The psychological barriers facing MMR promotion campaigns

A focus group study of parents' attitudes towards interventions promoting uptake of the MMR vaccine suggests it is better for health advice to be seen as independent from government.

The findings come after the General Medical Council ruled yesterday that Andrew Wakefield, the doctor who first suggested a link between the MMR vaccine and autism, was guilty of serious professional misconduct.

The MMR vaccine protects children against measles, mumps and rubella. Unfortunately the number of UK parents vaccinating their children plummeted in the wake of Wakefield's 1998 Lancet study, since discredited and un-replicated, which purported to show a link between the MMR vaccine and autism. Today vaccination rates remain at around 85 per cent, compared with the desired rate of 90 to 95 per cent required for herd immunity (whereby even the unvaccinated are safe).

For the new study, Benjamin Gardner and colleagues analysed five focus group interviews they held with 28 parents in London. The parents were asked for their responses to three 'motivation-based' interventions (a website; an information pack; and parent-led group discussions) and three 'organisational interventions' (health care workers acting as immunisation champions; mobile vaccination units; legislation to penalise non-compliers).

Five key themes emerged. Parents felt they didn't have enough information, especially in relation to the dangers associated with not vaccinating. Government sources were not trusted. By contrast, other parents were trusted: 'Parents trust advice from other parents,' one mother said. '[You] take it on board. You listen to them.' Parents also revealed they were biased towards risk-related information. And they misunderstood balance, believing that pro- and anti-MMR arguments should be given equal weight even though the scientific evidence overwhelming favours MMR vaccination.

Gardner's team said a number of practical implications emerged from their findings. In particular, promotional MMR campaigns are likely to be better received if they appear to be independent of government and if they are fronted by parents. More information is needed about the risks of non-vaccination. And care should be taken when highlighting the small risks associated with vaccination - parents are likely to zoom in on these.

The researchers acknowledged their study has some limitations, most notably that the majority of the parents involved had actually vaccinated their children. Nonetheless, they said their results 'highlight important psychological barriers and facilitators that may determine whether MMR promotion interventions are effective.'
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Gardner B, Davies A, McAteer J, & Michie S (2010). Beliefs underlying UK parents' views towards MMR promotion interventions: a qualitative study. Psychology, health & medicine, 15 (2), 220-30 PMID: 20391239

Also on the Digest: How to promote the MMR vaccine.

Doubt cast on the maxim that time goes faster as you get older

Time gets faster the older you are. Or does it? When William Friedman and Steve Janssen asked 49 New Zealand undergrads (average age 21) and 50 older adults (average age 68) to say how fast time passed for them, including the last week, month and year, very few differences emerged. Most participants felt time passed quickly but it was only when considering the speed of the last ten years that the older adults said time had gone by more quickly than the younger participants, and even here the effect of age was small.

This finding, and another like it involving German and Austrian participants published in 2005, casts doubt on some of the classic explanations for time speeding up with age, including William James' suggestion that time feels slower when younger because it is packed with more memorable events. If true, you'd expect the effect to apply over time periods shorter than ten years.

Friedman and Janssen's initial study also undermined a novel explanation for time speeding up known as 'telescoping'. This is the idea that time feels faster when we look back on past events and discover that we underestimated how long ago they occurred. Earlier in the study, the researchers had asked their participants to estimate when 12 newsworthy events from the past had occurred, including Saddam Hussein's capture in 2003. By giving them false feedback on their accuracy, the researchers exaggerated or reduced the telescoping effect but this didn't have any effect on participants' subsequent ratings of how fast time goes by.

A second study, conducted on the internet, tested a novel explanation for time seeming faster to some people than others: feeling rushed. Nearly two thousand Dutch participants aged between 16 and 80 rated the speed of time and how rushed they felt in life. Once again, very few age differences emerged, with only the ten-year period being judged to have passed more quickly by older participants.

Age accounted for four per cent of the variance in how quickly participants said the last ten years had passed and just one per cent of the perception of time's speed in general. By contrast, how busy and rushed people reported feeling accounted for ten per cent of the variance in subjective speed of time. Consistent with this, women reported feeling more rushed than men, on average, and they perceived time to go by more quickly.

Quite why the idea that time speeds up with age is so widely believed requires further study, the researchers said. 'Another significant question,' they continued, 'is why age differences in the subjective speed of time are found when adults are asked to consider the last ten years but not present or only very weak when they report on the last year or more recent intervals.' The effect over ten years, they suggested, could simply be the self-fulfilling effect of the cultural belief that time speeds up with age.

'The answers to these questions,' Friedman and Janssen concluded, 'may shed light on a topic that has engaged philosophers and psychologists for more than 100 years.'
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Friedman, W., & Janssen, S. (2010). Aging and the speed of time. Acta Psychologica, 134 (2), 130-141 DOI: 10.1016/j.actpsy.2010.01.004

50 Father's Day Gifts Under $10

50 Father's Day Gifts Under $10
Father's Day usually finds me with more men in my life than money in my purse. I love to find great gifts for dad, father-in-law, grandfather, our priest. Here are 50+ Father's Day gifts all priced under $10 each. And not a tie on the list!
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Africa Safari: Arriving

One of the biggest highlights on my South Africa trip was the visit to the Kruger National Park.

Or most would call it: Safari.




A tourist attraction Africa has long been famous for.


to see animals! in the wild! or be seen.


More correctly known, Kruger National Park is one of the biggest game reserves in South Africa.

And after three days in Cape Town, that's where we were heading to.




If you see a green patch on where the arrow is pointing, that, my friend, would be the safari I'd be living in for the next three days. ;) *leaping in joy*


There are two ways to get to Kruger National Park:

One is to drive. Which of course would take you 24 hours on the wheel according to google maps, which meant realistically, it would take 3 whole days of driving.

So we opted for the second, more sane, choice, which was to fly.




It wasn't anything fancy, bigger than a propeller, smaller than an Ikea truck.

But the ride would get us to our destination in two hours instead of two days.


And then we arrived in probably the most beautiful airport in the whole of South Africa.




Looks like a long house to me. A long house that houses a family of 9 generations.

(or known as "rumah panjang" - a sort of native house in Malaysia that's incredibly long and will be extended whenever a new family in the family is formed)


And because unlike a normal traveler, we don't travel like normal traveler do, we travel in style.

Instead of camping out in the park like most budget-limited backpacker would, we were sleeping in the Safari chalet/hut on the park.




Equipped with air-cond and attached toilet.




My "neighbour" Pete insisted to be loyal to his brand and hung Nestle Drumstick banner outside his hut.




I could already imagine, having a glass of wine sitting outside the porch at night underneath the eerie moonlight in the middle of one of the biggest safari in the middle of no where in South Africa, this has got to be the life.


Although it also made the whole werewolf myth much ghoulish to tell, thanks to the venue.


Instead of driving aimlessly around ourselves in our own rented cars, we were driven around by professional park guides in gateless jeeps.




You know how most safaris in other parts of South Africa have their jeeps fenced up for tourists because they would feed the animals, aka lions, through the jeep to lure the animals, well, not in Kruger Park.

It's a good move because then wild animals would not turn to human or jeep-looking creature to look for food, hence they would not be dependent on us, or attack us when hungry.


imagine all the good food on the truck.


This gave us a lot of room and "visuals" to being in a safari. The feeling, I can tell you, is really overwhelming, and scary at times.




Though sometimes the closest animal that would get to our jeep was a possum looking animal that looked half like a rat and half a meerkat (think Timon from Lion's King movie).




Then on top of that, we have professional rangers driving these jeeps to look for animals for us!


playing with a rifle bullet by the ranger... woooo...


A service that's not cheap when you're forking out of your own pocket.

I was pretty hyped about the entire idea of living in the safari together with the animals.

Especially wild animals I don't get to see everyday, and definitely not in the wild.

Animals that otherwise would consider endangered, dangerous or too wild to be standing in the wild outdoor side by side.

It was all set. I packed my bags. Got on the plane. And ready for another three days of adventure.


The only problem, now, was that...

Well..

That morning, before I got on the plane to Kruger,

I flipped open a local English newspaper at the airport and this was the first article that was shoved at my face.




Read: "...Suspected poacher devoured by lions in Kruger National Park."

o.O........

First thing went through my mind:


"I'm F*cked."







Don't even pull the puppy dog eyes on me, missy.

I have my eyes on you. *two fingers eye to eye flipping back and front gesture*

Wedding Favours

Wedding favours are little tokens of appreciation given by the bride and groom to their guests. They are given either at the wedding ceremony or the wedding reception. Also known as bonbonnieres, wedding favours can be keepsake items, edible products or even donations to charities.

Once the theme of the wedding is established, you can select your wedding favours to compliment it. Finest Expressions carries a range of wedding favours for you to choose from, including keepsake items such as bottle stoppers, coasters, frames and candles. If you want to give your guests delicious edible favours, we carry a range of beautiful boxes, ribbons and tags as well.

Here are a few of our favours designs but we have much more in our wedding favours gallery, so be sure to check them out! All favours can be customized using your wedding colours and theme. (Minimum order of 25 required)

Mini-Gold Chest Favour Boxes with elegant personalized tags are perfect for weddings and other special events. Size 2 3/4"L x 1 3/4"W x 2"H
Colour availabilities: White & Gold


Brown Cone- Favour Boxes are made of delicate linen thread embossed pattern on paperboard box. Cones boxes can be used for bottle stoppers, edible favours, handing out bird seeds or paper confetti. We have paired these unique cones with baby pink ribbons and personalized tags. Size: 6"L x 1 5/8W x 1 5/8"H
Color Availabilities: Brown,White, Ivory
Pattern: Quilted, Floral, Plain

Below are a few of the Kate Aspen Favours we carry as well.

Please visit our website or email us for wedding favours inquiries. We'd love to help you make your special day unforgettable!

anniversary party info

what's up guys!!!!

can't believe the party is tomorrow, but i guess that means we can finally stop making waffles and chocolate dipped bacon and get back to business soon.

We are closing off the online ticket sales today at 3pm, so make sure you go get your tix immediately if you haven't yet. http://www.brueryprovisions.com/Anniversary-Celebration_c_179.html

Since we'd like anybody who wants to come to have the chance, we will release some tickets for sale at the door. They will be sold for a total of $43.50 and will be cash only.

For the Tasting Room fans, we are open tonight (friday) and even have Kogi BBQ stopping by, but we are completely closed for the Anniversary Party on Saturday and Sunday, so if you don't have tickets, you can't get in.

We will not be allowing growler fills at the party. Sorry, there will simply be too many people and it will tie up the draft lines.

If you are a Reserve Society member who ordered allocations of Melange #3 or 100% Barrel Aged Coton, it will be available for pickup beginning Saturday and Sunday and continuing at the Tasting Room after this weekend.

For the rest of you, or for RS members who want more beer, the general release of Coton will be available at the anniversary party for only $15. After this weekend it will jump back up to the normal price of $20 at the Tasting Room.

Finally, we can't wait to celebrate with all of you!!!!

Cheers.

The Bruery

Opera singing in the brain scanner

The idea that the brain changes and adapts according to how you use it, including through adulthood, is now widely accepted in psychology and neuroscience. Some of the most striking examples of this have come from studies of musicians. It's been shown, for instance, that string and keyboard players have more neural tissue given over to the control of the hands and fingers than do non-musicians. However, little researched until now is the brain re-organisation associated with professional singing.

Like the playing of a musical instrument, singing involves skilled muscle movements - indeed, more than 100 muscles are used - but there are also some differences between singing and instrument playing. For example, you can watch your own fingers tap out a tune on a keyboard but you can't 'see' your muscle coordination whilst singing.

Boris Kleber's team had 10 professional opera singers, 21 singing students and 18 non-singer controls lie in a brain scanner and sing 6 phrases from the first stanza of the Italian aria 'Cara mio ben'.

The most striking finding was that greater experience with opera singing was associated with more activation of the somatosensory cortex whilst singing. This part of the brain processes incoming signals from the body and the finding suggests that singing expertise is particularly associated with enhanced processing of where the vocal muscles are positioned in space. This makes sense given that you can't 'see' yourself sing and must instead rely on feedback from the vocal muscles.

As you might expect, studies with people who can play musical instruments have generally found increased activation of the primary motor cortex - a key brain area involved in sending commands to the muscles. However, in the current study, it was only the most experienced opera singers who showed exaggerated activity in this brain area.

Another neural characteristic associated with expertise in opera singing was more activity in the dorsolateral prefrontal cortex, an area involved in working memory. The researchers speculated this could be because opera singing usually involves singing and acting at the same time, so the experts may have developed 'more resources for performance monitoring'.

More singing experience was also linked with more activation in the inferior parietal cortex, possibly reflecting comparison of 'the actual kinesthetic feedback with the kinesthetic "expectation" for the produced sound', and with greater activation of the cerebellum - that's the cauliflower shaped structure hanging off back of the brain, which is known to be involved in coordination.

'Opera singers must routinely adapt their vocal system to unusual postures during singing as part of their stage play,' the researchers said. 'It is likely that this group has a particularly developed adaptive system to cope with such demands, which might require increased cerebellar involvement.'
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Kleber, B., Veit, R., Birbaumer, N., Gruzelier, J., & Lotze, M. (2009). The Brain of Opera Singers: Experience-Dependent Changes in Functional Activation. Cerebral Cortex, 20 (5), 1144-1152 DOI: 10.1093/cercor/bhp177