Developing a Collaborative Agenda for Humanities and Social Scientific Research on Laboratory Animal Science and Welfare.

Improving laboratory animal science and welfare requires both new scientific research and insights from research in the humanities and social sciences. Whilst scientific research provides evidence to replace, reduce and refine procedures involving laboratory animals (the '3Rs'), work in the humanities and social sciences can help understand the social, economic and cultural processes that enhance or impede humane ways of knowing and working with laboratory animals. However, communication across these disciplinary perspectives is currently limited, and they design research programmes, generate results, engage users, and seek to influence policy in different ways. To facilitate dialogue and future research at this interface, we convened an interdisciplinary group of 45 life scientists, social scientists, humanities scholars, non-governmental organisations and policy-makers to generate a collaborative research agenda. This drew on methods employed by other agenda-setting exercises in science policy, using a collaborative and deliberative approach for the identification of research priorities. Participants were recruited from across the community, invited to submit research questions and vote on their priorities. They then met at an interactive workshop in the UK, discussed all 136 questions submitted, and collectively defined the 30 most important issues for the group. The output is a collaborative future agenda for research in the humanities and social sciences on laboratory animal science and welfare. The questions indicate a demand for new research in the humanities and social sciences to inform emerging discussions and priorities on the governance and practice of laboratory animal research, including on issues around: international harmonisation, openness and public engagement, 'cultures of care', harm-benefit analysis and the future of the 3Rs. The process outlined below underlines the value of interdisciplinary exchange for improving communication across different research cultures and identifies ways of enhancing the effectiveness of future research at the interface between the humanities, social sciences, science and science policy.

Culture and psychosocial function in british and Japanese people with an ostomy.

PURPOSE: We compared social and psychological adjustment to surgery ending with an ostomy in British and Japanese patients. METHODS: In response to a postal survey, 948 ostomy patients (464 British and 484 Japanese), selected at random from respective national databases, provided assessable data on the Ostomy Adjustment Inventory-23 (OAI-23), a validated scale for measurement of psychosocial adjustment to an ostomy. RESULTS: Analysis of variance revealed that country of residence (F1,876 = 50.9, P < .001) and time since surgery (F3,876 = 9.9, P < .001) significantly influenced psychosocial adjustment to an ostomy. British persons with an ostomy experienced higher psychosocial adjustment to an ostomy than did Japanese respondents. Multivariate analysis based on acceptance, social engagement, anxious-preoccupation, and anger also found that country of residence and time since surgery influenced psychosocial adjustment (Pillai's Trace: V = 0.22, F = 67.15, P < 0.001, and V = 0.05, F = 3.6, P ≤ .001, respectively). Acceptance and social engagement (discriminant coefficient = 0.92 and 0.56, respectively) made the largest contribution. CONCLUSION: Psychosocial functioning differed in British and Japanese persons with an ostomy, suggesting that culture influences psychosocial adjustment to life with an ostomy. These findings support the need for culturally informed ostomy care.

Development and psychometric evaluation of the Ostomy Adjustment Inventory-23.

PURPOSE: This article describes the development of the Ostomy Adjustment Inventory-23 (OAI-23), a self-report, multidimensional scale designed to assess psychosocial adjustment in patients with ostomy. SUBJECTS AND SETTING: Five hundred seventy persons with a colostomy, ileostomy, or urostomy, who were randomly selected from 3 national databases, provided assessable data. RESULTS: The results indicate that the OAI-23 is reliable (the Cronbach alpha = .93, split-half = 0.91, and test-retest (r) = 0.83) and valid, correlating positively with Felton's Acceptance of Illness Scale (r = 0.72) and confirming expected improvements in adjustment consistent with increasing time since surgery (F 5,531 = 5.22, P < .001). Four factors (eigenvalue >or= 1) that accounted for 55.4% of the total variance emerged from factor analysis. CONCLUSION: The OAI-23 is a valid and reliable measure of psychosocial adjustment that will be of interest to both researchers investigating life after stoma surgery and clinicians making objective assessments of their patients' progress.

Reflections on the dialogue process, FRAME and the Three Rs.

My contribution to FRAME's 40th Anniversary meeting started by looking back: offering some reflections on the benefits and difficulties of engaging in wide-ranging dialogue on laboratory animal issues, largely based on experience with two forums - both of which have involved FRAME. Drawing on this discussion, I then looked forward: arguing that such dialogue now has an especially important role to play in developing strategies to replace (and reduce or avoid) the use of animals in research.

Adjustment to colostomy: stoma acceptance, stoma care self-efficacy and interpersonal relationships.

AIM: This paper is a report of a study to examine adjustment and its relationship with stoma acceptance and social interaction, and the link between stoma care self-efficacy and adjustment in the presence of acceptance and social interactions. BACKGROUND: There have been significant advances in stoma appliances and an increase in nurses specialising in stoma care. Despite this, a large proportion of patients continue to experience adjustment problems, which suggests that improvements in the management of the stoma are by themselves not enough to enhance psychosocial functioning. Illness acceptance and interpersonal relationships are widely reported as correlates of adjustment to chronic illness, but these have not been specifically examined in patients with a colostomy. Evidence of their association could offer stoma therapists alternative ways of aiding adjustment. METHOD: Between 2000 and 2002, 51 patients with colostomies provided demographic and clinical data and completed validated questionnaires to measure acceptance of the stoma, relationship with others and stoma care self-efficacy 6 months after surgery. FINDINGS: Multiple regression analysis showed that stoma care self-efficacy, stoma acceptance, interpersonal relationship and location of the stoma were strongly associated with adjustment. The model explained 77% of the variance. Stoma-care self-efficacy accounted for 57.5%, the psychosocial variables 13% and location of the stoma 4.6%. The addition of gender, which was not statistically significant (P > 0.05), explained a further 1.9% of the variance. CONCLUSION: Addressing psychosocial concerns should become part of the care routinely given to stoma patients. We recommend more emphasis on dispelling negative thoughts and encouraging social interactions.

Animals, science, and ethics -- Section III. Critical anthropomorphism, animal suffering, and the ecological context.

Section III discusses the problem of animal suffering and its recognition by "critical anthropomorphism," a serious and thoughtful attempt to bridge the gap between the understanding of human and animal life. This is a method that involves critically using our human experience to recognize and alleviate animal suffering by checking our immediate intuitions about an animal's subjective life against what we can learn from more objective scientific studies. Yet the necessarily imperfect or imprecise nature of any method to get "inside" the animal and to grasp what it subjectively feels accounts for the ongoing difficulties and controversies over the definition of animal suffering. Just how far should we adhere to an objective, "outside" or subjective, "inside" approach?....