Chris Fife-Schaw

Personality, personal Model beliefs, and self-care in adolescents and young adults with Type 1 diabetes

This study compared 3 models of association between personality, personal model beliefs, and self-care in a cross-sectional design. These models were as follows: (a) Emotional stability determines self-care indirectly through personal model beliefs, and conscientiousness is a direct predictor of self-care; (b) emotional stability determines self-care indirectly through personal model beliefs, and conscientiousness moderates the association between beliefs and self-care; (c) both emotional stability and conscientiousness determine self-care indirectly through personal model beliefs. Participants (N = 358, aged 12-30 years) with Type 1 diabetes completed measures of personality, personal model beliefs, and self-care. Structural equation modeling indicated that Model C was the best fit to the data.

Which school of thought? The dimensions of resort hotel quality

The service quality literature has evolved around two schools of thought: the North American and the Nordic European. Although the North American School of thought has received much attention from the practitioners with a five factorial model, it has also generated a great deal of criticism. The Nordic European School of thought, on the conceptualisation of service quality, has remained for the most part at the conceptual level with few attempts at applications. Attempts to test an instrument developed by the North American School. It did not produce the nominated dimensions. In fact the result favours the Nordic European School in that it produced a two factor model.

Attitudes to biotechnology: estimating the opinions of a better-informed public

Public familiarity with basic scientific concepts and principles has been proposed as essential for effective democratic decision-making (Miller, 1998). Empirical research, however, finds that public ‘scientific literacy’ is generally low, falling well short of what normative criteria would consider ‘acceptable’. This has prompted calls to better engage, educate and inform the public on scientific matters, with the additional, usually implicit assumption that a knowledgeable citizenry should express more supportive and favourable attitudes toward science. Research investigating the notion that ‘to know science is to love it’ has provided only weak empirical support and has itself been criticised for representing science and technology as a unified and homogenous entity. In practice, it is argued, how knowledge impacts on the favourability of attitudes will depend on a multiplicity of factors, not least of which is the particular area of science in question and the technologies to which it gives rise (Evans & Durant, 1992). This article uses a new method for examining the knowledge-attitude nexus on a prominent area of 21st century science—biotechnology. The idea that greater scientific knowledge can engender change in the favourability of attitudes toward specific areas of science is investigated using data from the 2000 British Social Attitudes Survey and the 1999 Wellcome Consultative Panel on Gene Therapy. Together the surveys measure public opinion on particular applications of genetic technologies, including gene therapy and the use of genetic data, as well as more general attitudes towards genetic research. We focus our analysis on how two different measures of knowledge impact on these attitudes; one a general measure of scientific knowledge, the other relating specifically to knowledge of modern genetic science. We investigate what impact these knowledge domains have on attitudes towards biotechnology using a regression-based modelling technique (Bartels, 1996; Althaus, 1998; Sturgis, 2003). Controlling for a range of socio-demographic characteristics, we provide estimates of what collective and individual opinion would look like if everyone were as knowledgeable as the currently best-informed members of the general public on the knowledge domains in question. Our findings demonstrate that scientific knowledge does appear to have an important role in determining individual and group attitudes to genetic science. However, we find no support for a simple ‘deficit model’ of public understanding, as the nature of the relationship itself depends on the application of biotechnology in question and the social location of the individual.

Simulating behaviour change interventions based on the theory of planned behaviour : Impacts on intention and action

The theory of planned behaviour (TPB; Ajzen, 1991) has been used extensively to predict social and health behaviours. However, a critical test of the TPB is whether interventions that increased scores on the theorys predictors would engender behaviour change. The present research deployed a novel technique in order to provide this test. Statistical simulations were conducted on data for 30 behaviours (N=211) that estimated the impact of interventions that generated maximum positive changes in attitudes, subjective norms and perceived behavioural control (PBC) on subsequent intentions and behaviour. Findings indicated that interventions that maximized TPB variables had a substantial impact on behavioural intentions. Although TPB maximization increased the proportion of the sample that performed respective behaviours by 28% compared with baseline, the behaviour of a substantial minority of the sample (26%) did not change. The research also identified several interactions among TPB variables in predicting simulated intention and behaviour scores and investigated the mediating role of intentions in predicting behaviour.

The self-regulatory model in women with rheumatoid arthritis: relationships between illness representations, coping strategies, and illness outcome.

OBJECTIVES The self-regulatory model proposes that an individuals cognitive representations of illness threat (illness representations) influence the selection and performance of strategies to cope with that illness (Leventhal, Meyer, & Nerenz, 1980). Also implicit in the model is the proposal that such coping strategies influence illness outcomes. These relationships represent a mediational model (Baron & Kenny, 1986). The aim of the present study is to test the hypothesis that coping strategies partially mediate the relationship between illness representations and illness outcome in women with rheumatoid arthritis. DESIGN AND METHODS The study is an observational cross-sectional design. Self-report measures of illness representations, coping strategies, and illness outcome were collected from 125 women with rheumatoid arthritis attending rheumatology outpatient clinics. Clinical measures of disease activity and severity were obtained from hospital records. RESULTS Avoidant and resigned coping were found to partially mediate the relationship between symptom identity and the illness outcome measures of disability and psychiatric morbidity. As in other studies, strong relationships were found between illness representations and illness outcome. CONCLUSIONS The finding that avoidant and resigned coping partially mediated the relationships between the illness representation dimension of symptom identity and two of the illness outcome measures (disability and psychiatric morbidity) provided some support for the hypothesis. However, the hypothesis was not fully supported, as coping did not partially mediate the relationship between any of the other illness representations and illness outcomes.

Sexual activities and preferences in a United Kingdom sample of 16 to 20-year-olds

Data are reported on the sexual behavior of a random sample of 2171 youth, 16–20 years old, in two locations in the U.K. Lower bound prevalence estimates for a range of specific sex acts are presented with discussion of the likely biases in the data. Given concerns about the spread of HIV through the heterosexual population, emphasis is given to the nontrivial estimates of a number of potential transmission risk behaviors, in particular, heterosexual anal penetration. Data are also presented suggesting that experience with particular sexual acts is associated with maintenance of a desire to do these acts in the future. The implications of these findings for health education policy are discussed.

Attitudes to New Technology in Relation to Social Beliefs and Group Memberships: A Preliminary Investigation

Though the term “new technology” is widely used and discussed, there has been very little systematic study of attitudes to technology and their relation to other beliefs and group memberships. This article describes an initial investigation into the nature of attitudes towards new technology (n=534 undergraduates) and demonstrates that, as yet, these attitudes are only weakly structured and are not fully integrated with other social beliefs. General evaluations of the benefits of technological advance appear to be almost unrelated to beliefs about the inevitability of these advances or the desire to acquire training to deal with them. Contrary to popular expectations, evaluations of video games are unrelated to other beliefs about technology while other social beliefs are, as yet, only weakly integrated with these attitudes. This study also identifies gender differences in the assessment of potential benefits and highlights other differences attributable to academic group memberships. These finding are discussed with reference to the literature on sex-role stereotyping and group socialization processes.

Internet-based instructor-led mindfulness for work-related rumination, fatigue, and sleep: Assessing facets of mindfulness as mechanisms of change. A randomized waitlist control trial.

This study aimed to extend our theoretical understanding of how mindfulness-based interventions exert their positive influence on measures of occupational health. Employing a randomized waitlist control study design, we sought to (a) assess an Internet-based instructor-led mindfulness intervention for its effect on key factors associated with “recovery from work,” specifically, work-related rumination, fatigue, and sleep quality; (b) assess different facets of mindfulness (acting with awareness, describing, nonjudging, and nonreacting) as mechanisms of change; and (c) assess whether the effect of the intervention was maintained over time by following up our participants after 3 and 6 months. Participants who completed the mindfulness intervention (n = 60) reported significantly lower levels of work-related rumination and fatigue, and significantly higher levels of sleep quality, when compared with waitlist control participants (n = 58). Effects of the intervention were maintained at 3- and 6-month follow-up with medium to large effect sizes. The effect of the intervention was primarily explained by increased levels of only 1 facet of mindfulness (acting with awareness). This study provides support for online mindfulness interventions to aid recovery from work and furthers our understanding with regard to how mindfulness interventions exert their positive effects.

Guiding healthier food choice: systematic comparison of four front-of-pack labelling systems and their effect on judgements of product healthiness

Different front-of-pack (FOP) labelling systems have been developed in Europe by industry and organisations concerned with health promotion. A study (n 2068) was performed to establish the extent to which inclusion of the most prevalent FOP systems--guideline daily amounts (GDA), traffic lights (TL), GDA+TL hybrid (HYB) and health logos (HL)--impact consumer perceptions of healthiness over and above the provision of a FOP basic label (BL) containing numerical nutritional information alone. The design included within- and between-subjects factors. The within-subjects factors were: food (pizzas, yogurts and biscuits), healthiness of the food (high health, medium health and low health) and the repeated measurements under BL and test FOP label conditions. The between-subjects factors were: the system (GDA, TL, GDA+TL hybrid, HL), portion size (typical portion size and a 50% reduction of a typical portion) and country (the UK, Germany, Poland and Turkey). Although the FOP systems tested did result in small improvements for objective understanding under some conditions, there was little difference between the provision of an FOP label containing basic numerical nutritional information alone or between the various systems. Thus, any structured and legible presentation of key nutrient and energy information on the FOP label is sufficient to enable consumers to detect a healthier alternative within a food category when provided with foods that have distinctly different levels of healthiness. Future research should focus on developing greater understanding of the psychological and contextual factors that impact motivation and the opportunity to use the various FOP systems in real-world shopping settings.

Evaluation of interventions to reduce smoking

This paper reports some of the findings from a large-scale (N = 4970) longitudinal study evaluating the efficacy of two types of school-based intervention designed to discourage cigarette smoking in children between the ages of nine and thirteen. The interventions were in the form of a Theatre in Health Education (THE) programme and a school smoking policy which involved changes in adult behaviour. The research adopted a quasi-experimental design, following children from primary to secondary education where necessary over a period of two and a half years. Five waves of questionnaire data were collected with biochemical markers in the form of saliva samples which served as a “bogus pipeline”. Though absolute levels of smoking were low, the findings indicate a weak positive effect over the longer term of both interventions on smoking behaviour (past and current) for girls but no such effect for boys. Conversely, there was no impact for girls on a measure of intention to smoke, although a small long term effect was found for boys in the Theatre in Health Education intervention group. Effects of the interventions on targeted psychological variables were also minor. Possible reasons for these effects are discussed.