Microdosing psychedelics is the regular use of sub-perceptive threshold doses of substances such as lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD) and psilocybin (\'magic\') mushrooms. The phenomenon has attracted increasing public and scientific attention in numerous countries in recent years. This commentary looks at microdosing psychedelics as an emerging facet of human enhancement through drugs. After presenting a narrative based on a multidisciplinary body of literature on human enhancement drugs and microdosing, the commentary maps out directions for further sociological studies of the phenomenon as well as outlining the different fields such research can contribute to.

In the wake of the COVID-19 pandemic and mass lockdowns that continue to shake the world, sociologists of health and illness have been advised to undertake research only when the time feels right and to avoid premature evaluation. Such advice makes sense, especially amidst an epidemic of interpretation that has resulted in substandard work. However, this contribution argues that when trying to understand and perhaps analyse early societal responses to COVID-19, medical sociology comprises a toolbox of ideas that are \'good to think with\' and should not be ignored. Indeed, our community is well placed to make its presence felt sooner rather than later as we collectively live through a deepening critical situation. Divided into two sections, this piece first offers a critical appreciation of Philip Strong\'s classic essay on \'epidemic psychology\', noting some insights and posing research questions for pandemic times. Second, going from micro- to macro-sociological concerns, it builds on Graham Scambler\'s calls for not only critique but also foresight and action within a \'fractured society\' comprising class-generated fissures and tensions. Early interventions from other leading medical sociologists and publicly engaged intellectuals are also cited when asking \'what sort of society are we heading towards and what sort of world do we want to share?\'

The amount and type of municipal solid waste (MSW) in Bahía Blanca (Argentina) were assessed and correlated with population socioeconomic level. In this sense, seven areas with different quality of life were selected. In addition, a parallel study on a control area was performed and validated for obtaining a representative result to provide analogous conclusions for the whole city. From this study, a combination of sorting methodologies is proposed in order to reduce the actual amount of waste sent to landfill. If these methodologies are implemented in Bahia Blanca city, MSW in landfill could be reduced at least 80%. The proposed strategy is to combine waste sorting at source and at destination. An alternative separation at source could be proposed as follows: packaging (including plastic, cans and Tetra Pak), other plastics, paper and glass. The rest of MSW could be included in a container which would be collected daily or three times a week without changing inhabitants\' habits and promoting their collaboration. Then, it could be separated at destination for waste-to-energy, composting, and biogas obtaining. Residuals from incinerators and biogas/composting plants would be sent to landfill. On the other hand, regarding the relationship between the proposed strategy and population quality of life, obtained results from this study could be useful to size and to efficiently locate disposal bins/containers for source separation as well as to redesign routes of municipal solid waste collection. Also, this strategy allows to add value to different components of MSW, improving working conditions of waste workers and creating new jobs in Bahia Blanca city.

UNASSIGNED: Addressing the determinants of severe acute malnutrition (SAM) among children remains a challenge in Nepal. This study investigated the effect of maternal and social determinants of SAM among under-five children of Nepal.
UNASSIGNED: We conducted a hospital-based unmatched case-control study with 256 under-five children (128 cases and 128 controls). The children aged 6-59 months were taken, and the cases and controls were defined based on mid-upper arm circumference (MUAC).
UNASSIGNED: Backward Stepwise logistic regression analysis of 6-59 months children showed that the odds of SAM were lower among male children (AOR = 0.50, 95% CI = 0.27-0.92), mothers from high socioeconomic status (AOR = 0.469, 95% CI = 0.26-0.83), breastfeeding 6-12 months (AOR = 0.21, 95% CI = 0.05-0.68), breastfeeding ≥13 months (AOR = 0.18, 95% CI = 0.05-0.54) and optimal complementary feeding (AOR = 0.40, 95% CI = 0.22-0.70). SAM was significantly higher among children of the age group 6-24 months (AOR = 2.57, 95% CI = 1.30-5.22) and children with a history of diarrhea (AOR = 1.75, 95% CI = 0.92-3.39).
UNASSIGNED: In order to reduce the children\'s SAM, it is necessary to scale up services to improve the socioeconomic status which includes the education, occupation, and monthly income of the mother. Girls of age group 6-24 months were more likely to develop SAM. Two contributing factors to decrease SAM are the importance of exclusive breastfeeding practices and the availability and usage of soap in hand washing, which are ideal for low cost interventions. To reduce SAM in Nepal, a focus on enhancing complementary feeding through increased affordability of nutritious foods is also needed.

The term \'language testing and assessment\' (LTA) seems to often invoke ideas related to numbers, such as mathematical equation and statistical calculation. This may range from scoring performance or responses to examination questions as numbers, to informing stakeholders of test results. This article investigates a series of actions pertaining to LTA by bringing in reflexive ethnography (Davies, C.A. [2008]. Reflexive Ethnography: A Guide to Researching Selves and Others. Routledge: London.). The aims are to add a humanistic element to the discipline in general and to feed another piece of applicability information to ethnographers in particular. Attempting at introducing such an approach largely qualitative as ethnography to the field of LTA can be useful because it may open up possibilities for balanced views in assessing language competence in future studies, in which social factors can also be taken explicitly into account for a decision making in LTA. For ethnographers, applicability of reflexive ethnography in LTA could mean the methodology achieves greater generalizability through a larger sample in the universe of admissible observations. A primary research question is whether a change in using CEFR-oriented placement test scores can be justified using empirical reasoning. Participatory observations, situational weigh-in, and statistical analyses are found capable of synergizing using a reflexive-ethnographic perspective for a justifiable decision-making process.

Family carers affected by violent, abusive or harmful behaviour by the older person for whom they care face social and epistemic challenges in developing and sharing knowledge about their experiences. These difficulties have contributed to a situation in which there is a paucity of evidence and public discourse about how we understand violence and harm instigated by people who have care needs or are \'vulnerable\'. This paper reports the findings of a qualitative study that involved 12 in-depth interviews with female carers affected by violence, abuse or harm. The study was informed theoretically by Miranda Fricker\'s concept of epistemic injustice which was used as a framework for analysis. There were two principal findings: (1) Carers were sensitive to anticipatory stigma and loss of moral autonomy. As a result, they self-censured what they shared and, at times, were met with subtle but powerful processes of silencing. (2) Carers had limited linguistic and conceptual resources to explain the emotional and social aspects of the harm they experienced, exacerbated by implicit social norms about the \'private\' and gendered nature of familial care. To conclude, we discuss the implications of these findings for sociological research and health and social care practice.

Health impact assessment (HIA) involves assessing in advance how projects affect the health of particular populations. In many countries, HIA has become central to attempts to better integrate health and public participation into policy and decision making. In 2017, HIA gained statutory status in Wales. This study considers how the public and their evidence are presented within HIA reports and what insights this offers into how public participation is constructed within public health.
Critical discourse analysis, as described by Fairclough (2003), to analyse seven HIA reports produced in Wales.
Discourses were grouped under four headings. \"Consensus and polyphony\" relates to the tendency to produce consensus. \"Authors and authority\" is concerned with how participants and their evidence are shaped by different authorial stances. \"Discussions, decisions and planes of action\" brings together material on how decision makers are (or are not) brought into contact with evidence in the reports. \"Evidence: fragmentation and compression\" analyses strategies of abstracting.
This analysis suggests that participants and their evidence are presented in specific ways within HIA reports and that these are particularly shaped by genre, authorial stances and approaches to abstracting and re-ordering texts. Acknowledging these issues may create opportunities to develop HIA in new directions. Further research to test these conclusions and contribute to a wider \"sociology of public health documents\" would be of value.

This article explores the adoption of agile methods for the management of projects in collaborative research initiatives. The use of the scrum framework, a specific set of agile principles and practices for self-organizing cross-functional teams in software development projects, is currently being expanded to other types of organizations and knowledge management processes. The study addresses the extent to which key principles and tools usually used in scrum, due to their potentially positive influence on team dynamics and efficiency, can contribute to the collaborative management and coordination of tasks in research processes. The responses from interviews with 17 researchers, as well as participant observation and analysis of online activity, are examined and presented as a case study on the adoption of scrum practices in a distributed research centre dedicated to the evaluation of public policies. Results indicate that integrating agile methods and principles for interdisciplinary collaboration requires a high degree of flexibility and a \"learn by doing\" approach.

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Writing has always been seen as the most troublesome and challenging area of language learning for all students without exception especially if it is to be done in a foreign language. Most of these students fail to meet the expectations of instructors both communicatively and linguistically. Those students are, in fact of varied backgrounds, different learning methodologies, varied levels of language skills and experience, let alone different insights, attitudes and conceptions about the writing skill. Consequently, it is significant to exhibit what these students think of writing and how they approach it. This study was meant to serve a two-fold purpose. Firstly, it aimed at examining what the Palestinian EFL students\' attitudes towards writing in general are; and secondly, whether the Palestinian EFL students feel any difference between expressing ideas while writing in English and Arabic. The participant of this study were (102) EFL students enrolled in four writing courses offered by the English Department in the Faculty of Humanities at An-Najah National University in the Spring Semester 2016/2017. A 28-item questionnaire modified from Daly-Miller Writing Apprehension Questionnaire and an open-ended question to help respondents freely express their attitudes towards writing were used to answer the questions. The study findings showed that students had positive attitudes toward writing, the various writing courses offered by the university, the textbooks and teaching methods used, and their writing skills and strategies.