Like mother, (not) like daughter: The social construction of menopause and aging

In recent American history, the definition of menopause has shifted from a natural, developmental transition to an increasingly more medicalized perspective that emphasizes biological deficits of the aging female body. Using qualitative data from two generations of women, this essay explores how and why this redefinition has occurred and what effect it has had on women's attitudes toward health and aging. The physical experiences of menopause were remarkably similar across mother-daughter pairs; however, daughters (who represented a slice of the baby boom cohort) differed from their mothers in how they talked about menopause, how they defined and treated menopause, and how willingly they accepted or fought the changes associated with menopause. Major social institutions, including the media and pharmaceutical industry, have played a significant role in reshaping the cultural lens through which women experience issues of health, body, and aging. This essay emphasizes the baby boomers' desire to maintain control over their bodies and considers how this cohort of women, as a result, may experience late-life issues of body and health.     

关于山东省实现基本公共卫生服务均等化的对策思考

基本公共卫生服务均等化是我国基本公共服务均等化的重要组成部分。近年来,山东省基本公共卫生服务水平不断提高,但各地市存在供给差异。基于此,分析其成因,并提出山东省实现基本公共卫生服务均等化的具体对策成为亟待解决的重要议题。     

基于校园文化视角的大学生心理健康“软环境”建设研究

大学生心理健康问题已成为社会关注的热点问题之一。文章试图从校园文化的视角,研究培育大学生健康心理的校园“软环境”。文章认为校园文化的三个结构维度,即精神文化、制度文化和物质文化,分别对大学生心理“质”的健康和“关系”健康,有着不同程度的影响,因而共同构成了培育大学生健康心理的“软环境”。进一步地,文章对有益于学生身心健康的软环境建设,提出了有意义的建议。     

青岛市中学生生活习惯的调查与研究

针对青岛市中学生日常生活习惯中的饮食规律、日常卫生习惯、营养均衡状况、睡眠及体育锻炼等方面进行问卷调查,调查结果显示:中学生体育锻炼时间普遍偏少;部分中学生不能够做到定时定量的规律进餐,且对均衡营养的重要性认识不足;很多中学生个人卫生习惯较差;最后提出相应的对策建议.     

12-h workdays: current knowledge and future directions

Work schedules other than those based on the traditional 8-h workday duration have become much more common in recent years. Many such schedules compress the work week into three or four longer workdays and include an increased number of days off. In particular, rosters based on 12-h workdays have gained in popularity, and such rosters have been the focus of considerable research. The literature on 12-h workdays is, however, full of inconsistencies. Not surprisingly, there is considerable evidence from some of these studies that 12-h shifts tend to cause more fatigue than 8-h shifts. This extra fatigue may be associated with lower work efficiency, and with more errors and accidents. There is also strong evidence that workers prefer 12-h shifts due to some perceived advantages. The present paper reviews and examines these studies and their findings and discusses some possible reasons for the apparent contradictions in reported findings. Directions for decision makers and future research are suggested.     

Demanding work schedules and mental health in nursing assistants working in nursing homes

Nursing home assistants have physically and emotionally challenging jobs, and they often work demanding schedules in order to provide 24-h care. While the physical effects of demanding work schedules have been studied, little is known about the impact on mental health. This study explored the relationship between demanding scheduling variables and mental health indicators of depression, anxiety and somatization. A cross-section of 473 US female nursing assistants working in nursing homes was surveyed. Work schedule characteristics included shiftwork, hours per day and week, days per week, number of weekends per month, number of double shifts per month, breaks, and number of jobs worked. Working two or more double-shifts per month was associated with increased risk for all mental health indicators, and working 6–7 days per week was associated with depression and somatization. There was a trend for increasing odds of adverse mental health with increased numbers of demanding work schedule factors. The odds of depression was increased four-fold when working 50+ h/week, more than two weekends/month and more than two double shifts/month. Providing work schedules that are less unhealthy may have implications for both worker retention and the quality of care delivered to nursing home residents.     

IGLOO: An integrated framework for sustainable return to work in workers with common mental disorders

ABSTRACT

Current research on return to work (RTW) for employees with common mental disorders suffers from two limitations. First, research mostly focuses on the influence of resources during the absence period ignoring the resources which may facilitate sustainable RTW, i.e. employees continuing to work and thrive at work post-return. Second, research tends to view the work and non-work domains separately and fails to consider the interaction of resources at the individual, group, leader and organisational levels, once back at work. In the present position paper, we present an integrated framework and a preliminary definition of sustainable RTW. Based on current occupational health psychology theory and existing research on RTW, we develop ten propositions for the resources in and outside work, which may promote sustainable RTW. In addition to the individual, group, leader, and organisational levels, we also argue for the importance of the overarching context, i.e. the societal context and the culture and legislation that may promote sustainable RTW. Our framework raises new questions that need to be addressed to enhance our understanding of how key stakeholders can support employees with common mental health disorders staying and thriving at work.     

Signs of struggle (SOS): The development and validation of a behavioural mental health checklist for the workplace

ABSTRACT

For managers to successfully support employee access to mental health resources, they must first be able to recognise if and when an employee may need help. To manage employees effectively, managers must be able to recognise changes in employees’ work behaviour that may indicate when an employee is struggling at work. In study 1, we develop and establish the structure of the 20-item Signs of Struggle (SOS) checklist as comprising five factors that describe the warning signs of health impairment at work (i.e. distress, withdrawal, reduced attendance, degradations in performance, extreme behaviours). In study 2, we show that manager-rated signs of struggle correlated substantially (r?=?.72) with participant-reported strain. The SOS tool provides managers a way to recognise when employees may be struggling and could benefit from workplace resources. We recommend that for maximal benefit, managers also receive training on how to use the SOS, and also on how to approach and assist employees who are displaying warning signs.     

An expanded typology of conflict at work: Task,relationship and non-task organizational conflict as social stressors

This study investigated the roles of three types of conflict at work – task, relationship and non-task organizational – in predicting employee strain. These conflict types refer to disputes over issues that are, respectively, work-task specific, driven by emotionally charged interpersonal animosity or rooted in more broad organizationally relevant issues. Findings from a sample of 260 working adults from various organizations in the United States supported the notion that the three types of conflict function as social stressors and are related to a variety of psychological, behavioural and physical strains. They extend previous research based primarily on relationship conflict. Non-task organizational conflict emerged as a key predictor across strain criteria, thus highlighting the importance of including a more complete conceptualization of the conflict construct in social stress research. The results for task conflict are at variance with findings that it can be beneficial, and suggest that its negative relationship with well-being may be due to its co-occurrence with the other forms of conflict. These findings provide support for an expanded typology of conflict.     

Improving human resources for health planning in developing economies

There is a universal consensus that human resources represent the heart and soul of effective health systems everywhere. However, despite this consensus, human resource planning in low income countries remains a neglected, often poorly implemented and ineffective component of health-system development. The planning exercises that do take place are often inefficient, use inappropriate planning models or fail to adequately prioritize human resource investment decisions. This article briefly discusses possible reasons why this failure occurs and describes four key steps that can help health system planners more effectively prioritize and link human resource for health investment decisions to health system strategy and programmatic initiatives. Implications for human resource development practice and national human resource development are discussed.