Perceived stressors and stress responses among hospital-based nursing trainees

Perceived sources and levels of stress were assessed with a rating scale describing the experience of stressors and stress responses and an unstructured self-report about the reasons of such ratings in 60 nursing students in their first and final year of hospital training. The results, which show a significantly higher report of stress in the latter group, also point to identifiable sources of stressors in hospital-based nursing training procedures. Several recommendations to alleviate these conditions are discussed.     

Parenting stress in parents of children with attention-deficit hyperactivity disorder and parents of children with learning disabilities

Parenting a child with ADHD can challenge parenting resources and coping. Increasingly, researchers are examining the relationship between the behavior of the child with ADHD and family functioning. While studies have shown inceased parenting stress in parents of children with ADHD, these studies have compared children with ADHD to non-disabled children. This study compares reports of parenting stress among mothers of children with ADHD, mothers of children with learning disabilities and mothers of non-referred children. Results showed that parenting stress was highest for mothers of children with ADHD. Increased parenting stress was associated with child characteristics and, in particular, with externalizing behavior problems.     

Depression and unemployment: Panel findings from the Epidemiologic Catchment Area study

Studies that have found an association between unemployment and psychological depression often fail to establish the direction of causal influence. Analyses of Epidemiologic Catchment Area panel data revealed that of employed respondents not diagnosed with major depression at first interview, those who became unemployed had over twice the risk of increased depressive symptoms and of becoming clinically depressed as those who continued employed. Although the increase in symptoms was statistically significant, the effect on clinical depression was not, possibly because of the low power of the test. The reverse causal path from clinical depression at Time 1 to becoming unemployed by Time 2 was not supported. The unemployment rate in the respondent's community at time of interview was not related directly to psychological depression but appeared associated indirectly with depression via its impact on the risk of becoming unemployed. Implications for policy and further research were discussed. The research described in this paper was supported by Grant #5 RO1 AA08379-02 from the National Institute of Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism. The authors appreciate the suggestions provided by members of the Consortium for Research Involving Stress Processes sponsored by the W. T. Grant Foundation and by two anonymous journal reviewers.     

A spanish translation and validation of the daily stress inventory and a comparison of the level of stress experienced by three culturally distinct hispanic groups

Two studies were conducted, the first to establish a valid Spanish version of the Daily Stress Inventory (DSI). A second study was conducted using the bilingual version of the DSI to assess differences in the level of stress experienced by three selected Hispanic groups: (a) very Hispanic/Hispanic-oriented bicultural, (b) true bicultural, and (c) Anglo-oriented bicultural/very Anglicized as determined by the adapted version of the Acculturation Rating Scale for Mexican Americans (ARSMA). It was expected that stress levels would be highest for the least acculturated group. The results of the first study indicate that the Bilingual DSI scores are highly correlated with the scores of the original DSI when both instruments are responded to simultaneously by fully bilingual individuals. In Study 2, the initial data analyses showed no difference in the level of stress reported by Hispanics at different levels of acculturation as measured by the ARSMA. When a median-split method was employed, differences in the DSI I/E measures between the two groups were significant, suggesting that acculturation level may be related to stress level.     

Stress and family support as predictors of distress and rejection in people who care for a relative with schizophrenia

Relatives (N=121) of adult schizophrenia patients were interviewed to investigate predictors of their level of psychological distress and of rejecting attitudes toward the sufferer. The relatives' total stress, particularly that associated with poor communication skills in the sufferer, predicted several measures of their psychological distress, and the same variables plus turbulence of sufferer behavior (i.e., violence and disruptiveness) predicted rejection of the sufferer by the relative. In each case, adequacy of family support moderated the influence of the stressors, although this effect was more marked for distress outcomes than for rejection. The results have important implications for the sorts of professional and peer support which relatives may need to encourage their performance of this potentially burdensome role. In addition, the results fit a classic stress management model and provide a feasible alternative to the Expressed Emotion Model of the relationship between relatives' rejection and patients' illness severity.     

Organizational stress and stress management programs

There is a growing awareness of how stress adversely affects organizational efficiency. The implementation of stress management programs to counteract this problem has been slow. This study examined such programs in companies who claimed that they were active and successful in stress management for their employees. The successful features of these organizational stress management programs are identified, discussed, and a model for organizations is presented.     

Characteristics of Calls to Israeli Hotlines During the Gulf War

The current study presents results of a survey of 3,215 calls received at seven centers of telephone emergency services (TES) in Israel during the Gulf War, when citizens of Israel experienced severe stress resulting from SCUD missile attacks. Whereas former surveys have shown that characteristics of calls to TES in Israel are generally not affected by external stressogenic events, a remarkable change was recorded in both the quantity and quality of calls received in TES centers in Israel during the Gulf War. The relative frequencies of problem categories presented by callers during the Gulf War revealed a significant increase in environmental pressures, a category that reflected the stressful situation of the war, as opposed to intra- or interpersonal problems typical of peacetime calls. A comparison between this group of war calls and a control group of nonwar calls, revealed that the two groups represented populations of callers differing in sociodemographic characteristics, expectations, and benefits from the calls. Results are discussed in reference to the unique role of TES as a source of psychological first-aid in a community crisis situation.     

语句重音分布模式知觉

在排除语义和句法结构信息的情况下,用统计方法研究听者使用局部的韵律学线索知觉语句重音分布模式的能力;并根据知觉模式,讨论汉语中重音分类、词重音在语流中的变化以及重音在语句组织和语义表达中的作用等问题。     

Diagnosing posttraumatic stress disorder with the MMPI clinical scales: A review of the literature

A review of the literature resulted in 21 published studies that reported mean MMPI profile patterns for PTSD patients. Of these, six (29%) reported that the mean 8-2 profile pattern significantly differentiated PTSD patients from non-PTSD patients. The majority of studies found additional PTSD profile patterns reflecting nearly all of the MMPI clinical scales. The data indicate some common group profile patterns for inpatient veterans, prisoner's of war, and inpatient veteran substance abusers. The results also support the hypothesis that there is a continuum from inpatient to outpatient and veteran to civilian populations that corresponds with both symptom and stressor severity. It is concluded that although there is some typicality in similar populations, clinicians should expect heterogeneous MMPI profiles from PTSD patients representing a diversity of clinical symptoms and styles.     

MFT trainee adjustment to program lifestyle stress: The TAPS scale

The 30-item Trainee Adjustment to Program Stress (TAPS) scale was developed to measure lifestyle stress of family therapy trainees. Initially, 70 items were generated from propositional statements based on four constructs. Following pilot testing, 329 out of 900 (37%) student members of the American Association for Mariage and Family Therapy (AAMFT) returned TAPS questionnaires. Internal consistency reliability analyses and principal components and factor analyses produced a final 30 item TAPS scale appropriate for use in family therapy training programs. Reliability and validity measures are reported.