Healthcare at Your Fingertips: The Professional Ethics of Smartphone Health-Monitoring Applications

Health professionals are inundated by the surfeit of health apps while lacking guidance to help them critically evaluate whether a particular health-monitoring app is safe, likely to lead to clinical benefit, and not introduce additional liability. Our objective is not to argue for or against the use of mobile health-monitoring apps but to illuminate the associated ethical issues and provide recommendations to guide the ethical decision-making process for clinicians who are considering the use of a mobile health-monitoring app. To this end, the Canadian Code of Ethics for Psychologists is used as a framework to situate recommendations.     

A focus on commitment: the roles of transformational and transactional leadership and self-regulatory focus in fostering organizational and safety commitment

The concept of employees’ commitment is one of the most challenging concepts in the management, organizational behaviour and human resource management literatures and research. The current study focuses on the construct of commitment as an emotional attitude, and expands the concept of general organizational commitment to a new more specific form of commitment, commitment to safety. Furthermore, commitment theorists commonly identify leadership as an important contributing factor to the development of organizational commitment. We aim to explain an underlying motivational mechanism, self-regulatory foci, through which leadership styles foster followers’ commitment. Results of three studies that used different methods (field and experimental), within different samples, demonstrated that transformational leadership was positively associated with followers’ promotion focus, which in turn was positively associated with both followers’ general and affective commitment to safety. Prevention focus mediated the positive relationship between a transactional active leadership style and both followers’ general and continuance commitment to safety. The implications of the findings for theory and practice are further discussed.     

Online access by adolescents in Accra: Ghanaian teens' use of the internet for health information

In developed countries, adolescents go online to find information about health; however, little is known about the online practices of youth from developing countries. This study's purpose was to explore and provide current information, drawn from adolescents living in Ghana's capital city of Accra, on the use of the Internet as a health information source. Using a representative sample of in-school adolescents and a convenience sample of out-of-school adolescents, 778 15- to 18-year-olds completed a detailed media and health information survey. Two-thirds (66%) of the in-school youth and approximately half (54%) of the out-of-school youth had previously gone online. Of all these Internet users, 53% had sought online health information, and this percentage did not differ significantly by gender, age, ethnicity, or even school status. Youth reported great interest, high levels of efficacy, and positive perceptions of online health information. Although more research should be conducted, this study offers exciting data on the potential to deliver, via the Internet, health information to youth in developing countries.     

Standards for evaluating proposals to develop ethics curricula

A focus on standards for assessing proposals for online teaching of practical and professional ethics provides an approach to standards for raising the level of online teaching. Intellectual merit, broad impact, and integration of research and teaching featuring a high level of interactivity are key criteria for evaluation. Especially noted is research that can serve to prepare instructors, to enrich the content of courses, and to stimulate further research. Yet raising the level of online teaching hinges on developing easy access and navigability in an online curriculum.     

A Tale of Two Cities: Replication of a Study on the Acculturation and Adaptation of Immigrant Adolescents From the Former Soviet Union in a Different Community Context

While a great deal of research has been conducted to understand acculturation and its relationship to adaptation in the new country, surprisingly little attention has been paid to the ways in which the characteristics of the local community impact these processes. The present study addresses this gap in the literature by exploring the potential role of community differences in the acculturation and adaptation processes of 269 refugee and immigrant adolescents from the former Soviet Union who resettled in two different community contexts. Specifically, a prior study on acculturation and adjustment among high school students (D. Birman, E. J. Trickett, & A. Vinokurov, 2002) was replicated with the same émigré population in a contrasting community within the same state. The contrast between these communities allowed us to test hypotheses emerging from an ecological perspective concerning (1) patterns of acculturation, (2) levels of discrimination and its effect on acculturative outcomes, and (3) community differences in the relationship between acculturation and outcomes. In addition to the focus on community differences, the study also employs a multidimensional measure of acculturation and assesses acculturation to both American and Russian culture. Furthermore, adaptation is assessed across different life domains; including peer relationships, family relationships, school adaptation, and psychological adaptation. Findings support the general ecological perspective, suggesting the importance of studying acculturation and adaptation as a reflexive process in which culture and context are very much intertwined.     

Acculturation and adaptation of Soviet Jewish refugee adolescents: predictors of adjustment across life domains

This study explores how acculturation is related to adaptation across different life spheres for 162 Soviet Jewish refugee adolescents in a suburban community in Maryland. Because the different contexts of refugee adolescents' lives vary in acculturative demands, different patterns of acculturation should be related to adaptation in different life spheres. The study uses a multidimensional measure of acculturation and assesses acculturation to both American and Russian cultures as it relates to psychological adaptation, peer relations, and school and family outcomes. Findings support the general ecological thesis that acculturation to different cultures is differentially related to adaptation across life domains. Acculturation to American culture predicted better grades and perceived support from American peers. Acculturation to Russian culture predicted perceived support from Russian peers. Both American acculturation and Russian acculturation predicted reduced loneliness and perceived support from parents. Further, different dimensions of acculturation, such as language and identity, were differentially related to adaptation. Implications for acculturation theory and measurement are drawn, and cautions are offered about the interpretation of acculturation studies using single proxies such as language use or preference.     

Making sense of scientists' responsibilities at the interface of science and society. Commentary on "Six Domains of Research Ethics"

As Kenneth Pimple points out, scientists’ responsibilities to the larger society have received less attention than ethical issues internal to the practice of science. Yet scientists and specialists who study science have begun to provide analyses of the foundations and scope of scientsts’ responsibilities to society. An account of contributions from Kristen Shrader-Frechette, Melanie Leitner, Ullica Segerstråle, John Ahearne, Helen Longino, and Carl Cranor offers work on scientists’ social responsibilities upon which to build.     

Effects of a Self-Help Program on Depressed Mood for Women with an Unfulfilled Child Wish

This randomized controlled trial aimed to examine the effectiveness of a cognitive behavioral self-help program (CBS) with minimal coaching in improving depressed mood for women with a permanent unfulfilled child wish. Participants completed pretest, posttest, and follow-up questionnaires and were randomly allocated to CBS (n = 27) or a waiting list condition (WLC, n =27). Respondents who followed the CBS improved significantly on depression scores compared to the WLC. This positive effect remained at follow-up. This study suggests that a low-resource, low-cost self-help program could be an effective intervention in reducing depressed mood in women living with the loss of a desired child.     

Using a Constant Family in Role-Plays for Training MFTs

Marriage and Family Therapy training programs use role-plays and simulations to train their students in interviewing skills and in various therapeutic models. A review of literature shows that these training tools do not allow student-therapists to experience therapy beyond the first session. This article presents a modified version of the role-play, in which a constant family is used in preparing student-therapists for clinical work. This article describes a training scenario using the constant family role play and includes feedback from student-therapists. The authors present the benefits, limitations, and potential training considerations that can enhance use of the constant family role play.