HIV-positive pregnant women attending the prevention of mother-to-child transmission of HIV/AIDS (PMTCT) services in Ethiopia: economic productivity losses across urban-rural settings

HIV/AIDS impacts significantly on pregnant women and on children in Ethiopia. This impact has a multiplier effect on household economies and on productivity losses, and is expected to vary across rural and urban settings. Applying the human capital approach to data collected from 131 respondents, this study estimated productivity losses per HIV-positive pregnant woman–infant pair across urban and rural health facilities in Ethiopia, which in turn were used to estimate the national productivity loss. The study found that the annual productivity loss per woman–infant pair was Ethiopian birr (ETB) 7,433 or United States dollar (US$) 378 and ETB 625 (US$ 32) in urban and rural settings, respectively. The mean patient days lost per year due to inpatient admission at hospitals/health centres was 11 in urban and 22 in rural health facilities. On average, urban home care-givers spent 20 (SD = 21) days annually providing home care services, while their rural counterparts spent 23 days (SD = 26). The productivity loss accounted for 16% and 7% of household income in urban and rural settings, respectively. These high and varying productivity losses require preventive interventions that are appropriate to each setting to ensure the welfare of women and children in Ethiopia.     

Changes in syllabus tone affect warmth (but not competence) ratings of both male and female instructors

The syllabus is often the first meaningful piece of information that students receive about a course. Previous research has indicated that students form more positive impressions of a course instructor after reading a syllabus that has been manipulated to convey information in a friendly, rather than unfriendly, tone (Harnish and Bridges in Soc Psychol Educ 14:319–330, 2011). While a friendly syllabus leads to increased perceptions of instructor warmth and approachability, it is unclear from this previous research whether a friendly syllabus may also lead to decreases in the perceived competence of the instructor. Thus, we aimed to clarify whether changes in syllabus tone affect perceptions of instructor competency. We also wished to explore the possibility of gender bias affecting these syllabus-based impressions of instructors, and to examine whether differences in syllabus tone impact the impressions formed of male and female instructors in the same way. Participants read a friendly or unfriendly course syllabus from either a male, female, or gender-unspecified instructor. Regardless of instructor gender, participants receiving the friendly syllabus perceived the instructor as being more approachable, more caring, and more motivating, but not any more or less competent, compared to those receiving the unfriendly syllabus. While instructors will be relieved to know that efforts to appear friendly on a course syllabus do not appear to negatively impact student perceptions of instructor competence, more research is needed to examine the potential role of gender bias on students’ initial impressions of instructors.     

The effects of ambiguous appearance-related feedback on body image,mood states,and intentions to use body change strategies in college women: An experimental study

The current study evaluated the effects of receiving ambiguous appearance-based or nonappearance-based feedback on body image, mood states, and body change strategies. One hundred and forty-six women were randomly assigned to either an appearance condition, wherein they interacted with a confederate supposedly working for a cosmetic surgery center, or a nonappearance condition, in which the confederate purportedly worked for an academic enhancement center. Counter to expectations, there was no evidence of significant group differences on most of the variables that assessed mood states and body change strategies. However, intentions to engage in bulimic behavior were significant higher and dieting intentions marginally higher at posttest for the appearance condition, however anger levels were significantly higher for the nonappearance condition. Limitations of the study are discussed and future indications for research in this area are suggested.     

Testing the theory of embodied cognition with subliminal words

In the current study, we tested the embodied cognition theory (ECT). The ECT postulates mandatory sensorimotor processing of words when accessing their meaning. We test that prediction by investigating whether invisible (i.e., subliminal) spatial words activate responses based on their long-term and short-term meaning. Masking of the words is used to prevent word visibility and intentional elaboration of the words’ semantic content. In this way, masking specifically isolates mandatory sensorimotor processing of words as predicted by the ECT. Do spatial subliminal words activate responses nonetheless? In Experiment 1, we demonstrate a spatial congruence effect of the invisible words if they precede visible target words. In Experiment 2, we show that masked words activate responses based on their long-term meaning. In Experiment 3, we demonstrate that masked words are also processed according to their short-term response meaning. We conclude that the ECT is supported by our findings and discuss implications of our results for embodied theories of semantic word processing and masked priming experiments.     

Counseling Considerations Among Arab Americans

In keeping with our pluralistic society, counselors have begun the task of attempting to understand issues of multicultural diversity. The purpose of this article is to describe a focus group interview conducted with a group of therapists in a large‐scale, comprehensive family service agency in an Arab American community. Participants represented various countries of origin, helping disciplines, and years of U.S. residence. The interview format was semistructured, and the results confirmed what little was already known about the population and supplemented that body of knowledge with updated information. Implications for counseling and further research are discussed.     

Who is empowered? Relative importance of dispositional and situational sources to psychological empowerment

Major reviews of psychological empowerment (PE) suggest four broad sources to becoming empowered: organizational, leadership, job, and dispositional. This study examines the redundancy, uniqueness, and relative importance within and across these situational and dispositional domains using commonality and dominance analyses. Across multiple samples, we find (a) within socio-structural domains, empowering leadership, knowledge sharing, and task significance are the most unique organizational sources of PE, (b) dispositional predictors augment situational features in explaining PE, and, perhaps most importantly, (c) job characteristics (JC) along with core self-evaluation (CSE) occupy the most dominant role on PE. In study 1 (N = 229), rank and CSE accounted for 64% of the variance in PE after accounting for information distribution, leadership, and the Big Five. Controlling for expanded Big Five inventory, leadership constructs, and socio-structurally features, study 2 (N = 171) finds general dominance of task significance (14%), empowering leadership (19%), and reduced, albeit incremental, effect of CSE (10%). Finally, study 3 (N = 386) replicates the large (30%) and moderately (10%) dominant effects of multiple JC dimensions and CSE. Implications call for a micro-level approach to PE emphasizing expanded roles, broadened self-concept, and personal impact on society rather than inspiring managers or organizational practices.     

Hopelessness,Parent‐Adolescent Communication,and Suicidal Ideation among Chinese Adolescents in Hong Kong

Based on the responses of 5,557 Chinese secondary students in Hong Kong, the relationships among perceived hopelessness, family functioning, and suicidal ideation were examined. Results showed that suicidal ideation was positively related to hopelessness, but negatively related to parent‐adolescent communication. Compared with father‐adolescent communication, mother‐adolescent communication generally had a stronger association with adolescent suicidal ideation. It was further found that the linkage between hopelessness and adolescent suicidal ideation was stronger under a low parent‐adolescent communication condition, thus suggesting the moderating effect of parent‐adolescent communication on the effect of hopelessness on suicidal ideation. The theoretical and practical implications of the findings are discussed.     

“长白云国度”海外传教运动视野下的对华传教——新西兰赴华传教士(1877-1952)

新西兰对华传教史至今尚被忽略,本文尝试在国际差传体系的大视野下检视新西兰赴华传教的个案,先就人数、差会、性别比例、阶段性发展等因素作通史性勾勒,再以"英属殖民地差传国"、"小型次传教国"和"对华传教对新西兰本土的反向影响"为理论进路挖掘一些易为"外史型"学者所忽略的问题。在海内外中国教会史研究日臻细化的趋势下,新西兰兼具"中心"与"边缘"、"接收"与"差派"的双重属性,加上国土之"小"、人口之"少"、教会史之"短"、宗派之"简"等特点,皆增添了这一课题所潜藏的学术价值。