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To-do list got you down? Understanding the psychology of goals can help tick things off – and keep you on track

<div class="theconversation-article-body"> <a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/kim-m-caudwell-1258935">Kim M Caudwell</a>, <a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/charles-darwin-university-1066">Charles Darwin University</a> It feels like we are living in busy times. According to the <a href="https://www.oecdbetterlifeindex.org/topics/work-life-balance/">OECD Better Life Index</a>, 12.5% of Australians report working at least 50 hours a week, higher than the OECD average. Many Australians are also <a href="https://www.abc.net.au/news/2023-08-03/multiple-job-holders-hit-record-high-abs/102679190">working more than one job to buffer against cost-of-living pressures</a>. Psychology has long been interested in our goals – our mental representations of desirable outcomes. Much of this research is on how we form, pursue and attain goals, plus how goals make us feel. Across studies, we see a consistent pattern of <a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10902-013-9493-0#Sec34">successful goal pursuit and wellbeing</a>. So, having time to work toward our goals is important. With this in mind, what is the best way to get things done – and how can we get better at achieving our goals, especially when we feel time poor? <h2>Make a list</h2> Most of us approach multiple goals with the age-old “to-do” list. First, you write down everything you need to do. Then you “check” or tick things off as you do them. One reason to-do lists are useful is because we are more likely to remember things we haven’t completed, rather than things we have. This is known as the <a href="https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=E-F1U4bV2m8">Zeigarnik effect</a>. While to-do lists are easy to write, they don’t always work. There are however <a href="https://hbr.org/2021/01/i-tried-4-to-do-list-methods-heres-what-worked">various approaches for to-do lists</a> that may improve their effectiveness. Another thing to consider is the wide range of apps, tools and platforms that can make tasks more fun and outsource mental load. Adding elements of game play like point scoring or competition – called “<a href="https://theconversation.com/how-gamification-could-revolutionise-creative-thinking-in-the-workplace-122852">gamification</a>” – can <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0747563221002867">help people work toward goals in educational and work settings</a>. Similarly, app-based reminders can help people reach <a href="https://doi.org/10.1177/2047487320905717">physical rehabilitation goals and form good exercise habits</a>. <h2>Finding your why</h2> Researchers have focused a lot on the psychology of why people pursue goals – and how this affects their approach to tasks. For example, some people want to complete a university degree because they want to get a job. Others may be more interested in developing skills or knowledge. In both cases, there is a desired outcome – albeit with differing reasons. Our goals can be differentiated by who or what is driving them. Goals that feel like our own, and for which we experience a sense of intrinsic motivation, are known as “self-concordant”. These goals represent enduring personal interests, are aligned with values and are positively <a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s12144-020-01156-7">linked to wellbeing</a>. <a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10648-006-9012-5">Goal orientation theory</a> offers a similar perspective. Using the same example, you may study so you score well on a test (a performance goal) or because you want to be sure you develop your knowledge (a mastery goal). Mastery goals tend to lead to <a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s10869-010-9201-6">better results and self-regulation</a>. <h2>Juggling goals – 4 to-do tips</h2> So, what happens when we have multiple – perhaps even competing – goals, or goals that aren’t so enjoyable? We might want to finish writing a report or assignment, then read a few chapters of a textbook – but also go to the gym and binge a few episodes of our favourite TV show. In such scenarios, psychological science offers some insights into how we might stay task-focused, and on track to tick more items off our to-do list. 1. Beware the <a href="https://www.pwc.pl/en/articles/planning-fallacy-part-I-cognitive-traps.html">planning fallacy</a>. This happens when we underestimate the amount of resources (such as time) it will take to reach a goal. As writer and religious thinker William Penn put it: “Time is what we want most, but what we use worst”. Think through the all the steps and time required to complete your goal. 2. Monitor your progress. <a href="https://eprints.whiterose.ac.uk/91437/8/3_PDFsam_Does%20monitoring%20goal.pdf">Incorporating goal monitoring</a> into an activity can boost progress. And reviewing your estimations and expectations against your actual times and achievements can be used to calculate a “<a href="https://www.indeed.com/career-advice/career-development/estimating-time-for-tasks">fudge ratio</a>” to aid future planning. For instance, you could multiply your expected time on tasks by 1.5 to help buffer against the planning fallacy. 3. Focus on mastery. Self-concordant goals and tasks feel easier, and their underlying tasks may be <a href="https://journals.sagepub.com/doi/full/10.1177/0146167215575730">less subject to forgetting</a>. Tedious but necessary goals (such as doing the dishes or filling out forms) are less intrinsically motivating. This means <a href="https://www.emerald.com/insight/content/doi/10.1108/EBHRM-04-2014-0013/full/html#idm45933122746592">planning, reminders and support become more important to goal progress</a>. 4. Plan for derailments. People vary in their ability to plan and might forget to take a goal-directed action at an appropriate time (this could be one reason the <a href="https://www.sbs.com.au/news/article/the-streaming-services-winning-the-battle-for-attention-and-the-feature-australians-want/9crrpafgd">average Australian streams 27 hours of video each week</a>). <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/full/10.1080/10463283.2024.2334563">Implementation intentions</a> bring our attention back toward our goals by linking them to an environmental marker. These simple “if-then” plans are shown to <a href="https://cancercontrol.cancer.gov/brp/research/constructs/implementation-intentions#:%7E:text=Implementation%20intentions%20are%20formed%20for,might%20otherwise%20undermine%20goal%20striving.">help overcome issues with self-regulation</a>. Such a statement might be “if I see the ‘next episode’ icon appear, I will get up and turn off the TV so I can read a chapter of my textbook”. With time being frustratingly finite, it is inevitable we will run out of time to do all of the things on our to-do list. Finding an approach that works for us will take time and effort. But it’s probably a worthy goal in itself.<img style="border: none !important; box-shadow: none !important; margin: 0 !important; max-height: 1px !important; max-width: 1px !important; min-height: 1px !important; min-width: 1px !important; opacity: 0 !important; outline: none !important; padding: 0 !important;" src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/230399/count.gif?distributor=republish-lightbox-basic" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" /> <a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/kim-m-caudwell-1258935">Kim M Caudwell</a>, Senior Lecturer - Psychology | Chair, Researchers in Behavioural Addictions, Alcohol and Drugs (BAAD), <a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/charles-darwin-university-1066">Charles Darwin University</a> Image credits: Shutterstock This article is republished from <a href="https://theconversation.com">The Conversation</a> under a Creative Commons license. Read the <a href="https://theconversation.com/to-do-list-got-you-down-understanding-the-psychology-of-goals-can-help-tick-things-off-and-keep-you-on-track-230399">original article</a>. </div>

Mind

“People don’t understand boundaries”: Woman ruins couple’s romantic proposal

A young couple has been left devastated and mortified after their marriage proposal was crashed by an inconsiderate “Karen” on the beach. Zenicca Llanza, a 24-year-old from the Philippines, shared a video of her boyfriend getting down on one knee at the beach and asking her to marry him. Her partner had arranged a romantic set up on the beach, complete with a tent, picnic table, proposal sign, a cake and rose petals. However, when the time came for him to pop the question, a beach goer began to interfere and rearrange the set up, interrupting the romantic moment. In the video posted to TikTok, Zenicca’s partner got down on one knee and began to recite a speech, as the unnamed woman walked into shot. <div><iframe title="tiktok embed" src="https://cdn.embedly.com/widgets/media.html?src=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.tiktok.com%2Fembed%2Fv2%2F7269928964536192298&display_name=tiktok&url=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.tiktok.com%2F%40warngwarng%2Fvideo%2F7269928964536192298&image=https%3A%2F%2Fp16-sign.tiktokcdn-us.com%2Fobj%2Ftos-useast5-p-0068-tx%2F80e87476646048bca323b002688ff427_1692662253%3Fx-expires%3D1692910800%26x-signature%3D2CX7o9uY0RsEB7creGyXnWP8mas%253D&key=5b465a7e134d4f09b4e6901220de11f0&type=text%2Fhtml&schema=tiktok" width="340" height="700" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" allowfullscreen="allowfullscreen"></iframe></div> She then moves the proposal sign before walking over to the couple to get a look at the ring, before Zenicca even got a chance to wear it. “How to quickly ruin a proposal,” Zenicca wrote on TikTok. “Please be mindful of other people's once in a lifetime event! You never know you're already ruining it,” she wrote. The video has racked up tens of thousands of views, with many people being outraged on Zenicca’s behalf. “You could excuse the first few seconds w good intentions but the rest I feel like we’re just really bad manners and not having any self awareness,” commented one person. “This made me physically ill. I'm so sorry omg,” added another. “Aw I could tell she had good intentions but was ignorant in the moment that she was slightly ruining something y’all would cherish forever,” commented a third. “Just tell her it’s a personal moment. Sometimes people don’t understand boundaries.” Image credits: TikTok

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Lucy Letby: it is not being ‘beige’, ‘average’ or ‘normal’ that makes her crimes so hard to understand

<a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/lizzie-seal-183829">Lizzie Seal</a>, <a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/university-of-sussex-1218">University of Sussex</a> In seeking to understand the crimes of Lucy Letby, the neonatal nurse who murdered seven babies in her care, a fixation about how “ordinary” she appears to be has emerged. At times like this, we seek answers, which perhaps explains the vague sense that understanding this apparent inconsistency can teach us a lesson for the future. But that is a circle that cannot be squared. Letby was sentenced to whole life imprisonment for the murders of seven babies carried out while she worked at Countess of Chester Hospital, in north-west England. She was found guilty of the attempted murder of six other babies and is suspected of having harmed more. She is variously described as a “serial killer” and a “serial killer nurse”. Letby meets the <a href="https://www.aic.gov.au/publications/tandi/tandi346">generally accepted criminological definition</a> of a serial killer – that is, someone who commits three or more murders on separate occasions which are not for revenge or material gain. Everyday understandings of serial killing are consistent with the criminological definition and, arguably, the “serial killer” is a compelling example of the overlap – and perhaps cross-pollination – between the academic and wider understandings of crime. Both academic and wider understandings of serial killing are shaped by portrayals and archetypes from fiction, film, television and true crime podcasts and documentaries. The ubiquity of portrayals of serial killers mean we reach for certain stock explanations of their actions. Quoting police officers involved in the investigation and former colleagues of Letby, news articles describe her as <a href="https://news.sky.com/story/who-is-lucy-letby-the-average-nurse-who-became-britains-most-prolific-child-killer-12943602">“average”</a> and <a href="https://www.thesun.co.uk/news/23003681/beige-lucy-letby-killer-nurse-death-toll/">“beige”</a>. Shock and confusion abound about the crimes of an “ordinary” young woman who did not stand out in terms of character or ability. The puzzle these descriptions create is how a “serial killer nurse” could possibly be someone so unremarkable. Letby lived in a three-bedroom semi-detached house, with a <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/uk-news/2023/aug/18/lucy-letby-the-beige-and-average-nurse-who-turned-into-a-baby-killer">“happy Prosecco season”</a> sign adorning the wall of her kitchen and a collection of soft toys in her bedroom. Although <a href="https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/crime/nurse-lucy-letby-motive-why-would-she-kill-babies-b2397008.html">motives were suggested</a> by the prosecution during her trial, they feel unsatisfactory. <h2>Looking for answers in the wrong place</h2> Our inability to parse “satisfying” explanations for Letby’s actions relates to her departure from accepted cultural scripts of serial killing. A prominent serial killer script is that of perceived deviance and transgression, whereby something pathological about the killer accounts for their personality and actions. Frequently, this pathology is along the lines of mental illness, as in one of the classic templates for modern cultural scripts of serial killing, Norman Bates in the film Psycho. Another recurrent portrayal is the serial killer who is motivated by sexual perversion. Lucy Letby’s apparent normality means she cannot be read through this script. The fact that <a href="https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-3-030-87488-9">she is a woman</a> while serial killers are overwhelmingly male adds to this (although serial killing by women, including nurses, is <a href="https://www.dailymail.co.uk/news/article-12423909/Other-cases-missed-Detective-nailed-Beverley-Allitt-says-like-Lucy-Letby-read-book-chillingly-similar-Angel-Death-case-30-years-believes-killer-nurses-have.html">not without precedent</a>). <a href="https://link.springer.com/chapter/10.1057/9780230369061_6">Popular culture has taught us</a> that a serial killer is a certain type of person. They are often even glamorised in films and TV shows. In his <a href="https://www.goodreads.com/en/book/show/36061">1996 memoir My Dark Places</a>, the novelist James Ellroy comments on the figure of the serial killer in 1990s popular culture: “serial killers were very unprosaic. They were hip, slick and cool”. Ellroy’s comment gets to the heart of why Lucy Letby feels like a dissonant serial killer. She is prosaic. But this is a red herring. We may have absorbed tropes about serial killers but that does not mean we understand them or their motives in any more depth than we understand why Letby killed. There is nothing truly conclusive about saying someone killed for power or sexual gratification, just as there is nothing conclusive about any of the explanations offered for Letby’s actions. Our belief that we understand reasons for serial killing – and thereby deviations from those reasons such as appearing “ordinary” – is based on familiar but incomplete narratives. Our cultural scripts about serial killers do not offer good explanations for their crimes. In reality, it is incredibly unusual for someone like Lucy Letby to be a serial killer because it is incredibly unusual for anyone to be a serial killer.<img style="border: none !important; box-shadow: none !important; margin: 0 !important; max-height: 1px !important; max-width: 1px !important; min-height: 1px !important; min-width: 1px !important; opacity: 0 !important; outline: none !important; padding: 0 !important;" src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/211960/count.gif?distributor=republish-lightbox-basic" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" /> <a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/lizzie-seal-183829">Lizzie Seal</a>, Professor of Criminology, <a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/university-of-sussex-1218">University of Sussex</a> Image credits: Getty Images This article is republished from <a href="https://theconversation.com">The Conversation</a> under a Creative Commons license. Read the <a href="https://theconversation.com/lucy-letby-it-is-not-being-beige-average-or-normal-that-makes-her-crimes-so-hard-to-understand-211960">original article</a>.

Legal

Why understanding how spiders spin silk may hold clues for treating Alzheimer’s disease

<a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/michael-landreh-1328287">Michael Landreh</a>, <a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/karolinska-institutet-1250">Karolinska Institutet</a> and <a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/anna-rising-1440132">Anna Rising</a>, <a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/karolinska-institutet-1250">Karolinska Institutet</a> Really, we should envy spiders. Imagine being able to make silk like they do, flinging it around to get from place to place, always having a <a href="https://pubs.acs.org/doi/10.1021/acsmacrolett.8b00678">strong-as-steel safety line</a> or spinning a comfy hammock whenever they need a rest. The fascinating properties of spider silk make it no wonder that scientists have been trying to unravel its secrets for decades. If we could understand and recreate the spinning process, we could produce artificial spider silk for a <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/abs/pii/S0141813021021292">range of medical applications</a>. For example, artificial silk can help <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.biomaterials.2021.120692">regenerate the nerves that connect our brain and limbs</a>, and can shuttle <a href="https://doi.org/10.1021/acs.biomac.0c01138">drug molecules directly into the cells where they are needed</a>. <figure><iframe src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/zNtSAQHNONo?wmode=transparent&start=0" width="440" height="260" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen="allowfullscreen"></iframe></figure> Spider silk is made of <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/engineering/spidroins">proteins called spidroins</a>, which the spider stores in a silk gland in its abdomen. There are several types of spidroin for spinning different sorts of silk. Spiders <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC7673682/">store them as a liquid</a> that resembles oil droplets. But one of the questions that has eluded scientists so far is how spiders turn these liquid droplets into silk. We decided to investigate why the spidroins form droplets, to get us closer to replicating a spider’s spinning process. <h2>Weaving a web</h2> The trick that spiders use to speed up their spinning process can be used to spin better artificial silk, or even develop new spinning processes. In 2017, we learned to <a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/ncomms15504">make synthetic silk fibres</a> by emulating the silk gland, but we did not know how things work inside the spider. Now we know that forming droplets first <a href="https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/37084706/">speeds up the conversion to these fibres</a>. An important clue to how the droplets and fibres are related came from an unexpected area of our research – on <a href="https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/23013511/">Alzheimer’s and Parkinson’s diseases</a>. Proteins that are involved in these diseases, called <a href="https://www.sciencedirect.com/topics/biochemistry-genetics-and-molecular-biology/alpha-synuclein#:%7E:text=%CE%B1%2DSynuclein%20is%20a%20highly,linked%20to%20familial%20Parkinson%20disease.">alpha-synuclein</a> and <a href="https://www.alz.org/media/Documents/alzheimers-dementia-tau-ts.pdf">tau</a>, can assemble into tiny, oil-like droplets in human cells. Tau is a protein that helps stabilise the internal skeleton of nerve cells (neurons) in the brain. This internal skeleton has a tube-like shape through which nutrients and other essential substances travel to reach different parts of the neuron. In Alzheimer’s disease, an abnormal form of tau builds up and clings to the normal tau proteins, creating “tau tangles”. Alpha-synuclein is found in large quantities in <a href="https://www.webmd.com/mental-health/what-is-dopamine">dopamine-producing nerve cells</a>. Abnormal forms of this protein are linked to Parkinson’s disease. <figure class="align-center zoomable"><a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/528217/original/file-20230525-25-p40y48.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/528217/original/file-20230525-25-p40y48.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/528217/original/file-20230525-25-p40y48.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/528217/original/file-20230525-25-p40y48.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/528217/original/file-20230525-25-p40y48.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=400&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/528217/original/file-20230525-25-p40y48.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/528217/original/file-20230525-25-p40y48.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/528217/original/file-20230525-25-p40y48.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=503&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" alt="Beautiful spider web with water drops close-up" /></a><figcaption>The trick spiders use to speed up their spinning process can be used to spin better artificial silk. <a class="source" href="https://www.shutterstock.com/image-photo/beautiful-spider-web-water-drops-close-155560781">Aastels/Shutterstock</a></figcaption></figure> Oil droplets of either one of these proteins form in humans when they become entangled, like boiled spaghetti on a plate. At first, the proteins are flexible and elastic, much like spidroin oil droplets. But if the proteins remain entangled, they get stuck together which alters their shape, changing them into rigid fibres. These can be toxic to human cells – for example, in neurodegenerative conditions such as Alzheimer’s. However, <a href="https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/33148640/">spidroins can form droplets</a> too. This left us wondering if the same mechanism that causes neurodegeneration in humans could help the spider to convert liquid spidroins into rigid silk fibres. To find out, we used a <a href="https://www.nature.com/articles/nchembio.2269">synthetic spidroin called NT2RepCT</a>, which can be produced by bacteria. Under the microscope, we could see that this synthetic spidroin formed liquid droplets when it was dissolved in phosphate buffer, a type of salt found in the spider’s silk gland. This allowed us to replicate spider silk spinning conditions in the lab. <h2>Silky science</h2> Next, we studied how the spidroin proteins act when they form droplets. To answer this question, we turned to an analysis technique <a href="https://www.britannica.com/science/mass-spectrometry">called mass spectrometry</a>, to measure how the weight of the proteins changed when they formed droplets. To our surprise, we saw that the spidroin proteins, which normally form pairs, instead split into single molecules. We needed to do more work to find out how these protein droplets help spiders spin silk. Previous research has shown spidroins have different parts, called domains, with separate functions. The end part of the spidroin, called c-terminal domain, makes it form pairs. The c-terminal also starts <a href="https://journals.plos.org/plosbiology/article?id=10.1371/journal.pbio.1001921">fibre formation when it comes into contact with acid</a>. So, we made a spidroin which contained only the c-terminal domain and tested its ability to form fibres. When we used phosphate buffer to entangle the proteins into droplets, they turned into rigid fibre instantly. When we added acid without first making droplets, fibre formation took much longer. This makes sense since the spidroin molecules must find each other when forming a fibre. Entangling the spidroins like spaghetti helps them rapidly assemble into silk. This finding tells us how the spider can instantly convert its spidroins into a solid thread. It also uncovered how nature uses the same mechanism that can make brain proteins toxic to create some of its most amazing structures. The surprising parallel between spider silk spinning and fibres toxic to humans could one day lead to new clues about how to fight neurodegenerative disorders. Scientists may use spider silk research, including what we have learned about the spider silk domains, to keep human proteins from sticking together – to stop them from becoming toxic. If spiders can learn how to keep their sticky proteins in check, perhaps so can we.<img style="border: none !important; box-shadow: none !important; margin: 0 !important; max-height: 1px !important; max-width: 1px !important; min-height: 1px !important; min-width: 1px !important; opacity: 0 !important; outline: none !important; padding: 0 !important;" src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/205857/count.gif?distributor=republish-lightbox-basic" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" /> <a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/michael-landreh-1328287">Michael Landreh</a>, Researcher, Department of Microbiology, Tumor and Cell Biology, <a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/karolinska-institutet-1250">Karolinska Institutet</a> and <a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/anna-rising-1440132">Anna Rising</a>, Researcher in Veterinary medicine biochemistry, <a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/karolinska-institutet-1250">Karolinska Institutet</a> This article is republished from <a href="https://theconversation.com">The Conversation</a> under a Creative Commons license. Read the <a href="https://theconversation.com/why-understanding-how-spiders-spin-silk-may-hold-clues-for-treating-alzheimers-disease-205857">original article</a>. Images: Getty

Body

“I didn't understand it”: Albo opens up about blindsiding divorce

Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has candidly opened up about the difficult days after his ex-wife asked for a divorce. Albo shared how he was blindsided by his wife’s request, after 19 years of marriage and 30 years together. Following their marriage breakdown on New Year's Day in 2019, Albo shared that he went overseas for two weeks and even considered quitting politics entirely. He said he was shocked by the revelation that his ex-wife, former deputy NSW premier Carmel Tebbutt, wasn’t happy in their marriage. “I didn't understand it, but I came to accept it,” the PM told Melbourne's Triple M radio. After Tebbutt asked for the divorce, Albo travelled to London for a week to visit friends before journeying on to Lisbon in Portugal. “It was two weeks to clear the air, determine what I wanted to do with my life, decide whether I wanted to run again in the election,” he said. He made the decision to come home and throw himself into public life, announcing a run for the top job in the lead up to the 2022 election. Along the road to his election victory, Albo found love again with Jodie Haydon after the pair met at an event in Melbourne. The PM said he was always open to finding love again, but was concerned about his public image. “I never did Tinder,” Mr Albanese said, acknowledging it would be “fine” for him to use it - “except [everyone] would know about it”. He said, “It was [incredibly challenging], but you live in the public eye. It was very difficult for me personally, but Carmel made a decision that she wanted to move on with her life... our son had reached 18, he'd graduated from school.” “It was a decision I found difficult but one she obviously had the right to do.” In spite of the heartache, Mr Albanese and Ms Tebbutt do appear to be on good terms. They famously share custody of their dog, Toto, and Ms Tebbutt was seen on the campaign trail for Labor during the election. As for his new relationship, Mr Albanese said it's “fantastic” that he “has someone to spend his personal life with”, along with his son Nathan, particularly given the complex challenges that come with running a country. “I'm most proud of my resilience,” he said. “I've hung in there, I've stayed true to my values and I think I've made a difference.” Image credits: Getty Images

Relationships

Understanding legal jargon for your future

Confused by some of the legal jargon you continually come across in getting your affairs in order? If so, here’s some of the most common ones explained. Do you know the difference between a power of attorney and an enduring power of attorney? What about the meaning of an enduring guardianship? Or what an executor does? As you start to get your affairs in order and plan for your future, you’re bound to come across a handful of terms again and again, so it’s best to understand what you’re reading or hearing from your lawyer. Here’s a guide to some of the most common terms you’re likely to come across when planning ahead. Note there are quite a few differences between the States and Territories. Something that is called one thing in Victoria for example, may not be called the same thing in Tasmania. Advance health directive/Advance Care directive: Also called a living will and in the Northern Territory an Advance Personal Plan, this is a legal document that enables you to make decisions now about your medical treatment if you became sick or injured and you aren’t able to communicate your wishes or consent to treatment. If this happens, this bit of paper would effectively become your voice. Keep in mind, that an advance health directive would only come into effect if it applied to the treatment you required and only if you were unable to make reasoned decisions about a treatment when it was needed. The document could be a general statement of your wishes or it may give specific directions for various medical conditions and types of treatment that you do and don’t want. Medical staff can refer to this document if you were or became incapable of making the decisions yourself. Be aware however that advance directives are only legally binding on doctors in Queensland, South Australia and the Northern Territory. Beneficiary: A person or institution, such as a charity, who can receive part or all of something from a will or trust. You’ll see this word used quite a bit, particularly when your attorney drafts your will. Enduring guardianship or enduring power of guardianship: Where an enduring power of attorney allows your attorney to make decisions on your behalf when it comes to your assets, if you lose the capacity to make those decisions yourself, an enduring power of guardianship allows your guardian to make decisions on personal health and lifestyle options. It is another legal document that authorises a person of your choosing to make decisions on your behalf. Your appointed guardian cannot make decisions about your assets and finances. This person can however make decisions about where you live, the support services you have access to and the treatment you receive if you unable to do so yourself. In the ACT the functions of a guardian can be met by an attorney under a Power of Attorney. In South Australia, the functions of a guardian can be met by an Advance Care Directive. In Victoria and Western Australia, a guardian has some limitations on the decisions that he/she can make and can be overruled in relation to medical treatment decisions if you have appointed an enduring power of attorney (medical treatment) (in Victoria) or if you have made an Advance Health Directive (in Western Australia). In the ACT and Queensland, you cannot appoint a guardian, but you can appoint an attorney under a power of attorney who can make the same decisions as a guardian. Estate plan: Many of you may already know what an estate plan is or have one in place but for those who don’t, it’s basically a plan of where your assets are distributed at your passing. Generally, the key documents that will form your estate plan include: will (which could include one or more testamentary trusts), superannuation death benefit nominations, power of attorney, enduring power of guardianship and advance directive. If you have made a binding death benefit nomination for your superannuation or insurance policies, your nominated beneficiaries will override anyone outlined in your will. There are specific rules however in relation to fee you can nominate to receive your super. An effective estate plan can also pass control of other assets that you may not hold personally, such as assets held by family trusts and family companies. Executor: A person appointed by your will to administer your estate when you pass away. Basically, this person will make sure all of your debts are paid and that any assets and possessions you outlined in the will go to where you stipulated. The executor is nominated by you and becomes your legal personal representative. More than one executor can be nominated although if you do this, then you need to specify whether those executors must make joint decisions (they all agreed), or can make decisions on their own, or you include some other basis for how decisions will be made (for example by majority vote). An executor’s role generally involves notifying the beneficiaries, paying any outstanding taxes and debts, and distributing your assets as instructed in your will. Intestacy: This is the word used to describe when a person passes away without leaving a will. The person is said to have passed intestate. That person’s estate would then pass to specified next of kin according to a set statutory order. If no eligible recipients can be found for your estate to be passed on to, then according to the law, the state is entitled to keep everything. Basically, the biggest drawback to not making a will is that you have no say as to who inherits your assets. It’s also more expensive to administer an estate without a will, with the extra cost deducted from your assets. Power of attorney: If you’re planning on going overseas for a holiday or going to hospital for a month-long stay, it could be a good idea to make a power of attorney. By making a power of attorney you’re basically giving another person the authority to make legal decisions about your assets and finances on your behalf. You can limit the scope of a power of attorney, for example so that it only applies to specific assets or for a certain period of time. If you’re looking longer term when planning for your future, it may be better to make an enduring power of attorney. The difference between a power of attorney (also known as a general power of attorney) and an enduring power of attorney is that a general power of attorney will stop if you lose the capacity to make your own decisions. An enduring power of attorney (as the name suggests) will remain in place even if you lose the capacity to make your own decisions. In the ACT and Queensland, your attorney can also make the same decisions as a guardian in relation to personal health, medical and lifestyle decisions. In Victoria, you can appoint an enduring power of attorney (medical treatment), which will overrule any guardian that you may have appointed, in relation to medical treatment. In the Northern Territory, legislation was introduced starting from 1 July 2014, which means that you can no longer appoint an enduring power of attorney. Testamentary trust: This is a trust set up inside a will that only takes effect when the person who creates the will, passes away. The main benefit of a testamentary trust is to provide greater control over the distribution of assets which are held by the testamentary trust, to beneficiaries set out in the will. There are also tax and asset protection advantages to testamentary trusts, making them an effective estate planning tool for some people. It differs from a family trust which is created by deed and commences during your lifetime. The testamentary trust will be administered by a trustee who is usually appointed in the will and who must look after the assets for the benefit of the beneficiaries until the trust expires. This article is for general information only and cannot be relied on as legal advice. You should seek formal legal advice on your specific circumstances. Image credit: Shutterstock

Legal

For some LGBTQ+ older people, events like World Pride can be isolating – we need to better understand how to support them

<a href="https://sydneyworldpride.com/">World Pride</a> has come to Sydney, with the annual <a href="https://sydneyworldpride.com/events/mardi-gras-parade/">Mardi Gras Parade</a> on Saturday having returned to its Oxford Street home for the first time in three years. The 17-day festival is expected to host 500,000 participants over more than 300 events. It is an opportunity to celebrate all things queer, and a good time to take stock of the changes LGBTQ+ older people have experienced, and the challenges they continue to face. LGBTQ+ people aged in their 70s, 80s and 90s have witnessed extraordinary social change regarding gender and sexual diversity. For example, in Australia, same-sex marriage is now legal, <a href="https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/where-transgender-is-no-longer-a-diagnosis/">Gender Identity Disorder</a> has been removed as a clinical diagnosis, and all states have an equal age of consent for homosexual and heterosexual sex. These have been hard-fought gains after many years of adversity and advocacy on the part of LGBTQ+ older people, among others. Each year, the <a href="https://www.78ers.org.au/">78ers</a> – who were involved in the Sydney marches and protests between June and August 1978 – take pride of place towards the front of the parade. <h2>Loneliness and social isolation</h2> Despite these achievements, the consequences of living most of one’s life in a homophobic and transphobic society have been considerable, particularly in terms of mental illness and social isolation. <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/00918369.2021.2005999?journalCode=wjhm20">Australian</a> and <a href="https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/34326557/">US</a> research indicates loneliness is more common among lesbian, gay and bisexual older people than the general population. This is particularly so for those who live alone and are not in a relationship. Similar findings are reported in relation to <a href="https://www.lgbtagingcenter.org/resources/pdfs/LGBT%20Aging%20and%20Health%20Report_final.pdf">transgender older people</a>, although more research is needed. <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/00918369.2021.2005999?journalCode=wjhm20">Loneliness</a> is also more common among lesbian and gay older people who are disconnected from LGBTQ+ communities and who hold negative attitudes towards their own same-sex attraction. For LGBTQ+ older people experiencing social isolation and loneliness, what might be their experience of watching World Pride from a distance? What might it be like navigating rainbow paraphernalia while shopping at <a href="https://www.coles.com.au/about/sustainability/better-together/our-team/pride">Coles</a> (a World Pride partner)? How might they perceive the glitz and glamour of the Mardi Gras Parade? World Pride may be challenging for those who don’t feel an attachment to LGBTQ+ communities or who feel negative about their own sexuality. And this may reinforce a sense of disconnection. But some may gain comfort from witnessing the sense of community on display. It may even strengthen their perceived connection to other LGBTQ+ people. And, for those who are not open about their sexuality or authentic gender, it may support their journey to “come out” later in life. <h2>The impact of discrimination</h2> For many LGBTQ+ older people, the experience of discrimination remains very real in their lives. <a href="https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/33770516/">Past and recent discrimination</a> leads to delays seeking treatment and support, simply because people expect to be discriminated against when accessing services. In Australia, previous discrimination has been found to predict <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/00918369.2021.2005999?journalCode=wjhm20">loneliness</a> and <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/ageing-and-society/article/abs/recent-versus-lifetime-experiences-of-discrimination-and-the-mental-and-physical-health-of-older-lesbian-women-and-gay-men/90988215582414EA0AB7936B6384FC97">lower mental health</a> among older lesbian and gay people. In the US, <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC6779303/">microaggressions</a> – small everyday interactions that reinforce the experience of being “other” – have predicted greater impairment, higher rates of depression and lower quality of life among LGBTQ+ people aged 80 and over. There remain major gaps in evidence on the issues faced by LGBTQ+ older people, particularly for bisexual, queer, transgender and nonbinary older people. This is mainly due to the failure to systematically collect inclusive data on gender and sexual diversity, through variables such as those recommended by the <a href="https://www.abs.gov.au/statistics/standards/standard-sex-gender-variations-sex-characteristics-and-sexual-orientation-variables/latest-release">Australian Bureau of Statistics</a>. <h2>Strengths and resilience</h2> This year, older people seemed to occupy a more prominent place in the Mardi Gras Parade. Perhaps this is because of the natural ageing of our community activists. Older people were also represented in the wider World Pride festival, such as in the theatre production <a href="https://sydneyworldpride.com/events/all-the-sex-ive-ever-had/">All the Sex I’ve Ever Had</a>, in which older Sydney residents reflect on the evolution of their sexuality over the course of their lives. A festival like World Pride showcases the strengths and resilience of LGBTQ+ people and communities. The organisation of such an event should not be underestimated. This reflects LGBTQ+ people’s high level of civic engagement and commitment to giving back to society, as demonstrated by their greater likelihood of being <a href="https://www.tandfonline.com/doi/abs/10.1080/0312407X.2021.1899256">volunteers</a> and <a href="https://www.caregiving.org/wp-content/uploads/2020/05/2015_CaregivingintheUS_Final-Report-June-4_WEB.pdf">caregivers</a>. And the contribution of volunteers and caregivers during the HIV/AIDS crisis of the 1980s and ‘90s is not forgotten. LGBTQ+ older people generally are <a href="https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC5241752/">resilient and maintain good health</a>. Many report increased <a href="https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s13178-021-00653-z">confidence and self-esteem</a>, compared with when they were younger. And many have created their own families – their families of choice – to support each other in later life. But we don’t know enough about their needs and how to provide them with inclusive services as they get older. World Pride is an opportunity to reflect on the hard-won gains but not ignore the challenges ahead. Image credits: Getty Images This article originally appeared on <a href="https://theconversation.com/for-some-lgbtq-older-people-events-like-world-pride-can-be-isolating-we-need-to-better-understand-how-to-support-them-200533" target="_blank" rel="noopener">The Conversation</a>.

Caring

British expat shares strange Aussie slang words she doesn't understand

When Charlee moved from the UK to Australia, she never expected for there to be such a language barrier. The 25-year-old expat shared a list of unique Aussie slang words that she had "never heard in her life" until moving Down Under, with the list of Australianisms quickly going viral. “If you’re thinking about moving to Australia. Listen up. But first – Australian’s don’t all come at me,” she said in the video. “I am very aware I am an uncultured British person which is why I have moved to the other side of the world. I am ready to see the sights.” Charlee said despite having lived in Australia for a few months now, there are still quite a few words she hears daily that have her wondering what they mean. “First thing – an eskie. An eskie is a cool box (what they call it in the UK),” she said. “I do actually quite like the word. It sounds better than ‘cool box’ but still, [I’ve] never heard of it in my life.” The word "esky" became common in Australia after a brand by the same name released the first portable coolers in 1952. Another word Charlee struggled to understand was “doona". “A doona is a duvet. I don’t understand why you would just change the last three letters of the word. It’s quite a nice word, ‘doona’, it sounds very Australian … but it’s just a bit of a strange word.” Like most expats, the term “thongs” threw Charlee off when she first heard it. “I know we should all know what thongs are by now – they’re flip-flop. However, on the odd occasion someone will say thong to me and I genuinely think they're asking me about the piece of material wedged between my butt cheeks.” The other words Charlee listed were footy, ‘too easy’, ‘scull’ (ie scull a drink) and pants, which they refer to as trousers in the UK. Charlee's videos about life in Australia have garnered her an impressive following, with comments rolling in from natives saying "Yep, welcome to Australia!" Image credits: TikTok <div class="media image venti" style="caret-color: #000000; color: #000000; font-style: normal; font-variant-caps: normal; font-weight: 400; letter-spacing: normal; orphans: auto; text-align: start; text-indent: 0px; text-transform: none; white-space: normal; widows: auto; word-spacing: 0px; -webkit-text-size-adjust: auto; -webkit-text-stroke-width: 0px; text-decoration: none; box-sizing: inherit; display: flex; flex-direction: column; align-items: center; width: 493.639679px; margin: 24px auto;"> </div>

Travel Trouble

5 keys to understanding grief

Christopher Hall is chief executive officer of the Australian Centre for Grief and Bereavement, and previously worked as a psychologist with the Victorian Department of Education. For too long, we have suffered from a narrow definition of grief. We’ve viewed grief largely as the human response to death but grief is really the human response to change. It’s a multifaceted response that involves our emotional life, our cognitions – the way we think about ourselves, the world and our relationships, as well as the impact of grief on our bodies, our relationships, our spirituality and even our broader frameworks of meaning. It may be a change that is unwelcome, an adverse life event such as a loved one’s death or a floundering relationship. It may even be a welcome change, such as adjusting to a new work culture or moving to a new location. Change is a fundamental part of life. It plays a central role in the work of psychologists, as we help our clients adjust to change or transition. 1. Theories about grief People often refer to Kübler-Ross’ 1969 model of grief which suggests that people passively go through five emotional stages – from denial through to anger, bargaining, depression, and then acceptance. While this cookie-cutter model brings a sense of order to a complex process, it has been widely rejected for failing to reflect people’s own unique experience of grief. Freud’s initial work suggested that the task for bereaved people was to say goodbye and let go – a process of breaking emotional bonds. We now acknowledge that grief is different for everyone. Bereaved people do not tend to break emotional bonds, instead they continue these bonds with the deceased. We know that death ends a life but it doesn’t end a relationship. 2. Keeping the connection Much of psychology’s work is in how people can maintain, in an adaptive way, a connection to the deceased and their relationship, while not preventing them from living fully in the world. We move from a relationship of physical presence to a relationship of memory. This continuing bond can manifest in a variety of ways. It may be that the person has relocated their loved one to heaven and their heart or that they remember the person on their birthday and light a candle. It may be that they keep that relationship alive through raising research funds, a foundation in their memory, or even pursue a change to legislation. Most importantly, it can be a creative and dynamic connection. Just as our relationships in life can be complicated, so can our relationships with the deceased. The therapeutic task is no longer about getting the person to say goodbye, it’s about developing a new relationship with the deceased. In a sense, the deceased still populates our head and our heart. They can still speak to us and we can still listen to them. 3. The grieving process Grief has been described as the price we pay for love. We know that in bereavement, grief will often come in waves. People can waver between the intensity and the pain of grief and finding times where they find comfort in activities that might distract or provide some avoidance of the loss. We all have different ways of grieving. For some people, their grief is very private while for many, it’s instrumental – they grieve through action. People need to find a safe place where they can let the grief in while finding a home for grief in their world. Grief is a process that can potentially last a lifetime. For the child who loses a parent in their early life, they will re-grieve this loss as they are able to think about the world in more complex ways or as they miss that parent at later stages in their life. Grief is not about arriving at a point of closure, where all business is done and dusted. In many ways, it is a loss that will be revisited throughout life. Historically, we have tended to pathologise people’s response to loss. We believed that if they hadn’t let go or said goodbye, that in some way their grief was compromised. We now recognise that grief is an experience that most people will respond to with resiliency. We know about seven per cent of bereaved people will develop complications in their bereavement experience that will benefit from professional engagement. These are often, but not always, people who have a particular way of relating in the world that makes change difficult for them and people who experience deaths that are sudden, unexpected or traumatic. While grief will always remain with us, we expect that around the six-month mark that people will begin to feel that they are able to manage their way in the world more effectively. If they are still significantly struggling, we may advise them to seek additional support. 4. How others can help The silence or inaction of others following a bereavement can add to people’s experience of grief. It’s important that people surrounding the bereaved person be courageous and proactive. Recognise that there are no best words or best actions. However, it’s imperative we don’t give the bereaved person our own meaning in the death. Be cautious about saying things like – ‘look on the good times’ or ‘they’re with God now’. Support may come in the form of a written note or an opportunity for social engagement. Offers of assistance can help, as for many bereaved people a significant stressor are the day to day demands of living, particularly after the death of a partner. 5. Coping with grief It’s imperative that people take good care of themselves physically and get plenty of rest. Seek out those things or activities that provide you with some degree of comfort or relief. These could be activities such as walking, yoga or meditation. Many people want to read information about other people who’ve had similar experiences of loss. They might access online information, books or films about grief. They may consider joining a support group and meeting with other people who’ve had a similar experience or simply find company in supportive friends. People grieve in the way that they tend to live their lives. Some people will find that returning to work or being occupied in activities is beneficial. For many people, it’s about finding some kind of meaning in the loss, perhaps reflecting on those questions of why and how, and thinking about how this person has changed their life. Ultimately, change is part of the world in which we live. Coping with grief is not about getting back to normal. It’s often about creating a brand new normal – a new life, in the wake of that event. Written by Christopher Hall. Republished with permission of <a href="https://psychlopaedia.org/society/understanding-grief/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Psychlopaedia</a>. Image: Getty

Caring

"I don't understand": Heartbroken bride mourns husband's passing mere hours after wedding

A bride has been left heartbroken as she mourns the death of her new husband just hours after they tied the knot. Oklahoma singer-songwriter Jake Flint and his fiancée Brenda Wilson said their vows in a beautiful ceremony on November 26. The pair then went home and Flint just never woke up again after dying in his sleep. However the cause of death has still not been confirmed. “We should be going through wedding photos but instead I have to pick out clothes to bury my husband in. People aren't meant to feel this much pain,” a devastated Brenda wrote. “My heart is gone and I just really need him to come back. I can't take much more. I need him here.” <iframe style="border: none; overflow: hidden;" src="https://www.facebook.com/plugins/video.php?height=476&href=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.facebook.com%2Fbrenda.wilson.14224094%2Fvideos%2F4989810367788613%2F&show_text=false&width=267&t=0" width="267" height="476" frameborder="0" scrolling="no" allowfullscreen="allowfullscreen"></iframe> Flint’s longtime publicist Clif Doyal confirmed the horrific news and said that he was “loved by everybody”. “He was not only a client, he was a dear friend and just a super nice guy,” he wrote. “As you can see from the outpouring on social media, he was loved by everybody. I think a lot of it was just that he was a people person, and he had an amazing sense of humor. “He made everybody laugh, and he made everybody feel welcome.” Flint's manager, Brenda Cline, also confirmed his death in a sad social media post. “With a broken heart and in deep grief I must announce that Jake Flint has tragically passed away,” she wrote. “I've tried several times today to make a post, but you can't comment on what you can't process.” Images: Facebook

Family & Pets

The value of a banana: understanding absurd and ephemeral artwork

In September 2020, the Guggenheim Museum in New York acquired <a href="https://news.artnet.com/art-world/guggenheim-banana-cattelan-1909179">Maurizio Cattelan’s Comedian</a> by anonymous donation. The work – a banana duct-taped to a wall — was first shown and sold at the <a href="https://www.theartnewspaper.com/news/this-art-is-bananas-maurizio-cattelan-presents-first-new-work-for-an-art-fair-in-15-years#:%7E:text=The%20maverick%20Italian%20artist%20Maurizio,wall%20with%20grey%20duct%20tape.">Art Basel fair in Miami Beach</a> in the autumn of 2019 where it generated attention, derision and <a href="https://wwd.com/fashion-news/fashion-scoops/art-basel-2019-art-banana-memes-1203395572/">innumerable memes</a>. Social media was, for a brief time, overflowing with images of <a href="https://www.news18.com/news/buzz/people-are-coming-up-their-own-duct-tape-art-after-banana-in-art-basel-sells-for-rs-85-lakh-2416655.html">just about anything duct-taped to walls</a>: tamales, beer cans, cabbage, a <a href="https://knowyourmeme.com/photos/1668205-duct-tape-banana">durian</a> fruit, a sandal, someone’s cat. <a href="https://adage.com/article/digital/brands-are-trying-one-art-basel-banana/2221661">Companies quickly countered with online ads</a> where their products, from deodorants to French fries, were shown duct-taped to the wall with a modest price tag. Comedian reignited a set of questions that seem to flare up with some regularity: what makes something a high-priced artwork when another, seemingly identical, object is not? Since the work was shown at an art fair, it is relevant to consider what exactly is being bought when acquiring an artwork like Comedian. The original banana had to be replaced several times during the course of the fair, once after it was eaten as <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/world-us-canada-50704136">a stunt by another artist</a>. The collectors who bought and subsequently donated the work to the Guggenheim did not receive an actual banana or a piece of duct tape. Instead, what they got was a document, a so-called certificate of authenticity that granted them the right to recreate the work and instructions of how to do so. <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2020/09/18/arts/design/banana-art-guggenheim.html">It stipulated</a>, among other things, that the banana should be hung 175cm above ground and that it should be replaced every seven to ten days. <h2>A banana is a banana is a banana</h2> Although the art world has accepted the idea of <a href="https://www.tate.org.uk/art/art-terms/r/readymade">ready-made</a> everyday objects as art, at least since the mid-20th century, Cattelan’s artwork invited a collective focus on the structure of evaluation of artworks. If anyone can tape anything to the wall — as many did — what is the point of a document granting the legal right to do the same? Let’s compare Comedian to another fruit-based artwork: Zoe Leonard’s <a href="https://www.philamuseum.org/collections/permanent/92277.html">Strange Fruit</a> (1992-1997), a large installation of fruit peels, carefully stitched together by the artist. It was made during the Aids crisis and functioned as a ritualised act of mourning and memorialising. After closely working with a conservator who developed a method of halting material decay at a particular point, <a href="http://contemporary.burlington.org.uk/journal/journal/intent-in-the-making-the-life-of-zoe-leonards-strange-fruit">Leonard decided</a> that it was more in line with the work’s idea to have it turn slowly into dust. In contrast to Comedian, replacing the fruit peels was not an option since the specific acts of stitching as mourning was key to the work’s meaning. The material manifestation of Leonard’s organic objects is far from stable – time passes and they change – but it is crucial that it is these precise pieces of fruit that undergo that transformation. Conceptual artists in the 1960s argued that an artwork’s identity is not to be found in its physical manifestation but in the artist’s idea. That idea can, but does not have to, take material form. Following that logic, the material object is a manifestation of an idea, and it is the idea that is bought and sold on the art market. When the object is reproducible or immaterial, the certificate of authenticity ensures the artwork’s identity as an artwork. Comedian is not dependent on a specific banana, any banana could be used without altering the meaning of the work. That, however, is very different from saying that any banana and piece of duct tape is an artwork by Maurizio Cattelan. <h2>Poking fun at the market</h2> Even though the <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2019/dec/06/maurizio-cattelan-banana-duct-tape-comedian-art-basel-miami">US$120,000 (£92,000) price tag for Comedian</a> was by contemporary art standards fairly moderate, it is obviously a huge mark-up for the act of combining two very cheap and readily available materials. The work’s title hints that it is aware of the comedic absurdity of its own evaluation on the art market. Also, the banana’s upward curve on the wall recalls a stylised smiling face, and the banana peel, as we know, is involved in the most basic of slapstick skits. Comedian was in fact not the first time Cattelan poked fun at the market, art dealers and their place within this system. In 1995, he made his dealer Emmanuel Perrotin (in whose booth at Art Basel Comedian was shown) <a href="https://www.frieze.com/article/maurizio-cattelan">dress up as a giant pink penis-shaped bunny</a> for the duration of his exhibition at Perrotin’s Paris gallery. The piece was called “Errotin le vrai lapin (Errotin the true rabbit). By making Perrotin wear a ridiculous and humiliating phallic costume while carrying out his day-to-day work as a commercial gallery owner, the spectacle of the art market came into sharp view. Comedian is not the only of Cattelan’s works that has drawn attention to the Guggenheim in recent years. In 2016, the artist installed the work <a href="https://www.guggenheim.org/exhibition/maurizio-cattelan-america">America</a> in one of the lavatories of the museum. The 18-karat gold toilet is a tongue-in-cheek commentary on the excesses of America’s rich; a piece of satirical participatory art that welcomes people to actually use it. It has reverberations of <a href="https://www.tate.org.uk/art/artworks/duchamp-fountain-t07573">Marcel Duchamp</a> and <a href="https://whitney.org/media/760">Sherrie Levine</a>’s lavatorial works. It <a href="https://www.vanityfair.com/style/2018/01/the-art-museum-that-offered-donald-trump-a-solid-gold-toilet">could have been President Trump</a>’s after he requested to borrow a Van Gogh from the Guggenheim but was offered America instead – he declined. It then was taken in by Blenheim Palace in Oxford in 2019 where art critic Jonathan Jones <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/artanddesign/2019/sep/13/maurizio-cattelan-blenheim-palace-review-hitler-golden-toilet-blenheim-churchill">commented, "</a>How does it feel to urinate on gold? Much like peeing on porcelain. But here, among all the photos of young Winston, it also feels like pissing on British history." Soon after, <a href="https://www.nytimes.com/2019/11/20/arts/design/gold-toilet-america.html#:%7E:text=14%2C%20a%20fully%2Dfunctioning%20toilet,the%20birthplace%20of%20Winston%20Churchill.&text=The%20police%20may%20not%20know,palace%2C%20have%20plenty%20of%20theories.">it was stolen</a>. Its whereabouts remain unknown. Cattelan’s works — like other pieces — must be considered in relation to other artworks and the structures in which it operates. The questions they raise are relevant but in part unanswerable: are we to take Comedian seriously, or is it an elaborate joke? And if it is a joke, who is in on it and who, or what, is mocked? Image credits: Getty Images This article originally appeared on <a href="https://theconversation.com/the-value-of-a-banana-understanding-absurd-and-ephemeral-artwork-147689" target="_blank" rel="noopener">The Conversation</a>.

Art

12 things only fully-fledged bookworms will understand

<h2>You’re emotionally attached to fictional characters</h2> Have you ever become so attached to characters in a book that they start to feel like real people? Books provide such vivid insight into characters’ personality and psyche that you might feel like you know them even better than you do your own peers and acquaintances. And if the characters are personally relatable, they can start to feel like actual friends. You may have even experienced a romantic connection to fictional characters (*cough cough* Mr Darcy). But no judgment here. As fellow bookworms, we get it. <h2>You know exactly when the next book in a series will be released</h2> As a true bookworm, you prefer reading a series to individual novels so that you don’t have to stop at the last page. However, for you, few fates are worse than reaching the latest book in a series only to have to wait years for the next one’s release. When a subsequent book is set to be published, you know exactly when it’s hitting shelves (because you’ve pre-ordered it, naturally), and you’ve got a mental countdown running in the interim. The suspense completely eats away at you! <h2>You’re a sucker for literary gifts</h2> You may not be materialistic, but if you’re a bookworm, you can never resist buying items related to your favourite books regardless of whether or not you actually need them. For example, you wouldn’t think twice about purchasing the Library Candles by Paddywax, which have your favourite quotes printed across the front and scents that are inspired by iconic authors. (We swear Ralph Waldo Emerson must have smelled exactly like his cedar and wild fern candle!) <h2>You ignore your basic needs when you’re deep in a read</h2> Books are all-consuming for you, and time seems to stand still when you’re fully engrossed in the text in front of you. But in fact, hours upon hours have passed, and you’ve completely forgotten to eat, shower, or get to bed on time. But oh well. For you, any basic needs can wait until you’re finished with this chapter. And maybe the next one. <h2>You hate watching movie adaptations</h2> As a lifelong bibliophile, nothing annoys you quite like movie adaptations of books you’ve read. After all, you remember all the passages so vividly that you can’t help but critique a film’s many discrepancies. You’d really rather not watch movie adaptations if you can help it, as they risk deviating from your beloved literary works and not doing them justice. <h2>Call us old-fashioned, but we bookworms still resist making the switch to digital texts.</h2> There’s something about the weight of a hardback in your lap, the sound of turned pages, and feeling the remaining chapters dwindle in your right hand as you power through them. E-books may be more environmentally friendly, but they can’t measure up to the sensory experience of physical books we so adore. <h2>You can recall the details of fictional worlds as if you’ve been there</h2> Diagon Alley, Middle Earth, Narnia, and District 12 – these places aren’t just two-dimensional fantasies to you. For a real bookworm, these fictional worlds exist. In fact, you know them so intimately that it can be hard to determine if perhaps you’ve actually been there. <h2>You can quote your favourite passages verbatim</h2> If there’s one thing someone should never do in front of a bookworm, it’s misquote a line from a novel. Whenever it happens, you’re quick to correct them. Bookworms have an uncanny memory for text, so if you’re of them, you’re probably guilty of reciting your favourite lines all the time. And you don’t just recite them verbatim; you use the same accent and inflection of the original character. <h2>Your personal library is a source of pride</h2> Some people collect shoes, others collect purses, or vintage baseball cards, but you collect books. It’s plain and simple. Your books are like family to you, and they’re a real source of pride. You dream of one day having a floor-to-ceiling wall of books in your home, or even an entire study containing your collection. Whenever you have to downsize or donate your books, parting with them is a genuinely painful experience. <h2>You love the smell of new books</h2> Every time you crack open a brand-new book, you lean forward to smell its pages. The scent is not only all too familiar to you, but it also brings you a unique joy. The smell is like being a kid and opening a present on Christmas morning – you feel pure excitement at the prospect of owning a classic. You also know the difference between the smell of old and new books, and you love them both for different reasons. <h2>You can spend hours wandering the aisles of a bookstore</h2> Most people feel a rush of excitement walking into a clothing store, but as a total bookworm, you feel completely at home in bookstores instead. You could spend hours scanning the shelves, running your fingers along the many spines, and seeing what’s new in your favourite section. To you, bookstores aren’t just comforting safe havens, they make you feel like a kid in a candy store, because you wish you could try them all. <h2>You’re permanently inspired by fictional characters</h2> As an avid reader, you’ve come across a number of protagonists and authors that have permanently changed your life. You’re a different (and hopefully better) person for having experienced these people, real or imagined. To pay homage, you feel the need to etch them into your everyday life. Perhaps you’ve gotten a tattoo of your favourite quote, or named your dog Fitz for F. Scott Fitzgerald. As a bookworm, you see nothing wrong with naming your child after characters like Atticus, Holden, or Rosaline. In fact, you find it commendable. This article originally appeared on <a href="https://www.readersdigest.com.au/true-stories-lifestyle/12-things-only-fully-fledged-bookworms-will-understand?pages=1" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Reader's Digest</a>. Image: Shutterstock

Books

5 legal terms you need to understand

As we grow older we’re required to make a range of decisions regarding our health, wellbeing and assets that will be some of the most important we make in our life. So it goes without saying it’s important to understand the terms. We’ve taken a look at five legal terms every Australian senior needs to understand. Becoming acquainted with these terms is the best way to get the ball rolling. 1. Power of Attorney Varying somewhat from state to state, a Power of Attorney is a legal documents giving someone legal authority to manage your financial affairs. This is useful if you find the demands of financial management too much or if you don’t want to burden certain member of your family with the responsibility of looking after your financial affairs. 2. Will Generally speaking, a will is a formal document that’s designed to provide direction for the distribution of a person’s property and assents when they pass away. Making a will is no simple task, and requires the consideration of a range of complex financial, legal and tax issues, to ensure that your estate is distributed in accordance to your wishes. 3. Beneficiary A beneficiary is the person who receives your assets when you pass away. It’s essential to make sure you have the correct names and details on your will to ensure the right beneficiary receives the right assets, as that is a mistake a lawyer can rarely fix. 4. Testamentary trust Testamentary trusts are set up to protect the assets in a will, taking effect when the person who has created the will passes away. A trust is administered by a trustee (appointed in the will), who looks after the benefits of the beneficiaries until the trust expires. A testamentary trust is useful in the following instances: <ul> <li>Beneficiaries are minors or have diminished mental capacity.</li> <li>Beneficiaries are not trusted to use inheritance wisely.</li> <li>Avoid split of family assets in event of a divorce settlement.</li> <li>Avoid split of family assets in event of bankruptcy proceedings.</li> </ul> 5. Enduring Guardian An Enduring Guardian can makes decisions on your behalf when you lose capability to do so. And Enduring Guardian has the capacity to make a range of important decisions regarding lifestyles, healthy and medicinal treatments, so it’s important to choose the right person. Image: Getty

Legal

Readers Respond: What's something you really don't understand until you're in your 50s?

One day you’re young living what you think is your best life when BAM you’re older and life gets in the way. But that’s the beauty of life - to grow, learn, laugh, cry. With that in mind, we decided to ask our readers to share something they didn’t understand until they reached their 50s. Check out the responses below. Dawn Dominick - It's OK to say NO and it's OK to have your own opinions. Anne van Heel - The joys of grand parenting. Julia Santos - That other people's opinions don't matter. Live for you. They are living their best lives. Moira Tyrrell - Worrying about things that may not happen. It will get you nowhere. Sue Carter - That your children are great company as adults. Aileen Barrat Zanelli - That your youth has passed you by before you realise it. Kathy Davey - That I didn’t know everything, in fact I knew nothing. Isobel Siebel - Your body ages but you still feel young in the head. Barbara Williamson - That you become invisible to younger generations. Frank Derksen - The amount of damage you do to your body when you’re young. Share something you really didn’t understand until your 50s <a href="https://www.facebook.com/oversixtys/posts/pfbid0wDNUs5cL9iCjdi59F25YojAwcWeJWXWxta8CMe6R9mA9hFJfPcVXVjzwwGVWAzf5l" target="_blank" rel="noopener">here</a>. Image: Shutterstock

Retirement Life

Understanding legal jargon for your future

Legal

Understanding home care packages

In her role as Funding Manager at <a href="https://www.australianunity.com.au/assisted-living/home-services" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Australian Unity</a>, Claire Watson has answered plenty of questions about Home Care Package funding levels and what it all means. “People are always curious about the different levels of Home Care Package funding and the practical differences in the support you receive,” she says. “If you're approved for a Home Care Package, you'll be assigned a funding level from 1-4. The main thing to understand is that Home Care Package budgets increase with the levels, so support becomes more comprehensive as you go up. Whatever your approved level, your provider (like <a href="https://www.australianunity.com.au/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Australian Unity</a>) will work with you to develop a support plan that addresses your unique needs and goals, within your budget.” Home Care Package: Level two “A level two Home Care Package is designed for somebody with low care needs,” explains Claire. This level of service is designed for someone who is still relatively healthy, mobile and independent but needs some extra support around the house to allow them to maintain their lifestyle. This level of Home Care Package is currently valued at $15,877* for a 12-month period and equates to around 10 hours of services each month.” A package of services at level two might include fortnightly domestic assistance, such as vacuuming, mopping, dusting, cleaning the bathroom, doing the laundry, and changing and making the bed. Many level two customers also receive monthly gardening assistance – which could include maintenance tasks or lawnmowing. “You might also choose to have somebody come in to assist with grocery shopping once a week,” Claire adds. This can ease the burden of carrying shopping from the supermarket if you don’t drive. Example package of services – Level Two <ul> <li>Fortnightly cleaning services</li> <li>Monthly gardening and maintenance services </li> <li>Weekly shopping assistance</li> <li>Monthly group social activities and outings </li> </ul> Home Care Package: Level three People approved for a level three Home Care Package can expect double the amount of funding of a level two package. The value currently comes to $34,550* for a 12-month period, equating to around 19 hours of services each month and is for someone described as having intermediate needs. “Generally, the big change we'll find is that someone on a level three package has been assessed at that level because they do have care needs that are greater than somebody on a level two. Sometimes that’s because they are experiencing mobility issues or managing a health condition,” Claire says. Common service inclusions on a level three package are personal care services, which might include assistance with showering, dressing, grooming or toileting. Sometimes personal care can just mean having a care worker present as you shower, for peace of mind. “You might be a little worried about safety in the shower and want someone nearby, or you might need a bit of assistance getting dressed. Our care staff are incredibly kind, compassionate and discreet in the support they provide,” Claire says. People approved for a level three package may also have allied health services as part of their support plan. “At that time there may be more of a need for allied health services, such as physio or podiatry. You may have had a fall and these services may help you maintain or enjoy greater mobility and independence,” Claire says. Example package of services – level 3 <ul> <li>Monthly podiatry </li> <li>Fortnightly domestic cleaning </li> <li>Monthly garden maintenance </li> <li>Personal care support – three times per week</li> <li>Weekly social support </li> </ul> <img src="https://oversixtydev.blob.core.windows.net/media/2022/08/Aus-Unity23778lr_1280.jpg" alt="" width="1280" height="720" /> Are you thinking about a Home Care Package? Home care funding can be complex – but <a href="https://www.australianunity.com.au/assisted-living/home-services" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Australian Unity</a>'s knowledgeable team can assist. If you've recently been approved for Home Care Package funding, their friendly and knowledgeable team can help you understand what a package of services could look like based on your approved level and individual needs and goals. Or if you’re just getting started, they can help you understand your funding options and even assist with a referral to My Aged Care. <a href="https://www.australianunity.com.au/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Australian Unity</a> employs thousands of care workers, nurses and allied health professionals, with the aim of providing consistent, high-quality care to their customers – whatever their needs or goals. For guidance, enquire online at <a href="https://www.australianunity.com.au/assisted-living/home-services/contact-us" target="_blank" rel="noopener">https://www.australianunity.com.au/assisted-living/home-services/contact-us</a>. Images: Supplied This is a sponsored article produced in partnership with <a href="https://www.australianunity.com.au/" target="_blank" rel="noopener">Australian Unity</a>.

Caring

Reader’s Respond: What is something younger generations will never understand?

We asked you to take a trip down memory lane and share something younger generations will never understand and your responses did not disappoint. From black-and-white TVs to getting up to change the channel, having your milk delivered to your front door and even good old-fashioned typewriters, here are just some of the memories you shared. Dawn Dominick - The sense of safety that we had growing up. Jeanne-Marie Thomas - When you are 81...you live in a world soooo different from the world you grew up in! The list is immense. Keith Wilson - Having to stand up to change the channel Joan Gebetsberger - Milkman, Bread delivered not sliced, listening to the radio for the serials no TV. Playing in the street, hunting tadpoles enjoying the outdoors Anne Mckeon - Being thankful for what we had. Margaret Inglis - Typewriters. And carbon paper to place between 2 pieces of paper to make a copy. And put it in an envelope to forward it to someone. Tolla Edda Anderson - Not being able to use the phone and computer at the same time. Maureen Lyons Martinsky - Dialling a rotary phone. Geoff Scrimes - No internet. Maybe black and white TV too. Of course no cell phones!! Rosy Bloom - Stockings, suspenders, belts and corsets! Marguerite Gainsford Stanford - actual money (cash) instead of paying everything on cards. Steve Smith - milk bottles delivered to your front door. Image: Shutterstock

Retirement Life

CBT is wrong in how it understands mental illness

Cognitive behavioural therapy (CBT) is one of the most popular forms of talking therapy. It is the treatment of choice for depression and anxiety and is a staple of public healthcare systems, such as the NHS and the Australian Medicare system. CBT’s understanding of mental illness and therapeutic techniques is already part of the mainstream – accusations of “catastrophising” and pleas to “reality check” beliefs <a href="https://www.rallyware.com/cognitive_distortions">can be found everywhere</a>. As a <a href="https://www.washingtonpost.com/archive/lifestyle/wellness/2002/09/03/a-change-of-mind/19573ec9-9b36-4d11-874f-eb6dbc5d9164/">Washington Post article</a> put it: “For better or worse, cognitive therapy is fast becoming what people mean when they say they are ‘getting therapy’.” One of the reasons for CBT’s runaway success is the reams of <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/journals/psychological-medicine/article/evidence-for-cognitive-behavioural-therapy-in-any-condition-population-or-context-a-metareview-of-systematic-reviews-and-panoramic-metaanalysis/3BE55E078F21F06CFF90FFAD1ACEA5E0">evidence that support its effectiveness</a> at treating a host of mental health disorders. Although there is evidence for CBT’s effectiveness, the evidence for its theory, particularly its understanding of mental illness, is far more mixed. To put it another way, we know that CBT works, but we are not sure how or why it works. CBT’s <a href="https://beckinstitute.org/about/intro-to-cbt/">cognitive model of mental illness</a>, originally <a href="https://www.upenn.edu/pennpress/book/14502.html">developed by Aaron Beck in the 1960s</a>, hypothesised that disorders such as depression were characterised by certain patterns of thought that give rise to the negative emotions and behaviour typical of mental illness. These patterns of thought are referred to as “cognitive distortions” or “negative automatic thoughts”. But what exactly is wrong with these thoughts? What makes them “distorted”? Generally, vague answers are offered in response. For example, the American Psychological Association describes these thoughts as being <a href="https://www.apa.org/ptsd-guideline/patients-and-families/cognitive-behavioral">“faulty” or “unhelpful”</a>. Looking at <a href="https://www.verywellmind.com/ten-cognitive-distortions-identified-in-cbt-22412">lists of distortions</a>, offers clues. Most distortions focus on faulty reasoning, where someone “jumps to conclusions”, makes a poor inference (“overgeneralising”), is biased in how they perceive a situation (“black or white thinking”), or, more straightforwardly, when they believe something false or inaccurate. CBT then goes on to suggest that if this faulty reasoning was resolved, the “unhelpful” negative emotions and behaviour will change. <h2>Three reasons to doubt the model</h2> There are three reasons to doubt the cognitive model and the association of mental illnesses with errors in reasoning. First, the sort of issues CBT draws attention to – bias, false beliefs, poor inferences – are all relatively common, even in mentally healthy people. As a great deal of psychological research <a href="https://www.cambridge.org/core/books/judgment-under-uncertainty/6F9E814794E08EC43D426E480A4B412C">has shown</a>, we are all prone to poor reasoning. And even with mental disorders that seem to involve obvious faulty thinking, such as schizophrenia or psychosis, it is very difficult to nail down the difference between a <a href="https://mitpress.universitypressscholarship.com/view/10.7551/mitpress/9780262035484.001.0001/upso-9780262035484-chapter-013">delusion and a strange belief</a>. For example, what distinguishes delusions from the sorts of beliefs associated with conspiracy theories or belief in the supernatural? “Faulty” thinking does not obviously correlate with mental illness. Second, although CBT researchers have studies showing that mental disorder has something to do with cognitive distortions, there is a problem with the tests or measures used in this research. Many of these tests ask questions that have nothing to do with poor reasoning. They often ask people to answer questions that are simply about how they feel (“I’m so disappointed in myself”, <a href="https://psycnet.apa.org/record/1981-20180-001">Automatic Thoughts Questionnaire</a>), need a great deal more information, maybe about population-level data to answer (“I do few things as well as others”, <a href="https://books.google.at/books/about/Inventory_of_Cognitive_Distortions.html?id=aSlJNwAACAAJ&redir_esc=y">Inventory of Cognitive Distortions</a>), or seem to be about moral or practical issues rather than poor reasoning (“Taking even a small risk is foolish because the loss is likely to be a disaster”, “To be a good, moral, worthwhile, person, I must help everyone who needs it”, <a href="https://psycnet.apa.org/doiLanding?doi=10.1037%2Ft00091-000">Dysfunctional Attitude Scale</a>). Finally, there is research suggesting that it is mental health rather than mental illness that is related to poor reasoning. The “depressive realism hypothesis”, shows that depressed people more accurately: <a href="https://psycnet.apa.org/record/1981-02686-001">predict how much control they have over outcomes</a>, <a href="https://psycnet.apa.org/record/1980-01102-001">evaluate their performance</a> and <a href="https://psycnet.apa.org/record/1984-23229-001">recall feedback</a>. Mentally healthy people, on the other hand, succumb to an “illusion of control” and tend to recall their own performance and feedback in an excessively rosy light. Although most of this research has been on depression, there are studies suggesting that schizophrenia may be associated with <a href="https://pubmed.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/17978328/">better theoretical reasoning</a> and autism is sometimes characterised by enhanced logical and theoretical reasoning. <h2>Not backed by research</h2> Not only is there contrary evidence showing problems with reasoning are widespread as well as potentially associated with mental health rather than mental disorder. But the evidence in favour of CBT’s take on mental illness is tainted because the tests used in these studies do not even track problems with reasoning. CBT provides a compelling story about mental illness – mental illness is associated with “faulty” reasoning, and in resolving this, negative behaviour and emotions are addressed. Unfortunately, research doesn’t quite back up this story. We might wonder whether it matters. After all, CBT seems to work, so why should we care how it works or whether it is wrong in its story about mental illness? It matters ethically. It is one thing to point out that certain patterns of thinking are “unhelpful” or bring about negative emotions and behaviour, quite another to suggest that someone is irrational or reasoning poorly when the evidence for this is shaky. It is what the philosopher Miranda Fricker terms “<a href="https://oxford.universitypressscholarship.com/view/10.1093/acprof:oso/9780198237907.001.0001/acprof-9780198237907">epistemic injustice</a>”, where a member of a disenfranchised group (that is, the mentally ill), is told their claims are plagued by errors or cannot be taken at face value. Even worse, with CBT they are told this when they come seeking help. Troubling, at best, unethical at worst. Image credits: Getty Images This article originally appeared on <a href="https://theconversation.com/cbt-is-wrong-in-how-it-understands-mental-illness-175943" target="_blank" rel="noopener">The Conversation</a>.

Mind

Yes, your dog can understand what you’re saying — to a point

Humans are unique in their ability to develop sophisticated language abilities. Language allows us to communicate with each other and live in complex societies. It is key to our advanced cognitive abilities and technological prowess. As a developmental psychologist, I have extensively studied the <a href="https://psycnet.apa.org/record/2005-06810-003">role of language in children’s cognitive development</a>, especially their <a href="https://genetic.org/wp-content/uploads/2018/09/Exec-Function-e-book.pdf">executive functions</a> – the cognitive skills that allow them to control their behaviour, plan for the future, solve difficult problems and resist temptation. <h2>Executive functions</h2> The <a href="https://psycnet.apa.org/doi/10.1002/9780470880166.hlsd001013">development of executive functions</a> occurs slowly over the course of childhood. As they get older, children get better at organizing their thoughts and controlling their behaviours and emotions. In fact, humans are the only known species to develop advanced executive functions, although other species like <a href="https://doi.org/10.1002/wcs.1504">birds, primates</a> and <a href="https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.1323533111">dogs</a> have rudimentary executive functions similar to young children. In humans, our ability to develop <a href="https://psycnet.apa.org/doi/10.1017/CBO9780511581533.005">executive functions has been linked to our language development</a>. Language permits us to form and hold representations of our goals and plans in mind, allowing us to govern our behaviour over the long term. What is not clear is whether language actually causes the emergence of executive functions, and whether the relation between language and executive functions exists only in humans. <h2>Canine behaviour</h2> For humans, studying dogs offers the perfect opportunity to consider these questions. First, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1007/s10071-018-01234-1">dogs possess rudimentary executive functions</a>. These can be measured in a variety of ways, including <a href="https://escholarship.org/uc/item/7pb1j56q">asking owners</a> about their dogs’ ability to control their behaviours, as well as <a href="https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0118469">behavioural tests</a> designed to assess dogs’ control abilities. Second, not only do we expose dogs regularly to human language, but research also indicates that dogs can <a href="https://doi.org/10.3389/fnins.2018.00737">perceive different words</a> and can learn to respond to <a href="http://dx.doi.org/10.2752/089279305785594108">specific words</a>. For example, three dogs — two border collies named <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.beproc.2010.11.007">Chaser</a> and <a href="https://doi.org/10.1126/science.1097859">Rico</a>, and a Yorkshire terrier named <a href="https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0030182">Bailey</a> — learned to respond to over 1,000, 200 and 100 words, respectively. <a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/440929/original/file-20220114-13-11cnb18.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/440929/original/file-20220114-13-11cnb18.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" alt="a woman talks to her dog while they're sitting beside a lake" /></a> Dogs are regularly exposed to human language. (Shutterstock) However, many dog language studies have been limited in scope, either examining the word-based responses of only one or a small sample of dogs, or the responses of multiple dogs but only to select words. One exception was a study in which <a href="https://citeseerx.ist.psu.edu/viewdoc/download?doi=10.1.1.563.5569&rep=rep1&type=pdf">37 dog owners were asked to list words they believed their dogs responded to consistently</a>. Owners reported that their dogs responded to an average of 29 words, although this likely is an underestimation. Indeed, research using a similar free-recall approach with parents shows that they are <a href="https://www.jstor.org/stable/1166093">prone to forget many words when asked to generate lists of words to which their babies respond consistently</a>. <h2>Communicating with dogs</h2> Research with human infants does provide a solution for systematically and reliably assessing word-based responding in large samples of dogs. Arguably the best and most widely used measure of early language abilities of infants is the <a href="https://products.brookespublishing.com/The-MacArthur-Bates-Communicative-Development-Inventories-Users-Guide-and-Technical-Manual-Second-Edition-P78.aspx">MacArthur-Bates Communicative Development Inventories</a>, a parent-report checklist of words responded to consistently. Remarkably, the number of words selected on the MacArthur-Bates Communicative Development Inventory predicts children’s <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.infbeh.2019.101379">language development years later</a>. In 2015, I began a collaboration with psychologist Catherine Reeve, at the time a graduate student working on dogs’ scent detection abilities. Our goal was to develop a similar measure of vocabulary for use with dog owners that we could then use to examine links between language and executive functions. We developed a list of 172 words organized in different categories (for example, toys, food, commands, outdoor places) and gave it to an online sample of 165 owners of family and professional dogs. We asked them to select words that their dogs responded to consistently. We found that, on average, <a href="https://doi.org/10.1016/j.applanim.2021.105513">service dogs respond to about 120 words, whereas family pets respond to about 80 words, ranging between 15 to 215 words across all dogs</a>. We also found that certain breed groups, such as herding dogs like border collies and toy dogs like chihuahuas, respond to more words and phrases than other breed types like terriers, retrievers and mixed breeds. <img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/440930/original/file-20220114-25-t28c2r.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" alt="A woman talks to a group of dogs in a field" /> Understanding how dogs process language can help train service dogs. (Shutterstock) What we don’t yet know is whether dogs who respond to more words also have better executive functions. We recently assessed 100 dogs on a behavioural measure of executive functions and had their owners identify words on our vocabulary checklist. We are now analysing the results. I first became interested in studying dogs to see what they might tell us about child development. That said, this research might also provide important practical information about dogs. For example, it is very expensive to train puppies for service work and many do not make the final cut. However, if early word-based responding abilities predict later behavioural and cognitive abilities, our measure could become an early and simple tool to help predict which dogs are likely to become good service animals.<img style="border: none !important; box-shadow: none !important; margin: 0 !important; max-height: 1px !important; max-width: 1px !important; min-height: 1px !important; min-width: 1px !important; opacity: 0 !important; outline: none !important; padding: 0 !important; text-shadow: none !important;" src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/173953/count.gif?distributor=republish-lightbox-basic" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" /> <a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/sophie-jacques-1299844">Sophie Jacques</a>, Associate Professor, Psychology and Neuroscience, <a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/dalhousie-university-1329">Dalhousie University</a> This article is republished from <a href="https://theconversation.com">The Conversation</a> under a Creative Commons license. Read the <a href="https://theconversation.com/yes-your-dog-can-understand-what-youre-saying-to-a-point-173953">original article</a>. Image: Fabian Gieske/Unsplash

Family & Pets

Understanding how animals become infected with COVID-19 can help control the pandemic

When veterinarians at the Antwerp Zoo noticed <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/world/2021/dec/05/hippos-test-positive-covid-antwerp-zoo-belgium">two hippopotamuses with runny noses</a>, they didn’t just offer them tissues to blow their noses. They administered tests, which came back positive for COVID-19, the worldwide virus that has plagued the globe. Since the start of the global pandemic almost two years ago, humans have not been the only species to contract the COVID-19 virus. Although the Belgian hippos were the first of their species to contract the virus, it has spread throughout the entire animal kingdom. COVID-19 has revealed how health connects humans, animals and the environment — <a href="https://www.who.int/news-room/questions-and-answers/item/one-health">the approach that considers these relationships and connections is known as “One Health.”</a> Responding to the pandemic has been a model of One Health in action. Veterinarians, physicians and environmental experts have needed to collaborate to determine which <a href="https://ovc.uoguelph.ca/news/node/632">species are susceptible to better understand how the COVID-19 virus spreads</a>. <h2>Infected pets</h2> In the early days of the COVID-19 pandemic — if you can remember that far back — alarming reports of pets infected with the COVID-19 virus <a href="https://www.psychologytoday.com/ca/blog/canine-corner/202003/unfounded-fears-dogs-can-spread-covid-19-can-cause-harm">raised unfounded fears regarding the potential exposure and risk of viral infections</a>. In April 2020, two cats from different households in different parts of New York state became <a href="https://www.cdc.gov/media/releases/2020/s0422-covid-19-cats-NYC.html">the first domestic cats in America to contract the COVID-19 virus</a>, followed several months later by the <a href="https://www.ctvnews.ca/health/coronavirus/cat-becomes-first-animal-in-u-k-to-test-positive-for-covid-19-1.5040581">first positive British cat</a>. And although the first American dog to test positive for the COVID-19 virus died within a few months, <a href="https://www.nationalgeographic.com/animals/article/first-dog-to-test-positive-for-covid-in-us-dies">his symptoms indicated he likely had cancer</a>, suggesting that the virus may not have been the sole cause of his death. Although confirmed COVID-19 in pets is relatively uncommon, dogs and cats are at risk from <a href="https://www.eurekalert.org/news-releases/615304">catching the virus</a> from an infected household member. Conversely, however, and to great relief, overwhelming agreement has <a href="https://www.bva.co.uk/coronavirus/frequently-asked-questions/#frequently-asked-questions-owners">emerged among major</a> <a href="https://www.canadianveterinarians.net/coronavirus-covid-19">veterinary societies</a> that <a href="https://www.avma.org/resources-tools/animal-health-and-welfare/covid-19/sars-cov-2-animals-including-pets">the risk of humans</a> contracting COVID-19 <a href="https://www.cdc.gov/healthypets/covid-19/pets.html">from their dogs and cats</a> is extremely low. <iframe width="440" height="260" src="https://www.youtube.com/embed/KDne4Zm4HBE?wmode=transparent&start=0" frameborder="0" allowfullscreen=""></iframe> A VICE report on COVID-19 and pets. Interestingly, an article in Scientific American reported on studies that showed that of the dogs and cats who lived in a household with a positive family member, <a href="https://www.scientificamerican.com/article/people-with-covid-often-infect-their-pets/">one of every five of the pets had the virus, though symptoms were relatively mild</a>. Currently, there is <a href="https://doi.org/10.1126/science.abg2296">no need for dogs and cats to be vaccinated</a>, but <a href="https://globalnews.ca/news/8423409/covid-19-vaccine-animals-zoos/">pharmaceutical representatives are confident</a> in their ability to readily produce a vaccine to protect pets. <h2>Animals at risk</h2> At the beginning of this pandemic, researchers were eager to discover the extent to which COVID-19 was transmittable from animals to humans, given the potential for animals to “<a href="https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-020-01574-4">spark new outbreaks</a>.” Early on, at least seven big cats — lions and tigers — at the Bronx Zoo <a href="https://www.nationalgeographic.com/animals/article/tiger-coronavirus-covid19-positive-test-bronx-zoo">tested positive for COVID-19</a>. By the end of 2021, more than 300 animals representing 15 different species contracted COVID-19, <a href="https://www.nationalgeographic.com/animals/article/more-animal-species-are-getting-covid-19-for-the-first-time">including hyenas, lions, tigers, snow leopards, gorillas, otters and deer</a>. Recently, <a href="https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2022/jan/08/snow-leopard-dies-covid-19-illinois-zoo">four snow leopards who contracted the disease</a> from humans have died in American zoos. Risks remain elsewhere in the animal kingdom. Captive gorillas, for instance, <a href="https://www.ctvnews.ca/health/coronavirus/nearly-all-gorillas-at-atlanta-s-zoo-have-contracted-covid-19-1.5586112">are highly susceptible to COVID-19</a>. Were the disease to spread to <a href="https://doi.org/10.1126/science.abc5635">gorillas in the wild</a>, it would likely contribute to the depletion of the <a href="https://www.iucnredlist.org/species/9404/136250858">critically endangered species</a>. <a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/439954/original/file-20220110-23-1a86u4f.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/439954/original/file-20220110-23-1a86u4f.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" alt="an adult lowland gorilla and two smaller ones in an enclosure" /></a> Nearly all of Zoo Atlanta’s Western lowland gorillas tested positive for the COVID-19 Delta variant in September 2021 after catching it from a zoo staff worker. (AP Photo/Ron Harris) <h2>Animal vaccines</h2> If humans are not contracting COVID-19 from animals, why are scientists worried? After all, pets are more at risk from infected humans, and individuals who work closely with wild animals take appropriate precautions to prevent transmission. However, it is important to remember that <a href="https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-021-00531-z">animals are the likely source of the current pandemic</a>: bats, in particular, carry a number of <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-51496830">different coronavirus strains and are considered by many as the original carriers of SARS-CoV-2</a>, the virus that causes COVID-19. The transmission of the COVID-19 virus between humans and animals has been <a href="https://doi.org/10.1126/science.abe5901">found in minks</a>, a phenomenon that spread within <a href="https://www.pbs.org/wgbh/nova/article/mink-covid-virus-mutation/">mink farms in the United States and Europe</a>. As a result, millions of minks have since been culled and there have been calls for banning mink farming. The most recent solution to human-animal transmission has been developing COVID-19 vaccines for animals. Because zoos are responsible for “<a href="https://www.the-scientist.com/news-opinion/the-rise-of-covid-19-vaccines-for-animals-69503">often rare and high-value animals</a>,” some have begun to <a href="https://www.nationalgeographic.com/animals/article/bears-baboons-tigers-are-getting-covid-vaccines-at-zoos-across-the-us">vaccinate their residents</a>. <h2>New viral diseases</h2> There are concerns that <a href="https://www.who.int/news-room/feature-stories/detail/how-who-is-working-to-track-down-the-animal-reservoir-of-the-sars-cov-2-virus">the COVID-19 virus has the potential to remain undetected in an animal</a> and <a href="https://doi.org/10.1038/d41586-021-00531-z">could mutate and become more infectious or dangerous to humans</a>. An estimated <a href="https://www.bbc.com/news/science-environment-54246473">three of every four new infectious diseases in humans originated in animals</a> — and this continues to worry scientists. Researchers worry about “<a href="https://dx.doi.org/10.1590/1678-4685-GMB-2020-0355">zoonotic spillover</a>,” the movement of diseases between animals and humans, given the increased risk of “<a href="https://dx.doi.org/10.17269/s41997-020-00409-z">infectious agents capable of jumping the species barrier</a>.” The current pandemic has been called “<a href="https://impakter.com/coronavirus-china-one-health-solution/">a wake-up call</a>” for recognizing how the importance of One Health: a collaborative global vision committed to the health and well-being of humans, animals and the environment that can thwart future global health crises.<img style="border: none !important; box-shadow: none !important; margin: 0 !important; max-height: 1px !important; max-width: 1px !important; min-height: 1px !important; min-width: 1px !important; opacity: 0 !important; outline: none !important; padding: 0 !important; text-shadow: none !important;" src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/173978/count.gif?distributor=republish-lightbox-basic" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" /> <a href="https://theconversation.com/profiles/beth-daly-1224943">Beth Daly</a>, Associate Professor of Anthrozoology, <a href="https://theconversation.com/institutions/university-of-windsor-3044">University of Windsor</a> This article is republished from <a href="https://theconversation.com">The Conversation</a> under a Creative Commons license. Read the <a href="https://theconversation.com/understanding-how-animals-become-infected-with-covid-19-can-help-control-the-pandemic-173978">original article</a>. Image: Shutterstock

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