Health: Introductory paper

The notion of confidence is essential if there is to be any dialogue within the family about questions of health. The international and ecological aspects of health problems must, however, also be incorporated.     

The impact of artistic awakening and education on the young

Art is both a motor for the development of children, and an extraordinary means of communication. More time must be given to art in schools, through the increased training of teachers and by rebalancing the pace of teaching.     

Preconceptional family health evaluation: A regional education program for family planning clients and health professionals

The Preconceptional Family Health Evaluation Program was a regional project developed and funded for 2 years by the New England Regional Genetics Group (NERGG) to educate family planning health professionals about genetics, and to offer family planning clients preconceptional identification of genetic and environmental exposure risks. To meet these goals, genetic education was provided on a regional basis to 45 family planning professionals. A self-administered family health risk questionnaire adaptable to individual family planning settings was developed. Five hundred and twenty-nine family planning clients voluntarily completed the questionnaire. Cigarette smoking (35%) and alcohol use (57%) were two major categories of risks identified. The Preconceptional Family Health Evaluation Program was well received by all participants and provided an effective means for regional education of family planning health professionals. As a result of the program, state program planners, clinical genetics services, and family planning health professionals developed a strong relationship that will serve future educational and genetic risk screening efforts.     

Teenagers and health

Adolescence is a key period, both because it makes the growing individual more fragile, and also because of the habits that are taken then and which will influence health thereafter.

During this difficult period and on emerging from it, the teenager often reduces the notion of health to “being and staying in shape.” Unfortunately, educators and health carers are ill‐trained to respond to the specific needs of teenagers.     

The effectiveness of narrative versus informational smoking education on smoking beliefs,attitudes and intentions of low-educated adolescents

Objective: This study tests the effectiveness of narrative versus informational smoking education on smoking beliefs, attitudes and intentions of low-educated adolescents.

Design: A field experiment with three waves of data collection was conducted. Participants (N = 256) were students who attend lower secondary education. At the first and third waves, they completed a questionnaire. At the second wave, 50.8% of the participants read a smoking education booklet in narrative form and 49.2% read a booklet in informational form. After reading, all participants also completed a questionnaire at wave 2.

Main outcome measures: Beliefs about negative consequences of smoking, attitudes towards smoking and intentions to smoke were measured.

Results: Repeated measures analyses with time as a within-subjects factor and condition as a between-subjects factor showed that beliefs about smoking were more negative at Wave 2 compared to Wave 1, irrespective of condition. However, attitudes towards smoking were more positive at Wave 3 compared to Wave 1 when participants had read the narrative version.

Conclusion: These results show that narrative smoking education is not more effective than informational smoking education for low-educated adolescents and can even have an unintended effect for this target group by making attitudes towards smoking more positive.     

The impact of parental divorce on the attainment of the developmental tasks of young adulthood

The purpose of this study was to assess the impact of parental divorce on young adult development. One hundred twenty-five participants provided demographic information and completed the PAFS-Q (college version) and the conflict subscale of the Family Environment Scale. Results indicate that parental divorce and family conflict significantly affect developmental task attainment. The interactions between sex and age and family structure (i.e., single-parent or stepfamily) were also significant predictors of post-divorce task attainment. Implications of these results for therapists as well as recommendations for future research are provided.This is a revised version of a paper presented at the annual conference of the American Psychological Association, Los Angles, California, August 1994.     

Factors associated with the mental health of adolescents when a parent has cancer

This study explored factors associated with the mental health in adolescents (ages 11-17; n = 54) within 12 months after a parent had been diagnosed with cancer. A control group was included (ages 11-17; n = 49). A demographic questionnaire, the SF-8 Health Survey, the Youth Self Report and the McMaster Family Assessment Device were used. Similar levels of psychological distress and healthy family functioning were reported in the clinical and the control group. No effect of gender of the ill parent and that of the adolescent was found. A negative correlation was found between the physical health of the ill parent and the mental health of the adolescent. Healthy family functioning correlated with less psychological distress in adolescents with a parent with cancer. Open communication, flexible problem solving and appropriate affective involvement were significant predictors for less psychological distress in the adolescents. The study concludes that a healthy family functioning facilitated the adolescent's adjustment to parental cancer.     

Feedback on health status and peer popularity influences social risk decision-making processes in adolescents and young adults

Cognitive and dual-processes models, involving cognitive and socio-emotional components, for adolescents’ risky behaviour have been proposed. This study tested their predictions by manipulating the presence or absence of feedback about gains and losses in health and peer popularity in a decision-making task with peers. Risky (e.g., taking or refusing a drug) and ambiguous decisions (e.g., eating hamburger or hotdog) were examined in 256 adolescents (aged 13–14; 15–16; 17–18) and young adults (aged 19–20). Participants made more risky choices and required less decision time when receiving feedback about the negative consequences on health and positive consequences on peer popularity. Decision times were comparatively larger for risky than for safe options in late adolescence and young adulthood. Results supported the dual-processes model showing that, though late cognitive changes were observed that could eventually lead to the selection of safe options, feedback gains in peer popularity outweighed unhealthy consequences leading to risky decisions.     

The Family Intervention Program

No abstract available for this article.     

An evaluation of the UK government health education campaign on AIDS

In the absence of an effective treatment for HI V the only means of containing its spread is through changes in behaviour. Health education is a key route for achieving this. To be effective, a health education campaign must result in behaviour change. The United Kingdom Department of Health and Social Security has attempted to address these needs in a recent health education campaign, which took the form of whole page newspaper advertisements in the national press. Groups of higher and lower risk subjects were questioned before and after the campaign. The desire for information was high and the vast majority of respondents named the medical profession as the desired source to turn to. 31.1% of the lower risk group and 50% of the higher risk group noticed and read the campaign. Information scores were slightly increased but the campaign had no effect on adjusting misconceptions and anxiety was not lowered. Attitudes and behaviour were unaltered. These results are discussed in the light of a content analysis of the campaign.     

The potential impact of the neurosciences on religious and spiritual education: ramifying from the impact on values education

This article will argue that neuroscientific insights can inform religious and spiritual education’s capacity for strengthening student understanding, promoting transformation and ultimately wisdom. Among other findings, it will show that current neuroscientific research supports a holistic approach to pedagogy which emphasises the cognitive, affective, moral and other dimensions of student learning and the corresponding need to facilitate development in all of these dimensions in order for authentic learning to take place. As such, the article adopts a cross-disciplinary reference point, referring to research that has demonstrated the usefulness of neuroscientific findings in application to education through a specific focus on values education. Values education is held up as a discipline with complementary interests to a holistic religious and spiritual education, these interests being in its capacity to inculcate in students the character dispositions which orientate them towards moral excellence, so allowing them to navigate complex ethical terrain, contribute constructively to society, and ultimately achieve human flourishing (Porter 2001 Porter, J. 2001. “Virtue Ethics.” In The Cambridge Companion to Christian Ethics, edited by R. Gill. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press. [Google Scholar]; Becker 2004 Becker, M. 2004. “Virtue Ethics, Applied Ethics and Rationality Twenty-three Years after ‘After Virtue’.” South African Journal of Philosophy 23 (3): 267–281.[Taylor & Francis Online], [Web of Science ®] , [Google Scholar]; Narvaez 2007; Rachels 2007). Drawing on what has been demonstrated above, we will argue that neuroscientific insights can help in understanding and facilitating religious and spiritual education as holistic and able to respond to contemporary issues of personal identity and social friction and, furthermore, as uniquely poised to contribute to contemporary educational research, including around the intersections between neuroscience and education.     

The health needs of the majority versus the health needs of the individual: The reorganization of medical education in Colombia

The challenge of excellence in community health services has been taken up by medical educators in Colombia. Confronted with a nation where the primary indicators of disease mortality and morbidity (cardiovascular disease and infant mortality) were characteristic of First and Third World patterns, respectively, the Ministry of Health and La Asociacion Colombiana de Facultades de Medicina (ASCOFAME), representatives of institutions of medical education, have collaborated to conduct a needs assessment of the country's health needs and devised an implementation plan designed to better address the needs of the majority of that nation's people.As a model, the Colombian reorganization of medical education is an example which could be emulated by the U.S. where policy makers are struggling with troublesome questions of cost, equity and quality.     

学校心理健康教育中的参与式教师培训初探

本研究通过参与式培训手段,提高了昆明市东华一小全体教师关心学生心理健康的意识和能力,并探讨参与式培训的可行性和有效性.多维评估结果表明本次培训取得了良好的效果,其原因在于:1.通过需求评估确定内容,增加了培训内容的针对性.2.参与式教学手段的引入,激发了学员的参与热情,提升了培训效果.3.全员培训从“面”上增进了教师积极的日常教学行为,减少了消极的日常教学行为.     

The moderating effect of differentiation: Education and health in married couples

This study had four hypotheses based on Bowen Family Systems Theory. First, to determine the similarity in couple members' levels of differentiation, a latent profile analysis was performed. About 67% of couples reported less than a point difference on average between their scores on the differentiation subscales used. Second, whether differentiation was associated with physical health was determined by comparing the means of health indicators for couple members across the latent profile classes, and it was found that health and differentiation were related as expected. Finally, to determine whether differentiation moderated the associations between education, stress, and health, a group comparison procedure was performed for an Actor–Partner Interdependence Model. Evidence suggested that differentiation moderated some of these associations.     

Perversion on the other side of the couch

Abstract

Taking as his starting point the fact that, according to Freudian theory, perversion is inherent to the human being, the author focuses upon an aspect of perversion that has been little discussed: perversion on the other side of the couch, and thereby questions of how, in psychoanalytic theoretical and clinical practice, perverted drive motions may be presented. Such a phenomenon takes various forms: actually being enacted with patients; using psychoanalytic theory as a normative rule; the individual choice of profession and so forth. To exemplify his point of view, the author presents four different expressions of sexuality in Freudian theory: genital sexuality, perverted sexuality, the sexuality of the Ideals and narcissistic sexuality. After differentiating these four sexual expressions, the author shows how each of them may generate perversion in both clinical and theoretical psychoanalysis.

Ceccarelli P Perversion auf der anderen Seite der Couch

Indem er als Ausgangspunkt die Tatsache nimmt, daß entsprechend der Freudianischen Theorie Perversion dem menschlichen Sein inhärent ist, fokussiert der Autor auf einen Aspekt der Perversion, der wenig diskutiert wurde: Perversion auf der anderen Seite der Couch und damit Fragen, wie in der psychoanalytischen und klinischen Praxis pervertierte Triebbewegungen dargestellt werden können. Ein solches Phänomen zeigt sich in verschiedenartigen Formen: tatsächlich mit Patienten in Szene gesetzt; im Gebrauch psychoanalytischer Theorie als einer normativen Regel; die individuelle Wahl des Berufs und so weiter. Um seinen Standpunkt zu exempifizieren, stellt der Autor vier verschiedene Ausdrücke von Sexualität in der Freudianischen Theorie dar: genitale Sexualität; perverse Sexiualität; die Sexualität der Ideale; und narzißtische Sexualität. Nach einer Differenzierung dieser vier Ausdrücke für Sexualität zeigt der Autor, wie jeder von ihnen Perversion in klinischer und theoretischer Psychoanalyse generieren kann.

Ceccarelli P. Perversión del otro lado del diván.

Tomando como punto de partida el hecho de que de acuerdo a la teoría Freudiana la perversión es inherente al ser humano, el autor se enfoca en un aspecto de la perversión que ha sido muy poco discutido: la perversión del otro lado del diván, se pregunta cómo en la práctica psicoanalítica clínica y teórica, algunos impulsos pervertidos pueden estar presentes. Un fenómeno así puede tomar diversas formas: pasos al acto con pacientes, usar la teoría psicoanalítica como regla normativa, la elección individual de profesión y así. Para ejemplificar su punto de vista, el autor presenta cuatro diferentes expresiones de la sexualidad en la teoría freudiana: la sexualidad genital, sexualidad pervertida, la sexualidad de los Ideales, y la sexualidad narcisista. Además de diferenciar estas cuatro expresiones sexuales, el autor demuestra como cada una de estas formas puede generar perversión en el psicoanálisis clínico y teórico.     

The effects of parental illness and other ill family members on youth caregiving experiences

Informed by a model of family role redistribution derived from the family ecology framework, this study examined differences in two proposed psychological components of role redistribution (youth caregiving experiences and responsibilities) between youth of a parent with illness and their peers from ‘healthy’ families controlling for the effects of whether a parent is ill or some other family member, illness type and demographics. Based on self-report questionnaire data, four groups of Australian children were derived from a community sample of 2474 youth (‘healthy’ family, n = 1768; parental illness, n = 336; other family member illness (OFMI), n = 254; both parental and OFMI, n = 116). The presence of any family member with a serious illness is associated with an intensification of youth caregiving experiences relative to peers from healthy families. This risk is elevated if the ill family member is a parent, if more illnesses are present and by certain youth and family demographics, and especially by higher caregiving responsibilities. The presence of a family member, particularly a parent, with a serious medical condition has pervasive increased effects on youth caregiving compared to healthy families, and these effects are not fully accounted for by illness type, demographics or caregiving responsibilities.     

Effects of a post-hospitalization group health education programme for patients with coronary heart disease

Abstract

Effects of a post-hospitolization group health education programme for patients with coronary heart disease. A health education programme was offered to groups of coronary heart patients and their partners after discharge from hospital. A randomized pre-test post-test control group design was used to evaluate the effects of this experimental intervention. The health education programme was offered to 109 coronary heart patients in groups of between five and eight patients together with their partners in addition to standard medical care and physical training. A control group of 108 patients received only standard medical care and physical training.

The intervention consisted of eight weekly two-hour group health education sessions and one follow-up session. All sessions focused on the promotion of healthy habits and the reduction of adverse psychosocial consequences of the incident.

In the short term (about four months after the incident) the health education programme showed statistically significant intervention effects on knowledge about coronary heart diseases, smoking cessation, healthy eating habits and the number of consultations with the family physician, but no effects on emotional distress. In the long term (one year after the incident) there was only a significant intervention effect on smoking cessation.

These results suggest that the effects of the programme are modest, especially in terms of maintenance of behavioural change. As a consequence, it is suggested that the programme should not be offered to all coronary patients during cardiac rehabilitation, but only to those who can be expected to profit most from it.     

Religiosity and the mental health of adolescents in Great Britain

Most studies show that religion is a protective factor for mental health. A few argue that it is detrimental and the remainder conclude it makes no difference. We investigate the religiosity correlates of childhood psychopathology – strength of belief, importance of being able to practice one’s religion, and worship frequency. Questions on religiosity were included in the mental health survey of children in Great Britain administered to 2992 11–19-year-olds in 2007. The Development and Well-Being Assessment was used to generate rates of clinically recognisable mental disorders. Logistic regression analysis was used to establish the magnitude of the religiosity correlates of emotional and conduct disorders. Young people with a stated religion who had weakly held beliefs or who regarded religious practice as unimportant were those with the greater likelihood of having emotional disorders. Regular attendance at religious services or prayer meetings reduced the likelihood of having a conduct disorder.     

从社会文化的视角看健康与教育的阶层差异

如何缩小健康和教育的阶层差异, 促进社会公平是世界各国普遍关心的社会问题。已有的社会阶层心理研究取向中, 社会文化视角从不同阶层的文化所塑造的不同自我出发, 提出了解释社会阶层生产和再生产的文化循环理论和提升低阶层社会适应水平的差异教育方法, 这些理论观点为教育与健康的阶层差异提供了超越个体或环境任何单一因素的系统解释, 并提供了着眼于社会心理重塑的干预方案以减少健康和教育的不平等。未来社会文化视角的研究和实践工作的可能方向包括理论和干预实践的中国化, 与其他社会阶层理论和社会公正视角相结合, 以及考察社会流动与文化变迁背景的影响。