Are “good guys” more likely to participate in local agriculture?

In recent years a new form of food production and distribution organisation, as part of small-scale and local agriculture, has been gaining ground. Generically termed short supply chains (SSCs), this new model of food procurement comprises various forms such as community-supported agriculture, box schemes and solidarity purchase groups. Consumer participation in SSCs is dictated by deep motivations: while consumers are principally encouraged by the desire to preserve local producers, as well as the social and environmental aspects of farming, the attraction of SSCs is also tied to different and more complex ways of perceiving food quality. The quality issue in SSCs is not only seen in the light of classic attributes, such as taste and safety, but also in terms of social criteria built on the basis of aspects of products linked to social and environmental domains.This study provides an empirical assessment of consumers participating in SSCs to ascertain whether, and to what extent, those actively involved in an SSC show differences in terms of what is more personal and subjective, such as universal values and food-related lifestyles, compared with those who do not participate. In order to assess such relationships, data were collected from a solidarity purchase group in Sicily (southern Italy). For comparison, a group of consumers in conventional food outlets were also interviewed in the same city. Data were analysed with the propensity score matching method. Our results show that the decision to participate in a solidarity purchase group is especially dictated by profound ideological and emotional considerations. They emphasise the interest in preserving, protecting and sustaining the welfare of other people, in line with the fundamental purpose of short supply chains.     

Research Watch: Most diverse communities most likely to be invaded

Biodiversity.     

Smokers living in deprived areas are less likely to quit: a longitudinal follow-up

Objective

To follow up smokers to examine whether the likelihood of quitting smoking varied by area deprivation, and whether smoking history, health status, personality characteristics, social support and stressful situations contributed to differences in area deprivation in quit rates.

Design

Longitudinal data with a 6‐year follow‐up period were analysed using multilevel logistic regression. Area‐level deprivation was characterised by a composite measure that was the sum of the proportion of unemployed residents, the percentage of residents in blue‐collar occupations and the proportion with only elementary‐level education. Previously established predictors of smoking cessation, including education, age at smoking initiation, self‐assessed health, chronic illness, locus of control, neuroticism, negative life events, longlasting relationship difficulties, emotional social support and negative neighbourhood conditions were examined separately and in a combined model to assess whether they contributed to neighbourhood deprivation differences in quitting.

Participants

404 participants (residing in 83 areas) identified as smokers at baseline and who did not change their residential address over the follow‐up period.

Main outcome

Being a non‐smoker at follow‐up.

Results

Odds ratios of quitting decreased with greater area‐level deprivation, but differences reached significance only between the most and least deprived quartiles. Smoking history, health status, personality characteristics, social support and stressful situations did not contribute to the lower quitting rates seen among smokers in deprived areas.

Conclusions

Living in a deprived area seems to reduce the likelihood of quitting smoking; hence individual‐level tobacco control efforts should be complemented with area‐based interventions. However, we need to identify and understand the underlying factors associated with living in a deprived area that contributes to lower quitting rates.Extensive research has examined the socioeconomic influences on smoking. Most of this work has focused on socioeconomic determinants at the individual level, such as how smoking varies by education, occupational class and income.^1,2 Recent work has shown that deprivation characteristics of residential areas are associated with residents'' smoking, independent of their demographic and socioeconomic characteristics, and that smoking prevalence increases with area deprivation.^1,2,3,4 However, one of these studies showed that the relationship between smoking prevalence and area deprivation did not hold for all measures of area deprivation.³ A US study found no relationship between the degree of income inequality in states and smoking behaviour.⁵ These studies have hypothesised that area inequalities in smoking may be the consequence of a spatial patterning in smoking history, health status, personality characteristics, support and stressful situations that predisposes people in disadvantaged areas to smoke.The relationship between area deprivation and smoking has been examined only in cross‐sectional studies. There has been no longitudinal follow‐up of changes in smoking status of adults living in areas with different deprivation characteristics. Such an examination would help elucidate whether area of residence is likely to have a causal relationship on smoking, and whether any of the established individual‐level factors contribute to changes in smoking status.This study followed a group of smokers over 6 years to examine whether the likelihood of quitting varied between residents of areas differing in their deprivation characteristics. Furthermore, it investigated whether smoking history, health status, personality characteristics, coping, social support and stressful situations contributed to area deprivation inequalities in quitting.     

Orthokeratology reshapes eyes to be less prolate and more symmetric

PurposeThis prospective study assessed the influence of wearing and then discontinuing orthokeratology (OK) lenses on retinal shape and peripheral refraction in myopic children.MethodsFifty-eight myopic children (age 8–12 years) were equally divided into an OK group and a single vision spectacles (SVS) group. After 12 months of OK, it was discontinued for 1 month. Peripheral eye length (PEL), relative peripheral refraction (RPR), and corneal parameters were measured in the right eye on the nasal and temporal retinal sides at baseline, 6 months, and 12 months (13 months in OK group) visits.ResultsIn the SVS group, faster elongation of the temporal side PEL made the eyes more asymmetric and prolate, developing a temporal pointed shape. In the OK group, the nasal retinal side PEL grew faster, the nasal RPR developed less hyperopic defocus, and the eye shape became more symmetric and less prolate. The central cornea became thinner and flattened, while the peripheral cornea became steeper. Changes in corneal thickness, relative peripheral corneal power, and K-values were no significant differences for the OK and SVS groups at 12 months.ConclusionsThe cornea reverted to be no difference with myopic children with SVS after 1 month discontinuation of OK. The retinal shape of SVS eyes became more asymmetric and prolate with myopia progression. OK remodelled retinal shape to be less asymmetric and less prolate.     

印刷企业何去何从——以新《劳动合同法》为视角

人民币汇率不断攀升、印刷原材料成本上涨、国内新《劳动合同法》的实施等因素都直接导致了印刷企业成本增加,加上全球性金融危机,无一不给中国印刷企业带来了巨大的影响。机遇与挑战并存,行业将面临新一轮的洗牌,在市场的重新调整下，     

Can the dietary element content of virgin argan oils really be used for adulteration detection?

Levels of eight dietary elements were assessed by ICP-AES in virgin edible and beauty argan oil samples prepared from four remote locations of the argan forest, and over a three-year period. The data showed sufficiently little variability to assess that all argan oil samples present, in terms of dietary elements, a similar composition, independently from the tree location within the argan forest. Therefore, adulteration detection by trace element analysis in edible and beauty argan oil is a method that can be generalised.     

Are Chileans exposed to dietary furan?

Chilean consumer preferences include foods that may contain considerable amounts of furan, a potential human carcinogen. However, there is no information regarding dietary exposure to furan in Chile. Thus, the objective of this work was to determine the Chilean exposure to dietary furan. To accomplish this objective, the furan concentration of 14 types of commercial foods processed at high temperature were analysed based on a modified headspace-GC/MS (HS-GC/MS) method in which the limits of detection for different food matrices ranged from 0.01 to 0.6 ng g^?1. In addition, a risk assessment was made with exposure estimates based on dietary data from national studies on different age groups (9-month-old babies, school children, adults and elderly people). Of the food items surveyed “American”-type coffee (espresso coffee plus hot water) obtained from automatic coffee machine (936 ng g^?1) and low moisture starchy products like crisps and “soda”-type crackers showed the highest furan concentrations (259 and 91 ng g^?1, respectively). Furthermore, furan was also found in samples of breakfast cereals (approximately 20 ng g^?1), jarred fruit baby foods (8.5 ng g^?1) and orange juice (7.0 ng g^?1). School children (aged 9–13 years) represented the highest intake of furan (about 500 ng kg^?1_bw day^?1), with margins of exposure of 2479 and 2411, respectively, which points to a possible public health risk.