Satisfaction,involvement, and unconditional care: The perceptions of children and adolescents receiving wraparound services

Client satisfaction has emerged as an important variable in evaluating outcomes for mental health treatment, yet studies have seldom queried children and adolescents about their perceptions of the services they receive. The present study surveyed 20 youths receiving community-based, wraparound services about their satisfaction, sense of involvement, and feelings of unconditional care. Unconditional care, in this case, referred to the youth's sense that his or her caretakers would remain stable regardless of what happened. Each of these variables was in turn related to behavioral adjustment. It was found that both youths' sense of involvement and their perceptions that their care was unconditional were strongly associated with satisfaction with services. However, neither satisfaction nor involvement were correlated with the severity of subjects' acting-out behaviors. Subjects' perception that care was unconditional was strongly, negatively correlated with the severity of acting-out behaviors. Thus, while the relationship between satisfaction and behavior remains unclear, it appears that youths' perceptions of the stability of their services plays a role in their acting out. It was concluded that youths' feelings about their services can provide meaningful information for researchers and service providers.     

TEACHING CHILDREN APPROPRIATE SHOPPING BEHAVIOR THROUGH PARENT TRAINING IN THE SUPERMARKET SETTING1

The shopping behavior of three elementary school-age boys was analyzed and parent-child interactions assessed for one boy and his mother. Estimates of parent or consumer satisfaction with child shopping behavior were also obtained. The effects of a parent-mediated treatment package on child behavior were assessed using a multiple-baseline design. Treatment produced significant increases in appropriate shopping behavior in all three children and parents became increasingly satisfied with improved child behavior. Analysis of data for one mother also revealed that her manner of interacting with her child became more positive.     

PEER TRAINING OF SAFETY-RELATED SKILLS TO INSTITUTIONAL STAFF: BENEFITS FOR TRAINERS AND TRAINEES

A peer training program, in which experienced staff trained new staff, was evaluated as a method for teaching and maintaining safety-related caregiver skills in an institutional setting for the developmentally disabled. Three sets of safety-type skills were assessed in simulated emergency situations: responding to facility fires, managing aggressive attacks by residents, and assisting residents during convulsive seizures. Using a multiple-baseline research design, results indicated that the peer training program was an effective method of training the three types of emergency skills to new direct care staff. The program also appeared effective in improving the skills of the peer trainers. Perhaps most importantly, results indicated that if experienced staff functioned as peer trainers for particular emergency skills, then their proficiency in those skills maintained over time whereas their proficiency declined in emergency skills for which they did not act as peer trainers. Social validity information collected from available staff 23 months after the program was completed supported the utility of the training in terms of staff responses during actual emergencies. Also, acceptability measures indicated that staff liked participating in the program. However, some inconsistencies between staff verbal reports and performance-based measures of acceptability were noted. Results are discussed regarding the overall effectiveness of the peer training program, the importance of maintenance strategies for safety-related skills, and the need for multidimensional analyses of staff acceptability in staff training/management research.     

EXPERIMENTS IN A COMMUNITY MENTAL HEALTH CENTER: INCREASING CLIENT PAYMENTS FOR OUTPATIENT SERVICES

Although public health care systems often depend on revenue generated from client payment for services, inadequate agency fee payment systems continue to create substantial administrative problems. The first study examined the effects of implementing a system for producing and maintaining routine client fee payment. The second study was a replication of the first study. The Credit Criterion System was designed to: (a) allow clients to establish intra-agency credit by paying cash for each of the first three visits; and (b) pay for services monthly after credit was established. The system resulted in a baseline collection rate of 20%, compared with the Credit Criterion rate of 96.6%. The Credit Criterion System did not create additional administrative costs and it had no effect on attendance. Thus, the Credit Criterion System appears to be a reasonable set of procedures for allowing clients to meet their financial obligations to an agency.     

The Nursing Stress Scale: Development of an instrument

Despite increased recognition of the stress experienced by hospital nursing staffs and its effects on burnout, job satisfaction, turnover, and patient care, few instruments exist that can be used to measure stress. This paper describes the development of an instrument, the Nursing Stress Scale (NSS). It consists of 34 items that describe situations that have been identified as causing stress for nurses in the performance of their duties. It provides a total stress score as well as scores on each of seven subscales that measure the frequency of stress experienced by nurses in the hospital environment. The Nursing Stress Scale was administered to 122 nurses on five hospital units. Factor analysis indicated seven major sources of stress that closely paralleled the conceptual categories of stress on which the scale was based. Test-retest reliability as well as four measures of internal consistency indicated that the Nursing Stress Scale and its seven subscales are reliable. Validity was determined by correlating the total score from the Nursing Stress Scale with measures of trait anxiety, job satisfaction, and nursing turnover hypothesized to be related to stress. In addition, the ability of the scale to differentiate hospital units and groups of nurses known to experience high levels of stress resulting in staff turnover was examined.     

Consumer evaluation in practice

Users of a community child and adolescent mental health service were surveyed, 3–4 weeks after their last contact, to determine their satisfaction with the service they received. High levels of overall satisfaction were obtained by general ratings, which tended to mask more specific critical comments to open-ended questions suggesting ways in which the service could be improved. The resulting changes in service provision are identified, the general value of consumer surveys discussed and the need to include open-ended questions in satisfaction surveys emphasized.     

IS SOCIAL VALIDITY WHAT WE ARE INTERESTED IN? ARGUMENT FOR A FUNCTIONAL APPROACH

It is argued that neither the term social nor the term validity is best to identify the processes used or the results obtained in questioning consumers about the goals set, procedures employed, or outcomes achieved in habilitative programming. The term consumer satisfaction acknowledges the fact that it is essentially a collection of consumer opinions. The underlying intent of the process might be called habilitative validation, a name that seems to better guide our validation efforts. More important, in carefully considering consumer satisfaction assessment, it becomes clear that not only does consumer satisfaction itself need to be validated, but also that more objective methods can be used for assessing habilitative validity. However, legitimate uses still remain for consumer satisfaction measurement, as long as we do not mistake it for strong evidence of the habilitative validity of our goals, procedures, or outcomes.     

日资企业中职工的满意度与选好度——中国与东南亚三国的比较

本文比较了在日资企业里工作的中国和东南亚三国职工的满意度和企业选好度。1总体而言 ,四国职工的满意度都不太高。中国职工对“现在的工资”、“工资的增长”、“福利保健”及“劳动时间”等方面的满意度更低于东南亚三国。只在“职业稳定性”和“对上司的态度”上显示出比较满意。而东南亚三国在“劳动时间”和“福利保健”上有较高的满意度。2与欧美企业相比 ,四国职工对日资企业的评价总体上是低的。除“雇佣稳定性”外 ,对所有项目的回答都是欧美企业优于日资企业。 3如果条件相同 ,中国职工对企业的选好度的顺序是 :本国企业、欧美企业、港台企业和日资企业。马来西亚是 :日本企业、欧美企业、本国企业、港台企业。印度尼西亚将日资企业排在第二位。泰国将日资企业排在第三位。4在中国 ,对日资企业的选好度的决定因素是对工作和待遇的满意度和对日资企业劳动条件的评价。而在东南亚三国 ,起决定作用的是满意度和日本管理有用性。     

员工正念对配偶家庭满意度和工作投入的影响

文章基于资源保存理论, 采用体验抽样法收集了一家商业银行114名员工及其配偶的数据。结果表明, 在个体内层面, 员工正念通过员工情感联结策略的中介作用影响其配偶家庭满意度及第二天早上工作投入; 在个体间层面的配偶家庭负面情感表达调节了员工正念与员工情感联结策略的关系及员工情感联结策略的中介作用, 即配偶家庭负面情感表达水平越高, 员工正念对员工情感联结策略的影响及员工情感联结策略的中介作用相对更弱。     

Comment favoriser l’anticipation positive d’un déménagement organisationnel chez des salariés ? Test d’un modèle psychosocio-environnemental

French academic research on organizational relocation is scarce. This study aimed to explore how positive attitudes can be developed before organizational relocation using a psycho-social environmental model. More specifically, this paper analyzes the impact of workplace attachment and socio-professional support on anticipated satisfaction with relocation and the mediating role of the agreement with the top management decision to move. We conducted an empirical study with a sample of 119 employees of an audiovisual company based in France. Results show that anticipated satisfaction with relocation was inhibited by workplace attachment and facilitated by socio-professional support. Moreover, agreement with the change decision to move mediated these relationships.