An illness-specific version of the Revised Illness Perception Questionnaire in patients with atrial fibrillation (AF IPQ-R): Unpacking beliefs about treatment control,personal control and symptom triggers

Objective: This study modified the Revised Illness Perception Questionnaire (IPQ-R) in patients with persistent atrial fibrillation (AF).

Design: Qualitative interviews and think-aloud techniques informed modification of the IPQ-R to be specific to AF patients. Confirmatory Factor Analysis (CFA) (n = 198) examined the validity of the modified IPQ-R (AF-IPQ-R). Exploratory factor analysis (EFA) examined the new AF-triggers scale. Construct validity examined associations between the AF-IPQ-R, quality of life (QoL) and beliefs about medicines. Test–retest and internal reliability were examined.

Results: Interviews indicated that patients viewed triggers of AF rather than initial causes of illness as more applicable. Patients believed specific behaviours such as rest could control AF. Treatment control beliefs related to pharmacological and procedural treatments. These data were used to modify the IPQ-R subscales and to develop a triggers of AF scale. CFA indicated good model fit. EFA of the triggers scale indicated three factors: emotional; health behaviours; and over-exertion triggers. Expected correlations were found between the AF-IPQ-R, QoL and treatment beliefs, evidencing good construct validity.

Conclusion: The AF-IPQ-R showed sound psychometric properties. It provides more detailed specification than the IPQ-R of beliefs that may help to understand poor QoL in AF patients, and guidance for future interventions in this area.     

Prototypical supervisors shape lay‐off victims’ experiences of top management justice and organizational support

Job loss is a pervasive experience affecting millions of workers around the globe annually. To investigate lay‐offs from the perspective of those who are affected, we conducted a lagged study examining lay‐off victims’ experiences of supervisory justice, top management justice, and organizational support. We test the hypotheses that the relationships between supervisory justice and lay‐off victims’ subsequent experiences of top management justice as well as organizational support are moderated by supervisors’ prototypicality of their team. Results from our study conducted during lay‐off process indicated that supervisory justice had a positive lagged impact on lay‐off victims’ unfolding experiences of both (1) top management justice and (2) organizational support for supervisors who were viewed as highly (but not lowly) prototypical of the team that both supervisors and subordinates were part of. Our study identifies a theoretically grounded moderator that may account for the presence (or absence) of cross‐foci effects found in previous multifoci justice studies. Moreover, our results shed light on the development of justice perceptions by demonstrating the impact of lower‐level supervisors in translating subordinates’ perceptions of justice of the supervisor to that of the top management. Findings suggest that supervisors have an important role to play in managing (for better or worse) the potentially harmful consequences associated with organizational redundancies.

Practitioner points

• Prototypical supervisors are ‘gatekeepers’ who are able to influence their subordinates’ relationship with the organization and its management.
• Involving supervisors in critical events such as lay‐offs may be important to effectively manage employees’ concerns.
• It may not be well advised to overly centralize responsibility for communicating information regarding lay‐offs under human resource departments.

     

Sexual Perfectionism and Women’s Sexual Assertiveness: Understanding the Unique Effects of Perfectionistic Expectations about Sex Originating from and Directed toward the Sexual Partner

Marriage has significantly changed since Becker proposed his specialization model yet some scholars maintain that specialization characterizes modern couples. Specialization occurs when one partner, traditionally the man, concentrates on market work while the other partner, traditionally the woman, focuses on nonmarket work such as housework or childcare. Using innovative time diary data from primarily highly-educated, White, dual-earner U.S. couples, we examine how couples manage their time in market and household work and leisure across a momentous, gendered life course turning point—the transition to parenthood. We find little evidence of specialization, but stronger evidence of nonspecialization where both partners concurrently engaged in market work or leisure. Yet gender still mattered. Men enjoyed more leisure time, particularly on nonworkdays, whereas their partners performed more nonmarket work. Our study is the first known to uncover exactly what men were doing while women performed additional minutes of housework and childcare. On nonworkdays, fathers engaged in leisure 47% and 35% of the time during which mothers performed childcare and routine housework, respectively. Mothers engaged in leisure only about 16% to 19% of the time that fathers performed childcare and routine housework. In sum, although our study challenges economic theories of specialization by suggesting that nonspecialization is the norm for new parents’ time among highly-educated, dual-earner couples, persistent gender inequalities continue to characterize family work and leisure time.     

Nest sanitation as an effective defence against brood parasitism

Animal Cognition - Egg rejection is a crucial defence strategy against brood parasitism that requires the host to correctly recognise the foreign egg. Rejection behaviour has, thus, evolved in many...     

The role of career adaptabilities for mid-career changers

Career adaptability is mediated by personality factors and socio-psychological processes, with learning playing an important role. Using a five-fold career adapt-abilities competency framework (defined here as control, curiosity, commitment, confidence and concern), which was developed from the international quantitative study that is the focus of this special edition, an explicitly qualitative study of the career biographies of mid-career changers from two European countries was undertaken. Data from 64 in-depth interviews with adults in contrasting labor markets from Norway and the UK were analysed deductively, using a career adapt-abilities framework. Results demonstrate the utility of the framework, as well as how adaptive adults used both formal and informal learning to develop career adapt-ability competencies, over time, across occupations and occupational sectors. A key conclusion relates to how this career adapt-abilities competency framework could be used to motivate adults in mid-career to adopt behaviors that help them effect positive career change.     

Academic adjustment across middle school: the role of public regard and parenting

In the current longitudinal study, we examined associations between Black and Latino youths' perceptions of the public's opinion of their racial/ethnic group (i.e., public regard) and changes in academic adjustment outcomes across middle school. We also tested combinations of racial/ethnic socialization and parent involvement in academic activities as moderators of this association. We used a 2nd-order latent trajectory model to test changes in academic adjustment outcomes in a sample of 345 Black and Latino urban youth across 6th, 7th, and 8th grades (51% female). Results revealed a significant average linear decline in academic adjustment from 6th to 8th grade, as well as significant variation around this decline. We found that parenting moderated the association between public regard and the latent trajectory of academic adjustment. Specifically, for youth who reported high racial/ethnic socialization and low parent academic involvement, lower public regard predicted lower academic adjustment in 6th grade. For youth who reported both low racial/ethnic socialization and low parent academic involvement, lower public regard predicted a steeper decline in academic adjustment over time. Finally, among youth who reported high racial/ethnic socialization and high parent academic involvement, public regard was not associated with either the intercept or the slope of academic adjustment. Thus, the combination of high racial/ethnic socialization and parent academic involvement may protect youths' academic motivation and performance from the negative effects of believing the public has low opinions of one's racial/ethnic group. Implications for protecting Black and Latino youths' academic outcomes from decline during middle school are discussed.     

Couple therapy for military veterans: overall effectiveness and predictors of response

Despite the numerous challenges facing U.S. veterans and their relationships, there have been no examinations of the effectiveness of couple therapy for relationship distress provided to veterans. In the present study, 177 couples presenting for couple therapy at two Veteran Administration Medical Centers completed assessments of relationship satisfaction prior to therapy and weekly during therapy. Results revealed that the average couple showed significant gains in relationship satisfaction during treatment (d=0.44 for men; d=0.47 for women); gains were larger for couples beginning therapy in the distressed range (d=0.61 for men; d=0.58 for women) than for couples in the nondistressed range (d=0.19 for men; d=0.22 for women). Rates of premature termination were high, with 19% of couples completing fewer than three sessions and 62% rated as not completing a "full course" of therapy. Benchmarking analyses demonstrated that the average gains were larger than would be expected from natural remission and similar to previous effectiveness trials; however, average gains were smaller than those observed in couple therapy efficacy trials. Relationship, psychological, and demographic characteristics were generally unrelated to the amount of change in therapy after controlling for initial satisfaction. However, African American couples showed significantly larger gains than Caucasian, non-Hispanic couples. Thus, though yielding smaller effects than those shown in efficacy trials, the impact of couple therapy for veterans' relationship problems appears to generalize across various demographic, psychological, and relationship characteristics.     

The Deliberative Pulpit? The Democratic Norms and Practices of the PCUSA

In contrast to typical approaches that view religion as problematic or benign, thicker conceptions of religion's place in promoting and sustaining democratic politics are possible. This includes religious organizations modeling democratic practices and engaging in debate on common terms. We initiate this program of inquiry with data from a survey of Presbyterian Church, USA clergy gathered during the late summer and fall of 2009. We asked explicitly about clergy commitment to democratic norms and practices as reflected in their public speech and small group activities in their congregations. We use this article to explain variance in the results, looking especially to see if democratic commitments fall at the expense of religious competition, organizational maintenance, and personal preference and increased conservatism.     

Analysis of self-recording in self-management interventions for stereotypy

Most treatments for stereotypy involve arrangements of antecedent or consequent events that are imposed entirely by a therapist. By contrast, results of some studies suggest that self-recording, a common component of self-management interventions, might be an effective and efficient way to reduce stereotypy. Because the procedure typically has included instructions to refrain from stereotypy, self-recording of the absence of stereotypy, and differential reinforcement of accurate recording, it is unclear which element or combination of elements produces reductions in stereotypy. We conducted a component analysis of a self-management intervention and observed that decreases in stereotypy might be attributable to instructional control or to differential reinforcement, but that self-recording per se had little effect on stereotypy.     

A Narrower Scope or a Clearer Lens for Personality? Examining Sources of Observers’ Advantages Over Self‐Reports for Predicting Performance

Emerging studies have shown that observers' ratings of personality predict performance behaviors better than do self-ratings. However, it is unclear whether these predictive advantages stem from (a) use of observers who have a frame of reference more closely aligned with the criterion ("narrower scope") or (b) observers having greater accuracy than targets themselves ("clearer lens"). In a primary study of 291 raters of 97 targets, we found predictive advantages even when observers were personal acquaintances who knew targets only outside of the work context. Integrating these findings with previous meta-analyses showed that colleagues' unique perspectives did not predict incrementally beyond commonly held trait perceptions across all raters (except for openness) and that self-raters who overestimate their agreeableness and conscientiousness perform worse on the job. Broadly, our results suggest that observers have clearer lenses for viewing targets' personality traits, and we discuss the theoretical implications of these findings for studying and measuring personality.