People with moderate to profound intellectual disabilities (ID) have a higher risk of health problems and, therefore, healthy living is of great importance for them. To achieve this, this group requires support from the people around them such as relatives and direct support professionals (DSPs). However, DSPs do not feel sufficiently equipped to provide this support. The objective of Annelies Overwijk’s research was to determine how to facilitate a healthy lifestyle for people with moderate to profound ID by improving the lifestyle support provided by DSPs. To this end, DSPs’ support needs were first explored after which a training and education program was developed, implemented, and evaluated. In this thesis, DSPs indicated that they need knowledge and skills to provide lifestyle support. One of the skills they can help use to stimulate people with ID is the use of behavioral change techniques. This thesis shows that, although a number of these techniques are used in daily practice, they are not yet consciously utilized to improve lifestyle support. Since the attitude of DSPs to support healthy nutrition is important, a practical questionnaire was also developed to measure this. Based on DSPs’ support needs for encouraging a healthy lifestyle, a training and education program was developed together with them and experts. This program consists of an e-learning and three in-person sessions that can be adapted to the support needs of the DSPs and the team and proved to be promising in an implementation study. The products are free and available on: www.dekrachtengebundeld.nl.
DOCUMENT
Background: For a healthy lifestyle, people with moderate, severe, and profound intellectual disabilities living in residential facilities and/or participating in day activity centers are dependent on their direct support professionals. However, it is unclear what knowledge and skills these direct support professionals require to support these individuals in living a healthy lifestyle. Therefore, the aim of this study was to identify the needs of direct support professionals for supporting these people with moderate to profound intellectual disabilities to achieve and maintain a healthy lifestyle. Method: Direct support professionals (n = 28) were interviewed with the use of a semi-structured protocol based on the theoretical domains framework. The interviews were analyzed with a theory-driven content analysis. Results: The most frequently mentioned needs referred to the following domains of the theoretical domains framework: environmental context and resources (n = 27), social/professional role and identity (n = 25), social influence (n = 25), skills (n = 24), and knowledge (n = 23). Conclusion: To support people with moderate to profound intellectual disabilities in leading a healthy lifestyle, direct support professionals (DSPs) primarily needed support related to the domain environmental context and resources. Within this domain available time, dealing with different seasons, and a healthy lifestyle policy in the organization need attention. Development of interventions targeting these DSPs needs is required.
DOCUMENT
Background: Behaviour change techniques (BCTs) can be employed to support a healthy lifestyle for people with intellectual disabilities. The aim of this study is to determine whether and which BCTs are used by direct support professionals (DSPs) for supporting healthy lifestyle behaviour of people with moderate to profound intellectual disabilities. Method: Direct support professionals (n = 18) were observed in their daily work using audio-visual recordings. To code BCTs, the Coventry Aberdeen London Refined (CALO-RE-NL) taxonomy was employed. Results: Direct support professionals used 33 BCTs out of 42. The most used BCTs were as follows: ‘feedback on performance’, ‘instructions on how to perform the behaviour’, ‘doing together’, ‘rewards on successful behaviour’, ‘reward effort towards behaviour’, ‘DSP changes environment’, ‘graded tasks’, ‘prompt practice’ and ‘model/demonstrate behaviour’. Conclusions: Although a variety of BCTs is used by DSPs in their support of people with moderate to profound intellectual disabilities when facilitating healthy lifestyle behaviour, they rely on nine of them.
DOCUMENT
Receiving the first “Rijbewijs” is always an exciting moment for any teenager, but, this also comes with considerable risks. In the Netherlands, the fatality rate of young novice drivers is five times higher than that of drivers between the ages of 30 and 59 years. These risks are mainly because of age-related factors and lack of experience which manifests in inadequate higher-order skills required for hazard perception and successful interventions to react to risks on the road. Although risk assessment and driving attitude is included in the drivers’ training and examination process, the accident statistics show that it only has limited influence on the development factors such as attitudes, motivations, lifestyles, self-assessment and risk acceptance that play a significant role in post-licensing driving. This negatively impacts traffic safety. “How could novice drivers receive critical feedback on their driving behaviour and traffic safety? ” is, therefore, an important question. Due to major advancements in domains such as ICT, sensors, big data, and Artificial Intelligence (AI), in-vehicle data is being extensively used for monitoring driver behaviour, driving style identification and driver modelling. However, use of such techniques in pre-license driver training and assessment has not been extensively explored. EIDETIC aims at developing a novel approach by fusing multiple data sources such as in-vehicle sensors/data (to trace the vehicle trajectory), eye-tracking glasses (to monitor viewing behaviour) and cameras (to monitor the surroundings) for providing quantifiable and understandable feedback to novice drivers. Furthermore, this new knowledge could also support driving instructors and examiners in ensuring safe drivers. This project will also generate necessary knowledge that would serve as a foundation for facilitating the transition to the training and assessment for drivers of automated vehicles.
Our world is changing rapidly as a result of societal and technological developments that create new opportunities and challenges. Extended Realities (XR) could provide solutions for the problems the world is facing. In this project we apply these novel solutions in food and hospitality. It aims to tackle fundamental questions on how to stimulate a healthy and vital society that is based on a sustainable and innovative economy. This project aims to answer the question: How can Extended Reality (XR) technologies be integrated in the design of immersive food experiences to stimulate sustainable consumption behavior? A multidisciplinary approach, that has demonstrated its strength in the creative industry, will be applied in the hospitality and food sector. The project investigates implications and design considerations for immersion through XR technology that can stimulate sustainable consumption behavior. Based on XR prototypes, physiological data will be collected using biometric measuring devices in combination with self-reports. The effect of stimuli on sustainable consumption behavior during the immersive experience will be tested to introduce XR implementations that can motivate long-term behavioral change in food consumption. The results of the project contribute towards developing innovations in the hospitality sector that can tackle global societal challenges by exploiting the impact of new technology and understanding of consumer behavior to promote a healthy lifestyle and economy. Next to academic publications and conference contributions, the project will develop a handbook for hospitality professionals. It will outline steps and design criteria for the implementation of XR technologies to create immersive experiences that can stimulate sustainable consumption behavior. The knowledge generated in the project will contribute to the development of the curriculum at the Academy for Hotel and Facility at Breda University of Applied Sciences by introducing a technology-driven experience design approach for the course Sustainable Strategic Business Design.
Main goal of the Sport Physical Education And Coaching in Health (SPEACH) Project is to increase awareness and behavioural change in sport professionals and European citizens towards an active and healthy lifestyle.Sedentariness and physical inactivity are a cross-national problem. Therefore, the Project builds upon a strong collaborative-partnership to contribute in solving this problem on the European level and to increase sport and physical activity participation. To achieve this, the project will develop HEPA related educational modules, which will be included into existing education structures in the areas of sport coaching and physical education (PE), in order to stimulate pupils, young athletes and adults towards an active and healthy lifestyle.An innovative aspect of the project is the diversity of partners involved. The consortium consists of ten organizations and actors from seven EU countries in the field of sport, PE and health. The partners involved are national and international sports committees, sport federations and higher educational institutes in the field of sport, PE teacher education and health. Finally, the project is strongly supported by the European Network of Sport Science, Education & Employment (ENSSEE).
