title: Network of positive affect and depression in older adults

authors: Hopkins, Ella G.

abstract: Background
Depression in older adults poses significant health challenges, yet the protective role of positive affect remains understudied. This research examined the complex network of positive affect and depression in older adults using advanced network analysis techniques to identify potential targets for intervention.
Methods
Bayesian Gaussian Graphical Models and Directed Acyclic Graph modelling were used to analyse associations between ten positive affect variables and depression. Exploratory and confirmatory network analyses ensured stability and node predictability quantified variable influence. Stepwise linear regression confirmed whether specific positive affective variables identified in the networks predicted lower depression scores.
Results
Enthusiasm emerged as a key ancestral node with the highest predictability (R2 = 0.65), initiating cascades of positive affect. A primary pathway to depression was identified through feeling active (strength = 1.00, direction = 0.79), with an indirect pathway from feeling enthusiastic via active (strength = 0.98, direction = 0.79) to depression (strength = 1.00, direction = 0.79). Confirmatory longitudinal analysis showed that feeling active and enthusiastic consistently predicted lower depression scores (p < 0.001). The network structure remained stable across analyses.
Conclusions
Enthusiasm was identified as a central catalyst in the positive affect network, revealing clear pathways through which positive affect may protect against depression in older adults. Enhancing enthusiastic and active emotional experiences emerged as potential effective, nonpharmacological strategies for preventing and treating depression in older adults.

text: Network of positive affect and depression in older adults Background
Depression in older adults poses significant health challenges, yet the protective role of positive affect remains understudied. This research examined the complex network of positive affect and depression in older adults using advanced network analysis techniques to identify potential targets for intervention.
Methods
Bayesian Gaussian Graphical Models and Directed Acyclic Graph modelling were used to analyse associations between ten positive affect variables and depression. Exploratory and confirmatory network analyses ensured stability and node predictability quantified variable influence. Stepwise linear regression confirmed whether specific positive affective variables identified in the networks predicted lower depression scores.
Results
Enthusiasm emerged as a key ancestral node with the highest predictability (R2 = 0.65), initiating cascades of positive affect. A primary pathway to depression was identified through feeling active (strength = 1.00, direction = 0.79), with an indirect pathway from feeling enthusiastic via active (strength = 0.98, direction = 0.79) to depression (strength = 1.00, direction = 0.79). Confirmatory longitudinal analysis showed that feeling active and enthusiastic consistently predicted lower depression scores (p < 0.001). The network structure remained stable across analyses.
Conclusions
Enthusiasm was identified as a central catalyst in the positive affect network, revealing clear pathways through which positive affect may protect against depression in older adults. Enhancing enthusiastic and active emotional experiences emerged as potential effective, nonpharmacological strategies for preventing and treating depression in older adults.

year: 2026

title: Older adult education in two universities: A comparison in the New Zealand and Scottish contexts

authors: Findsen, Brian

subjects: Older adults’ education

abstract: This article examines the character of older adult education provision in two univer- sities at opposite ends of the globe. The universities of Waikato (New Zealand) and Strathclyde (Scotland) are analysed in terms of specific domains: funding, curriculum and provision, older people’s participation and university–community relationships. These two universities’ work in these areas is contextualised in the wider framework of prevailing societal trends, lifelong learning discourses, higher education, and adult and community education. While both institutions have much in common from the per- spective of a British influence, there are significant differences across the four domains as both universities contest the right to engage with older adults’ learning in a neoliberal environment.

text: Older adult education in two universities: A comparison in the New Zealand and Scottish contexts This article examines the character of older adult education provision in two univer- sities at opposite ends of the globe. The universities of Waikato (New Zealand) and Strathclyde (Scotland) are analysed in terms of specific domains: funding, curriculum and provision, older people’s participation and university–community relationships. These two universities’ work in these areas is contextualised in the wider framework of prevailing societal trends, lifelong learning discourses, higher education, and adult and community education. While both institutions have much in common from the per- spective of a British influence, there are significant differences across the four domains as both universities contest the right to engage with older adults’ learning in a neoliberal environment.

year: 2016

title: A late-Holocene and prehistoric record of environmental change from Lake Waikaremoana, New Zealand

authors: Newnham, Rewi M.

subjects: Palynology

abstract: Further evidence in support of a late pre-European (Polynesian) settlement of New Zealand is provided by an 1850-year-long tephropalynological record from a remote region in New Zealand's North Island. The earliest unequivocally anthropogenic forest clearance is estimated from sedimentation rates to have occurred c. 375 14C years BP (c. ad 1523–1631), although the radiocarbon chronology, shown by tephrochron ology to be erroneous due to hard-water effects, suggested this occurred c. 900 years earlier. Delineation of the anthropogenic era, and the distinction between human activity and other agents of environmental change in the pollen/spore diagram, are supported by cluster analysis and detrended correspondence analysis. Two distinct phases of forest clearance are evident during the pre-European era, reflecting local changes either in population pressure or settlement patterns. We note that the lull between the two phases of forest clearance coincides with the maximum of the ‘Little Ice Age’ within the period c. late ad 1600s to early 1800s.

text: A late-Holocene and prehistoric record of environmental change from Lake Waikaremoana, New Zealand Further evidence in support of a late pre-European (Polynesian) settlement of New Zealand is provided by an 1850-year-long tephropalynological record from a remote region in New Zealand's North Island. The earliest unequivocally anthropogenic forest clearance is estimated from sedimentation rates to have occurred c. 375 14C years BP (c. ad 1523–1631), although the radiocarbon chronology, shown by tephrochron ology to be erroneous due to hard-water effects, suggested this occurred c. 900 years earlier. Delineation of the anthropogenic era, and the distinction between human activity and other agents of environmental change in the pollen/spore diagram, are supported by cluster analysis and detrended correspondence analysis. Two distinct phases of forest clearance are evident during the pre-European era, reflecting local changes either in population pressure or settlement patterns. We note that the lull between the two phases of forest clearance coincides with the maximum of the ‘Little Ice Age’ within the period c. late ad 1600s to early 1800s.

year: 1998