Knowledge and attitudes of Polish university students toward organ donation and transplantation

Although the number of patients needing organ transplantation systematically increases, recent years have seen a considerable shortage of donors. The level of knowledge and attitudes toward donation are critical factors in achieving the required balance between supply and demand. This pilot study assessed the knowledge, opinions, and behaviors related to organ donation and transplantation among 625 students representing eight different fields of study from the University of Rzeszow in south-eastern Poland. Although the participants provided evidence of knowledge about human organ donation and transplantation, they were aware of the main organs of the human body for potential transplants, and generally showed positive attitudes; only 24% of the subjects indicated their willingness to register as a donor; only 3% stated that they had already registered and had a donor card. The findings suggest that good intentions do not translate into action and that Poland needs to develop a nation-wide, up-to-date, and youth-oriented health education program that builds on favorable attitudes toward organ donation and transplantation.     

Social representations of organ donors and non‐donors

This paper illustrates the empirical investigation of social representations by means of photographs as stimulus material and the technique of correspondence analysis to study the resulting data. The research was part of a campaign carried out to promote organ donation in Malta. The study tries to find out whether a public communication campaign could change perceptions. Five focus groups were held before the campaign and another five, two months after the campaign. Part of the data collected through these focus groups was analysed using correspondence analysis. The results showed that before the campaign, donors were generally perceived to be either young or important people or public personalities. After the campaign, donors were perceived more to be ordinary family people, educated, generous and religious. On the other hand, before the campaign, non‐donors were seen as conservative, uncouth and uncaring, whereas after the campaign non‐donors were generally perceived to be older, uninformed and uneducated people. Copyright © 2005 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

Death, organ transplantation and medical practice

A series of papers in Philosophy, Ethics and Humanities in Medicine (PEHM) have recently disputed whether non-heart beating organ donors are alive and whether non-heart beating organ donation (NHBD) contravenes the dead donor rule. Several authors who argue that NHBD involves harvesting organs from live patients appeal to "strong irreversibility" (death beyond the reach of resuscitative efforts to restore life) as a necessary criterion that patients must meet before physicians can declare them to be dead. Sam Shemie, who defends our current practice of NHBD, holds that in fact physicians consider patients to be dead or not according to physician intention to resuscitate or not. We suggest that criteria for a concept are not necessarily truth conditions for assertions involving the concept. Hence, non-heart beating donors may be declared dead without meeting the criterion of strong irreversibility even though strong irreversibility is implied by the concept of death. Our perception that a concept applies in a given case is determined not by the concept itself but by our necessary skill and judgment when using it. In the case of deciding that a patient is dead, such judgment is learned by physicians as they learn the practice of medicine and may vary according to circumstances. Current practice of NHBD can therefore be defended without abandoning death as an empirical concept, as Shemie appears to do. We conclude that the dead donor rule continues to be viable and ought to be retained so as to guarantee what the public most cares about as regards organ donation: that physicians can be trusted to make determinations of eligibility for organ donation in the interests of patients and not for other purposes such as increasing the availability of organs.     

To Ask or Not to Ask: Enhancing Donations to Nonprofits by Soliciting Opinions Upfront,Rather than Donations

The success of non-profit organizations depends mainly on the strategies they use to recruit new donors. One common strategy is to solicit donations upfront (mostly online)—but is this indeed an effective approach? We conducted three experiments (N_total?=?1287), in which we compared an upfront appeal of that sort with one that offered prospective donors the opportunity to express their opinion about a given fundraising campaign—and then asked if they cared to donate to it. Drawing on foot-in-the-door and escalation of commitment theories, we found that soliciting an opinion (as opposed to a donation) led to greater engagement with the charity among prospective donors, as reflected by their greater willingness to read about the cause. This, in turn, encouraged them to donate. In experiment 1, we showed that the direct effect of request type on donations was mediated by the donors’ willingness to learn about the charity. In experiment 2, we showed that pairing an appeal for an opinion with a donation request was more effective than merely appealing for a donation. Finally, in experiment 3, we found that the more donors learn about a given cause, the stronger their emotional response to it, and the greater their donations to it. Further, we showed that soliciting an opinion (as opposed to a donation) made donors feel a greater connection with the organization. In sum, we propose a simple and cost-effective intervention that may help non-profit businesses become more effective.

     

Under what conditions would people be willing to make a living organ donation?

The aim was to examine the factors involved in people's willingness to make a living organ donation. A convenience sample of 200 people in southern France rated willingness to be a living donor in 48 scenarios consisting of all combinations of five factors: recipient's identity (close family member and city resident); donor's surgical risk (little and some); donor's possible long-term health consequences (none, some lessening over time, and durable); transplant success ("generally durably successful" and "durably successful one time out of two"); and likelihood of other donors (subject is one of the rare compatible donors or one among others). Cluster analyses showed the existence of three distinct organ donation philosophies. For the largest cluster (49% of participants), willingness to donate was very high to a family member, but low to a city resident. For the second cluster (37%), willingness was high to family, but also moderately high to a city resident. For the third cluster (14%), willingness was always low. Thus, most participants judged themselves ready to make a living organ donation to a family member and many even to a stranger.     

Opening a donor's wallet: The influence of appeal scales on likelihood and magnitude of donation

We examine the influence of appeal scales on the likelihood and magnitude of donation in a large field experiment. We argue and show that the leftmost anchor on the appeal scale most strongly influences the likelihood of donating; the lower the anchor, the higher the donation likelihood. Furthermore, our findings indicate that increasing the steepness of the amounts on the appeal scale increases the magnitude of donations. Both effects are stronger for infrequent than for frequent donors. Our results demonstrate that by using what a charity knows about past donor behavior, it can alter appeal scales to change donation behavior.     

It's My Campaign I'll Cry if I Want to: How and When Campaigns Use Emotional Appeals

Recent research in the area of campaign advertising suggests that emotional appeals can influence political attitudes, electoral choices and decision‐making processes. Yet is there any evidence that candidates use emotional appeals strategically during campaigns? Is there a pattern to their use? For instance, are fear appeals used primarily late in the campaign by trailing candidates in order to get voters to rethink their choices? And are enthusiasm appeals used more commonly early on in order to shore up a candidate's base? We use affective intelligence theory—and supplement it with the idea of a voter backlash—to generate expectations about when candidates use certain emotional appeals (namely, anger, fear, enthusiasm, and pride) and which types of candidates are most likely to do so. We then test these ideas using campaign advertising data from several U.S. Senate races from 2004. Our research thus provides a link between research on campaign decision making—here the decision to “go emotional”—and research focusing on the effects of emotional appeals on voters.     

An “Opting In” Paradigm for Kidney Transplantation

Almost 60,000 people in the United States with end stage renal disease are waiting for a kidney transplant. Because of the scarcity of organs from deceased donors live kidney donors have become a critical source of organs; in 2001, for the first time in recent decades, the number of live kidney donors exceeded the number of deceased donors. The paradigm used to justify putting live kidney donors at risk includes the low risk to the donor, the favorable risk-benefit ratio, the psychological benefits to the donor, altruism, and autonomy coupled with informed consent; because each of these arguments is flawed we need to lessen our dependence on live kidney donors and increase the number of organs retrieved from deceased donors.

An “opting in” paradigm would reward people who agree to donate their kidneys after they die with allocation preference should they need a kidney while they are alive. An “opting in” program should increase the number of kidneys available for transplantation and eliminate the morally troubling problem of “organ takers” who would accept a kidney if they needed one but have made no provision to be an organ donor themselves. People who “opt in” would preferentially get an organ should they need one at the minimal cost of donating their kidneys when they have no use for them; it is a form of organ insurance a rational person should find extremely attractive.

An “opting in” paradigm would simulate the reciprocal altruism observed in nature that sociobiologists believe enhances group survival. Although the allocation of organs based on factors other than need might be morally troubling, an “opting in” paradigm compares favorably with other methods of obtaining more organs and accepting the status quo of extreme organ scarcity. Although an “opting in” policy would be based on enlightened self-interest, by demonstrating the utilitarian value of mutual assistance, it would promote the attitude that self-interest sometimes requires the perception that we are all part of a common humanity.     

An "opting in" paradigm for kidney transplantation

Almost 60,000 people in the United States with end stage renal disease are waiting for a kidney transplant. Because of the scarcity of organs from deceased donors live kidney donors have become a critical source of organs; in 2001, for the first time in recent decades, the number of live kidney donors exceeded the number of deceased donors. The paradigm used to justify putting live kidney donors at risk includes the low risk to the donor, the favorable risk-benefit ratio, the psychological benefits to the donor, altruism, and autonomy coupled with informed consent; because each of these arguments is flawed we need to lessen our dependence on live kidney donors and increase the number of organs retrieved from deceased donors. An "opting in" paradigm would reward people who agree to donate their kidneys after they die with allocation preference should they need a kidney while they are alive. An "opting in" program should increase the number of kidneys available for transplantation and eliminate the morally troubling problem of"organ takers"who would accept a kidney if they needed one but have made no provision to be an organ donor themselves. People who "opt in" would preferentially get an organ should they need one at the minimal cost of donating their kidneys when they have no use for them; it is a form of organ insurance a rational person should find extremely attractive. An "opting in" paradigm would simulate the reciprocal altruism observed in nature that sociobiologists believe enhances group survival. Although the allocation of organs based on factors other than need might be morally troubling, an "opting in" paradigm compares favorably with other methods of obtaining more organs and accepting the status quo of extreme organ scarcity. Although an "opting in" policy would be based on enlightened self-interest, by demonstrating the utilitarian value of mutual assistance, it would promote the attitude that self-interest sometimes requires the perception that we are all part of a common humanity.     

Motivation in Italian whole blood donors and the role of commitment

The literature contains numerous reports on motivation in blood donors, although none of these are specific to blood donation in Italy and almost all of them focus on altruism and the desire to help others. Altruism is important, but a comprehensive analysis of donor motivation should examine all the factors affecting the decision to donate, including commitment to voluntary blood donor organizations. The aims of this paper are to verify if the motivational factors that influence the choice to donate blood in Italy are generally consistent with the findings from other countries reported in the literature and to focus on commitment to donor organizations as an additional factor. A sample of 895 whole blood donors completed a self-report questionnaire containing questions about: reasons for beginning to donate, people who influenced this choice, and level of commitment to voluntary blood donor organizations. The most frequently reported reasons for giving blood for the first time were "to help others" (56%), "influence of family/friends" (22%), and "social/moral obligation" (11.2%); commitment did not vary as a function of the leading motivation reported. Differences emerged between males, who more frequently reported having been influenced by parents and friends, and females, who referred more often to altruistic motives. The opportunity to check one's own state of health also played an important role (6.9%), especially for male donors. Overall, however, the decision to donate was primarily a personal choice (41.3%), although influence was also attributed to relatives (21.8%), friends (22.3%), and voluntary blood donor organizations (21.8%). The reported level of commitment to the donor organization was positively correlated with the number of total and annual donations made and number of new donors recruited.     

From Altruistic Donation to Conditional Societal Organ Appropriation After Death

Since we have learned that human organs can be used to treat severe health problems, only donation has been considered for organ procurement. Among the other possibilities that can be used after a person’s death, purchase or systematic removal have been a priori rejected. However, we will show that the appeal to individual altruism have resulted in some of the aporias of the present situation. Subsequently, we will consider how systematic organ removal from deceased persons can be made acceptable in liberal and democratic societies. Finally, we will suggest that individual choices with regard to systematic organ removal could well be registered in a way that allows proper implementation of present French legislation.     

Living donation and cosmetic surgery: a double standard in medical ethics?

The commitment of transplant physicians to protect the physical and psychological health of potential donors is fundamental to the process of living donor organ transplantation. It is appropriate that strict regulations to govern an individual's decision to donate have been developed. Some may argue that adherence to such regulations creates a doctor-patient relationship that is rooted in paternalism, which is in drastic contrast with a doctor-patient relationship that is rooted in patients' autonomy, characteristic of most other operative interventions. In this article we analyze the similarities between cosmetic plastic surgery and living donor surgery as examples of surgeries governed by different ethical principles. It is interesting that, while the prevailing ethical approach in living donor surgery is based on paternalism, the ethical principle guiding cosmetic surgery is respect for patients' autonomy. The purpose of this article is not to criticize either practice, but to suggest that, given the similarities between the two procedures, both operative interventions should be guided by the same ethical principle: a respect for patients' autonomy. We further suggest that if living organ donation valued donors' autonomy as much as cosmetic plastic surgery does, we might witness a wider acceptance of and increase in living organ donation.     

情感广告的传播效果及作用机制

情感诉求在现代广告中运用非常广泛,并已成为西方广告心理研究的热点问题之一。研究者们重点探讨了情感诉求的作用机制、情感诉求所能达到的传播效果及影响其传播效果的相关因素。文章对这些研究进行了较系统的考察,并提出了现有研究依然存在的一些问题     

Earning points for moral behavior: organ allocation based on reciprocity

Anticipating the reevaluation of the Dutch organ procurement system, in late 2003 the Rathenau Institute published a study entitled 'Gift or Contribution?' In this study, the author, Govert den Hartogh, carries out a thorough moral analysis of the problem of organ shortage and fair allocation of organs. He suggests there should be a change in mentality whereby organ donation is no longer viewed in terms of charity and the volunteer spirit, but rather in terms of duty and reciprocity. The procurement and allocation of donor organs should be seen as a system of mutually assured help. Fair allocation would imply to give priority to those who recognize and comply with their duty: the registered donors. The idea of viewing organ donation as an undertaking involving mutual benefit rather than as a matter of charity, however, is not new. Notwithstanding the fact that reference to charity and altruism is not required in order for the organ donation to be of moral significance, we will argue against the reciprocity-based scenario. Steering organ allocation towards those who are themselves willing to donate organs is both an ineffective and morally questionable means of attempting to counter organ shortage.     

Fear versus humor: the impact of sensation seeking on physiological, cognitive, and emotional responses to antialcohol abuse messages

This study investigates the differences in physiological, cognitive, and emotional responses to existing emotional antialcohol abuse advertisements (fear vs. humor appeal) between high and low sensation seekers. A 2 (Message Type) x 2 (Sensation-Seeking Tendency) x 4 (Message Repetition) mixed-model experiment with repeated measures was conducted with 71 college students. The results, based on self-reports, indicated that fear messages generated more interest and perceived danger of excessive drinking regardless of sensation-seeking tendency, whereas humorous messages were rated as more likeable than fear messages, and the difference was bigger among low sensation seekers than among high sensation seekers. One interesting finding was that for both fear and humor appeals, low sensation seekers showed greater emotional responses (greater corrugators activities and greater zygomatic activities) than high sensation seekers overall. The implications of the current study as well as suggestions for future study were discussed.     

Increasing organ donor registration rates by providing an immediate and complete registration opportunity: an experimental assessment of the IIFF model

The IIFF model of organ donation holds that the simultaneous presence of four factors directly influence donor registration: (1) immediate and complete registration opportunity (ICRO), (2) information, (3) focused engagement, and (4) favorable activation. Two field experiments examined the impact of an ICRO on organ donation registration. In Study 1, participants were at town halls where they knew organ donation was to be discussed. Registration cards were distributed and then collected at the end of the session in half of the town halls. For the other half, participants were asked to mail in completed cards. In three US cities, participants given an ICRO registered at a significantly greater rate (z?=?4.865, p?相似文献   

服务行业员工的人格特质、情绪劳动策略与心理健康的关系

研究采用问卷法, 抽取服务行业员工样本357份, 探讨人格特质(QZPS)、情绪劳动策略对心理健康的作用机制。结果显示：(1) 在QZPS中, 善良预测较少的表层动作, 较多的自动调节; 才干预测较多的深层加工; 行事风格预测较多自动调节; 情绪性预测较少的深层加工; 他人指向预测较少的表层调节, 较多的自动调节; 自我指向预测较多的深层调节; 事物指向预测较多的自动调节和深层加工, 较少的表层动作。(2) 表层劳动预测较差的心理健康, 深层劳动和自动调节预测较好的心理健康。(3) 表层动作在善良、他人指向与心理健康之间起显著中介作用, 深层加工在情绪性、才干、自我指向、事物指向与心理健康之间起显著中介作用。自动调节在善良、行事风格、事物指向与心理健康之间起显著的中介作用。(4) 外向性可直接作用于心理健康。研究显示, 外向性、善良、才干、行事风格、他人指向、自我指向、事物指向等QZPS特质高分者都比较容易适应服务行业, “情绪性”高分者从事服务行业工作将有较大的心理健康代价。另外, 从深层调节和自动调节角度开展心理健康培训、职业心理咨询及自我调节, 可增强员工对服务工作的适应性, 并促进心理健康。     

Impact of emotional appeal on non-profit advertising: A neurophysiological analysis

The number of Non-Profit Organisations (NPOs) has increased in the past years, and they rely on advertising to communicate their causes. Although the effectiveness of NPO advertising has been studied previously, there is still no consensus about which appeal (emotionally positive or negative) increases its effectiveness. On the other hand, the most prevalent research approaches to NPO advertising are traditional research methodologies based on declarative techniques. So, the purpose of this study is to identify which appeal (positive or negative) in NPO advertising is more effective at the three levels of effectiveness (perceptual or communicational effectiveness, psychological or attitudinal effectiveness and behavioural effectiveness), providing a new approach based on the analysis of consumers' unconscious responses to advertising. We conducted an experiment with 113 participants whose neurophysiological responses were evaluated through electroencephalogram (EEG) and eye tracking (ET) while they watched NPO advertisements with a randomly assigned emotional appeal (positive or negative). In addition, a survey revealed behavioural responses. The results showed that considering the psychological or attitudinal effectiveness, positively framed ads are more effective, as there is a positive effect on attitudes towards the ad and a higher positive emotional valence. On the other hand, in perceptual effectiveness, where attention is considered an important variable, the negatively framed ads showed more significant time in the area of interest (AOI) of the image area of the ad, and longer time in the AOI text was observed for positively framed ads. Furthermore, regarding behavioural effectiveness, negatively framed ads seem more effective in eliciting actual donations. The results suggest that a positive appeal is more effective in generating a more positive attitude and a positive emotional valence towards the advertisement, which could benefit the NPO in the long term. But a negative appeal is more effective if the goal is to achieve immediate donations.     

Donation after circulatory death: burying the dead donor rule

Despite continuing controversies regarding the vital status of both brain-dead donors and individuals who undergo donation after circulatory death (DCD), respecting the dead donor rule (DDR) remains the standard moral framework for organ procurement. The DDR increases organ supply without jeopardizing trust in transplantation systems, reassuring society that donors will not experience harm during organ procurement. While the assumption that individuals cannot be harmed once they are dead is reasonable in the case of brain-dead protocols, we argue that the DDR is not an acceptable strategy to protect donors from harm in DCD protocols. We propose a threefold alternative to justify organ procurement practices: (1) ensuring that donors are sufficiently protected from harm; (2) ensuring that they are respected through informed consent; and (3) ensuring that society is fully informed of the inherently debatable nature of any criterion to declare death.     

Social and emotional self‐efficacy at work

Research has shown that self‐efficacy is often one of the most important personal resources in the work context. However, because this research has focused on cognitive and task‐oriented self‐efficacy, little is known about social and emotional dimensions of self‐efficacy at work. The main aim of the present study was to investigate social and emotional self‐efficacy dimensions at work and to compare them to a cognitive and task‐oriented dimension. Scales to measure social and emotional self‐efficacy at work were developed and validated and found to be well differentiated from the cognitive task‐oriented occupational self‐efficacy scale. Confirmatory factor analyses of data from 226 Swedish and 591 German employees resulted in four separate but correlated self‐efficacy dimensions: (1) occupational; (2) social; (3) self‐oriented emotional; and (4) other‐oriented emotional. Social self‐efficacy explained additional variance in team climate and emotional self‐efficacy in emotional irritation and emotional exhaustion, over and above effects of occupational self‐efficacy. Men reported higher occupational self‐efficacy, whereas social and emotional self‐efficacy revealed no clear gender differences. The scales have strong psychometric properties in both Swedish and German language versions. The positive association between social self‐efficacy and team climate, and the negative relationships between self‐oriented emotional self‐efficacy and emotional irritation and emotional exhaustion may provide promising tools for practical applications in work settings such as team‐building, staff development, recruitment or other training programs aiming for work place health promotion. The next step will be to study how social and emotional self‐efficacy relate to leadership, well‐being and health over time.