Tag Archives: Angela Duckworth

Research Summaries: Development and Validation of the Short Grit Scale (Grit–S)

This research summary will be especially attractive to those who have interest in psychometric and would like to see how the concept and measure of grit has evolved. In this paper, Angela Duckworth refines her measurement of grit and establishes the test-retest stability of the concept apart form predictive and  consensual validity.

Animation of a vernier caliper measuring a bolt

Animation of a vernier caliper measuring a bolt (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

  1. The authors wanted to come up with a briefer version of the grit scale, which would have better internal consistency and still retain the predictive power and the two factor structure of Consistency of Interests and Perseverance of effort.
  2. As such they dropped 2 items each from both the factor items and retained just 4 items each for each of the factors. The decision to drop the items was taken on the basis of analyzing data across four studies as delineated in their earlier paper, whose research summary is present here.  The newer 8 item Grit scale called Grrit -S retained predictive power and showed the same two factor structure.
  3. Similar to their earlier paper, they did an online study measuring grit-S/grit -O, big five traits as predictors and career changes and educational levels as outcome variables. Grit -S correlated with conscientiousness, but was still able to predict the outcomes over and beyond conscientiousness.
  4. Using the same online procedure, they asked subjects as well as informants (their friends  family members) to complete the Grit-S/Grit -O measures and established the consensual validity of the scale.
  5. In another study with students, they measured Grit-S/Grit -O  for two consecutive springs and established the test-retest stability of the scale as well as its predictive validity where GPA obtained was an outcome variable and so was the number of hours watching television.
  6. The next study was similar to the West point study they had done for earlier paper, but with grit-S predicting who makes it through the beast barracks.
  7. The last study was again a followup study of the national spelling bee competitors, this time with a new cohort, and using a new scale and led to similar results, whereby girt predicted who reached which round etc. based partly on who practiced how much and had prior experience participating.
  8. So, if you were looking for some more areas/ examples of the predictive power of grit, this doesn’t add much to what Anagela et al had presented in the earlier paper, but it does reconfirm finding with a shorter measure that also appears to be a better measure of grit.

so, if you are the one who is fascinated by how scales evolve, do check out this paper here.

Research Summaries: Positive predictors of teacher effectiveness

Research Summaries: Empirical identification of the major facets of Conscientiousness

This research summary looks at a paper co-authored by Angela Duckworth, that tries to carve conscientiousness at it joints.

English: perfectionist measuring and cutting grass

English: perfectionist measuring and cutting grass (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

  1. Conscientiousness is a personality trait that is present in most personality theories and measured by most personality inventories, the most famous of these being the Big Five or OCEAN model and as measured by Big Five Inventory (BFI)/ NEO-PI-R.
  2. Personality traits structure is supposed to be hierarchical with traits like Conscientiousness comprising of many finer aspects or facets. The NEO-PI-R is structured around 6 facets of conscientiousness, they being competence, order, dutifulness, achievement-striving, self-discipline and deliberation.
  3. Conscientiousness predicts a number of important life outcomes, however the relationship of different facets with different outcomes is not well established; nor are the number of facets of Conscientiousness agreed upon.
  4. Thus Angela and colleagues set forth to find out what was the underlying facet level structure of Conscientiousness and which facets predicted which outcomes. For this they used exploratory factor analysis and confirmatory factor analysis on data obtained from 291 adolescents. Conscientiousness was measured using items present in multiple scales from IPIP (international personality item pool).
  5. Exploratory factor analysis yielded an eight factor structure which was confirmed with confirmatory factor analysis.
  6. The eight factors were best described by the following construct labels: (a) Industriousness (“I make an effort”, “I am always prepared”); (b) Perfectionism (“I want to be the very best”, “I demand quality”); (c) Tidiness (“I like to tidy up”, “I leave a mess in my room” [reverse-keyed]); (d) Procrastination Refrainment (“I get to work at once”, “I am easily distracted” [reverse-keyed]); (e) Control (“I rush into things” [reverse-keyed], “I do unexpected things” [reverse-keyed]); (f) Cautiousness (“I think before I speak”, “I make careful choices”); (g) Task Planning (“I follow a schedule”, “I work according to a routine”); and (h) Perseverance (“I give up easily” [reverse-keyed], “I am easily discouraged” [reverse-keyed]).

  7.   Multiple outcomes of interest for the students were measured, these included absenteeism, CGPA, high stakes achievement results and teacher ratings of social behavior. All facets except tidiness predicted these outcomes. Perfectionism predicted scores in high stakes test even stronger than Conscientiousness as a whole. Industriousness predicted less absenteeism even strongly than Conscientiousness as a whole.
  8. Based on when the factors emerged and drawing a parallel with other lesser factor solutions, its apparent that following pairings can be done (my interpretation!) :
    1. Task planning (ordering tasks and time) and Tidiness (ordering possessions) make one group that can be called organization/orderliness. Task planning seems to be the dutifulness facet of NEO-PI-R.
    2. Cautiousness (prudence in VIA) and Control of impulses (self-regulation in VIA) make one group that is related to in-the-moment exercise of control, willpower and judgement. Cautiousness seems to be related to deliberation facet of NEO-PI-R.
    3. Industriousness (hard work {driven by harmonious passion?} where focus is on achieving quantity) and Perfectionism ( drive towards perfection {driven by obsessive passion?} where focus is on achieving quality) seem to make one group that is related to long term focus/ passion. Industriousness looks the same as Achievement-striving as per NEO-PI-R.
    4. Procrastination refrainment (decisiveness or starting things without waiting)  and perseverance (or finishing things that have been started, no matter what) seem to make the final group that is task-oriented. While procrastination refrainment seems like self-discipline of NEO-PI-R, Perseverance is more close to competence.
  9. To me the above eight factor structure of conscientiousness fits beautifully with my own ABCD model whereby I can see parallels with the Orderliness/organization related to Affect dimension and so forth.
  10. This research has real world implications. Given the limited time, if at all,  allotted by schools for positive education interventions, if one wants to increase odds of better outcomes, its wiser to focus on particular facets of Conscientiousness like industriousness, that are known to be associated with good outcomes, rather than poor predictor facets like tidiness, or even Conscientiousness as a whole.
  11. Bottom-line appears to be that teaching children tidy habits may be totally irrelevant,, in terms of valued life outcomes,  but making them appreciate the value of hard work and effort may really pay off!

if intrigued, here is the original paper.

Research Summaries: The Economics and Psychology of Personality Traits

Today’s research summary is about a paper co-authored by Angela Duckworth, that is at the intersection of psychology and economics. Though I have been following behavioral economics a bit, I still found the paper a bit challenging to read and comprehend and don’t claim to understand all the attached jargon, functions and mathematical formulations. The fact that the paper is 88 pages long wasn’t of help either 🙂 (the saving grace being that 20 or more pages were filled with references alone), so read the rest of the summary at your own peril!

An illustration of Spearman's two-factor intel...

An illustration of Spearman’s two-factor intelligence theory. Each small oval is a hypothetical mental test. The blue areas show the variance attributed to s, and the purple areas the variance attributed to g. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

  1. The paper aims to throw light on how personality affects (socio)economic outcomes and how concepts from personality psychology can be used in economic equations and modeling.
  2. To start with, an important socioeconomic outcome is success in life. IQ or cognitive ability is well established as a predictor of success in life/job,  and slowly but surely, a case is building up for the predictive power of personality traits like conscientiousness to predict success in life/job.
  3. Its useful to distinguish cognitive factors like Intelligence/IQ from other ‘non-cognitive’ factors like personality traits and motivation.
  4. Perry Preschool study which enriched the environment (an intervention aimed at increasing IQ) of disadvantaged kids with subnormal IQ, found that IQ gains for treatment group (which shot up initially) and control group became equal at age 10 , though the treatment group continued to be much more successful on many socioeconomic outcomes over their life cycle. This can be only explained if we admit that something other than IQ, maybe personality factors, were changed by the intervention.
  5. Psychologists use personality, motivation and cognitive factors to explain behavior and success of an agent. Economists however use concepts like preferences, constraints, incentives etc to explain choice/decision/ behavior and ultimately success in life.
  6. Cognitive factors are defined as ‘‘ability to understand complex ideas,to adapt effectively to the environment, to learn from experience, to engage in various forms of reasoning, to overcome obstacles by taking thought’’. The various tests like IQ tests that measure cognitive ability have led to identification of a general factor ‘g’ of intelligence. The factor structure of Intelligence is hierarchical;  as per one conceptualization, the second-order factors are ‘fluid intelligence’ and ‘crystallized intelligence“.
  7. IQ test are not a pure measure of maximal intellectual performance; for those getting low scores, appropriate incentives can increase their scores. Similarly test anxiety may affect performance; thus IQ measure is affected by factors like motivation and personality.
  8. Personality factors also have a hierarchical structure; the most common level contains the Big Five factors, below them are specific facets  and above them two super factors of plasticity and stability.
  9. The personality traits of Big Five have been arrived at using factor analysis and are more descriptive in nature, based around clustering of together of traits, adjectives or behaviors. The same can be said of ‘g’ which is again more descriptively arrived at. In contrast, economists prefer measures that have been built based around their predictive power in the real word. MMPI, Hogan personality inventory etc were on the other hand built with the specific aim of predicting real world outcomes.
  10. Economists, try to estimate preferences of agents and thus predict/explain their behavior etc. Some of the typical preferences studied are time preference, risk aversion, preference for leisure and altruism/ social preferences. Estimating these preferences help explain and predict behavior that deviates from a purely self-interested rational agent.
  11. Time preference is the preference for immediate reward over future reward. This is measured by the phenomenon of time discounting while making decisions.  For example, what would you choose 1 $ today or 2 $ tomorrow? 500 $ this week or 1000 $ next month? based on answers to questions like these (and maybe real world behaviors/ decisions too) economists can infer what is the rate at which you discount future utility for present utility. That function is hyperbolic in nature.
  12. Its seems “time preference is tri-dimensional, comprising three separate underlying motives: impulsivity, the tendency to act spontaneously and without planning; compulsivity, the tendency to stick with plans; and inhibition, the ability to override automatic responses to urges or emotions”. Its easy to see how the three components of time preference can be related to personality factors. Also important is to note that a person with low future vision or imagination may be constrained on this time preference dimension.
  13. Risk aversion is the phenomenon, whereby a sure or less uncertain outcome is preferred over an uncertain outcome.  For example, what would you choose  1 $ for sure or a 50 % chance of winning 2.2 $? Based on analyzing such decisions, one can again calculate, how risk averse a person is. This paradigm is however prone to framing effects.
  14. Those who show little risk aversion, also have poor outcomes like indulging in smoking, stealing and not wearing seat belts. The personality trait of sensation seeking, as developed by Zuckerman, is related to this construct.
  15. Preference for leisure is the preference to use time for relaxation etc over indulging in work or economic activity. Some people are driven to work hard and personality traits like Conscientiousness are really relevant here.
  16. Social preferences are preferences like inequality aversion where a monkey would not accept cucumber pieces for the same work, if another monkey is getting grapes instead. Doesn’t  make sense rationally, but economists can use social preference to get out of this hole!
  17. The big five as well as IQ are predictive of various life outcomes like leadership, grades, longevity etc
  18. Most personality traits as well as intelligence measures change with age- they are malleable and follow a pattern. For eg, fluid intelligence decreases while crystallized intelligence increases over the lifespan.
  19. Environmental factors like parental investment and social roles can be the mechanisms that lead to changes and stability in these traits.
  20. Preference factors, which are studied by economists, however are not clear as to whether they are stable or change with age and more research needs to be done there.
  21. The real contribution of this paper is in conceiving psychological traits as constraints under which economic decisions are being made.  For eg. low cognitive ability will constrain a person to figure out and get clarity about the issue at hand and he will be forced to choose in uncertainty and his risk aversion maybe causing him to make sub-optimal decisions.  The intelligent person has a richer choice set and intelligence is a constrain having real world implications; same is true for personality factors.
  22. Thus personality traits may be a form of constraints/ preferences and research in either psychology or economics around this shroud inform each other.
  23. Overall, despite its challenging economics jargon, I found this really useful; as someone interested in personality psychology, this provided a new perspective.

As always, do check out the original paper here.

Research Summaries: Grit: Perseverance and Passion for Long-Term Goals

Today’s research summary is based on this paper which Angela Duckworth co-authored with Chris Peterson and colleagues, and where she first introduced her concept of grit and operationalized it by introducing the Grit Scale.

Monkey Grit

Monkey Grit (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

  1. One common thread running thorough Angela’s research is a (harmonious) obsession with finding out what leads to great achievement. A lot of earlier research in psychology has focused on the role of talent/ intelligence in high achievement, and that role is well established.
  2. Terman, for example, studied a group of highly gifted children in a famed longitudinal study which found that those who rose to prominence were more likely to exhibit “Perseverance, Self-Confidence, and Integration toward goals”, rather than mere high IQ. So, cognitive factors are just a part of the picture, and do not explain the whole picture.
  3. The other factors that  could influence high performance have been variously named as non-cognitive, personality or motivational factors. Among these, the Big Five personality trait of Conscientiousness keeps emerging in research linking personality with high achievement and work outcomes. However, conscientiousness may be multi-faceted with the achievement oriented facets that make one work hard, try to do a good job, and completes the task at hand, be more closely related to job performance than the dependability oriented facets that make one self-controlled and conventional.
  4. Thus Angela thought it worthwhile to introduce a new concept called Grit. which could explain why some people who have equal or lesser talent succeed over others who might have greater talent/ intelligence.   This is how they define Grit:

  6. Grit is different from Conscientiousness, but correlated with the achievement side of Conscientiousness. To me, conscientiousness seems to comprise both Grit and Self-control. Grit is all about staying course driven by long-term super-ordinate goals,  while self-control is more about not getting distracted and managing one’s impulses and emotions in the service of the currently activated goal. On can think of grit as sustained self-control in the service of a constant non-changing goal. The important thing to note is Grit is different from both self-control and conscientiousness.
  7. Across six studies Angela found that Grit predicted successful outcomes over and above Intelligence. Point to note that Grit and IQ/ intelligence are typically uncorrelated or even negatively correlated. The latter finding is explained by the fact that people having less IQ/ Talent may need to exercise and develop Grit more fully to achieve good outcomes. Three of these studies were longitudinal and the rest cross-sectional.
  8. Study 1 & 2 validated a 12 item Grit scale, which contained two orthogonal factors passion ( or consistency of interest) and perseverance of effort. The incremental validity of grit in predicting educational achievements (an outcome variable), over and above, IQ and conscientiousness, in a cross-sectional population was also ascertained. It was also found that older people were more gritty.
  9. In study 3, they looked at undergrads at UPenn and found that grit predicted overall CGPA and explained variance over and above that explained by SAT scores(proxy for intelligence).
  10. Study 4 and 5 looked at west point cadets (the analog of NDA cadets in India) and found that Grit predicted who made it through the beast barracks (the first summer training) better than self-control etc.  However, for those who stayed, self-control predicted better the CGPA at end of year one and MPS (Military performance score).
  11. Study 6 looked at National spelling bee participants and found that Grit predicted who will make to which final round.  Also the effect of grit was mediated by the study time or hours participants put on weekend preparing for this and  number or prior participation in the competition ( the more gritty you are the more likely you are to participate in more prior competitions and the more no. of prior participation, the greater your odds of success)
  12. Overall, this paper gave direction to a whole new field and established Grit as a valid concept with important outcomes and correlates.

If your interest has been piqued, you can check the full article here.

Research Summaries: Self-Discipline Gives Girls the Edge: Gender in Self-Discipline, Grades, and Achievement Test Scores

Today’s post summarizes a paper by Angela Duckworth and Martin Seligman, that parses the same set of data, as obtained in their earlier paper (see research summary of that paper here), to come up with new insights about gender differences in self-control and scholastic achievement.

Dangal (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

  1. Girls, typically outperform boys when it comes to getting good grades overall and within each subject. this is true of US; however from what I have seen of Indian board results, the same is true of almost every board exam in India, be it CBSE, ICSE or State Boards.
  2. The girls however do not outperform boys on achievement tests like SAT or on ability test like IQ tests.
  3. If one were to assume that achievement and ability test are a better measure and can be used for predicting the grades, then girls grades as predicted by IQ etc fall shorter of what they actually achieve; and boys typically achieve lower actual grades that those predicted on the basis of their IQ. This phenomena is called underprediction and overprediction respectively.
  4. Traditional accounts of explaining this gender gap focus on how boys are better at achievement tests and are at an advantage. For example, as boys are expected to do better on such tests, girls face ‘stereotype threat’ which leads to poor performance by girls.
  5. Angela set out to find whether the undeprediction of grades for girls, and the advantage that girls have over boys when it comes to grades, might be due to gender differences in self-control. Specifically she surmised that girls are more self-controlled than boys and this factor could partially explain the female advantage when it comes to grades.
  6. I had lamented in my earlier research summary, that Anglea hadn’t defined self-control; she does in this paper:
  7. We use the terms self-discipline and self-control interchangeably, defining both as the ability to suppress prepotent responses in the service of a higher goal and further specifying that such a choice is not automatic but rather requires conscious effort. Examples of self-discipline include deliberately modulating one’s anger rather than having a temper tantrum, reading test instructions before proceeding to the questions, paying attention to a teacher rather than daydreaming, saving money so that it can accumulate interest in the bank, choosing homework over TV, and persisting on long-term assignments despite boredom and frustration.

  8. Parsing the data from previous study they found that indeed VIII class girls outperformed boys when it came to grades achieved; that their grades were underpredicted if one looked at achievement test results; girls were more self-controlled than boys and that gender differences in self-control partially mediated the relationship between gender and grades. In study 2, they had administered an IQ test also, and that too underpredicted girls’ grades.
  9. To me, if we put the two papers together, one showing that self-control trumps IQ, and the second showing that girls have an advantage in grades due to self-control over boys, and we club this with the fact that in some IQ tests etc boys show a greater variance than girls on IQ, I think a safe bet for boys, is not to rely too much on IQ, but develop self-control too.  Both intelligence and self-control are immensely malleable, and depending on the type of test / grade that my be more meaningful criteria of academic achievement for you, you should develop either or both- but most important do not compromise on your love of learning, curiosity and creativity while being lured by these indices of scholastic achievement- these are way too important in their own way and without being a means to an end.

Research Summaries: Self-Discipline Outdoes IQ in Predicting Academic Performance of Adolescents

Today’s research summary focuses on a very early article by Angela Duckworth, that first catapulted her to fame. Co-authored with Martin Seligmen, the article focuses on how non-cognitive factors like self-control are a better predictor of scholastic achievement than say cognitive factors like IQ.

Two college students wrestling (collegiate, sc...

Two college students wrestling (collegiate, scholastic, or folkstyle) in the United States. (Photo credit: Wikipedia)

  1. Authors use the awkward term self-discipline in the paper, but all they really meant was self-control, defining which, and around which, a rich literature already existed. Angela clarifies as much in her new MOOC on Coursera, so don’t start wondering what this new concept means in psychological literature.
  2. Self-control (which the authors surprisingly didn’t define), as per VIA, is the ability to be disciplined and to regulate what one feels and does; it involves both feelings and actions; it is the ability to delay present gratification for future benefits, and it also about not getting distracted by temptations and able to focus on the task at hand. It is the opposite of being impulsive.
  3. The present studies (two of them) focused on class VIII students and were partly driven by Angela’s observation as a math teacher that hard working students who could control their impulses, sometimes fared better than those who could grasp concepts easily. That drove part of the hypothesis.
  4. Earlier works has shown that Self-control, as measured by Marshmallow test, in 4 year olds, can predict positive life outcomes decades later; similarly, in college students out of 32 measured personality traits (like extraversion, energy levels etc), only self-control predicted later CGPA more robustly than earlier SAT scores. Thus, it was reasonable to hypothesize that self-control in eighth graders will predict academic achievement better than IQ.
  5. Self-control is a difficult thing to measure accurately. Thus, they used self-reports, teacher reports, parent reports as well as a test that gave students hypothetical choices between a small reward now or a big reward later. Angela actually wanted to do an age appropriate  test similar to marshmallow test with the eighth graders, but Marty was skeptical; in the second study they did include a behavioral measure of delay of gratification task, whereby they actually handed out 1$ envelope to students with a choice of  keeping that or returning it now to get 2$ next week.
  6. Academic achievement was measured by grades achieved at end term, attendance, selection into a high school program, and achievement test scores.
  7. IQ was measured using a standard IQ test; keep in mind that IQ is a very narrow assessment for a part of broader cognitive factors/ intelligence.
  8. What they found was that self-control not only predicted academic achievement and who would improve school grades over the class term, but that it was twice an effective predictor than IQ (explained twice as much variance).
  9. This is an important paper as it makes the case for enhancing and working on the self-control of students, for better academic performance. Self-control, by all means, and like any other character strength, is malleable and can be increased by proper interventions.
  10. This paper is personally relevant to me, as last year I worked with IXth class students on their character strengths and this year I am working with VIII class students focusing on their character strengths.  Although the results, I believe, will be applicable and generalize to other age groups, its heartening to note that at least for VIII class, barring cross-cultural effects, there is proven research showing that increasing strengths like self-control pays big dividends.

if the above has you wanting to read more, go to the source- the original article can be found here.

Research Summaries: Positive Psychology in Clinical Practice


Effects of Alcohol and How They Impact Alaska DUI Accidents

Drunk driving is a serious offense that involves criminal penalties and a driver’s license suspension, but the potential punishment is not enough to deter some motorists from getting behind the wheel while intoxicated. According to the US Centers for Disease Control and Prevention (CDC), DUI accidents comprise 28% of all fatalities from motor vehicle collisions. Worse, up to 111 million individuals self-report that they have driven while drunk in the last year, though they were never apprehended. As such, drunk driving accidents remain a risk for all Alaska motorists.

If you were hurt in a DUI crash, it is essential to get in touch with an Anchorage DUI accident lawyer right away. You may qualify to recover compensation for your losses, but the process is complicated even if the intoxicated motorist was arrested. In addition, you might benefit from reviewing some information on how consumption of alcohol increases the potential for serious collisions.

How Alcohol Impairs Driving

In criminal law, officials will typically base drunk driving charges upon the motorist’s blood alcohol concentration (BAC) as measured by a chemical test. BAC directly relates to the ability to drive, so blowing in excess of .08% could lead to an arrest. However, BAC affects the human body in ways that impair the driver and increase the potential for crashes. For instance:

  • At .02%, the driver is already feeling relaxed and looses some judgment. There is also a decline in vision and ability to perform multiple tasks at once.
  • When the motorist is at the legal limit, concentration and perception are markedly impaired. The person may lack muscle coordination and have difficulties perceiving dangers on the road.
  • At a BAC of .15 or higher, the driver has lost almost all control over muscle movement and balance.

Legal Remedies After a DUI Accident

Drunk driving is a crime in Alaska, but the possibility of jail time, fines, and probation does nothing to compensate for victims’ losses. Instead, your legal options are civil in nature, as you seek monetary damages for your medical costs, lost wages, pain and suffering, and other consequences.

To obtain compensation in a civil lawsuit for any type of accident, you must prove that the at-fault motorist breached the duty to exercise reasonable care when operating a vehicle. In a DUI collision, showing that the other driver was intoxicated is solid evidence of negligence. Because the standard of proof in a civil claim is lower than a criminal matter, it is not necessary that the other motorist was arrested for driving drunk.

Set Up a Consultation With an Alaska DUI Accident Attorney

Recovering compensation after a drunk driving crash is not as clear-cut as you expect. Do not put your rights and remedies at risk by trying to represent yourself. You can trust our team at Power & Power Law, so please contact our Anchorage, Alaska office for more information. We can help you exercise your legal options after reviewing your unique circumstances.


Puneet Varma (Editor)

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Specialty  Rheumatology
ICD-9-CM  701.0 710.1
ICD-10  L94.0-L94.1, M34
MedlinePlus  000429

Similar  Scleroderma polyrhizum, Scleroderma areolatum, Scleroderma cepa

Scleroderma is a long term autoimmune disease that results in hardening of the skin. In the more severe form, it also affects internal organs. The cause is unknown. The underlying mechanism involves the body's immune system attacking healthy tissues. There is a strong association with certain mutations in HLA genes. Environmental factors have also been implicated.

There are two main types of the disease: the localized form (called localized scleroderma, limited scleroderma, or morphea) and the systemic form (called Systemic scleroderma, diffuse scleroderma, generalized scleroderma, or systemic sclerosis). Limited scleroderma involves mainly the skin of the hands, arms and face. Diffuse scleroderma is rapidly progressing and affects a large area of the skin and one or more internal organs, frequently the kidneys, esophagus, heart and/or lungs. This form of scleroderma can be quite disabling. A limited cutaneous subtype of it is called CREST syndrome.

There are no treatments for scleroderma itself, but organ system–specific complications are treated. Outcomes are generally good for limited scleroderma of the skin when there are no lung complications. They are worse for those with the diffuse skin disease, particularly in older age and males. Death occurs most often from lung, heart and kidney complications. In diffuse cutaneous disease, five-year survival is 70% and 10-year survival is 55%. Scleroderma was first described in 1753 by Carlo Curzio of Ospedale degli Incurabili, Naples.

Signs and symptoms

Potential signs and symptoms include:

  • Cardiovascular: Raynaud's phenomenon (is the presenting symptom in 30% of affected persons, occurs in 95% of affected individuals at some time during their illness); healed pitting ulcers on the fingertips; skin and mucousal telangiectasis; palpitations, irregular heart rate and fainting due to conduction abnormalities, hypertension and congestive heart failure.
  • Digestive: gastroesophageal reflux disease, bloating, indigestion, loss of appetite, diarrhoea alternating with constipation, sicca syndrome and its complications, loosening of teeth and hoarseness (due to acid reflux).
  • Pulmonary: progressive worsening of shortness of breath, chest pain (due to pulmonary artery hypertension) and dry, persistent cough due to interstitial lung disease.
  • Musculoskeletal: joint, muscle aches, loss of joint range of motion, carpal tunnel syndrome and muscle weakness.
  • Genitourinary: erectile dysfunction, dyspareunia, scleroderma renal crises and kidney failure.
  • Other: facial pain due to trigeminal neuralgia, hand paresthesias, headache, stroke, fatigue, calcinosis and weight loss.
  • Cause

    Scleroderma is caused by genetic and environmental factors. Mutations in HLA genes seem to play a crucial role in the pathogenesis of some cases (but not all), likewise silica, aromatic and chlorinated solvents, ketones, trichloroethylene, welding fumes and white spirits exposure seems to contribute to the condition in a small proportion of affected persons.

    It is characterised by increased synthesis of collagen (leading to the sclerosis), damage to small blood vessels, activation of T lymphocytes and production of altered connective tissues. Its proposed pathogenesis is the following:

  • It begins with an inciting event at the level of the vasculature, probably the endothelium. The inciting event is yet to be elucidated but may be a viral agent, oxidative stress or autoimmune. Endothelial cell damage and apoptosis ensue, leading to the vascular leakiness that manifests in early clinical stages as tissue oedema. At this stage it is predominantly a Th1 and Th17-mediated disease.
  • After this the vasculature is further compromised by impaired angiogenesis and impaired vasculogenesis (fewer endothelial progenitor cells), likely related to the presence of anti-endothelin cell antibodies. Despite this impaired angiogenesis, elevated levels of pro-angiogenic growth factors like PDGF and VEGF is often seen in persons with the condition. The balance of vasodilation and vasoconstriction becomes off-balance and the net result is vasoconstriction. The damaged endothelium then serves as a point of origin for blood clot formation and further contributes to ischaemia-reperfusion injury and the generation of reactive oxygen species. These later stages are characterised by Th2 polarity.
  • The damaged endothelium upregulates adhesion molecules and chemokines to attract leucocytes, which enables the development of innate and adaptive immune responses, including loss of tolerance to various oxidised antigens, which includes topoisomerase I. B cells mature into plasma cells, which furthers the autoimmune component of the condition. T cells differentiate into subsets, including Th2 cells, which play a vital role in tissue fibrosis. Anti–topoisomerase 1 antibodies, in turn, stimulate type I interferon production.
  • Fibroblasts are recruited and activated by multiple cytokines and growth factors to generate myofibroblasts. Dysregulated transforming growth factor β (TGF-β) signalling in fibroblasts and myofibroblasts has been observed in multiple studies of scleroderma-affected individuals. Activation of fibroblasts and myofibroblasts leads to excessive deposition of collagen and other related proteins, leading to fibrosis. B cells are implicated in this stage, IL-6 and TGF-β produced by the B cells decrease collagen degradation and increase extracellular matrix production. Endothelin signalling is implicated in the pathophysiology of fibrosis.
  • Vitamin D is implicated in the pathophysiology of the disease. An inverse correlation between plasma levels of vitamin D and scleroderma severity has been noted and vitamin D is known to play a crucial role in regulating (usually suppressing) the actions of the immune system.

    Typical scleroderma is classically defined as symmetrical skin thickening, with about 70% of cases also presenting with Raynaud's phenomenon, nail-fold capillary changes and antinuclear antibodies. Affected individuals may or may not experience systemic organ involvement. There is no single test for scleroderma that works all of the time and hence the diagnosis is often a matter of exclusion. Atypical scleroderma may show any variation of these changes without skin changes or with finger swelling only.

    Laboratory testing can show antitopoisomerase antibodies, like anti-scl70 (causing a diffuse systemic form), or anticentromere antibodies (causing a limited systemic form and the CREST syndrome). Other autoantibodies can be seen, such as anti-U3 or anti-RNA polymerase.

    Diseases that are often in the differential include:

  • Eosinophilia, a condition in which there are too many eosinophils (a type of immune cell that attacks parasites and is involved in certain allergic reactions) in the blood.
  • Eosinophilia-myalgia syndrome, a form of eosinophilia that is caused by L-tryptophan supplements.
  • Eosinophilic fasciitis, a disease that affects the connective tissues surrounding skeletal muscles, bones, blood vessels and nerves in the arms and legs.
  • Graft-versus-host disease, an autoimmune condition that occurs as a result of bone marrow transplants in which the immune cells from the transplanted bone marrow attack the host's body.
  • Mycosis fungoides, a type of cutaneous T cell lymphoma, a rare cancer that causes rashes all over the body.
  • Nephrogenic systemic fibrosis, a condition usually caused by kidney failure that causes fibrosis (thickening) of the tissues.
  • Primary biliary cirrhosis, an autoimmune disease of the liver.
  • Primary pulmonary hypertension
  • Complex regional pain syndrome
  • Classification

    Scleroderma is characterised by the appearance of circumscribed or diffuse, hard, smooth, ivory-colored areas that are immobile and which give the appearance of hidebound skin, a disease occurring in both localised and systemic forms:

    There is no cure for scleroderma, although relief of symptoms is often achieved. These include

  • Raynaud's phenomenon with vasodilators such as calcium channel blockers, alpha blockers, serotonin receptor antagonists, angiotensin II receptor inhibitors, statins, local nitrates or iloprost
  • Digital ulcers with phosphodiesterase 5 inhibitors (e.g., sildenafil) or iloprost
  • Prevention of new digital ulcers with bosentan
  • Malnutrition, secondary to intestinal flora overgrowth with tetracycline antibiotics like tetracycline
  • Alveolitis with cyclophosphamide, azathioprine with or without corticosteroids
  • Pulmonary arterial hypertension with endothelin receptor antagonists, phosphodiesterase 5 inhibitors and prostanoids
  • Gastrooesophageal reflux disease with antacids or prokinetics
  • Kidney crises with angiotensin converting enzyme inhibitors and angiotensin II receptor antagonists
  • Systemic disease-modifying treatment with immunosuppressants is often used. Immunosuppressants used in its treatment include azathioprine, methotrexate, cyclophosphamide, mycophenolate, intravenous immunoglobulin, rituximab, sirolimus, alefacept and the Tyrosine kinase inhibitors, imatinib, nilotinib and dasatinib.

    Experimental therapies under investigation include endothelin receptor antagonsits, tyrosine kinase inhibitors, beta-glycan peptides, halofuginone, basiliximab, alemtuzumab, abatacept and haematopoietic stem cell transplantation.

    The 5-year survival rate for scleroderma is about 85%, whereas the 10-year survival rate is less than 70%. This varies according to the subtype; for instance, persons with limited skin disease have a 10-year survival rate of 71%, whereas the outlook for patients with systemic scleroderma has generally improved over the years. Ten-year survival rates rose from 54% in 1972 to 66% in 2001 The major causes of death in persons with scleroderma are: pulmonary hypertension, pulmonary fibrosis and scleroderma renal crisis. People with scleroderma are also at a heightened risk for contracting cancers (especially liver, lung, haematologic and bladder cancers) and, perhaps, cardiovascular disease.

    Scleroderma most commonly first presents between the ages of 20 and 50 years, although any age group can be affected. Women are four to nine times more likely to develop scleroderma than men.

    This disease is found worldwide. In the United States, prevalence is estimated at 240 per million and the annual incidence of scleroderma is 19 per million people. Likewise in the United States, it is slightly more common in African Americans than in their white counterparts, Scleroderma occurs much more often in women than it does in men. Choctaw Native Americans are more likely than Americans of European descent to develop the type of scleroderma that affects internal organs. In Germany, the prevalence is between 10 and 150 per million people, and the annual incidence is between 3 and 28 per million people. In South Australia, the annual incidence is 23 per million people, and the prevalence 233 per million people. Scleroderma is less common in the Asian population.

    Scleroderma in pregnancy is a complex situation; it increases the risk to both mother and child. Overall scleroderma is associated with reduced fetal weight for gestational age. The treatment for scleroderma often includes known teratogens such as cyclophosphamide, methotrexate, mycophenolate, etc. and hence careful avoidance of such drugs during pregnancy is advised. In these cases hydroxychloroquine and low-dose corticosteroids might be used for disease control.

    Scleroderma Wikipedia


Tokyo Street Count

What is Tokyo Street Count?

Tokyo Street Count (TSC) is our primary project where we conduct bi-annual counts of people sleeping rough in Tokyo during the night time. It first took place in January 2016 covering just three wards in central Tokyo and with 82 volunteers. However, as it gets more public awareness, the project has grown to cover wider areas and receive more volunteer participation. On the night of the count, volunteers go out to the streets after the last train and count the number of people sleeping rough because it is the time when most rough sleepers start to find shelter for the night. Initiated by ARCH and supported by a number of homelessness organisations as well as many volunteers, TSC is hoped to provide a more realistic picture of rough sleeping in Tokyo based on which more effective strategies can be made.

Why conducting TSC?

In Tokyo, official street counts are conducted during the daytime twice a year – one in summer (August) and the other in winter (January). While these counts are useful to some extent, especially in grasping the size of the less-mobile rough sleeping population with well-established structures such as cardboard shacks, a more realistic and neutral picture of entire rough sleeping would be provided through a night time count. TSC is therefore conducted during the night time around the same time of the year as the official counts and attempts to complement them by providing a night-time snapshot, which hopefully encourages improved policy making and raises public awareness of the actual situation of rough sleeping in Tokyo.

This action is driven by our will to create momentum in Tokyo’s homelessness sector and the society in general in the years leading up to the 2020 Olympic and Paralympic Games. We acknowledge that hosting an international event like the Olympics could trigger hostile attitudes towards rough sleepers, but also a great amount of energy to improve their situation. ARCH is determined to see to the latter, and TSC is one of the key actions towards that goal.

What happens on the night of the count?

Volunteers are asked to arrive at the meeting point (usually a railway station) by 0:30am. After signing in, they are advised of their team and counting area and provided a brief instruction about the count. Each team is made up of 3 to 5 volunteers. Once they finish checking the counting method, area and routes in a group, they inform the staff of their departure and the actual count starts.

The count takes around 2.5 hours from 1am to 3:30am. Each team walk all streets and paths within their counting area and record people who are considered homeless using a counting form and a map. The form asks the location and time, number of individuals sighted, whether they are lying/sitting down or mobile, and the form of rough sleeping such as in a tent or sleeping bag.

After the count, volunteers come back to the designated place (usually 24hr restaurant) by 4am at the latest and finalise their count results. We also ask them to fill a short questionnaire. The whole TSC program ends when the first trains leave around 4:30am.

During the count.jpg
Finalising the result.png

What are the findings of TSC?

On average, TSC finds 2.5 to 2.8 times more people sleeping rough during the night time compared to the official count conducted during the day. It has also revealed that, during the night time, a larger proportion of rough sleeping population tends to be seen on the streets and in railway stations, in sleeping bags or makeshift cardboard structures. These findings are likely to indicate that daytime counts cannot capture more temporary, mobile form of street homelessness that only becomes visible during the night time.

How are the results and findings of TSC used by ARCH?

We aggregate and analyse the counting data as well as volunteer questionnaire results. Usually, we announce the total number of rough sleepers who have been counted in TSC within a month. In addition to that, we use the final data analysis in our advocacy and research activities and publicise it with our policy recommendations in order to generate desired social impacts.

Find out more

Visit our blog for the latest news about TSC.


SKU: 9781782217992

Drawing Animals Using Grids

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If you have often struggled to draw animals, from master artist Giovanni Civardi comes this highly visual beginners guide to drawing dogs, cats and horses using the traditional grid technique a method that makes the first stages of drawing simple and achievable.

Giovanni Civardi shows you how to create an accurate pencil sketch of the subject by laying a grid over a photo or drawing and transferring the image to the drawing surface one square at a time.

Beginning with a summary of animal anatomy and basic drawing techniques, this book contains over 90 outlines of dogs, cat and horses in a range of static and moving poses, with guidance on how to add shading and tonal effects to create more detailed finished drawings.


The Importance of Education

Many people have very different viewpoints when it comes to education. Some people think that it is a complete waste of time, and some people think that it is one of the most important things in life. This is why many parents often stop at no barrier to send their child to an expensive school or university. Education is extremely important because it develops the mind in many different ways.

If you’re a young parent that’s looking to send their child to a good school, then you’re probably wondering what are the most important characteristics of a good school? A good school is comprised of fantastic facilities, great educators, and likeminded students. It is for this reason that we can recommend that your check out girls boarding schools Brisbane.

So why should you emphasize the importance of education?It is because it has been proven that people who have a higher education and a lot of experience in their industry are far more likely to obtain and hold higher paying and more high-status jobs. By studying hard and putting in the effort to acquire the knowledge that is necessary to occupy one of these higher paying jobs, your child will be able to lead a very comfortable lifestyle. Credentials are a very important part of getting hired by an employer. By studying hard and acquiring good grades throughout school your child can display to potential employers that they aren’t afraid of hard work and that the goals that they set will be accomplished.

Many people don’t understand why specifics are learned in school. One of the primary benefits of a good education is that you are able to develop your critical thinking skills and hone your decision-making skills. When children grow up into adulthood, they need to make many complicated decisions, such as paying off student loans, getting themselves a job, buying themselves a car, and sorting out a housing situation for themselves. These decisions can be very difficult to make. However, if the child has spent many years learning how to make decisions for themselves, these decisions will be much easier for them to contend with. They will be able to make good decisions on their own without parental support. In addition, they will be more likely to be good at finding arguments and ways to confirm their decisions.

They will also be able to make their lives better for themselves. If they want to lead a comfortable lifestyle which garners respect from society then they need to educate themselves. People who are more educated climb the corporate ladder at a faster pace than their less educated counterparts. Educated people are also more likely to give back to their communities. They are more likely to take part in projects that serve the greater good because it’s very important to lend a hand to those who need it. Overall, education is one of the most important things in the world. It makes our societies better, and it allows us to make decisions so that we may move forward as people.


How to maintain health in the modern world

Our immune system is a superorganism: a complex conglomerate of cells and molecules connected to all the organs, systems, and tissues of the body without exception. The national library of medicine defines immunity as “the most complex system in the body.”

The word “immunity” comes from the Latin immunis, which means “free” or “inviolable”. Immunity is a combination of various biological defense systems of the body, thanks to which we remain healthy. The immune system works wonders, although it works almost invisibly-unlike, for example, the heart, which we feel beating, or the lungs, which allow us to inhale and exhale. The work of the immune system is usually invisible, but it is this powerful system that protects us from everything foreign, maintains balance in the body, and ensures wound healing. Immunity is the basis of health and well-being.

Immunology is a multi-faceted and complex field of knowledge that studies the immune system. Thanks to the achievements of this science, many approaches to medicine have changed radically in the last 30 years. And in the current reality, it is more important than ever for each of us to understand the basics of immunology and learn the basic rules that will help to preserve and even improve health. This is what my book will help you do. I invite you to take a fascinating journey into the world of immunology, where you will be able to understand the principles of the immune system and learn how to “support” it, as well as get acquainted with new, amazing discoveries in the field of immunity science. You will understand how the immune system works and how it works.

There is no other system in the human body that affects such diverse and numerous aspects of life. Both in illness and in health, the immune system works without knowing rest. It is always on high alert and on guard for the well-being of the owner. You may think that the immune system is too complex for most of us to understand. But I would like to say that the immune system is a beautiful, amazing and very logical structure, although it is subject to constant changes and has to adapt to a particular person.

The immune system is the main tool for maintaining the health of the body, but few people realize all the variety of its protective mechanisms until they get sick. If we catch a cold, especially in winter, when vitamin C is not enough, and we immediately remember the immune system and thank him for his valiant struggle. But that’s not all he’s doing. If it only existed for the sake of a few weeks of winter cold, we would have a hard time. We almost do not notice the work of the immune system, but it is deeply intertwined with every aspect of the physical and mental state, provides us with health and longevity.

Immunity is a complex system consisting of many components. The human body is subject to a variety of troubles, from allergies to autoimmune diseases, from mental disorders to metabolic problems and cancer. We try our best to be healthy and feel as good as possible, but we are still weaker and more unhappy than ever before. The reason is that our complex immune system easily loses its balance due to constant overload, stress, dirty air, overeating and lack of physical activity. What is considered healthy in modern society is not always healthy. Our contemporaries die from diseases associated with an unhealthy lifestyle significantly more often than for other reasons, but in many cases this can be avoided if you pay more attention to yourself and take better care of yourself.

We will talk about the achievements of modern immunology and see why the immune system is, in fact, the sixth sense, which allows you to notice and understand how the environment, feelings and emotions affect our condition. We will learn why some people almost never get sick and how to be someone who suffers from chronic diseases, as well as what it means to “strengthen” the immune system.

I never cease to be surprised and admired by this most important and completely logical system, on which our well-being depends. Since childhood, I have been interested in the peculiarities of the human body, diseases and health. My mother is a professional chef, she always believed that each of us is responsible for our own health, and she taught me the traditional basics of cooking, which I, as a mother, always follow. She told folk tales, and there was wisdom in them, which aroused my curiosity as a researcher and helped me choose a path in science.

The more I learned about the immune system, the more I changed my own habits and behavior. I’m not sure what familiar to most modern lifestyle can be called healthy, and I think that the reason the immune system many of us begins to kink. I continue to search for answers to questions, explore the evolution of the immune system, and reflect on how the lifestyle of our ancestors may have affected the health of each of us today. Did we not throw out the baby with the dirty water, opting for modern approaches and habits, like those fools who, trying to get rid of the bad that they have, simultaneously destroyed all the good that they had? I am interested in the answer to this question, and I will offer you my thoughts on the pages of this book and at the same time help you understand the principles of immunity, based on both traditional ideas and scientific achievements. As you read, you can imagine immunity as a nimble mobile octopus: it changes and pulsates, and therefore it is difficult to describe it in the format of a sequential narrative. One of the features of immunity is that often many questions related to it can only be answered like “when how” or”everything is not easy here”. To understand how to protect and promote health, we need to find a balance between being open to the new (no matter how illogical it may seem) and being able to persistently and meticulously explore both traditional and innovative concepts.

The immune system is a powerful system, but we often hear calls to “strengthen” it through diet, exercise, or healthy habits. We still have a lot to learn and understand about the relationships and features of the elements of the immune system, but we know for sure that this system needs balance, not strengthening. In this book, I will explain what this means in the context of General health care.

The immune system is the only thing that protects each of us from hordes of microbes (they are also called microorganisms; they are indistinguishable to the eye, and they include bacteria, fungi, and viruses). Some micro-organisms do pose a threat to our health. Hippocrates (460-377 BC) was the first to try to explain the appearance of diseases from a scientific point of view. He believed that there are four types of life elements (bile, black bile, mucus and blood), and in a healthy body they are in optimal quantities, and in a sick person there is an imbalance of them. Hippocrates argued that diseases are the result of an excess of one of the vital juices, and this can be caused by miasma (toxic fumes containing particles of pathogenic substances) or by products of putrefaction entering the air (decomposition of organic tissues, for example, manure, food waste or corpses). This theory seems strange to us, but it is important to remember that it appeared when people did not have any modern technologies or precision instruments. It was impossible to see the microorganisms, so scientists could only speculate. In the mid-19th century, with the invention of more modern research equipment, the so-called microbial theory emerged, proposed by Louis Pasteur (the founder of modern immunology) and his contemporaries. Only then could humanity abandon the concept of the four elements. Most of us understand the importance of the immune system in the context of microbial theory: microorganisms are evil, and we are protected from them by white blood cells, which are among the first to come to the rescue, after the corresponding signal of attack from the histocompatibility protein complex, which I will discuss in more detail in the next Chapter. Of course, in reality, everything is a little more complicated, as it always happens in matters related to health and immunity.

The immune system is designed to detect and recognize your own cells and other (external) microorganisms. So far, the immune system is very clear who to fight and who to be friends with: extraneous and potentially dangerous microorganisms must be destroyed, and their tissues (it would be better) to preserve.

In the course of evolution, the immune system has developed an uneasy and even hostile relationship with microbes. For several hundred years, we have been accustomed to believe that microscopic organisms are the causes of terrible diseases-and not in vain. Mass outbreaks of infections, terrible epidemics, serious diseases really arise from the activities of myriads of microorganisms — our neighbors on the planet. In recent decades, we have seen outbreaks of diseases, from swine flu to zika and Ebola, and every time humanity has a well-justified fear of resistance to such terrible infections. However, do not forget that microorganisms attack us constantly, from birth to death, every day, every minute, every second of our existence. But whether we get sick or not depends on the reliability of our immune system. Most often, the immune system copes with the threat, and we don’t even notice it — that’s how important this system is! And no medication can protect us as much as our own strong immune system.

Any medical student will confirm that the immune system is extremely complex and confusing. But still, let’s try to get a General idea of how it works, without going into details.

So, the immune system is not a single integral organ, and it is not located compactly in one of the parts of the body. This is a whole network of various cells, molecules and signaling proteins that work together for the benefit of a person in all his organs, systems and tissues. A brilliant, orderly, multi-million dollar network like Facebook, programmed to protect and protect us. Just imagine: the immune system includes entire organs and systems; for example, its components are lymph nodes, bone marrow and spleen — organs of the lymphatic system, the most important signaling proteins — cytokines (molecules secreted by lymphocytes, and sometimes other cells). Cytokines, like satellites, can transmit signals to help other cells, and also provide intercellular interactions in the immune response. The bone marrow is a kind of immune factory, where stem cells, initially undifferentiated, but able to change and evolve, form the right type of immune cells. Despite the name, white blood cells are found not only in the blood, but also in all strategically important areas of the body. And each of these zones has a unique set of properties; each forms a variety of receptors and molecules that are responsible for the peculiarities of the immune system.

Border control

The immune system can also be compared to a fortress, which has several levels of protection that are closely related to each other. The skin and mucous membranes lining the mouth, nose, and gastrointestinal tract are nothing more than the first line of defense. The skin and mucous membranes are an important component of the immune system, they produce a sufficiently aggressive environment for microorganisms, survival in which is not possible for pathogens. However, these physical barriers are quite vulnerable and have weaknesses. Over the past thousands of years, the vast majority of microorganisms that seek to overcome the body’s defenses have learned to evolve to increase the chances of breaking through the defense line. In response, our immune system-that fortress-has formed a curious system that can identify and preserve the most important defense mechanisms and sacrifice ineffective ones. Due to this, each of the defensive barriers has its own unique properties. Viruses, bacteria and pathogens appear daily, and the immune system continuously improves its defense Arsenal. Microorganisms and the immune system evolutionarily lead a brilliant game of chess, the winning of which is determined by the inventiveness and strengths of the opponent.

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Roses Delivery

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Bouquet of Red and Hot Pink Roses with Peach Flowers and Eucalyptus Leaves

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Send a Bouquet of Roses

When you're looking for online flowers, you want farm-fresh, long-lasting flowers. Here at The Bouqs Co., we offer more than just the classic red rose beauties. Our rose flower collection includes garden, spray, and tea roses in different vibrant colors that are sure to pop for any upcoming event.

Colors and Occasions for Roses Delivery

Roses are extremely popular for a variety of gift-giving circumstances. Some colors are better suited for certain occasions than others because each rose color sends a different message. For instance, yellow and pink are common colors for Mother's Day. Here are some common rose color meanings so you can choose the right roses delivery for all upcoming occasions.

  • Red roses are by far the most romantic option, making them the best-selling rose color. If you and your partner are the romantic types, red roses are ideal for celebrating anniversaries and Valentine's Day.  A red rose Bouq can also be a beautiful birthday present for the person you love.

How to Care for Your Rose Bouquet After Delivery

When you order a flower arrangement, you want it to last as long as possible. Here are some care tips to make a roses delivery last longer, which you can give alongside a Bouq:

  • Fill a vase with fresh room temperature water.

  • Arrange the roses in the vase to your liking.

Rose Bouquet FAQ

What do white roses mean?

Symbolizing purity, youth, and innocence, white roses are associated with bridal bouquets. They signify true love and loyalty which makes them fitting to include in elegant funeral arrangements or a Mother’s Day bouquet.

What do 12 roses mean?

12 is associated with completeness. There are 12 hours a day, 12 months in a year, 12 zodiac signs, and we all buy eggs by the dozen. The number 12 carries a symbolic and spiritual significance. This meaning evolved into the gesture of sending 12 roses as a way of asking, “would you be mine?”

What do yellow roses mean at a funeral?

Yellow roses are a humble way of symbolizing respect, compassion, and enduring love for the deceased. Because yellow roses also symbolize friendship, they work well as a focal color to send to friends or colleagues to show appreciation.


Motoring in the afterlife

One spot at the Oshawa Automotive Museum that is said to be a ghost "hangout."
One spot at the Oshawa Automotive Museum that is said to be a ghost “hangout.”

The Oshawa Automotive Museum has been a historic staple in the city of Oshawa for more than 50 years, celebrating and showcasing the history of the automotive industry. The building houses a wide collection of antique cars and automotive artifacts, but some say the museum is home to much more than just automotive history.

Over the years, there have been many reports from staff and patrons of the museum who say they have seen or reported strange phenomenon around the building that can only be described as ghostly encounters.

No one really knows when the museum hauntings started, according to the Paranormal Seekers, a paranormal research and investigation group based in Durham Region.

The Paranormal Seekers are led by Rachael Cross, an expert in the paranormal who has been having encounters with spirits since she was a little girl.

 “I grew up believing in ghosts and reading about them,” said Cross. “My grandparent’s house was said to be haunted and I spent a lot of time there, but spirits never bothered me until my family moved to Courtice.”

Cross said that every time she was at her grandparent’s house, she regularly saw spirits running across the backyard toward the swimming pool.

But of all the places the Paranormal Seekers have been, the museum seems to have a pull that keeps them wanting more.

Throughout their investigations of the museum, the team has discovered a number of unusual phenomena such as orbs of light floating above cars, as well as voices on their digital recorders.

The team has come across at least five different spirits at the museum, each with a different story. These spirits have come in contact with Brenda Montgomery, the team’s psychic, and told her a little bit about why they are there.

“There is Cameron, a really friendly spirit in his late 40s. He’s our tour guide each time we go to the museum and he points out the places where the other ghosts hide,” said Cross.

Montgomery said the spirit of a little girl told her she is attached to one of the cars in the museum because it belonged to her family. They say there are also the spirits of a little boy who died in a fire next door to the museum, a pharmacist who enjoys the cars, and a guard who still continues to work his job long past retirement.

 “My first time at the Automotive Museum, we were investigating and my fully charged, top of the line camera didn’t work for 20 minutes,” said Colin Williamson, a paranormal investigator and photographer. “The weirdest part was hearing a voice say ‘hello’ and I was the only one who could hear it. Everyone else looked at me like I was crazy but later on the electronic voice phenomenon right before I say ‘who just said hello’ all you hear is ‘hello’.”

So what is it that makes ghosts affect our electronic devices like that, or make noises that only certain people can hear? Many experts, such as Cross, believe the ghostly plain of existence – the part of our world that shares space with the paranormal world – can be picked up by and affect electronic devices.

Ghosts are able to manifest themselves or their energy by absorbing the power from things like cameras or phones, according to Williamson.

This theory, shared by many experts, may explain why electronic devices can act up, or just die altogether when a person is in or around a place said to be haunted.

 According to Williamson, it also explains why it’s possible to use a device such as an electromagnetic field detector (EMF) to detect the presence of a ghost because they give off EMF readings.

However, if people think a house or a place around town is haunted there’s always a “level of skepticism,” according to Cross.

Not only do ghosts supposedly give off EMF but everything around does as well. From the phone in your pocket to the breaker box in your basement, there are any number of things that can give off false EMF readings, according to Cross.

However, according to the Paranormal Seekers there are no false readings coming from the Canadian Automotive Museum. The investigators did what they call a ‘walkthrough’ before their investigations, to get base readings for their equipment and see if there is anything around that could be interfering with the devices.

The Paranormal Seekers have given many firsthand accounts of the goings on at the museum and pictures and audio recordings of what they call spiritual encounters are on their website


Surrealism in 5 Minutes: Idea Behind the Art Movement

You've probably heard of Salvador Dali, Rene Magritte, or Frida Kahlo. These surrealist artists created many amazing artworks. But do you know about the philosophy behind the movement? What does Freud have to do with Surrealism? Why did Dali show us his dreams and nightmares? And why did Magritte paint an image of “raining men”? Let’s find out!

Surrealism started as a movement in Paris in 1924. Heavily inspired by the father of psychoanalysis - Sigmund Freud, a group of young Frenchmen centered around Andre Breton explored new ways of creating art. By practicing automatic writing and drawing, they wanted to reach the unconscious parts of the mind and reveal one's true nature. Some even used drugs and practiced hypnosis in order to discover the hidden parts of the human psyche.

Breton, who himself was a medical student, was always interested in exploring mental states and described Freud as “the human explorer”. Obsessed with Freud’s theoretical ideas, Breton used them to establish the philosophy of Surrealism. In his Surrealist Manifesto, Breton defined Surrealism as “a pure psychic automatism” through which artists expressed their thoughts with no control of the mind.

Surrealists used Freud's theory of dreams as inspiration. For Freud, dreams represented the direct expression of the unconscious. They showed our true desires, thoughts and fears.

In surrealist dream paintings like Dali's Dream, Caused by the Flight of a Bee we see the painter's wife Gala sleeping on a rock, surrounded by a rifle, fish, elephant, pomegranate, and two tigers. This type of painting showed an irrational mix of objects that had symbolic meanings and more often than not - sexual connotations.

This mix of contrary elements is also seen in paintings of Rene Magritte. In his work Golconda, Magritte painted more than a hundred figures of identical men falling from the sky like raindrops. All men are painted realistically, but Magritte’s surreal setup of bodies floating in the air looks like something you can only see in dreams.

Freudian dreamscape is present in Giorgio de Chirico's metaphysical paintings too. The dreamlike atmosphere of the empty piazzas, the sexual symbols seen in towers and arcades, and the mixing of contradictory elements - it's everything Surrealists loved!

But there’s a big difference between Freud and the Surrealists. Freud's theories were primarily meant to help people feel better. Surrealists didn't care much about the therapeutic side of psychoanalysis, they just wanted to explore its creative potential.

So, when Breton invited Freud to write an introduction for an anthology of dreams he put together, the famous psychoanalyst refused. In 1921 Breton decided to go to Vienna and meet Freud but left feeling very disappointed because the Austrian psychoanalyst showed little interest in artistic adaptations of his theories. Breton even bitterly described Freud as "an old man without elegance".

You may be asking yourself: what did Freud think of the Surrealists?

Well, he made his point quite clear in a letter sent to Breton in 1932. Freud wrote: "I am not able to clarify for myself what surrealism is and what it wants. Perhaps I am not destined to understand it, I who am so distant from art.''

So, we get it, Freud was a bit sceptical about Surrealism. But, Surrealists still wanted to explore the human psyche and thought of Surrealism as a philosophy of the mind. They wanted to give psychoanalytic theories a poetic expression through art. Maybe Surrealists didn’t really care for the health benefits of Freud’s ideas, but they still made many fascinating artworks we enjoy today. And let’s not forget that enjoying art is also a benefit for the mind!

If you enjoyed this video please give it a thumbs up and let us know in the comments section what you think. Also make sure to subscribe to our channel so you don't miss our next stories!
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Are ember-redux and Ember Data mutually exclusive?

Having recently found out about ember-redux, I’m wondering if it is to be used in conjunction with Ember Data, or instead of it?

I’ve been the sole developer on an internal Ember application (using v1.13), but I still feel like an Ember junior dev compared to many, so I’m not sure whether I should seriously consider Redux for a new project I’m on, or if there’s a lot that one has to know or manually hook up that would make it hard for someone like me to transition to it from Ember Data.

Any help/advice/information related to this, or questions I should ask myself to be able to make an informed choice and not regret it in a month is greatly appreciated!

1 Like

Hi @jdhines,

Did you find any luck with this path?

I’m learning React-redux on a project. And I also wonder a similar question.

Redux works well with React because of its component’s stateful design. Under what design of Ember will make Redux compatible with it? Shouldn’t ember-data suffice?

To answer the original question here, while Ember Data and Ember Redux aren’t mutually exclusive (just as using Ember Data and regular Ajax calls for JSON payloads aren’t mutually exclusive), it may get more complicated if you run both in your app.

Ember Redux (from what I’ve seen) gives you quite a bit of control at quite granular levels over how your data updates and when. If you know you need that (or strongly suspect you do), then go ahead and use it. Ember’s designed to allow working with a wide variety of data management systems. But Ember Redux is on the cutting/bleeding edge of Ember’s data handling approach, which means if you don’t know if you need it it may be wiser to stick with the tried and true defaults.

If your main interest in Ember Redux is due to anxiety about not being left behind (or getting out of date), then I would suggest reading It’s a clear articulation of the idea that most of the time with Ember, the defaults are “good enough” and are well-maintained while new ideas are considered and incorporated into the Ember defaults.

That doesn’t mean that there aren’t warts and flaws to what exist in Ember (there are!), but that often those issues are better understood within the Ember community than the cutting edge addons. Over time cutting edge ideas get incorporated into the defaults in Ember so that we can all use them.

Put another way: what is your risk tolerance/comfort level with cutting edge? :wink: and is that cutting edge stuff needed in the app you are working on? If it is, awesome and go for it. If not, choose boring tech …

Does that help at all?

Just wanted to clarify quickly that ember redux was created in Jan 2016 :wink: and has the same shared view on stability that you find throughout the wider ember community. I’ve worked hard to ensure the project is defect free all the while adding new features to push the project forward (just last week we landed support for es2015 class syntax in fact).

If you have any questions about redux or want a specific example of something ping me here or jump into the slack community channel #e-redux :slight_smile:

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Using the @dp.notebook_function() decorator

The @dp.notebook_function() decorator is very simple. It recieves any number of arguments, passes it down to its decorated function and runs the function. You can use it for example on a function which downloads data and you want to log its progress.

def download_data(logger: Logger):
    opener = urllib.request.URLopener()
        "Mozilla/5.0 (Macintosh; Intel Mac OS X 10_15_7) AppleWebKit/537.36 (KHTML, like Gecko) Chrome/90.0.4430.93 Safari/537.36",

    opener.retrieve("", "/")"Loans data successfully downloaded")
    opener.retrieve("", "/")"Repayments data successfully downloaded")

Technical Reference

Check the Technical reference for more details about the @dp.notebook_function and other decorators.