra of the atmospheres of about 1000 exoplanets. I outline here some possible scientific applications of the exquisite Ariel Core Survey data, beyond the science for which they are primarily designed.

Protocol of the COVID-19 Health and Adherence Research in Scotland (CHARIS) study: understanding changes in adherence to transmission-reducing behaviours, mental and general health, in repeated cross-sectional representative survey of the Scottish population

IntroductionCOVID-19 has unprecedented consequences on population health, with governments worldwide issuing stringent public health directives. In the absence of a vaccine, a key way to control the pandemic is through behavioural change: people adhering to transmission-reducing behaviours (TRBs), such as physical distancing, hand washing and wearing face covering. Non-adherence may be explained by theories of how people think about the illness (the common-sense model of self-regulation) and/or how they think about the TRBs (social cognition theory and protection motivation theory). In addition, outbreaks of infectious diseases and the measures employed to curb them are likely to have detrimental effects on people’s mental and general health. Therefore, in representative repeated surveys, we will apply behavioural theories to model adherence to TRBs and the effects on mental and general health in the Scottish population from June to November 2020, following the initial outbreak of COVID-19.Methods and analysisRepeated 20 min structured telephone surveys will be conducted with nationally representative random samples of 500 adults in Scotland. The first 6 weeks the survey will be conducted weekly, thereafter fortnightly, for a total of 14 waves (total n=7000). Ipsos MORI will recruit participants through random digit dialling. The core survey will measure the primary outcomes of adherence to TRBs, mental and general health, and explanatory variables from the theories. Further questions will be added, enabling more detailed measurement of constructs in the core survey, additional themes and questions that align with the evolving pandemic.Ethics and disseminationEthical approval for this study was granted by the Life Sciences and Medicine College Ethics Review Board (CERB) at the University of Aberdeen (CERB/2020/5/1942). Results will be made available to policy makers, funders, interested lay people and other researchers through weekly reports and three bimonthly bulletins placed on the CHARIS website and advertised through social media.

The Prevalence of Prior Mental Health and Substance Use Problems in Older Persons and Their Families

Although research has shown mental health and substance use problems (MHSUPs) are fairly prevalent in older adults (OAs), less research has considered MHSUPs in hospice beneficiaries and their families. This secondary analysis filled this gap using the Health and Retirement Study’s Core survey wave from 2014 and Exit wave data from 2016. These data are nationally-representative of OAs aged 50+. Each biennial wave introduces an experimental module to a random 10% of Core survey participants. One Core 2014 experimental module included self-report indicators assessing past MHSUPs, like depression and anxiety, using single items. Exit 2016 proxy-reported information about respondent deaths was used to create a decedent subsample. Descriptive statistics established MHSUP prevalence rates in OAs and their family. The self-report depression indicator was validated against the 8-item Center for Epidemiological Studies Depression Scale (CESD-8) at the ≥3, ≥4, and ≥5 cut points using χ2 analyses. The full sample’s (N=1,461) average age was 68 years. Participants were mostly non-Hispanic (87.5%), White (72.8%), and female (59.7%). The decedent subsample (n=64) was bifurcated by hospice (54.7%) versus nonhospice (45.3%) utilization. Most participants in the full sample (63.9%), hospice decedent subsample (77.1%), and nonhospice decedent subsample (75.9%) endorsed at least one MHSUP. Depression and anxiety were the most common MHSUPs in each study sample. The CESD-8 was associated with the self-report depression indicator across all cut points (p<.001). Practitioners, policymakers, and researchers should consider the high prevalence rates of MHSUPs found in OAs and their families when designing programs, policies, and research.

Protocol CHARIS study

BackgroundThe COVID-19 pandemic has unprecedented consequences on population health, with governments worldwide issuing public health directives which have major impacts on normal living. In the absence of a vaccine, a key way to control the pandemic is through behavioural change: people adhering to transmission-reducing behaviours (TRBs), such as physical distancing, regular hand washing, and wearing face covering, especially when physical distancing is difficult. The application of behavioural science is central to understanding factors that influence adherence to TRBs. Non-adherence may be explained by theories of how people think about the illness (the common-sense model of self-regulation) and/or how they think about the TRBs (social cognition theory and protection motivation theory). In addition, outbreaks of infectious diseases and the measures employed to curb them are likely to have detrimental effects on people’s mental and general health. Therefore, in representative repeated surveys we will apply behavioural theories to model adherence to TRBs, explain variations in adherence, and the effects on mental and general health in the Scottish population from June to November 2020, following the initial outbreak of the COVID-19 pandemic.MethodsRepeated 20-minute structured telephone surveys will be conducted with nationally representative random samples of 500 adults from throughout Scotland. The first 6 weeks the survey will be conducted weekly, thereafter fortnightly, for a total of 14 waves (total n=7000). Ipsos MORI will recruit participants through random digit dialling. The core survey will measure adherence to TRBs, mental and general health, and explanatory variables from the theories. Further questions will be added, enabling more detailed measurement of constructs in the core survey, additional themes, and questions that align with the evolving pandemic. DiscussionThis study will provide insights into the link between (changes in) adherence to TRBs and explanatory factors, and their effects on mental and general health, including event-related changes (e.g., when government directives change). Governments and other decision-makers may use these findings to tailor public health promotion, target specific population groups, and develop behaviourally informed interventions over the duration of the COVID-19 pandemic (along with any subsequent equivalent events) to protect health and limit the spread of COVID-19.

Estimates of the Abundance of Cetaceans in the Central North Atlantic from the T-NASS Icelandic and Faroese Ship Surveys Conducted in 2007

The Trans-North Atlantic Sightings Survey (T-NASS) carried out in June-July 2007 was the fifth in a series of large-scale cetacean surveys conducted previously in 1987, 1989, 1995 and 2001. The core survey area covered an area of about 1.8 million nm² spanning from the Eastern Barents Sea at 34°E to the east coast of Canada, and between 52°N and 78°N in the east and south to 42°N in the west. We present design-based abundance estimates from the Faroese and Icelandic vessel survey components of T-NASS, as well as results from ancillary vessels which covered adjoining areas. The 4 dedicated survey vessels used a Buckland-Turnock (B-T) mode with a tracker platform searching an area ahead of the primary platform and tracking sightings to provide data for bias correction. Both uncorrected estimates, using the combined non-duplicate sightings from both platforms, and mark-recapture estimates, correcting estimates from the primary platform for bias due to perception and availability, are presented for those species with a sufficient number of sightings. Corrected estimates for the core survey area are as follows: fin whales (Balaenoptera physalus): 30,777 (CV=0.19); humpback whales (Megaptera novaeangliae): 18,105 (CV=0.43); sperm whales (Physeter macrocephalus): 12,268 (CV=0.33); long-finned pilot whales (Globicephala melas): 87,417 (CV=0.38); white-beaked dolphins (Lagenorhynchus albirostris): 91,277 (CV=0.53); and white-sided dolphins (L. acutus): 81,008 (CV=0.54). Uncorrected estimates only were possible for common minke whales (B. acutorstrata): 12,427 (CV=0.27); and sei whales (B. borealis): 5,159 (CV=0.47). Sighting rates from the ancillary vessels, which used a single platform, were lower than those from the dedicated vessels in areas where they overlapped. No evidence of responsive movement by any species was detected, but there was some indication that distance measurements by the primary platform may have been negatively biased. The significance of this for the abundance estimates is discussed. The relative merits of B-T over other survey modes are discussed and recommendations for future surveys are provided.

Measuring Public Attitudes Towards the Police

Given that there is currently no common approach used across Canada to measure public attitudes towards the police, the objective of this study was to develop an empirically-informed small subset of items that can be used by Canadian police services for this purpose. We recommend a standardized, comprehensive and validated set of 12 ‘core’ survey items to measure public attitudes towards the police. Police services across Canada can use them to capture public opinion in a way that is comparable between jurisdictions and track change over time. We also recommend a supplementary set of measures of socio-demographics, police-citizen contact, victimization experience, perceived safety and perceived disorder.

Core fragmentation and Toomre stability analysis of W3(H2O)

Context. The fragmentation mode of high-mass molecular clumps and the properties of the central rotating structures surrounding the most luminous objects have yet to be comprehensively characterised. Aims. We study the fragmentation and kinematics of the high-mass star-forming region W3(H2O), as part of the IRAM NOrthern Extended Millimeter Array (NOEMA) large programme CORE. Methods. Using the IRAM NOEMA and the IRAM 30 m telescope, the CORE survey has obtained high-resolution observations of 20 well-known highly luminous star-forming regions in the 1.37 mm wavelength regime in both line and dust continuum emission. Results. We present the spectral line setup of the CORE survey and a case study for W3(H2O). At ~0.′′35 (700 AU at 2.0 kpc) resolution, the W3(H2O) clump fragments into two cores (west and east), separated by ~2300 AU. Velocity shifts of a few km s−1 are observed in the dense-gas tracer, CH3CN, across both cores, consistent with rotation and perpendicular to the directions of two bipolar outflows, one emanating from each core. The kinematics of the rotating structure about W3(H2O) W shows signs of differential rotation of material, possibly in a disk-like object. The observed rotational signature around W3(H2O) E may be due to a disk-like object, an unresolved binary (or multiple) system, or a combination of both. We fit the emission of CH3CN (12K−11K), K = 4−6 and derive a gas temperature map with a median temperature of ~165 K across W3(H2O). We create a Toomre Q map to study thestability of the rotating structures against gravitational instability. The rotating structures appear to be Toomre unstable close to their outer boundaries, with a possibility of further fragmentation in the differentially rotating core, W3(H2O) W. Rapid cooling in the Toomre unstable regions supports the fragmentation scenario. Conclusions. Combining millimetre dust continuum and spectral line data toward the famous high-mass star-forming region W3(H2O), we identify core fragmentation on large scales, and indications for possible disk fragmentation on smaller spatial scales.

Expanding the North American Breeding Bird Survey Analysis to Include Additional Species and Regions

The North American Breeding Bird Survey (BBS) contains data for >700 bird species, but analyses often focus on a core group of ∼420 species. We analyzed data for 122 species of North American birds for which data exist in the North American Breeding Bird Survey (BBS) database but are not routinely analyzed on the BBS Summary and Analysis Website. Many of these species occur in the northern part of the continent, on routes that fall outside the core survey area presently analyzed in the United States and southern Canada. Other species not historically analyzed occur in the core survey area with very limited data but have large portions of their ranges in Mexico and south. A third group of species not historically analyzed included species thought to be poorly surveyed by the BBS, such as rare, coastal, or nocturnal species. For 56 species found primarily in regions north of the core survey area, we expanded the scope of the analysis, using data from 1993 to 2014 during which ≥3 survey routes had been sampled in 6 northern strata (Bird Conservation regions in Alaska, Yukon, and Newfoundland and Labrador) and fitting log-linear hierarchical models for an augmented BBS survey area that included both the new northern strata and the core survey area. We also applied this model to 168 species historically analyzed in the BBS that had data from these additional northern strata. For both groups of species we calculated survey-wide trends for the both core and augmented survey areas from 1993 to 2014; for species that did not occur in the newly defined strata, we computed trends from 1966 to 2014. We evaluated trend estimates in terms of established credibility criteria for BBS results, screening for imprecise trends, small samples, and low relative abundance. Inclusion of data from the northern strata permitted estimation of trend for 56 species not historically analyzed, but only 4 of these were reasonably monitored and an additional 13 were questionably monitored; 39 of these species were likely poorly monitored because of small numbers of samples or very imprecisely estimated trends. Only 4 of 66 “new” species found in the core survey area were reasonably monitored by the BBS; 20 were questionably monitored; and 42 were likely poorly monitored by the BBS because of inefficiency in precision, abundance, or sample size. The hierarchical analyses we present provide a means for reasonable inclusion of the additional species and strata in a common analysis with data from the core area, a critical step in the evolution of the BBS as a continent-scale survey. We recommend that results be presented both 1) from 1993 to the present using the expanded survey area, and 2) from 1966 to the present for the core survey area. Although most of the “new” species we analyzed were poorly monitored by the BBS during 1993–2014, continued expansion of the BBS will improve the quality of information in future analyses for these species and for the many other species presently monitored by the BBS.