BU Research Blog

Category / student research

15 July 2015

FoL event and an opportunity to get involved in co-creating conservation research

Festival of Learning, Public engagement, student research adiaz

On Sunday Anita Diaz and Gitte Kragh joined with Michelle Brown and Darren Cook from the National Trust (NT) to run a joint BU-NT FoL workshop on the special species of Studland. We introduced our 70 guests to the amazing NT Cyril Diver project where Citizen Scientists and BU staff, BSc, MSc and PhD students have worked together to repeat a classic 1930’s survey of all the wildlife of Studland.

meeting the plants

Our guests learnt how these surveys help conservation by helping us understand how species respond to environmental change over time. Then we invited our guest to participate in lots of face-to-face opportunities to meet up-close some of the wonderful wildlife!

snakes

and spiders

Guests stroked snakes, stared spiders in their (8) eyes and squeezed spongy sphagnum mosses as they learnt about their ecology and how we can help conserve these and other wildlife.

If you would like to volunteer on the Cyril Diver project, or just find out more, then please contact Michelle on

Michelle.Brown1@nationaltrust.org.uk

No experience is needed as there are experts on hand and it’s a great way to learn and contribute to conservation while having fun!

15 July 2015

Introducing Jo George, Undergraduate Research Assistant

Fusion, REF Subjects, Research assessment, student research zsheppard

Hello, I will be working within the Health and Social Sciences Faculty with Impact Champion, Zoe Sheppard, over the next six weeks on the endeavour to monitor and measure the impact of research.

My work will involve:

Exploring methods of dissemination
Conducting literature searches to investigate the demonstration of impact
Working on two research case studies from the Health and Social Social Sciences Faculty

I can be found in R613 and contacted at jgeorge@bournemouth.ac.uk if you have any ideas or challenges you’d like to discuss. I will be sharing my findings towards the end of my six weeks here.

I look forward to meeting you,

2 July 2015

Realist methodologies – it’s a case of C+M=O don’t you know

PG research, student research, Training aharding

Having led some seminars at BU, and dipped my toe in to teaching, as a useful mechanism and resource, I have often wondered what contexts make for a good workshop. It would be my suggestion that some or all of; insightful means of relating content; inspiring delivery; a variety of taught and practical exercises; and an opportunity to network and socialise are needed for an enjoyable workshop experience. These are the contexts which I hypothesize to be conducive toward a good workshop outcome. My experiences of workshops in my early career researcher and PhD journey to date have been mostly positive, but I have never experienced all of the above in equal high measure – UNTIL NOW!

This week I have attended a 3 day workshop on Realist Methodologies. The workshop was hosted by the University of Liverpool, but delivered on their London campus in the heart of the city’s financial district.

The content and resources was communicated and contextualised by facilitators Justin Jagosh (University of Liverpool), Geoff Wong (University of Oxford) and Sonia Dalkin (Northumbria University) in a manner that was informative, insightful and engaging. There was a good mix of taught material and hands on exercises. However, there were also chances to present and constructively discuss your work to the wider and interdisciplinary group, and opportunities for one on ones with the facilitators to discuss and (de)construct your own realist projects. In addition, there was also an opportunity to chat in an informal setting over some pizza, pasta, beer and gin & tonics! All of this led to enhanced reasoning, a mechanism, with an outcome of increased understanding.

So in a way that is succinct and accessible, what is realist methodology and what how can it be applied in research? I’ve actually dropped in some hints in the two larger paragraphs above… Before the methodology is outlined, firstly it is useful to discuss the philosophical position on which realist methodologies are based.

Critical Realism

Realist methodology and evaluation is underpinned by the critical realist philosophical works of the likes of Roy Bhaskar and Andrew Sayer (to name a few). This furthers a philosophical position that “…there exists both an external world independent of human consciousness, and at the same time a dimension which includes our socially determined knowledge about reality.” (Danermark et al., 2002: 5-6). On this basis, it is possible to be a positivist and objective ontologist (what is) whilst, at the same time, being an epistemological interpretivist (what it is to know).

Going deeper (stay with me!), Roy Bhaskar proposed three realms of reality. The actual, (objective entities that manifest in the real world), real (Subjective structures, phenomena and agency that act as causal mechanisms in the real world) and the empirical (Observable human consciousness and perspectives on the actual and real). As Easton states, “The most fundamental aim of critical realism is explanation; answers to the question “what caused those events to happen?”” (2010: 121).

Realist Evaluation

Based on this, and in the context of evaluating social programmes, realist evaluation is a research approach that seeks to ‘scratch beneath the surface’ and offer a ‘real’ and plausible account of “…what works for whom, in what circumstances, in what respects and how.” (Pawson et al., 2005: 21). It does so by proposing that the outcome (O) of social programmes or interventions rest the conceptual relationship between mechanisms (M) and context (C) – expressed as the ‘O=M+C’ formula.

However, integral to mechanisms are both resources (typically the programme or intervention) and reasoning. With it sometimes hard to adequately illustrate and distinguish these two characteristics in the CMO configuration, Dalkin et al (2015) propose a new iteration of Pawson and Tilley’s (1997) original CMO formula – expressed as ‘M(Resources) + C→M(Reasoning) = O’. I’m afraid you’ll have to come and ask me in person for my CMO configuration!

In conjunction with findings and evidence from existing literature to inform research protocols, this conceptual formula is used to gather data, and interrogate to ‘scratch beneath the surface’ as to what happens in social programmes and interventions, why, for whom and in what context. Finally, and importantly to note, realist evaluation has no methodological prescriptions – although it is particularly suited to mixed methods and qualitative research methods.

The realist methodology community is a very friendly and collegiate one. Do get in touch to discuss this approach. If I can’t help you (for example, I haven’t discussed realist synthesis – a kind of systematic review approach using the realist philosophy and CMO configuration), I can pass you on to someone who might be able to (The RAMASES JISCMail list is a good start).

My next workshop has a lot to live up to!

References

Dalkin, S. M., Greenhalgh, J., Jones, D., Cunningham, B. & Lhussier, M. 2015. What’s in a mechanism? Development of a key concept in realist evaluation. Implementation Science, 10.

Danermark, B., Ekstrom, M., Jakobsen, L. & Karlsson, J. C. 2002. Explaining Society: Critical realism in the social sciences, London, Routledge.

Easton, G. 2010. Critical realism in case study research. Industrial Marketing Management, 39, 118–128.

Pawson, R., Greenhalgh, T., Harvey, G. & Walshe, K. 2005. Realist review – a new method of systematic review designed for complex policy interventions. Journal of Health Services Research & Policy, 10, 21-34.

Pawson, R. & Tilley, N. 1997. Realistic Evaluation, London, Sage.

1 July 2015

BU publications in Taylor & Francis top 20 most read articles

PG research, Publishing, student research Zulfiqar Khan

SDRC has developed a significant research portfolio in collaboration with industrial partners within corrosion, corrosion modelling, corrosion simulation, in-situ and remote corrosion condition monitoring.

SDRC industrial partners in corrosion research include The Tank Museum at Bovington, Defence Science & Technology Laboratory Ministry of Defence and Wessex Institute of Technology.

SDRC researchers have delivered invited guest speaking on the above topics in corrosion at the University of Oxford, Cranfield University, Institute of Physics and University of Southampton.

This activity also led to organising the 1^st BU-International Tank Museums Conference at BU and organising a special session at the recent Contact & Surface conference that included solving corrosion issues through Surface Engineering.

Recent publication “Optimisation of interface roughness and coating thickness to maximise coating–substrate adhesion – a failure prediction and reliability assessment modelling” has made to the top 16^th in the top 20 most read Taylor & Francis publications list with 409 article views/downloads.

Another recent publication “Modelling of metal-coating delamination incorporating variable environmental parameters” now stands 2^nd in the above list with 1161 article views/downloads.

It is worth noting that the first publication was available since April 13, 2015 and the later publication was available since December 15, 2014. The rest of the papers (except one Feb 7, 2014) in the Taylor & Francis most read articles list were available since April-Aug 2012.

If you have interest in the above research area or would like to know more please visit SDRC webpage or contact

Dr Zulfiqar Khan (Associate Professor)

23 June 2015

Collaborative ethnography and undergraduate learning

Fusion, Public engagement, Research Ethics, Research Integritiy, student research Rosie Read

The value of providing undergraduate students with experience of conducting first hand, empirical research is widely recognised. As a social anthropologist, I’ve long been interested enabling students to discover and engage in ethnographic research. I’m presently developing a new taught unit in which for our BA Sociology and BA Sociology and Anthropology students will carry out ethnographic projects developed in collaboration with local community organisations. This endeavour necessarily poses challenges. One of them is time. Undergrad students’ learning is divided into units delivered over semesters, but a semester is very short time frame in which to design, carry out and write up an ethnographic project. The other is the nature of the collaboration with the non-academic partner, whether that be an NGO, community group, local government partner etc. How can this collaboration be shaped in a way which is beneficial to both parties?

IUPUI students visiting a housing redevelopment scheme in a lower income neighbourhood, Indianapolis, February 2015.

This term I have visited IUPUI (Indiana University Purdue University in Indianapolis), USA. IUPUI is a public university in which dialogue and engagement between faculty and students, on the one hand, and citizens, organisations and businesses, on the other, is a priority for both teaching and research. My visits have provided me with an opportunity to see a diverse range of ways in which this dialogue is promoted and sustained. Here I will summarise some of the strategies I have seen in action at IUPUI which are most pertinent to the kinds of collaborative, community-engaged student ethnographic projects I hope to develop at BU.

1. Investing time
The importance of investing time in developing relationships with local organisations which will have a stake in the research cannot be overstated. Whoever the partner is and whatever the nature of the collaboration, the project is enormously enhanced when both parties make time to talk to each other, arrive at a suitable, realisable aim of the project, and figure out how they are going to achieve it within the fixed timescale. This is of course easy to state and much harder to realise, as it involves all parties investing a very scarce resource, time, into the process. I followed an ethnographic research methods course closely during my visits, a project exploring urban regeneration within a low-income neighbourhood. This made clear the benefits of that early investment of time. Both the academic course leader and management, staff and volunteers at the community development organisation in the local area set aside considerable time in identifying the possibilities and foci of student research projects, long before the teaching proper started. This communication and collaboration also continued throughout the course itself, adjusting to changing and contingent circumstances as the student research projects progressed.

2. Framing the question
Central to the process above is negotiating the research question; what is it that the students will research and why? The question needs to address the interests and priorities of both partners. It must contain the potential for students to formulate their empirical focus and interpret their data in the light of theories and critical questions within their disciplines, and to produce findings which are of some benefit or use to non-academic partners, organisations and citizens. At IUPUI, I found out about series of student projects on urban development issues such as poverty, homelessness, housing, city regeneration strategies, gentrification and food production and consumption, to name some of them. These kinds of topics resulted in findings and interpretations which had both critical value as pieces of academic work and practical value to local people and organisations.

3. Moving teaching to community settings
I closely followed two courses which were taught off-campus in community settings – one in a church / community centre, the other in a women’s correctional facility. The success of any ethnographic project hinges on proximity and familiarity and so establishing this sense of closeness is obviously of enormous value to students. Teaching in a setting within which students will find an immediate mutuality of interest in their engagement with the people and organisations they are going to study helps students think of themselves as ethnographers. It provides the basis for developing relationships, trust, access and cooperation within the community, and for fostering local understanding of what the project is about. This is also a valuable experience that students take with them into their future careers.

4. Finding (new) ways of disseminating the research findings
Academics at IUPUI employed many different means of disseminating their students’ research projects and findings, enabling it to reach audiences within but also well beyond the city itself. Students were strongly encouraged and sometimes financially supported to attend national and international conferences. Funding was raised for publishing pamphlets, books and eBooks about their empirical studies and findings. Time was invested in developing impressive academic blogs and websites about their research. I provide a few links to just some of this fantastic work below.
I have gained many insights, ideas and sense of possibilities from my visits to IUPUI, and I’d like to extend my warm thanks to all colleagues and students whom I had the pleasure of meeting. Special thanks to Professor Susan B. Hyatt, whose scholarship inspired my visits and who made the whole thing possible in a practical sense.

Links to some online examples of IUPUI collaborative student research and scholarship:

– The ‘Neighborhood of Saturdays’. Student research project about urban multi-ethnic neighborhood in Indianapolis.

– ‘Eastside Story: Portrait of a Neighborhood on the Suburban Frontier’: Student project exploring historical change and community identities in a suburban area of Indianapolis.

– ‘Urban Heritage? Archaeology and Homelessness in Indianapolis’. A student project using archaeological methods to explore experiences of homelessness.

– ‘Ransom Place’ project: Collaborative project on culture, consumption and race in an African American neighbourhood in Indianapolis: http://www.iupui.edu/~anthpm/ransom.html

– ‘Archaeology and Material Culture’: blog of Professor Paul Mullins.
https://paulmullins.wordpress.com/author/paulmullins/

16 June 2015

The Politics of Societal Impact: Community Development and Critical Scholarship

Fusion, Public engagement, student research Rosie Read

How can we do research that engages with communities in a genuinely collaborative way? What kind of research produces findings which address critical questions about the structural issues and problems faced by communities, but which are also of practical and transformative benefit to them? If these two objectives pull researchers in different directions, what kind of balance can be struck between them?

These are questions I have been pondering during two visits this semester to IUPUI (Indiana University Purdue University Indianapolis), in Indianapolis, USA. This is a university which places strong emphasis on the importance of community collaboration and engagement in scholarship and education. During two visits, I have particularly followed the community engaged work of Professor Susan Brin Hyatt.

I have known Professor Hyatt since June 2013, when she came to Bournemouth University to give a research seminar presentation about urban ethnographic research projects she and her students had undertaken in Indianapolis and Philadelphia (e.g., Hyatt et al 2012, Hyatt et al 2009. See also Hyatt 2001). During her visit we talked a lot about our common scholarly interests and discovered that we had a shared interest in the British Community Development Projects (CDPs) of the 1970s. The CDPs provide a very interesting example of the politics of using academic knowledge to bring about social change – or what we now call (societal) impact.

Meadow Well playground, 1976. Photography courtesy of Ken Grint. Available at IUPUI Digital Archive: http://indiamond6.ulib.iupui.edu/cdm/singleitem/collection/CDP/id/3685/rec/120

Initiated in 1969, the CDPs were a major social policy initiative, by the standards of then and now. There were twelve CDPs across the UK – mostly based in urban, industrial areas affected by economic decline, job loss and poverty. CDPs were set up with the aim of using community action to tackle various social problems associated with poverty and develop more integrated forms of service provision which responded to the local population’s needs. Each of the twelve CDPs incorporated a research team based in a university, and an action team based in the community, accountable to a local steering group. The idea was that social science knowledge and methods should both inform and support the development of local projects. The CDPs had an estimated budget of £5 million – a lot of money in those days. Most of the funding came from central government, but local CDPs operated with a high level of autonomy.

It is interesting to reflect on the CDPs from today’s vantage point. This was the creation of an ambitious infrastructure, across 12 regions, linking universities and academic researchers directly with community workers and activists in poor areas, with the explicit aim of enabling social science to inform social transformation. It is hard to imagine such a wide-ranging initiative emerging now, backed up by an equivalent budget from central government departments, in spite of widespread current concerns about growing use of food banks, zero hours contracts, high levels of in-work and child poverty and obscene income and housing inequalities; the kinds of problems which, some argue, are far more endemic now in the UK than they were in the 1970s.

Yet the CDP story is one in which two conflicting explanations of the causes of poverty unfolded (Loney 1983). The politicians and civil servants who set up the CDPs assumed a social pathology definition. They understood poverty to result essentially from the actions and beliefs of the poor themselves. From this viewpoint, what was needed was better, more joined up local services to help the poor to improve their skills and lifestyles, and become better adapted to the new economic realities of deindustrialisation. By contrast, those who worked for the CDPs quickly abandoned this definition of poverty in favour of a more structural perspective, attending to how social and economic policies reflected within corporate and government decision-making directly and indirectly gave rise to poverty and related social problems. In effect the CDP researchers, workers and activists refused to ‘localize’ the cause of the issues they tried to tackle. Their structural perspective informed how community action and research was used to engage, inform and mobilise local populations, and transform people’s lives for the better. This brought about many positive changes in areas in which CDPs were active and left some important legacies. However, this kind of impact was not what the government had in mind. CDPs were eventually wound down in the late 1970s, by which time politicians and senior government officials had mostly switched off from considering the implications of their findings for social policy at a wider level.

Although this was forty years ago, the CDPs have a strong contemporary resonance. Many of the problems tackled by the CDPs (poverty, insecure low paid work, unemployment) continue today, as do debates over how to deal with them. The activism and scholarship produced by the CDPs illustrates vividly how attempts to bring about positive change (to make an impact) in poor communities necessarily depends upon definitions of poverty which are always, inescapably political, whether or not they are recognised as such. As part of her research on British CDPs, Prof Hyatt and her colleagues at IUPUI have created a unique and extensive digital archive of many CDP reports, publications and photographs. This is an excellent resource for both teaching and research and I would like to recommend it to all colleagues interested in the issues discussed here.

References

Hyatt, SB., Linder, BJ., and Baurley, M. eds. 2012. The Neighborhood of Saturdays. Memories of a Multi-Ethnic Community on Indianapolis’ South Side. Indianapolis: Dog Ear Publishing.

Hyatt, SB., Branstrator, DW., Baurley, M., Dagon M., and Yarian, S. eds. 2009. Eastside Story. Portrait of a Neighborhood on the Suburban Frontier. Indianapolis: Department of Anthropology IUPUI, Neighborhood Alliance Press.

Hyatt, Susan B., 2001. From Citizen to Volunteer. Neoliberal Governance and the Erasure of Poverty. In Judith Goode and Jeff Maskovsky, eds. The New Poverty Studies. The Ethnography of Power, Politics and Impoverished People in the United States. New York: New York University Press.

Loney, Martin 1983. Community Against Government. The British Community Development Project 1968-78. London: Heinemann

26 May 2015

Does playing surface make a difference to fast bowlers in cricket?

PG research, Public engagement, student research Billy Senington

Tibial Accelerometer

In the world of sports science, we are always trying to place participants in as realistic an environment as possible, making data collection methods smaller, lighter and less obstructive. This is no different for my PhD study; I am looking at the effect of fast bowling technique on lower back pain in cricket. Current research has focussed a great deal of variables such as ground reaction force and how they contribute to fast bowling injury. However, the nature of the equipment has restricted these studies to lab environments. One of my aims was to develop a portable data collection method, to allow a more realistic bowling environment. The answer to this problem came in the form of accelerometers. This method has enabled me to address questions which have previously been difficult to answer, such as; how does playing surface affect force experienced during fast bowling?

The seasonal nature of cricket means that a lot of players must bowl indoors during the winter. Whether bowling on different surfaces has an impact on the bowler’s technique or the magnitude of force they are exposed to during bowling has not been tested previously. My study investigated these questions comparing bowling on a grass wicket, indoor rubber composite surface known as ‘uniturf’, outdoor artificial wicket and standard wooden sports hall floor.

With the grass and uniturf surfaces used most regularly in professional cricket, differences between these two surfaces are of most use to coaches and medical teams. These results were intriguing; even though (according to baseline surface firmness testing), the uniturf surface was firmer than the grass wicket, no difference in tibial acceleration was observed when bowling. This may suggest the bowlers subconsciously adjust their technique in order to avoid exposure to higher magnitudes of force. Although, such suggestions have been made within running literature, this is a novel finding within fast bowling.

It is commonly reported that change in technique or impact characteristics such as surface or footwear increases risk of injury. The findings of this study highlights that such technique modifications may exist and may aid coaches in addressing this issue if these technique modifications can be investigated further. As a result, I submitted my findings to the International Society of Biomechanics with the aim of presenting both the novel methodology and it’s results. I was lucky enough to have been accepted to present these orally at the International Society of Biomechanics Conference in Glasgow. I have been very fortunate to gain the support of the university in this venture and they have very kindly agreed to fund costs associated with attending this conference. I am immensely grateful for this opportunity and am excited to share my work with the wider community of biomechanists – thank you to Bournemouth University for your continued support

Force experienced by a fast bowler

20 May 2015

Working creatively to explore abuse in young people’s relationships – the CATCAM project

Fusion, Fusion Investment Fund, student research swincewicz

There is increasing awareness of the risks that young people face in terms of abusive personal relationships and intimate partner violence (IPV), and the Home Office has recently widened the definition the government uses to include abuse against those aged 16-17 as well as adults

Intimate partner violence concerns physical violence directed against a partner and often includes sexual violence and psychological abuse (Jewkes, 2002). This is a global issue and increasing concern is now being expressed about IPV in teenage and young people’s relationships (Keenan-Miller et al. 2007). US research suggests that 66 % of college-aged dating students experience at least one incident of IVP (Smith et al. 2003).

The project which has received Fusion Funding from BU aims to:

Develop creative methodologies/animation to explore the nature of abuse in young people’s relationships;
Explore how such methods might be used in domestic abuse prevention education

To date we have had two creative workshops which have used a range of materials and motion capture to produce a short piece of animation visualising mood and emotion. Those involved have enjoyed trying newapproaches to express and visualise meaning associated with relationships and abuse. It is great to be a co-learner in this process and to be taken out of my comfort zone as we are encouraged to use ‘visualisation’ techniques in a co-produced piece of work. Here are some examples of some of our visualisation work to date.

For more information on the CATCAM project please contact:

Dr. Lee-Ann Fenge lfenge@bournemouth.ac.uk

20 May 2015

New paper by PhD student Sheetal Sharma

PG research, Publishing, student research Edwin van Teijlingen

Sheetal Sharma, PhD student in the Centre for Midwifery, Maternal and Perinatal Health (CMMPH), published her latest paper this week in the Asian Journal of Social Sciences & Humanities [1]. The paper ‘Nepenglish’ or ‘Nepali English’: A New Version of English? raises the question whether we are beginning to see a new variant of English.

The paper is co-authored with Mrs. Pragyan Joshi from the United Nations Development Programme (UNDP) in Kathmandu and BU Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen. Sheetal’s PhD research focuses on the evaluation of a large-sclae maternity care improvement intervention in rural Nepal.

The paper is based on listening to people in Nepal speaking English and reading their writing in English. English is a living language and different native and non-native speakers develop English in slightly different ways. This paper argues that it is time to consider whether we should study the English spoken by native-Nepali speakers (Nepenglish) as a separately developing variant of English. The question is particularly intriguing since Nepali English bears such a similarity with Indian English, as both are largely based on originally Sanskrit-based languages. The focus is particularly on how native-Nepali speakers express themselves in English.

Reference:

Sharma, S., Joshi, P., van Teijlingen, E. (2015) ‘Nepenglish’ or ‘Nepali English’: A new version of English? Asian Journal of Humanities & Social Sciences 4(2): 188-193. www.ajssh.leena-luna.co.jp/AJSSHPDFs/Vol.4%282%29/AJSSH2015%284.2-21%29.pdf

Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen

CMMPH

13 May 2015

Nepal earthquake fundraising event

Public engagement, student research pmahato

Following the major 7.8 RS earthquake on 25th April, there were numerous aftershocks including 7.3 RS earthquake on 12th May. The April earthquake killed more than 8,000 people and left thousands of people homeless and destitute. At least 48 people were also confirmed dead because of earthquake on 12th May which has also triggered landslides.

UK Nepal Friendship society along with BU students organised a fundraising event on 12th May from 4 pm until 7 pm in Bournemouth square, appealing for the earthquake victims of Nepal. There were many generous people who contributed for the earthquake victims and we were successful to raise a total of £102.9 in 3 hours time. The raised money has been deposited into the bank account of UKNFS and will be utilised for the benefit of earthquake affected children in Sindhupalchowk district through Child Nepal, a non governmental organisation working for child protection, rights and development in Nepal.

Those who could not make it to the Bournemouth square yesterday can make their donations online through UKNFS website which has an option for making donations.

10 May 2015

BU students support Nepal earthquake disaster appeal

PG research, student research Edwin van Teijlingen

Posted on behalf of BU students!

Appeal for helping Nepal earthquake survivors

UK Nepal Friendship Society

Nepal was stuck by earthquake of 7.8 RS magnitude at 11:56 am local time on 25th April 2015. There have been more than one hundred aftershocks since. Many people are traumatised and lack proper care in the aftermath of the earthquake. This natural disaster has created havoc on a massive scale. To make conditions worse there was rain pouring down in parts of Nepal and there now is a risk of the spread of epidemic diseases, thefts, and other crime. Until now the death toll has reached almost 8,000 and thousands have been rendered homeless and destitute. According to the Prime Minister of Nepal Sushil Koirala, the death toll could rise as high as 10,000. We are planning to raise fund for the immediate relief and rebuilding process of Nepal.

The UK Nepal Friendship Society and students from BU are organising a fund-raising event for earthquake victims of Nepal on 12th May, Tuesday from 4pm until 7 pm in Bournemouth Square (western side). Please spread this information to all interested! Ask them to visit us on Tuesday and help Nepal at this time of crisis. Your donations will help to rebuild the nation and help to provide necessary amenities to people who have lost their home and family. Any amount will be greatly appreciated, but please give as much as you can. Nepal has been awaiting this disaster for many years now, and according to the cycle of major earthquakes in the country the national catastrophe that has taken place could have happened sooner (the last took place in 1934). Your donation via the UKNFS will be provided to disaster victims through official/reliable Government of Nepal and Embassy of Nepal in London recommendedchannels.

Please support Nepal at this time of national tragedy!

–xx–

BU has several undergraduate and postgraduate students from Nepal. Moreover, several BU students conduct studies or do their electives in Nepal.

Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen

CMMPH

7 May 2015

Reverse Mentoring, Fusion and Threshold Concepts

Knowledge Exchange, Knowledge Transfer, Public engagement, REF Subjects, student research gretad

Writing a blog post about our experience at the ABS (Association of Business Schools’) annual conference on Learning, Teaching and Student Experience, 27-29 April 2015, has proven to be a great way to fill in the time waiting for a plane back from York, UK!

Louise (Preget), Deborah (Taylor) and I (Milena Bobeva) had been to York to present the work from the first stage of the Fusion project on Reverse Mentoring (RvM) in Higher Education. This student:staff co-creation/co-production project examines RvM, a strategy where younger, less experienced employees share their knowledge and expertise with a more senior person. Our team has studied industry practices as viewed and experienced by our placement and post-placement students.

The conference was a brilliant opportunity for academics within UK Business Schools to share and showcase best practice in a number of key streams including internationalisation, blended learning, the changing student and employability. Bournemouth University had a strong lobby there with five academics and three publications, including two by Dr Sukanya Ayatakshi, who presented some assessment and engagement practices on the fully online International Business and Management undergraduate programme.

There was unanimous agreement amongst the BU team that the most interesting session at the conference was the talk on ‘Threshold concepts and troublesome knowledge’ delivered by Prof. Ray Land from Durham University. It stressed the importance of challenging our habitual practices as both learners and educators and made us recognise RvM as a threshold concept. Further detail of this seminal work is available here and on this website.
For those interested in finding out more about reverse mentoring and the findings of the Fusion project, we will be running a session at the Festival of Learning: 3-5pm on the 14^th July 2015 in PG142-144.

30 April 2015

GeoNet Human/Wildlife Conflict

Awarded & submitted bids, Fusion, Fusion Investment Fund, Knowledge Exchange, PG research, Public engagement, student research pgillingham

For our most recent GeoNet event we were lucky enough to have a visit from Gaius Wilson all the way from Southern India. Gaius told us about his PhD research into elephant behaviour. Apparently there are 12-15,000 elephants in Southern India, and they commonly come into conflict with humans. Farmers try to protect their crops with deep ditches (elephants can’t jump!) and electric fences. However, elephants are clever, and have realised that their tusks don’t conduct electricity, so the males (females don’t have tusks) push over fences or use trees to break them. An emerging problem is the spread of a weed called Lantana, which was introduced from South America as an ornamental hedge plant. Lantana forms very high, dense stands which elephants can’t cross. It takes up space and so there is a loss of fodder, since elephants don’t eat Lantana, and the plant contains oils and can lead to more intense forest fires. This pushes elephants closer to villages to find food, and means that locals with captive working elephants have to travel further to find food. One thing the forest department can do to stop elephants being forced to use farmer’s resources is to remove Lantana where it appears. Employing villagers to do this could create work opportunities, with associated economic benefits.

After Gaius’ talk we had an interesting discussion (joined by Susanna Curtin and Mandy Korstjens) about the potential for wildlife tourism to mitigate human/wildlife conflict. The idea is that if farmers have another income stream provided by tourists, it becomes in their interest to protect the animals that the tourists pay to see. However, most wildlife tourism in India is domestic, so not much cash is generated. There are pitfalls with this type of tourism, in that guides and others employed are often not local people, hotels are usually some distance from wildlife sites and locals often don’t receive any benefit from tourist visits, which can lead to resentment. There are some success stories – in Peru all guides are local by law and receive training to fulfil the role. Small-scale tourism in Peru involving locals has spread as nearby villages see the benefits and follow the example of those who set up schemes. However, in India legislation prevents people from setting up such schemes in protected areas, and until this is allowed nature tourism won’t have a role in persuading locals to protect elephants.

Our next three events are;

7^th May 13.00-14.00 Lawrence LT (Talbot Campus)

Participatory Research – Gitte Kragh (BU Life Sciences) Hayley Roberts (BU AAFS) Rick Stafford (BU Life Sciences) Paola Palmer (BU AAFS)

14^th May 13.00-14.00 KG01 (Talbot Campus)

Storymaps and place-based storytelling – Anna Feigenbaum (BU M & C)

21^st May 13.00-14.00, PG19 (Talbot Campus)

Cultural heritage landscapes and deathscapes – Craig Young (Reader in Human Geography at Manchester Met University), Tim Darville (BU SciTech AAFS), Anne Luce (BU M & C)

28 April 2015

Congratulations to the winners of the Research Photography Competition

PG research, student research Rachel Bowen

The resulting images demonstrate not just the creativity of our academics and postgraduates, but also the fascinating range of research taking place at BU.

Researchers from all across the university, working in areas as diverse as dementia, archaeology, kayaking and 3D printing submitted images to the competition.

Thousands of BU students, staff and members of the public voted for their favourite images, and we can now reveal the winners.

Winner – Sarah Hambidge, ‘Care Farming: Providing Brighter Futures for Young and Old’

Down on a farm, tucked away in the beautiful Dorset countryside, the therapeutic use of farming practices is being used to provide health, social and educational care services for a wide range of people. The farm offers the opportunity for people who are the hardest to reach, to utilise a rural environment to enhance their well-being and to achieve their potential. The farm has achieved many great success stories of people who have turned their lives around, been given confidence in their own value and become equipped with the learning they need to successfully engage in wider society. The challenge they now face is to show this model of care is successful to enable their work to continue and grow.

Historically, much of the awareness and research regarding mental health issues has focused predominantly on females, whilst males with mental health concerns have faced an element of negativity from society, despite being at higher risk of depression and loneliness, alcohol dependency, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder and suicide. My study aims to explore the benefits of the care farm model as an alternative social care intervention on improving physical / mental health outcomes and the quality of life of young males with behavioural, emotional and social difficulties as well as older men with dementia, and the benefits of intergenerational interaction between the two groups.

Runner up – Rosa Spencer-Tansley, ‘What causes mental illness?’

1 in 4 of us will experience mental health problems in our lifetime. The pathophysiology of mental illness involves a interplay of genetic and environmental factors and it is only the last few years that the aetiological picture has started to show. As a result uncertainty and oversimplified ideas regarding the causes of mental illness exist. This can exacerbate stigma and increase the emotional burden of mental illness amongst families. A major function of Psychiatric Genetic Counselling is to help affected individuals and families. This can help them successfully adapt to the condition as well as address and reduce feelings of shame, guilt, blame and stigma, thus having both informative and therapeutic values.

I will explore understanding amongst the UK about the causes of mental illness in order to evaluate the application of Psychiatric Genetic Counselling to the UK. This photograph captures 100 BU students’ answers to the question: “What causes mental illness?”

Runner up – Jordan Thomas, Stephanie Farrant, Robert Moore and Sulaf Assi, ‘On-spot Identification of Counterfeit Products Using Handheld Instruments’

The last decade has witnessed a change in the use of medicine products beyond diseases’ treatments to improve an individual’s life. Lifestyle products include medicines, cosmetic and herbal products which improve physical appearance and physical/mental performance. Counterfeit lifestyle products could be encountered anywhere across the wholesale supply chain.

The effects resulting from a counterfeit lifestyle product could range from ineffectiveness (at their best) to toxic/lethal effects (at their worst). As these products can be encountered anywhere, it is important to develop rapid, non-destructive and mobile technology for their identification. Handheld instruments techniques offer these advantages. Therefore, this project underlies developing methods for the rapid and non-destructive identification of counterfeit lifestyle products using handheld spectroscopic techniques.

In particular, the project involves building libraries which contain signatures of lifestyle products and materials commonly present in these products.

For one day only, you can view a full exhibition of all submissions in K101, Kimmeridge House on 28th April from 2pm – 4pm.

26 April 2015

We regret to inform you ….

PG research, Publishing, Research Integritiy, student research Edwin van Teijlingen

It is always disappointing for an academic author to receive a rejection letter. Today I received yet another one from Midwifery (published by Elsevier). Sometimes I think academic publishing in good journal is not getting any easier over time. Neither does the experience of having over two hundred peer-reviewed academic papers make a rejection easier to deal with. This was my third paper in a row that got rejected by Midwifery. All three papers were rejected on resubmission, so a lot of extra work had gone into these papers after the initial peer review and the editor’s feedback. These three papers where led by three different postgraduate students (Sharma, Baral & Burton) as first authors, and in each case co-authored by myself and different BU academics and/or from other universities.

Midwifery is the journal in which I have published more papers than any other journal (see top blue piece of pie in ‘Documents by source’) as reported on SCOPUS today (26 April 2015). Moreover, I am co-author of one of the top five most downloaded papers in Midwifery for 2014 (see recent BU Research Blog), and this paper is also the most cited Midwifery paper since 2010! Still I manage to have three papers rejected in a row.

What is does show to me is that the journal’s peer review system is robust (i.e. blind and impartial) because I am also a member of Midwifery’s editorial committee. I think it is back to the drawing board and discuss with each set of authors what the next step should be for our papers. To be fair we had a paper published already this year in Midwifery, namely: Grylka-Baeschlin, S., van Teijlingen, E.R., Stoll, K., Gross, M.M. (2015) Translation and validation of the German version of the Mother-Generated Index and its application during the postnatal period. Midwifery 31(1): 47–53.

As an editorial board we try continuously to maintain a high quality of papers to be published in our journal, and we would like to encourage potential authors to keep submitting their papers to Midwifery.

Prof. Edwin van Teijlingen

CMMPH

25 April 2015

BU SDRC Contributions to WIT Contact & Surface 2015 International Conference

PG research, Publishing, student research Zulfiqar Khan

: Dr Zulfiqar Khan presenting

: Dr Adil Saeed presenting

: PGR Hammad Nazir presenting

: SDRC Erasmus Mundus Exchange Student Parisa Pashaei presenting

: Mark Hadfield – Chairing Surface Engineering Session

BU SDRC Director Dr Zulfiqar Khan (Associate Professor) organised a special session on “Surface Engineering” at the WIT 2015 Contact and Surface International Conference and contributed as a member of the International Scientific Advisory Committee (ISAC) as a reviewer during 2014-15.

SDRC Professor Mark Hadfield chaired the special session and also helped the conference as a member of the ISAC to support review process.

BU academics and researchers along with the SDRC international partners from Gazi University Turkey contributed presentations and have submitted the following extended full length papers to the WIT International Journal of Computational Methods & Experimental Measurements (CMEM), which are all currently under review for publication.

Khan, Z., Pashaei, P., Bajwa, R., Nazir, M. H., & Cakmak, M. (2015). Fabrication and characterisation of electrodeposited and magnetron sputtered thin films. In Contact and Surface 2015. València, Spain. Retrieved from http://www.wessex.ac.uk/15-conferences/contact-and-surface-2015.html
Saeed, A., Khan, Z., & Hadfield, M. (2015). Performance Evaluation of Surface Protection Applied to Large Vehicles. In Contact and Surface 2015. València, Spain: Wessex Institute, UK. Retrieved from http://www.wessex.ac.uk/15-conferences/contact-and-surface-2015.html
Gultekin, A., Pashaei, P., Khan, Z., Ozturk, M. K., Tamer, M., & Bas, Y. (2015). X-ray and ab initio study of structural, electronic, elastic and optical properties in Be1-xZnxS alloys depending on Vegard’s law. In Contact and Surface 2015. València, Spain. Retrieved from http://www.wessex.ac.uk/15-conferences/contact-and-surface-2015.html
Nazir, M. H., Khan, Z. A. (2015). Maximising the Interfacial Fracture Toughness of Thin Coatings and Substrate through Optimisation of Defined Parameters. In Contact and Surface 2015. València, Spain: WIT. Retrieved from http://www.wessex.ac.uk/15-conferences/contact-and-surface-2015.html

WIT is currently collaborating with BU in Corrosion research through a post doc programme Mark Hadfield (PI), Zulfiqar Khan (Co-I) led by Dr Adil Saeed as a post doc researcher.

Corrosion (experimental, modelling and simulation) and Surface Engineering (nano coatings) research within BU SDRC is conducted in collaboration with multinational industrial partners through match funding with significant in-kind experimental support.

For further details on current research activity in SDRC please visit the Centre webpage. If you have interests in these areas and would like to find more please contact Dr Zulfiqar Khan

9 April 2015

Impact of fatigue management research in Multiple Sclerosis – FACETS, IMSPIRE and beyond

Fusion, PG research, Research assessment, Research Ethics, Research Integritiy, student research rfreeman

Lunchtime Seminar with Peter Thomas, Wednesday 15th April 1-1.50pm, R303

Please come to listen to Professor Peter Thomas present on the impact that his research into fatigue in Multiple Sclerosis is having, noting the importance of research with strong potential for patient benefit, and the importance of the research funder.

Further information on this Seminar series can be found by clicking on the link below.

Impact Seminar dates 2015

There is no need to book – just turn up. Contact Zoe on zsheppard@bournemouth.ac.uk for more information.

We look forward to seeing you there.

9 March 2015

Research photography competition: voting now open!

student research Rachel Bowen

‘Can you tell the story of your research in a single image?’ That’s the challenge we set BU’s academics and postgraduates earlier this year, and the overwhelming response saw researchers from all across the university downing tools to take up their cameras and think of unusual ways to illustrate their research. The resulting images demonstrate not just the creativity of our academics and postgraduates, but also the fascinating range of research taking place at BU.

Researchers from all across the university, working in areas as diverse as dementia, archaeology, kayaking and 3D printing submitted images to the competition, and now we want your help to decide which pictures should form a photography exhibition on Talbot campus later this year.

To vote for an image, visit the competition page here and click on the ‘Vote’ button below your favourite. Perhaps a particular research subject strikes a chord with you, or an you find a certain image especially evocative – whatever your reasons for having a favourite, the content of the exhibition is up to you to decide!

The most popular images will form part of a photography exhibition on Talbot campus later this year. The deadline for voting is 27^th March. Details of the exhibition will follow once voting is complete.

All images can be viewed on the research website.

Category / student research

FoL event and an opportunity to get involved in co-creating conservation research

Realist methodologies – it’s a case of C+M=O don’t you know

BU publications in Taylor & Francis top 20 most read articles

Does playing surface make a difference to fast bowlers in cricket?

Nepal earthquake fundraising event

BU students support Nepal earthquake disaster appeal

Reverse Mentoring, Fusion and Threshold Concepts

GeoNet Human/Wildlife Conflict

Congratulations to the winners of the Research Photography Competition

Winner – Sarah Hambidge, ‘Care Farming: Providing Brighter Futures for Young and Old’

Runner up – Rosa Spencer-Tansley, ‘What causes mental illness?’

Runner up – Jordan Thomas, Stephanie Farrant, Robert Moore and Sulaf Assi, ‘On-spot Identification of Counterfeit Products Using Handheld Instruments’

For one day only, you can view a full exhibition of all submissions in K101, Kimmeridge House on 28th April from 2pm – 4pm.

We regret to inform you ….

BU SDRC Contributions to WIT Contact & Surface 2015 International Conference

Research photography competition: voting now open!

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Category / student research

Winner – Sarah Hambidge, ‘Care Farming: Providing Brighter Futures for Young and Old’

Runner up – Rosa Spencer-Tansley, ‘What causes mental illness?’

Runner up – Jordan Thomas, Stephanie Farrant, Robert Moore and Sulaf Assi, ‘On-spot Identification of Counterfeit Products Using Handheld Instruments’

For one day only, you can view a full exhibition of all submissions in K101, Kimmeridge House on 28th April from 2pm – 4pm.

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Recent posts

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