School structure, bullying by teachers, moral disengagement, and students' aggression: A mediation model.

Aim: Understanding interrelations between the factors predicting students' aggressive behavior is a priority for bullying-prevention programs. Our study explores two possible mechanisms linking school disciplinary structure and students' aggression. We test students' moral disengagement and bullying by teachers as mediational pathways from school authoritative discipline to students' aggressive behavior. Methods: We used a regionally representative sample of 213 schools that participated in a school climate survey in Kaluga Oblast (a federal subject of Russia) in 2019. The analytical sample contained the anonymous responses of 16,809 students from grades 6-9 (12-15 years old); 51% of the respondents were girls. The analytical procedure consisted of structural equation modeling (SEM), which was implemented in Mplus 8.7. Results: The mediation model fit the data well, suggesting that the clarity and fairness of school rules negatively predicted peer aggression, while student moral disengagement and bullying by teachers independently and partially mediated this association. Conclusion: We confirm that authoritative school climate, characterized by a clear and fair disciplinary structure, is associated with a decrease in bullying. Novel result is the evidence for mediating mechanisms and the influence of teachers' aggression on students' behavior. Prevention programs designed to increase the fairness and consistency of school rules, eliminate bullying and humiliation from teachers, and decrease students' moral disengagement may reduce violence and victimization at school.

Peer influence in adolescent drinking behavior: A meta-analysis of stochastic actor-based modeling studies.

OBJECTIVES: To measure the effects of peer influence and peer selection on drinking behavior in adolescence through a rigorous statistical approach designed to unravel these interrelated processes. METHODS: We conducted systematic searches of electronic databases, thesis collections and conference proceedings to identify studies that used longitudinal network design and stochastic actor-oriented modeling to analyze drinking behavior in adolescents. Parameter estimates collected from individual studies were analyzed using multilevel random-effects models. RESULTS: We identified 26 articles eligible for meta-analysis. Meta-analyses for different specifications of the peer influence effect were conducted separately. The peer influence effect was positive for every specification: for average similarity (avSim) mean log odds ratio was 1.27 with 95% confidence interval [0.04; 2.49]; for total similarity (totSim) 0.46 (95% CI = [0.44; 0.48]), and for average alter (avAlt) 0.70 (95% CI = [-0.01; 1.41]). The peer selection effect (simX) was also positive: 0.46 (95% CI = [0.28; 0.63]). Conversion log odds ratio values to Cohen's d gives estimates from 0.25 to 0.70, which is considered as medium to large effect. CONCLUSIONS: Advances in methodology for social network analysis have made it possible to accurately estimate peer influence effects free from peer selection effects. More research is necessary to clarify the roles of age, gender, and individual susceptibility on the changing behavior of adolescents under the influence of their peers. Understanding the effects of peer influence should inform practitioners and policy makers to design and deliver more effective prevention programs.

Peer influence in adolescent drinking behaviour: a protocol for systematic review and meta-analysis of stochastic actor-based modeling studies.

INTRODUCTION: Alcohol consumption is a considerable public health problem that is especially harmful to young people. To develop effective prevention programmes targeted at adolescents, it is important to understand the social mechanisms triggering alcohol consumption. Among such mechanisms, peer influence plays an important role. The effects of peer influence are very difficult to evaluate because of the entanglement with social selection, that is, a tendency of people to befriend others with similar behaviour. The recently developed stochastic actor-oriented models (SAOM) approach is designed to disentangle social influence from social selection. The aim of this study is to conduct a systematic review and meta-analysis of studies employing SAOM methodology to evaluate the effects of social influence on adolescent drinking behaviour. METHODS AND ANALYSIS: In order to analyse the co-evolution of alcohol consumption and adolescent friendship networks, we will collect articles that use SAOM methodology through systematic electronic searches in Web of Science, Scopus, PubMed, The Cochrane Library (Cochrane Database of Systematic Reviews, Cochrane Central Register of Controlled Trials), EBSCOhost (MEDLINE, SocINDEX, Academic Source, ERIC), ProQuest (ProQuest Dissertations and Theses Global), PsycINFO (PsycNET), Excerpta Medica database (Embase) and Cumulative Index to Nursing and Allied Health Literature (CINAHL). We will collect the literature from academic journals, dissertations/theses, reports and conference materials. Three reviewers will retrieve and independently assess potentially relevant material in terms of whether they comply with prespecified criteria. Subsequently, we will summarise the results of the studies in a systematic review. If a sufficient number of studies can be found, SAOM quantitative results will be extracted and meta-analysed. The project will go from 1 December 2018 to 1 December 2019. ETHICS AND DISSEMINATION: Ethical approval will not be required as our work is based on published studies. A list of all the studies included in this work will be available for review. We plan dissemination in a peer-reviewed international scientific journal and through conference presentations. Our review will highlight the peer effect of peers in adolescent drinking behaviour and provide guidance for developing effective prevention and intervention programmes. We expect it to be informative for policy and practice, decision-making as well as for further research in public health and sociology of adolescents. PROSPERO REGISTRATION NUMBER: CRD42019119836.

Vocational education paths, youth activities, and underage drinking in Russia: How early does the trouble start?

Working-class educational paths tend to be associated with elevated drinking. Little research has examined whether disproportionate alcohol use among vocationally oriented youth begins before or after the start of their vocational education. The present study analyzes a large sample of Russian middle-school students (N=1269; mean age=14.9), comparing the patterns of drinking among middle-schoolers oriented towards vocational educational, and their peers who do not plan a vocational education path. Results suggest that the orientation towards vocational education is associated with disproportionately high alcohol involvement among Russian middle-school students, even before they enter vocational schools. We studied if such difference could be partially explained by how youth orient towards extracurricular activities: discretionary peer time in risky contexts, reading for pleasure, working for pay, and religious activities. Reading demonstrated the strongest (negative) association with alcohol use, while religious activity unexpectedly revealed a positive (though weak) association with drinking. Research and policy implications are discussed.

Molecular phylogenetic analyses indicate a wide and ancient radiation of African hepatitis delta virus, suggesting a deltavirus genus of at least seven major clades.

Hepatitis D virus (HDV) is a satellite of hepatitis B virus (HBV) for transmission and propagation and infects nearly 20 million people worldwide. The HDV genome is a compact circular single-stranded RNA genome with extensive intramolecular complementarity. Despite its different epidemiological and pathological patterns, the variability and geographical distribution of HDV are limited to three genotypes and two subtypes that have been characterized to date. Phylogenetic reconstructions based on the delta antigen gene and full-length genome sequence data show an extensive and probably ancient radiation of African lineages, suggesting that the genetic variability of HDV is much more complex than was previously thought, with evidence of additional clades. These results relate the geographic distribution of HDV more closely to the genetic variability of its helper HBV.

Hepatitis delta virus genotypes I and II cocirculate in an endemic area of Yakutia, Russia.

Currently, three genotypes of hepatitis delta virus (HDV) are described. The most common, genotype I, has a worldwide distribution; in contrast, genotype II has been found previously only in Japan and Taiwan, while genotype III is found exclusively in South America. Considering the high prevalence of HDV in Northern Siberia (Russia), restriction fragment length polymorphism (RFLP) was used to analyse HDV genotypes from 29 infected patients living in Yakutia. Of these isolates, 11 were characterized by partial nucleotide sequencing and two isolates were completely sequenced. Phylogenetic inference methods included maximum parsimony, maximum likelihood and distance analyses. A restriction pattern consistent with HDV genotype I was found in 14 samples, while the remaining 15 showed a different restriction pattern, inconsistent with any known genotype. Five Yakutian HDV isolates with the type I restriction pattern were sequenced and confirmed to be affiliated with genotype I, although the phylogenetic results indicate that they were heterogeneous and did not cluster together. Sequencing of eight isolates with the new RFLP pattern revealed that these isolates were most closely related to HDV genotype II. In contrast to HDV Yakutian genotype I sequences, all of these type II sequences formed a well-defined clade on phylogenetic trees. Comparison of clinical presentations during hospitalization between patients infected with HDV type I (n=14) and type II (n=15) did not reveal any differences in the severity of infection. These data indicate that the distribution of genotype II is not restricted to Taiwan or Japan, but spreads over Northern Asia, appearing in the native population of Yakutia. Type II Yakutian strains appeared to form a well-defined subclade and could be associated with severe chronic hepatitis in this area.