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Spirituality has started to attract increased interest in the mental health arena over recent years. Indeed, psychiatrists are becoming more interested in spirituality because of the benefits it can bring to the mental health of service users. However, the issue of spirituality and the mental health needs of people who have learning disabilities has not been extensively researched or reported. This article explores the spiritual dimension in mental health care and its relevance to people with learning disabilities. A discussion of the development of a working group to scope the issues in one learning disability service is explored, with practical commentary on the efforts made to gather more information from service providers. The findings from a brief survey are briefly discussed, as well as the developments which have ensued to date. The authors conclude that, although spirituality can mean different things to different people, responding to the diverse spiritual needs of service users must take a person‐centred and flexible approach.

Writers, their practices, and their tools are mediated by the contexts in which they work. In online spaces and classroom environments, today’s writers have increased access to collaborators, readers, and reviewers. Drawing on our experiences as English teacher educators and as researchers of digital literacies and online affinity spaces, this chapter offers examples from three English teacher education programs in the United States and Australia to demonstrate how we link our research in out-of-school spaces to literacy practices in school contexts for our pre-service teachers. To do so, we share an illustrative example from each program and consider how in-class activities and assessment tasks can encourage pre-service teachers to learn about: the importance of clear goals and real-world audiences for writers; the value of self-sponsored, interest-driven writing in the English curriculum; and the role of authentic conversations between readers and writers as part of the writing, revising, and publishing process. The chapter concludes with recommendations for class activities and assessments that could be used within English education programs.

Black slavery and white racism in the South and the nation, de jure and de facto Jim Crow, Brown v. Board of Education (1954), which outlawed separate schools, “massive resistance” to it (Klarman, 1994, p. 82), plus racial disparities in educational achievement since 1954, all frame this narrative of black males' quest for higher education. Bondmen were denied literacy and black freemen rarely attended school, much less pursue advanced study, during the antebellum period. Union victory in the Civil War, abolition of slavery with the Thirteenth Amendment (1865), and Reconstruction marked the rise of not only Negro schools and colleges but also southern share cropping, called “the new slavery” (Du Bois, 1935, p. 715), and epidemic violence against blacks that imposed their disfranchisement and segregation, by laws and customs, until the 1960s. Thus African American males sought collegiate and professional training in a national milieu of white supremacy, which postulated black men's mental and moral inferiority but ignored their widespread poverty, separation, and unequal opportunities. Confined in historically black colleges and universities (HBCUs), they breached the color-line little by little at white institutions, thereby paving the way for Brown, the civil rights movement, and desegregation. In the second half of the 20th century, HBCUs and the majority-white institutions trained increasing numbers of black male graduates and professionals. By 1980 though, only some 11 percent of young black men had received 4 years of college compared to 25.5 percent of young white men (Jaynes & Williams, 1989). An “achievement gap” was evident and it persists today (Lee, 2002, p. 3), revealing the deep roots of race and class inequality in America. White racism, its legal and extralegal forms, and black aspirations and efforts underlay and continue to fuel black men's drive for higher learning. Over time black men, and certainly women as well, faced racist structures, ideologies, and attitudes born of slavery; sub-citizenship, stereotypes, and terror, among other barriers, through a century of Jim Crow; and after Brown, ongoing discrimination, socioeconomic disadvantages, and ambiguous “affirmative action” policies (Jaynes & Williams, 1989, p. 376).

The aim of this paper is to contribute to the discussion of wellbeing within the university education system by outlining the key issues and benefits and recognising future research on digital well-being for students. The JISC Digital wellbeing paper highlights the many positive and negative impacts associated with digital wellbeing. This paper explores how some of these features have been considered within institutions within the UK and Vietnam and highlights the emerging research in one Vietnamese institution in relation to student wellbeing, where digital wellbeing was identified as a key concern.

This is a technical review article which summarises key guidance for organisational digital wellbeing and then reflects on the application in the UK (a developed economy) and in Vietnam (one of the fastest growing economies). This is the first time a review has been conducted from the perspective of different countries. There are two aspects to digital wellbeing, individual and the social or organisational perspectives.

The JISC Digital wellbeing paper highlights the many positive and negative impacts associated with digital wellbeing. This paper explores how some of these features have been considered within institutions within the UK and Vietnam and highlights the emerging research in one Vietnamese institution in relation to student wellbeing, where digital wellbeing was identified as a key concern. The context of digital wellbeing within higher education is then discussed drawing similarities between the UK and Vietnamese student experiences whilst acknowledging the limitations of current research within the field.

Many institutions have seen a rise in the number of wellbeing challenges, and there are few examples of specific initiatives aimed at addressing digital wellbeing challenges for their stakeholders. Existing research on students' wellbeing is predominately focused on undergraduate students and does not differentiate between undergraduate and postgraduate students, nor between masters, doctoral and professional level students and does not explore the impact of digital wellbeing discretely; this is an area which would benefit from future research.

The purpose of this paper is to examine advertising placed within Kai Tiaki: The Journal of Nurses of New Zealand. The periodization for this study is 1908-1929, a chronological time span and approach that incorporates the first issue of the Kai Tiaki in 1908 and ending 1929, thus representing the launch of the journal and first two decades of its production. During this period, New Zealand nursing was emerging as an organised and professionalised body of health-care workers. At the same time, New Zealand, Britain’s most distant “dominion”, was beginning to realise its own nationhood and growth.

The primary source of data was digitalised Kai Tiaki issues between 1908 and 1929. Each four issues for every year were analysed. All advertisements were coded (n = 1895), followed by a qualitative content analysis in which key themes were derived.

Five overarching themes were found. The two main themes were the proliferation of therapeutic “tonics” and the second the relationship of nurses to them that was profiled by advertisers. The three remaining themes were accommodations, lifestyle and the nurses “role” as nurse, handmaiden or mother. Conclusions discuss reasons for key findings, and, in particular, the reinforcement of the traditional nursing role, which was often at odds with the increased technological roles and responsibilities nurses were undertaking. In turn, advertisers saw the nursing profession as a new and potentially lucrative market of women with disposable income and influence in the health field.

To date, there is a scarcity of marketing analysis that examines advertising placed in trade journals and in particular for early twentieth century health-care professionals. Through a lens of advertising analysis, this study investigates the advertising nursing readership of the day was exposed to and the motives and tactics used by those interested in expanding both health-care worker and consumer markets through a singular strategy.

Despite the growing number of studies surrounding user-generated content (UGC), understanding of the implications, potential and pertinence of user-generated images (UGI), the visual form of UGC, on brand image in services is limited. The purpose of this paper is to introduce the concept and a comprehensive framework of image word of mouth (IWOM), which identifies UGI as visual articulations of service experiences that result in consumer judgment of service brand image. The framework takes a consumer-focussed approach and covers key branding issues relevant to services marketers such as identifying and linking valued services dimensions, made evident through IWOM, to ideas and thoughts inferred by consumers (viewers) of the brand image and consequent consumer intentions.

The paper reviews and synthesises current services, marketing and branding literature surrounding electronic word of mouth (WOM) and UGC, where it highlights the need to consider interpretations of UGI as persuasive forms of visual WOM or IWOM, as well as a critical stimuli of brand image.

The paper illuminates the importance of adopting a visual perspective that applies constructs developed in cognitive psychology, to decode how viewers (consumers) interact and form associations of brand image via IWOM.

The paper examines, integrates and adds to extant literature surrounding WOM, UGC, visual images and brand image within services.

The purpose of this paper is to develop queer futuring strategies that take into consideration adult learners’ needs in support of transformational and sustainable change for social justice and equity.

This paper develops the construct of queer futuring, which engages queer theory perspectives in a critical futures framework. Adult learning theory informs queer futuring strategies to support adults and inform education to sustain transformational changes for social justice and equity.

With social justice in mind, queer futuring opens spaces and supports opportunities for adults to engage in learning activities that address historical and layered forms of oppression. Building on learning needs of adults to create meaning and make a difference in the world around them, queer futuring strategies provide tools for activism, advocacy and building new relationships and ways of being-with.

The sustainability of our current system of growth and financial well-being has already been called into question, and the current pandemic provides tangible evidence of values for contribution, connection and concern for others, even in the midst of political strife and conspiracy theories. These shifting values and values conflict of society point to the questions of equity and narrative inclusivity, challenging and disrupting dominant paradigms and structures that have perpetuated power and authority “over” rather than social participation “with” and harmony. Queer futuring is just the beginning of a bigger conversation about transforming society.

Queering spaces from the perspective of queer futuring keeps the adult learner and queering processes in mind with an emphasis on affiliation and belonging, identity and resistance and politics and change.

The authors suggest queer futuring makes room for opening spaces of creativity and insight as traditional and reified rationality is problematized, further supporting development of emergentist relationships with the future as spaces of possibility and innovation.

Queer futuring connects ethical and pragmatic approaches to futuring for creating the kinds of futures needed to decolonize, delegitimize and disrupt hegemonic and categorical thinking and social structures. It builds on queer theory’s critical perspective, engaging critical futures strategies with adult learners at the forefront.

The Bureau of Economics in the Federal Trade Commission has a three-part role in the Agency and the strength of its functions changed over time depending on the preferences and ideology of the FTC’s leaders, developments in the field of economics, and the tenor of the times. The over-riding current role is to provide well considered, unbiased economic advice regarding antitrust and consumer protection law enforcement cases to the legal staff and the Commission. The second role, which long ago was primary, is to provide reports on investigations of various industries to the public and public officials. This role was more recently called research or “policy R&D”. A third role is to advocate for competition and markets both domestically and internationally. As a practical matter, the provision of economic advice to the FTC and to the legal staff has required that the economists wear “two hats,” helping the legal staff investigate cases and provide evidence to support law enforcement cases while also providing advice to the legal bureaus and to the Commission on which cases to pursue (thus providing “a second set of eyes” to evaluate cases). There is sometimes a tension in those functions because building a case is not the same as evaluating a case. Economists and the Bureau of Economics have provided such services to the FTC for over 100 years proving that a sub-organization can survive while playing roles that sometimes conflict. Such a life is not, however, always easy or fun.

With a historic lack of attention to synthesis methods such as systematic review and meta-analysis and a lack of randomised controlled trials, the evidence base for behavioural interventions for children and adults who are autistic or are diagnosed with developmental disabilities is patchy. The Sharland Foundation Developmental Disabilities Applied Behavioural Research and Impact Network (SF-DDARIN), a network of like-minded researchers and practitioners across the UK, aims to address this. The purpose of this paper is to describe the network’s work and provide the context for the remaining articles in the special issue that exemplify network projects.

In this case study paper, the authors describe how the SF-DDARIN works and is resourced, detailing the process used to maximise research opportunities by facilitating network members working together. The authors outline the progressive research steps that the SF-DDARIN has identified are needed to develop and improve the evidence base for behavioural interventions systematically and, with examples, describe how the network delivers these steps.

Since its establishment in 2016, the SF-DDARIN network members have collectively worked on more than 53 projects involving over 50 researchers, had over 120 special schools contribute to projects and have recruited over 500 participants. This has been achieved through funding from the Sharland Foundation, primarily to cover the staffing costs of a small support team and internship partnerships with external organisations. Some projects have attracted external funding.

SF-DDARIN may provide an innovative, effective and resource-efficient model for other groups seeking to develop and extend their evidence base in developmental disability research.