DORA
DORA (De Montfort Open Research Archive) is De Montfort University's research repository. It forms the primary public and institutional record of DMU research outputs. The breadth of research at DMU means that these outputs include articles, conference papers, books, book chapters, and other material available in a digital form. The record for each item contains descriptive information as well as, where possible, a version of the final research output. DORA also provides access to DMU PhD theses. This includes most PhD produced from 2009 onwards.
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Recent Submissions
Performance evaluation of Phase Change Materials for cooling Photovoltaics and enhancing efficiency in the Global South
(1st International Conference of Net Zero Carbon Built Environment, 2024) Khattak, Sanober; Brookbanks, Warren; Yang, Siliang
Corrosion Rate Prediction for Underground Gas Pipelines Using a Levenberg-Marquardt Artificial Neural Network (ANN)
(Sciendo, 2025-01-10) Ahmaid, Ashref; Khoshnaw, Fuad
This study addresses the challenge of accurately predicting corrosion rates and estimating the remaining life of underground gas pipelines, which is complicated by the complex interaction of physical factors and environmental conditions. Traditional models are inadequate in capturing these variables, leading to less reliable predictions, which this study aims to address by developing a more accurate and optimized artificial neural network (ANN) model. This study focuses on predicting corrosion rates and estimating the remaining life of underground gas pipelines using ANNs implemented in MATLAB. It incorporates both physical factors, such as maximum corrosion depth and pipe thickness, and environmental variables such as moisture, soil resistivity, and chloride concentration. The analysis identified corrosion depth and wall thickness as significant contributors, influencing material integrity by 20% and 16%, respectively. The optimal ANN model, with a Levenberg-Marquardt structure and one hidden layer of 10 neurons, achieved superior accuracy, with an MSE of 0.038 and R² of 0.9998. The study addresses the challenge of accurately predicting corrosion rates and remaining life in underground gas pipelines by developing an optimised ANN model.
Its contribution lies in creating a highly accurate prediction tool that outperforms traditional models and enables more informed decisions for pipeline maintenance and safety
The role of Digitalisation in sustaining the healthcare sector’s management amidst COVID-19.
(De Montfort University, 2024) Zafar, Bushra Angabeen
The primary aim of this study is to pinpoint a digital pathway that can improve the working conditions of the clinical workforce, allowing them to dedicate their time towards clinical duties and reducing time used in doing administration work. The clinical workforce that played an integral role during the pandemic faced many challenges that they have developed hesitancy towards new plans and tools utilised in the care system. The secondary aim is to target this stakeholder’s hesitancy by suggesting potential ways in which management can act as a bridge between patients and clinical staff directly supporting them by using digital means. Lastly, the above aims can overall improve the care quality given to the patients because the clinical staff has less chances to make errors due to time pressure and are being assisted by the management in clinical administration. The direction of the literature review used for this research is based on the 6 keywords, they segregate the data from several secondary research databases that were researched for this study. A pattern of three themes is extracted from the SLR and each theme is individually analysed creating a deductive thematic analysis. Three themes are identified (Management, Sustainable Management and Healthcare Sustainable Management) to answer the
research questions in this study. Telehealth was actively researched and helpful amidst the pandemic, this thesis contributes to the literature by presenting a potential digital pathway that can be adopted by the management of healthcare sector. The study contributes to this by adding an extension of a digital tool to the Tele hospital model, originally presented by Ohannessian (2020). This model is redefined through the findings of literature review (SLR) and the thematic analysis.
Intercultural communication in psychiatric diagnosis and psychiatric consultations in Leicester, UK
(De Montfort University, 2024-03) Chen, Janis
Background: Psychiatrists' perceptions shape diagnostic interviews, impacting intercultural clinical service delivery. Diagnostic criteria, patient information, and cultural influences affect diagnostic consultation outcomes, but barriers in intercultural contexts reveal a gap in applying intercultural knowledge with limited academic exploration. UK psychiatrists follow ICD guidelines, yet ICD10/11 criteria lack strict neuroscientific grounding. To bridge these gaps, psychiatrists are encouraged to enhance cultural competence by acquiring proper cultural knowledge, skills, and awareness when conducting high-quality diagnostic consultation interviews.
Aim: This research aimed to explore psychiatrists' perspectives on the cultural aspects of the quality of the diagnostic consultation process, serving as the foundational stage in understanding the evolving dynamics between psychiatrists and patients/families. Additionally, it aimed to examine how psychiatrists describe their incorporation of cultural awareness, knowledge, and skills in daily practice, along with their interpretation of
clinical situations in diagnostic consultation interviews.
Method: To understand psychiatrists' cultural competencies in clinical practice, a qualitative interpretative phenomenological analysis was conducted, investigating the cultural awareness, knowledge, and skills of twenty purposefully selected psychiatrists within Leicestershire Partnership NHS Trust through one-to-one, semi-structured interviews.
Findings: This study highlights the importance of integrating Fuchs's theoretical framework (2010) and Aggarwal's intersubjective model of culture (2023) into constructing a British Intercultural Psychiatric Communication Formulation within British psychiatric practice. It identified four key experiential themes and their subthemes: 1) non-verbal and verbal behaviours, 2) identity of a professional psychiatrist, 3) mapping
clinically significant information, and 4) reflectiveness.
Conclusions: This research highlights a significant oversight in current guidelines that overlooks the cultural context of psychiatrists. It also identifies limitations in psychiatrists' exploration of intercultural communication knowledge in formulating diagnostic consultations, emphasising potential gaps in their understanding of cultural nuances. The study underscores the need to overcome barriers and enhance psychiatrists’ capacity to develop culturally sensitive diagnostic approaches for multicultural backgrounds.
"People laugh, don’t believe it": Unveiling Male Rape Myths through a Mixed Methods Exploration of Professionals, Survivors, and Community Insights.
(De Montfort University, 2024-03) Kambashi, Ngosa
Research shows that misconceptions, or rape myths, about male sexual violence survivors are prevalent in England. These myths lead to adverse outcomes such as obstacles in reporting incidents, secondary victimisation, and hesitation in seeking medical and psychological support. Despite these known effects, studies on male rape myths, especially in England and Wales, are less comprehensive compared to those on female rape myths. Therefore, this doctoral research sought to understand better perceptions surrounding male rape myths (MRMs). The study utilised an exploratory sequential mixed methods research design to comprehensively explore MRMs, combining in-depth qualitative insights with generalisable quantitative factors. In the first phase (Study One), qualitative interviews were conducted with 13 professionals. The data was analysed using Willott and Griffin’s (1997) method for the Foucauldian discourse analysis. Willott and Griffin’s method allowed for identifying power dynamics, subject positions, discursive resources, interpretative repertories, and discursive practices. Study one unearthed three interrelated dominant discourses titled ‘Professionals’ Insights: Societal Myths, Acquaintance Rape Realities, and Legal Obstacles’, ‘Navigating Re-Traumatisation: Unequal Power and Support Challenges’. For mixed methods integration, the preliminary findings from study one informed phase two’s interview schedule, which was piloted with some professionals. The second phase (Study Two) had 9 male survivors; the same analysis from Study One was used to analyse Study Two’s data. Four dominant discourses emerged: ‘Bearing the Unseen Weight’, ‘Barriers: Institutional Power and the Complex Journey of Male Survivors’, ‘A Media Discourse: (in)Authentic Portrayal of Male Rape’, ‘Breaking the Silence: Disclosure and Support for Male Survivors’ and one negative case study. The third phase incorporated the qualitative findings from the first two studies to guide the design of the third quantitative study, specifically in selecting study variables and formulating acquaintance rape scenarios. Study three examined the extent to which rape myth acceptance, myth-consistent information, sexism, and sociodemographic factors predicted blaming attribution in response to acquaintance rape scenarios in a public sample (N=196). Findings suggested that myth-consistent information is a positive predictor of blame attribution, while male rape myth acceptance is a negative predictor of perpetrator blame. The implications, limitations and future recommendations were discussed for the study-level and overarching mixed-method study findings.