Feasibility and acceptability of using a web-based contraceptive support tool in a university health clinic

Abstract

Objective: To evaluate feasibility of integrating Bedsider.org, a web-based contraceptive decision support tool, at a university health clinic (UHC). Participants: Female students (ages 18–29) seeking contraceptive care at the UHC were enrolled in September 2015 (n?=?46). Methods: Providers recruited eligible patients during reproductive healthcare visits and introduced Bedsider. Surveys were administered immediately following the visit and a follow-up 2–4?weeks later. Electronic health records through 6?weeks post-enrollment were extracted. Results: Most patients had positive views toward Bedsider and appreciated receiving information during their UHC encounters. None were using long-acting reversible contraceptives (LARC) at enrollment. At follow-up, two patients self-reported IUD use. Among those recently sexually active, use of more effective contraceptive methods increased from 65% to 74%; 11% had initiated or were scheduled to receive a LARC. Conclusion: Bedsider can be feasibly integrated into UHC visits and may support women’s selection of more effective contraceptive methods, including LARCs.     

Exploring teachers’ career self-management. Considering the roles of organizational career management,occupational self-efficacy,and learning goal orientation.

The current study examines how organizational career management – i.e. activities undertaken by schools in order to plan and manage teachers’ careers – relates to teachers’ career self-management – i.e. teachers steering their careers by means of searching for opportunities, networking, or seeking supervisory support. Moreover, it examines the mediating roles of occupational self-efficacy and learning goal orientation in this relationship. Mediation analysis in SPSS, using the PROCESS macro of survey data from 220 Dutch secondary school teachers, showed that positive relationships between organizational career management and career self-management were mediated by occupational self-efficacy and learning goal orientation.     

Black widow spiders in an urban desert: Population variation in an arthropod pest across metropolitan Phoenix, AZ

The effects of urban disturbance are critical to understand, as the majority of the world??s population now resides in urban centers. For example, urbanization often leads to reduced species diversity at the expense of a few urban-adapted taxa. However, it remains unclear why some taxa thrive following human disturbance whereas others do poorly. The western black widow spider, Latrodectus hesperus, thrives in disturbed, urban habitat??often forming dense aggregations (i.e., infestations) relative to typical low-density, desert populations. We examined the population dynamics of ten black widow aggregations spread across metropolitan Phoenix, AZ, during the peak of the breeding season (June?CAugust). Here we show that prey abundance, female mass, web volume and population density exhibit minimal temporal variation across the breeding season, but that prey abundance, female mass and population density show significant spatial variation across the ten urban aggregations. Our measure of prey abundance and foraging success, the number of prey carcasses found in black widow webs, shared a strong positive relationship with female mass and population density, but not with web volume. Surprisingly, female mass, web volume and population density were not correlated with each other. The abiotic variables we measured at each site did a poor job of explaining black widow population parameters, although we did find a marginal trend for more recent developments to harbor denser black widow aggregations. Our findings support the generalization that urbanization heightens spatial variation, and we suggest that local urban prey abundance is influential in promoting urban infestations full of heavy, fecund female black widows. Studies of the population ecology of urban pests are necessary to identify the mechanisms allowing some species to thrive following human disturbance while much native biodiversity is lost following urbanization.     

SOVA: Design of a Stakeholder Informed Social Media Website for Depressed Adolescents and Their Parents

Two moderated social media websites were designed for increasing likelihood for mental health treatment engagement for depressed adolescents (sova.pitt.edu) and for parents (wisesova.pitt.edu). This article describes iterative stakeholder interviews conducted with adolescents, young adults, parents, advocates, and clinicians and use of human computer interaction techniques to inform major design changes which: (a) underscored the role of online interaction to provide emotional support and information, (b) importance of anonymity, (c) desire to share positive media, and (d) need for frequent moderation. Future studies will examine acceptability and effectiveness of revised websites in helping depressed adolescents and their parents engage with treatment.     

Introduction to the Special Issue on Domestic Violence and the South Asian Community

This article includes a discussion of elder sexuality, beginning with the problem of categorizing elders. This is followed by considerations of elder sexual practices, physiology, and social-psychological factors in elder sexuality. The article concludes with recommendations for people working with elders in regard to their sexuality.     

Das coachingtool-spezifische Wirkfaktorenmodell

Effective factors differentiate between effective and less effective coachings and the effects of a coaching can be attributed to them. Because of that, their realization in coaching tools is interesting for researchers as well as practitioners who want to use coaching tools as effective as possible. The developed coaching tool specific effective factors model is derivated from the models of Greif and Grawe. It only contains effective factors which can be realized in coaching tools. It contains the effective factors goal-oriented self-reflection, goal-oriented problem-reflection, goal-clarifying, implementation-support, resources-activation and experience-activation.     

Generalized stochastic dominance and bad outcome aversion

Incomplete preferences over lotteries on a finite set of alternatives satisfying, besides independence and continuity, a property called bad outcome aversion are considered. These preferences are characterized in terms of their specific multi-expected utility representations (cf. Dubra et al., J Econ Theory, 115:118–133, 2004), and can be seen as generalized stochastic dominance preferences.     

Evaluating the Move to a Linear Tax System in Germany and Other European Countries

This paper proposes a comparison of the results of tax policy analysis obtained on the basis of unitary and collective representations of the household. We first generate labour supplies consistent with the collective rationality, by use of a model calibrated on microdata as described in Vermeulen et al. [Collective Models of Household Labor Supply with Nonconvex Budget Sets and Nonparticipation: A Calibration Approach (2006)]. A unitary model is then estimated on these collective data and unitary and collective responses to a tax reform are compared. We focus on the introduction of linear taxation in Germany. The exercise is replicated for other European countries and other topical reforms. Distortions due to the use of a unitary model turn out to be important in predicting labour supply adjustments, in the design of tax revenue neutral reforms, and in predicting a reform’s welfare implications.