Managing Mental Health Crises of Foreign College Students

Student services professionals manage a number of mental health crises as part of their job responsibilities. This article examines some of the issues that arise from assisting foreign college students experiencing such crises, with special focus on psychiatric committal, withdrawal from school, and return to the home county.     

COMPLEXITY IN NURSING EDUCATION: EXAMPLES OF THE PARADIGM

Edgar Morin proposed that knowledge construction is best enacted via a complex and circular approach between both the part and the whole, while never enacting a strictly reductionistic or strictly holistic approach. It is the ability to connect and unite the parts within the whole via a dynamic circular process between the parts and whole that frees us from fragmented knowledge and helps us to bridge the gap between our seemingly disparate-competing nursing paradigms. This article examines the benefits of utilizing Morin's complexity theory, the dialogical, and circular processes in creating a liberating structural framework or paradigm for nursing education.     

Stereotype Threat: A Meta‐Analysis Comparing African Americans to Hispanic Americans1

Stereotype threat theory posits an explanation for cognitive underperformance in groups based on social stereotypes. When stereotypes are negatively related to a cognitive task, awareness of this relationship leads to decreased performance on that task; however, this underperformance can be reduced by actively dismissing the stereotype or disguising the nature of the task. This meta‐analysis examined the effects of stereotype threat nullification among African Americans and Hispanic Americans. There was a moderate improvement in scores for both African American and Hispanic Americans' performance when stereotype threat was nullified (d = 0.52). However, there were no differences between African Americans and Hispanic Americans or between the experimental methods used to create stereotype threats in terms of their effects on the outcomes.     

All holes are the same: Emerging from the confusion

The author describes a type of mental development in which the primitive libidinal value of faeces and urine is kept unaltered all through adulthood. In this instance, individuals harbour fantasies of projective identifi cation with the internal parents, denying their real dependence, which leads to a pseudomaturity. These fantasies are usually accompanied by anal and genital masturbation and have intense aggressive content. Furthermore, there is a signifi cant confusion among all body orifi ces, leading to an inability to distinguish the self from the object, the inner world from outside reality. Individuals with this type of development can only maintain limited object relations and have highly erotized excretory activities. Manipulation of faeces may occur. This structure works as a defence against breakdown, but may also provide pleasure as it gives the illusion of omnipotent control of the object, as typical in pathological organizations. The author presents clinical material and discusses the diffi culties of the analysis, in which the patient tries to seduce the analyst into colluding with his mental functioning, primarily as a means of communication as well as a projection of his despair and his disbelief in the analyst's ability to help him.     

How do friendship maintenance behaviors and problem‐solving styles function at the individual and dyadic levels?

Friendship maintenance behaviors and problem‐solving styles are both important for relationship satisfaction and commitment. However, the association between maintenance and problem‐solving styles is unclear. Furthermore, it has not been determined if maintenance and problem‐solving styles are individual‐ or dyadic‐level behaviors. One hundred forty‐eight friendship dyads completed measures of friendship maintenance, problem solving, and satisfaction/commitment. Utilizing the pairwise latent variable model (G. Griffin & R. Gonzalez, 1995), this research found that although there were both individual‐ and dyadic‐level components, maintenance behaviors occurred primarily at the dyadic level, but problem‐solving styles tended to be more of an individual‐level behavior. Maintenance behaviors were positively correlated with the problem‐solving styles of voice and loyalty but were negatively correlated with neglect and exit. Furthermore, friendship maintenance behaviors predicted dyadic‐level satisfaction/commitment. However, problem‐solving behaviors predicted individual‐level satisfaction/commitment. The results are discussed in terms of implications for the friendship maintenance and problem‐solving literature.