Stress and role satisfaction experienced by employed and nonemployed mothers with young children

The associations between employment status, role choice, social support, stressful events, and mothers' experiences of stress and role satisfaction were investigated. Interviews and questionnaires were used to obtain information from 105 mothers with two-year-old children. Role choice, social support, and stressful events each predicted the amount of stress mothers experienced in their lives, although not all did so independently. Employment status, role choice, and social support predicted role satisfaction.Thanks are extended to Lynn Arner, Susan Goodwyn, and Cindy Litman for their contributions to the project, and to Curt Acredolo and Leanne Friedman for their assistance with statistical analysis and computer programming.Susan B. Crockenberg received her Ph.D. from Stanford University. She is now a Professor, Department of Applied Behavioral Sciences, University of California, Davis, CA 95616. Research interests include the developmental, contextual, and child determinants of maternal role adjustment, maternal behavior, and their impact on the child's social-emotional development.     

Individual and organizational strategies for coping with organizational change

During times of significant change to organizations in strategies and structures, employees can experience high levels of stress as their jobs, areas of responsibility and roles also change. Yet research is curiously silent about how people react to organizational change, especially towards promoting healthy responses to change. As a first step to outlining areas for future research this paper considers a range of individual and organizational strategies that may be effective in reducing employee stress and related problems. Prior to the implementation of these strategies, however, organizations must empower employees to adopt the role of change agent and encourage them to take action to solve the problems that stress them. At the individual level, employees can respond to the stress created by organizational change by using problem- and emotion-focused strategies. Also important in coping with change are the personal resources of employees, including a sense of hardiness, beliefs about having control over their work environment, and the availability of social supports within and outside the organization. Although few organizations fully acknowledge their role in helping employees cope with change, there are a number of initiatives that organizations can pursue. Several strategies are discussed in relation to communication, leadership, job-related tasks and stress management programmes.     

Moving to and Living in a Retirement Home

Abstract

Bad health combined witii deteriorating physical functions force many elderly people to move to a retirement home. The primary focus of this study was to investigate the resident's experience of safety and security. From a sample of 57 residents, 12 persons volunteered to participate in the interview. Data were analyzed with qualitative content analysis. The standard and design of the participant's previous home made mobility difficult and this affected their sense of security. This motivated them to move into an environment where they felt more secure. The environment at the retirement home was predominantly described as secure and safe. The finding shows that the participants felt that safety and security were more important than independence.     

Low-intermediate dose testosterone replacement therapy by different pharmaceutical preparations improves frailty score in elderly hypogonadal hyperglycaemic patients

Abstract

An open-label follow-up study of low-to-intermediate dose testosterone replacement therapy (TRT) was conducted in 64 overweight patients (aged 65–75 years) with late onset hypogonadism (LOH) and increased fasting plasma glucose (FPG). Patients were subdivided into four treatment groups: oral testosterone (T) (T undecanoate, 80?mg/d), transmucosal T (60?mg/d), transdermal T (30?mg/d) or no treatment (control), and evaluated at 0 and 6 months. FPG, hemoglobin (Hb), prostate-specific antigen (PSA) and total T were measured and the Homeostasis Model Assessment of Insulin Resistance (HOMA-IR) index was calculated. Body mass index (BMI), waist circumference, fitness level (6-min walking test), Aging Males’ Symptoms (AMS) scale, handgrip strength and energy expenditure with physical activity (Minnesota questionnaire for Leisure Time Physical Activity (LTPA)) were evaluated and a “frailty score” (based on: grip strength, gait speed and LTPA) was calculated. T levels increased in all treatment groups; the oral T group had values still in the hypogonadal range (5.9?±?1.1?nmol/L). PSA and Hb concentrations did not change in any group. BMI, waist circumference, FPG and HOMA-IR improved in all T-treated groups after 6 months, with a greater effect seen with transmucosal and transdermal T compared with oral T. This study indicates that low-to-intermediate dose TRT may be safely utilized in LOH patients to ameliorate somatic and psychological frailty symptoms in association with improved anthropometric and glycometabolic parameters in aging, overweight men with LOH and impaired fasting glucose.     

Some asymptotic properties of point estimation with n-dimensional fuzzy data

Some asymptotic properties of point estimation with n-dimensional fuzzy data with respect to a special L ₂-metric ρ are investigated in this article. It is shown that the collection of all n-dimensional fuzzy data endowed with the ρ-metric is a complete and separable space. Some criterions for point estimation in such fuzzy environments are proposed, and the sample mean, variance and covariance with n-dimensional fuzzy data under these criteria are further studied.     

Family Support Groups for Family Members of Mentally Ill Offenders: Therapeutic Factors

This study investigates therapeutic factors of a Family Support Group (FSG) intervention for family members of mentally ill offenders. Seventeen family members completed the ‘Group Therapeutic Factors‐Client Questionnaire’ (GTF‐CQ‐28) during four sessions of two FSGs. Results indicate that family members experienced the following therapeutic factors over the course of treatment: the relational climate, interactional confirmation, expressing and experiencing mutual positive feelings, forgetting own problems, hope from seeing progress in others, guidance from therapists, and getting interpersonal feedback treatment. The therapeutic factors, including learning by observation, support from the group, and universality of problems, correlated with a decrease in self‐blame, improved emotional well‐being, and experiencing less loss of control over one's life, respectively. Further, family members were satisfied with what the FSG has provided for them personally and for the relation with their relative. Finally, clinical implications of the FSG are discussed. The study sheds light on valuable therapeutic factors within an FSG and the important role of therapists.     

Job design and levels of physical and mental strain among Australian prison officers

Abstract

Over the past 15 years much has been made of the moderating influence of job discretion and support in occupations that are perceived to be high in demands. Such an effect seems to be most prevalent when subject populations are large and heterogeneous. One aim of this study was to examine the influence of subjective perceptions of these variables on strain reactions among a group of relatively homogeneous workers such as, in the present study, prison officers (n = 274). A second aim was to extend previous research and examine the joint influence of negative affectivity and perceptions of demands, discretion, and support on mental and physical well-being. It was hypothesized that those high in negative affect would be particularly strained by jobs perceived as being demanding. The hypothesized relationship between job demands, discretion and support were found to be weak and at times inconsistent. Social support, in particular, was found to have both positive and negative consequences for different aspects of well-being. Those high in negative affect were in general found to suffer lower mental well-being. More importantly, the interactive effect of negative affectivity and job demands was found to significantly predict the majority of the dependent variables used in this study. The valences of these relationships were inconsistent and are interpreted in light of Warr's (1987) vitamin model of stress.

There are several conclusions that can be drawn from the present study. Negative affectivity appears to have a truly interactive effect with job components, job demands in particular, to influence a range of variables relating to physical and mental health as well a job-related attitudes. The nature of these effects, however, suggests a dissociation in the ways that different independent variables influence a range of indices of well-being and affect. This result requires further investigation since there are important theoretical implications which will follow if the data are replicable.

In order to examine such complex effects, in addition to the need for more longitudinal studies, it is also important that standardized measures of job components are developed so that levels of stress exposure can be equated and their impact assessed across organizational settings.

Finally, the data reported in this study suggest that some effective stress management may be undertaken by adopting selection strategies which take into consideration individual characteristics. In view of the fact that individual stress management programmes are of unproven benefit (Murphy 1986, 1988) such an approach is recommended especially for those organizations which are highly constrained in the services that must be performed.     

Conflict in Remarriages

This paper uses interview data from a study of 232 remarried and 102 first married couples to test hypotheses about the sources and consequences of conflict in remarriages. The hypotheses are suggested by an analysis of the sources of difficulty in families having prior marriage children. Support was found for hypothese predicting elevated conflict over financial issues, child rearing, and presence of husband's prior marriage children. The hypotheses that remarried husbands would give in more often than those first married, when there was a spousal disagreement, was also substantiated.     

Changing social responsibilities: the role of advocacy organisations in the construction of the Social Support Act in the Netherlands

This paper describes a study on civic participation in legislative processes. In January 2007 a new law on health and social care in the Netherlands was implemented: the Social Support Act (SSA). This law specifically aims at greater civic participation in the implementation of the law, in the provision of health and social care and in the social policy making process. This study focuses on civic participation in policy making, more specifically on civic participation in the legislative process of the Social Support Act. It examines whether national advocacy organisations were successful in their efforts to influence the legislative process and the final construction of the Social Support Act. The main conclusion is that the client and patient organisations were indeed successful in obtaining important changes in the law both through a well informed and professional individual lobby as well as by means of collective action. Yet questions concerning the justification of high expectations for successful local civic participation in the local policy-making process remain.     

Multiproduct cost-volume-profit model with product limits

A multiproduct cost-volume-profit model is extended to incorporate sales or product capacity limits for each product, required rate of return on sales, and the tax rate depending on profit levels as determined by the government. The model also deals with overhead costs that are traceable to a group of products but which cannot be allocated to individual products within the group to any reasonable accuracy. To solve the model, an algorithm is constructed to determine the required volume for each product that will achieve the best possible rate of return on sales revenue. Based upon the dBase Database Management System and the CVP model, a user-friendly menu-driven interactive decision support system is developed. The model algorithm and decision support system is illustrated with an example consisting of five products. Various reports generated by the interactive decision support system are also presented.