Aspiring to become a therapist: Personal strengths and challenges,influences, motivations,and expectations of future psychotherapists

Ten female students who were considering therapy as a career path wrote self-reflection papers and were interviewed regarding their career choice. Consensual qualitative research was used to analyze the data. These participants all indicated a passion for helping others, believed in the importance of giving back, and had prior experiences in helping activities. They considered themselves to have personal helping-related strengths (e.g. empathy) as well as challenges (e.g. avoidance of interpersonal conflict), and worried about potential problems they would encounter as therapists (e.g. being too emotionally invested). Participants expressed both other-oriented (e.g. to help others who had similar painful experiences) and self-oriented (e.g. to help self) motivations for wanting to become therapists. Implications for helping undergraduate students reflect about therapy as a career choice are offered.     

Editorial

The aim was to investigate organizational impact on working conditions and to explore the associations between sector, different types of organizational change, and working conditions. A strategic selection was made of representative staff members from 72 work sites. Data pertaining to organizational factors were collected from managers, and to working conditions from employees. Multilevel analyses were performed, with 10 aspects of self-reported and expert assessed psychosocial and ergonomic/physical working conditions as the dependent variables, and patterns of organizational change and sector as the explanatory variables. The results showed that the variance in working conditions was significantly attributed to organizational level (16?–?65% of the variance), and that both the pattern of change and the sector were important. Organizations that had not undergone change provided the best work conditions. The “standardizing” and “market-adjusting” patterns of change had deleterious effects, while the “lean” and “centralizing” patterns led to dual outcomes. Organizational change was perceived as having more negative consequences in the public sector than in the private sector. The results indicate that organizational change contributes to increased differentiation of working conditions, as different types of changes congregate in specific areas of the labour market and affect groups of employees differently.     

Religion and positive well-being among Israeli and diaspora Jews: Findings from the World Values Survey

This study investigates the impact of selected religious indicators on two measures of positive well-being among Jews. Using data from subsamples of Jewish respondents from Israel (N?=?1,023) and the diaspora (N?=?859) taken from the World Values Survey, single-item measures of happiness and life satisfaction were regressed onto six measures of religiousness in the diaspora sample and onto the one religious measure available in the Israeli sample, adjusting for effects of age, gender, marital status, education, employment, and social class. Among Israeli Jews, affirming the importance of God in one's life is modestly associated with greater life satisfaction (β?=?0.07, p?<?0.05), but not with happiness. In the diaspora, the same measure is associated with greater happiness (β?=?0.13, p?<?0.01), as is more frequent attendance at synagogue services (β?=?0.14, p?<?0.01), but neither is associated with life satisfaction.     

Religious support and psychosocial well-being among a religious Jewish population

The three subscales of the Religious Support Scale assess perceived support from a person’s religious community, religious leaders, and God. This three-factor structure was replicated in the current study with a sample of 277 religious Jewish persons residing in Israel. Hierarchical canonical analysis showed that, even after controlling for general social support, Religious Leader and God Support were related to lower emotional distress, Religious Leader and Religious Community Support contributed to a higher level of life satisfaction, and Religious Community and God Support contributed to the prediction of perceived health. Findings are discussed in terms of religious support’s generalizability as a psychosocial resource for persons of various faiths.     

Ways to independence

Much research attests to the beneficial effects of equine interventions on physical development and ability. However, less is known about the possible psychological benefits of horse activities, such as therapeutic riding or interactions with horses. Although there is public consensus that horses can have psychological benefits, it is an under-researched area and conclusions are largely based on anecdotal data. The little empirical evidence that is available about the efficacy of equine-assisted interventions on psychological outcomes tends to be mixed and is often difficult to interpret due to the lack of rigorous research designs. The purpose of this review was to examine the current state of the literature regarding the psychological effects of equine-assisted interventions, and to make recommendations for future research. Findings from this review suggest that equine-assisted interventions hold much promise, particularly in terms of child/adolescent social and behavioural issues, and perhaps adult affective disorders. However, the current state of the literature does not allow us to definitively conclude that equine-assisted interventions are efficacious. Well-designed randomised controlled trials are greatly needed in this area, as it is an appreciation of the need to standardise and document equine-assisted interventions and outcomes in future research.     

Exploring the atheist personality: well-being,awe, and magical thinking in atheists,Buddhists, and Christians

Atheists are America’s least trusted group, and stereotypes about them abound: Atheists are non-conformist, sceptical, cynical, and joyless, rarely experiencing awe. Atheists (N?=?42) were recruited from the American atheist website and compared to Christians (N?=?22) and Buddhists (N?=?18). Groups were highly similar in their reported well-being, empathy, and other personality scales, but differed strongly on scales assessing Spirituality and Magical Ideation, where atheists rejected the concepts of spirituality and magical beliefs. Responding to the question, “Have you ever felt wonderment or felt as if you were part of something greater than yourself?,” 71% said “yes,” citing Nature (54%), Science, (30%), Music/Art (12%), and Human cooperation (8%). Respondents explained their lack of belief as deriving from a preference for logic and rationality, suggesting an intellectual component to atheism. Findings thus support the stereotype of atheists as logical, sceptical, and non-conformist, but not as cynical and joyless.     

Exiters of religious fundamentalism: reconstruction of social support and relationships related to well-being

ABSTRACT

Over the past decade, researchers have documented the steady growth of religious “exiters” – those who drop their affiliation with any organised religion. Religious disaffiliation or “exiting” may affect health, and while most studies of religion and health are quantitative and emphasise the health benefits of religious involvement, little qualitative research has been devoted to documenting the lived experience of religious exiting. This qualitative study investigates the social psychological consequences of leaving religion in an understudied subgroup of exiters – individuals who have left Christian fundamentalist religions. Drawing on 24 in-depth interviews, this research reveals the processes through which former religious participants reconstruct supportive social relationships to reinforce their well-being. The results demonstrate that while it is challenging in the initial stages of the exiting process to forge and cultivate new supportive relationships, the construction of nonreligious social networks eventually contributed to their greater well-being.     

The relationships between subjective well-being,health, and religiosity among young adults from Qatar

Introduction: The aims of this study were to explore the associations between, and the factors of, subjective well-being, health, and religiosity among Qatari undergraduates. A sample of 113 male and 133 female college students from University of Qatar responded to the Oxford Happiness Inventory, Satisfaction With Life Scale, and Love of Life Scale, as well as to five self-rating scales to assess happiness, satisfaction with life, mental health, physical health, and religiosity. Men obtained a significantly higher mean score on self-rating of mental health than did their female counterparts. All the correlations between the scales were significant and positive. Principal components analysis yielded one factor in both the sexes and labelled “Well-being, health and religiosity.” The only predictor of religiosity was the self-rating scale of satisfaction in men and women. It was concluded that those who consider themselves as religious in the present study reported higher subjective well-being and good health.     

God,the good life,and HEXACO: the relations among religion,subjective well-being and personality

The relations among religiousness, subjective well-being (SWB) and the HEXACO (Honesty–Humility, Emotionality, eXtraversion, Agreeableness, Conscientiousness, Openness) model of personality were studied in a Muslim population. As expected, Extraversion and Honesty-Humility factors were the strongest correlates of SWB and religiosity, respectively. Religiosity also correlated with higher levels of SWB, and explained variance in SWB beyond personality factors, showing that religion is a unique predictor of well-being. Results have been discussed within the religious orientation paradigm, and the HEXACO model of personality structure.     

Validation of a Community Collective Efficacy Scale in an African Context

The aim of this study was to validate a community collective efficacy scale in an African context. An abridged version of the Community Collective Efficacy Scale was validated in a cross-sectional survey design. Participants (N = 1050) from urban (n = 451) and rural (n = 599) areas completed the CCES and other measures of self-efficacy and psychological well-being. Results indicated a Cronbach alpha reliability coefficient of 0.72 and satisfactory inter-item correlations ranging between 0.17 and 0.25. Significant correlations between the CCES and other measures of self-efficacy and psychological well-being indicated good criterion-related validity. Construct validity was supported by confirmatory and exploratory factor analysis. Exploratory factor analysis yielded one factor that relates to a sense of “we-ness”. The CCES thus has good reliability and validity in an African context.