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Hippotherapy is an emerging area of paediatric occupational therapy practice in Ireland. It is a treatment strategy used by specially trained occupational therapy practitioners, physical therapists and speech language pathologists as part of the intervention programme to facilitate functional gains. This paper aims to explore parents’ perspectives on children’s participation in home-based occupations following hippotherapy treatment.

Qualitative, semi-structured interviews were conducted with eight participants. Interviews were audio-recorded and transcribed verbatim. In accordance with thematic analysis, line-by-line coding was completed to identify codes. Codes were organised into categories, which were grouped to develop themes.

Three core themes were identified: lack of knowledge regarding hippotherapy as an occupational therapy intervention; children’s increased participation in home-based occupations secondary to improved physical, psychological, communication and social skills; and the unique hippotherapy environment as a motivating factor for children to engage in occupational therapy intervention.

Findings from this study support the growing body of evidence that hippotherapy is an effective means of intervention for increasing physical, psychological, social and communication skills. The participants report positive effects following hippotherapy on their children’s participation in home-based occupations. It highlights a link between the unique hippotherapy environment and children’s increased engagement in occupational therapy. Given that no published hippotherapy-specific literature related to occupational therapy exists in the Irish context, and given that hippotherapy is an emerging area of practice in Ireland, this paper contributes to the knowledge base.

Equine-assisted therapy (EAT) uses the horse and its environment to achieve therapeutic goals as designed by an allied health professional (Taylor, 2010). The benefits of these interventions affect areas such as motor skills (Bass et al., 2009; Silkwood-Sherer et al., 2012), sensory processing (Ward et al., 2013), learning, social interaction and socioemotional development (Bracher, 2000). It was felt that occupational therapists could offer valuable input in this area. This paper aims to investigate the impact of a specific six-week EAT programme on six participants’ occupational performance.

Mixed methods were used in this pilot study, consisting of a pre- and post-design with two follow-up periods. Participants were aged between 5 and10 years with a diagnosis of a visual impairment, and some had additional diagnoses. The Canadian Occupational Performance Measure (COPM) was administered to parents pre-programme, post-programme and approximately six week after the programme ceased. Additional information from notes that contained children’s and parents’ reports was analysed thematically.

Five of the six children were rated as having clinically significant changes in their occupational performance. Analysis of parents’ and children’s reports on their experience of the programme showed the main themes to be: peer interaction, taking on new challenges, feelings towards EAT and change.

Although there are many practitioners of EAT in Ireland, there is little research, and none was found in relation to the role of occupational therapists within this context. These results indicate that EAT may be effective in assisting some children to reach a variety of goals. This pilot study not only suggests that EAT is worth further research but also begins to explore the role of occupational therapy in this form of intervention.

This study examined the impact of an early childhood community-outreach summer camp on teaching single adolescent mothers early communication tools and strategies to support interaction with their infants and toddlers who were language delayed or at risk for language delay. Twenty-two mothers and their children were taught communication strategies through the use of baby signs and Hanen techniques for parents. Pre-post knowledge and skills were assessed. Mothers also completed a post-camp satisfaction questionnaire. Overall, mothers learned the information on baby signs and communication strategies. They were positive about the impact of the camp program activities on the social-emotional and communicative relationship between themselves and their child.

This study aims to investigate the correlations between latent variables embedded into three clusters (equine agritourism, therapeutic horse riding and equine sports) and entrepreneurial intentions of people interested to invest in equestrian sector.

The authors propose a conceptual framework focused on three latent variables that influence the interest of horse enthusiasts to embrace an entrepreneurial career. Statistical analyses via Pearson’s chi-square tests, analysis of variance (statistical formula used to compare variances across the means (or average) of different groups) and regression analysis have been performed to validate our assumptions.

Findings reveal a high level of interest of from horse enthusiasts to opt for an entrepreneurial career, as funding opportunities in this sector are growing due to European union and national funding available for this endeavour.

Very limited research studies have been explored the entrepreneurial intentions in equine industry. This study proves that sports and therapeutic activities influence to the greatest extent, the entrepreneurial intention in the equestrian sector.

This paper aims to fill the gap in social sciences research on parents’ strategies in navigating preschool education in Russia. It focusses on the barriers that children with developmental disabilities and autism face in preschool education in Russia and highlights the emerging facilitators of inclusive education.

It uses a modified labelling approach analysing strategies of withdrawal and resistance. The research included semi-structured interviews with parents of children with Down syndrome, Rett syndrome and autism spectrum disorders (ASD) in 2013–2014 and 2018–2019 and semi-structured interviews with professionals in Tatarstan, Russia. The data analysis was based on constructivist methods and grounded theory.

Although Russian law guarantees equal access to education for every child and requires the development of inclusive education, children with developmental disabilities, including autism, are often stigmatised at the preschool stage, both in special needs and mainstream institutions. Parents use various strategies to navigate access to preschool education and try more than one strategy from secrecy and withdrawal to resistance. Parents challenged the mainstream educational structures in Kazan and established groups for children with autism in some mainstream kindergartens and classes in mainstream schools.

There should be informational support for parents with different options for special needs education, providing integrative and inclusive education. It is necessary to increase the number of trained specialists in special needs and mainstream kindergartens in Russia for children with developmental disabilities and ASD. More study is required to overcome stigmatisation and increase tolerance towards persons with developmental disabilities in Russia both on a national and local level.

The research findings can be useful for countries which have recently recognised ASD and do not have inclusive preschool educational practices and where labelling towards children with developmental disabilities is still common. The study recommends that resources are required to provide free or affordable preschool education for children with developmental disabilities. It is also crucial to help parents navigate preschool education and select the best options for each child’s needs.

This study’s findings add value to the importance of addressing the stigma towards people with disabilities within professional groups and broader society, which form barriers for preschool education and in some cases result in withdrawal from preschool education. To overcome the stigmatisation of children with developmental disabilities in preschool education, it is necessary to establish modern targeted pedagogical approaches and training for professionals and informational campaigns for the broader audience.

The paper is novel as there was no sociological research into preschool education of children with developmental disabilities in Russia. It argues that the parents’ experiences are much broader than just interactions with special needs or mainstream education. Parents navigate across special needs institutions, specialised groups in mainstream and private kindergartens, mixed groups in mainstream kindergartens and home education with various strategies from secrecy and withdrawal to resistance and challenge. Preschool education for children with developmental disabilities in Russia is hindered by a lack of professional resources and the stigma embedded into professional and societal responses.

This study aims to examine peoples’ perception of climate change. It assessed their attitude, behavioural motivation for mitigating and adapting to climate change in the two capital cities of South Asia: Islamabad in Pakistan and Dhaka in Bangladesh.

This study used the quantitative research technique based on responses of 800 close-ended questions embedded in a close-ended questionnaire, which were filled-out from randomly selected sample of respondents. The primary data was analysed and presented through tabulation. For binary dependent variables, the standardised logistic coefficients were projected for more reliable estimates.

The findings reveal that the population of both capital cities have a low personal perception of climate change. Also, the dwellers of both cities have a low level of motivation to take mitigative and adaptive measures against climatic hazards. The results of the logistic regression model further indicate that the people who believe that climate change is a threat to their lives are more likely to adopt mitigative and adaptive strategies. This mostly applies to the people with a relatively higher income and education level.

This study implies to create awareness and sensitise the local community in both the capitals and beyond through information dissemination. Further, the availability of toolkits to handle emergencies remains imperative in registering attitudinal and behavioural changes to reduce the impacts of climate variability in poor localities.

This research study analysed the link between climate change mitigation and energy conservation from the societal attributes of perception, motivation, attitude and behaviour, which remains essential for community-based mitigation against climatic hazards.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate what factors have a significant effect on equestrians’ participation in equestrian tourism.

The methodology was quantitative research data analysis. Survey questionnaires (perceived risk, involvement, and intention to (re)visit questions) were developed based on pertinent previous studies. A main study was conducted in West Texas in the USA with college students.

This study found that the perceived risk factors significantly affected involvement factors and, in turn, affected intention to (re)visit in equestrian tourism.

Although equestrian tourism has many positive effects on tourists such as health benefits as well as local economies, equestrian tourism in the USA is considered one of the least favorite leisure sports compared to other sports activities. Consequentially, there are few studies related to equestrian tourists, this paper adds to a currently niche area of study.