Jonathan Drennan

Elder abuse and neglect in Ireland: results from a national prevalence survey

OBJECTIVE To measure the 12-month prevalence of elder abuse and neglect in community-dwelling older people in Ireland and examine the risk profile of people who experienced mistreatment and that of the perpetrators. DESIGN Cross-sectional general population survey. SETTING Community. PARTICIPANTS People aged 65 years or older living in the community. METHODS Information was collected in face-to-face interviews on abuse types, socioeconomic, health, and social support characteristics of the population. Data were examined using descriptive statistics and logistic regression, odds ratios (OR) and 95% confidence intervals (95% CI) are presented. RESULTS The prevalence of elder abuse and neglect was 2.2% (95% CI: 1.41-2.94) in the previous 12 months. The frequency of mistreatment type was financial 1.3%, psychological 1.2%, physical abuse 0.5%, neglect 0.3%, and sexual abuse 0.05%. In the univariate analysis lower income OR 2.39 (95% CI: 1.01-5.69), impaired physical health OR 3.41 (95% CI: 1.74-6.65), mental health OR 6.33 (95% CI: 3.33-12.0), and poor social support OR 4.91 (95% CI: 2.1-11.5) were associated with a higher risk of mistreatment but only social support and mental health remained independent predictors. Among perpetrators adult children (50%) were most frequently identified. Unemployment (50%) and addiction (20%) were characteristics of this group.

Professional Identity in Higher Education

Research in higher education has concentrated on a number of areas, which include the values and collective identities of academic faculty, their role in higher education governance, faculty norms and socialisation processes, and the impact of change in higher education on academic roles. While many authors advocate the types of research methodology that should be used in such investigations, few question how academics come to possess the constructs and ideas that inform their professional identity. Discipline-based cultures are the primary source of faculty members’ identity and expertise and include assumptions about what is to be known and how, tasks to be performed, standards for effective performance, patterns of publication, professional interaction, and social and political status. However, changes in higher education have added a further complexity to identity formation within higher education. Professional identity is not a stable entity, it is complex, personal, and shaped by contextual factors. The concept of professional identity is complicated by competing definitions. Against this background, this chapter will explore the following areas: professional identity as a construct; the different ways in which professional identity is viewed; the relationship between identity and professional socialisation in higher education; and the role played by networks and their impact on identity formation. This chapter will also consider gender; midlife career academics; the emergence of mixed identities; and the development of new professional boundaries within higher education.

Coursework master’s programmes: the student’s experience of research and research supervision

Although the coursework master’s degree is becoming the principal conduit for the delivery of continuing education to the professions, it is one of the least understood or researched academic levels in higher education. Furthermore, little is known of coursework master’s graduates’ experience of research or research supervision following the completion of a thesis as the final assessment of their degree. This article measures graduates’ experience of research and research supervision following the completion of a master’s degree. The article also examines the relationship between coursework master’s graduates’ experience of research supervision, completing a research thesis and their development of research capabilities. The findings are considered in the context of the appropriateness of a thesis as the most suitable form of assessment for coursework master’s degrees.

Controlling response shift bias: the use of the retrospective pre‐test design in the evaluation of a master's programme

Traditionally the measures used to evaluate the impact of an educational programme on student outcomes and the extent to which students change is a comparison of the students pre‐test scores with his/her post‐test scores. However, this method of evaluating change may be problematic due to the confounding factor of response shift bias when student self‐reports of change are used. Response shift bias occurs when the students internal frame of reference of the construct being measured, for example research ability or critical thinking, changes between the pre‐test and the post‐test due to the influence of the educational programme. To control for response shift bias the retrospective pre‐test method was used to evaluate the outcomes achieved from students completing a research module at masters level. The retrospective pre‐test method differs from the traditional pre‐test–post‐test design in that both post‐test and pre‐test perceptions of respondents are collected at the same time. The findings indicated that response shift bias was evident in that the programme had significantly greater impact on outcomes than identified using the traditional pre‐test–post‐test design leading to the conclusion that students may overestimate their ability at the commencement of an educational programme. The retrospective pre‐test design is not a replacement for the traditional pre‐test–post‐test measures but may be a useful adjunct in the evaluation of the impact of educational programmes on student outcomes.

Young Men’s Vulnerability in Constituting Hegemonic Masculinity in Sexual Relations

This article reports on a qualitative analysis of the accounts of young men on their experiences of heterosexual encounters. Based on data collected in Ireland using 17 focus groups with 124 young men aged between 14 and 19 years (a subsection of a wider study), the manner in which intricate peer group mechanisms acted as surveillance strategies in regulating the young men toward presenting themselves in ways consistent with hegemonic manifestations of masculinity is explored. However, there were also elements of resistance to such a culture in the way in which sexual pleasure for some young men was derived relationally through giving pleasure rather than merely through mechanical, emotionally detached sexual acts that characterize hegemonic masculinity. In emphasizing male vulnerabilities such as uncertainty, fear, and rejection in the realm of sexuality, it is proposed that one must not lose sight of the broader context of male sexual dominance for which, as data indicate, men themselves pay a price.

Critical thinking as an outcome of a Master’s degree in Nursing programme

AIM This paper is a report of a study measuring critical thinking ability in graduates on completion of a Masters degree in Nursing. BACKGROUND Nurse education programmes identify the development of critical thinking capabilities as a central outcome for graduates at Masters level. However, despite the centrality of critical thinking to educational curricula, achievement of this outcome has not been evaluated. METHOD A cross-sectional cohort study was conducted in Ireland between 2006 and 2007. Critical thinking was measured using the Watson-Glaser Critical Thinking Appraisal tool. The sample consisted of two cohorts: a control cohort (110 students commencing Masters in Nursing programmes) and an outcome cohort (222 students who had a Masters degree in Nursing). The Watson-Glaser Critical Thinking Appraisal scores of the graduate cohort were also compared to previously published norm reference scores in the area of nursing and other higher education professional groups. RESULTS Graduates had statistically significantly higher critical thinking scores than commencing graduates. Graduates from Masters in Nursing programmes also had similar critical thinking scores to nurses at undergraduate and postgraduate levels in the United States of America. However, scores were lower than those of occupational and academic groups in education and medicine. CONCLUSION Graduates from a Masters degree in Nursing make statistically significant gains in critical thinking scores when compared to students commencing the programme. However, the gains were relatively modest and call into question the effectiveness of pedagogical methods used to facilitate the development of critical thinking at Masters level.

Professional and academic destination of masters in nursing graduates: A national survey

Masters degrees, especially in the form of coursework masters programmes are becoming the main conduit for continuing professional education to the professions. However, there is a paucity of literature on the academic or professional destination of nurses following the completion of masters degrees in nursing. A cross-sectional postal survey of 322 graduates from masters in nursing programmes in Ireland was undertaken. Former students were surveyed regarding their professional and academic destinations subsequent to graduation. The majority of graduates were employed in clinical nursing followed by a substantial number working in the area of nurse education, mainly at the grade of college lecturer. The vast majority of graduates had achieved promotional grades following the masters degree. A minority of graduates indicated a desire to undertake further study at degree level. Those that did were following or intended to follow PhD level studies. However, the majority of graduates did not view the degree as a pathway to a PhD but as an integral part of their continuing professional education and related to clinical practice. There is a reversal of the trend seen in Ireland and the UK in the mid to late 1990s in which the majority of graduates followed career pathways in nurse education. Although there has been an increase in the number of nurses completing masters level education over the last five years unemployment of underemployment of graduates is not yet an issue.

The Changing Role of Academics and the Rise of Managerialism

In this chapter, the manner in which the traditional model of a university has evolved in light of recent shifts in the character of higher education institutions under the influence of the private business-sector model is explored. In particular, a genre of theoretical and empirical work focused on the implications of managerialism on academic activities is considered, particularly the diversification of academic work, changes in the control over academic activities, and the impact of managerialism on the nature of teaching and research. Empirical studies indicate that managerialism has neither been wholeheartedly rejected nor accepted by academics, but rather has been received in a more fluid and haphazard way. We conclude that although the general picture emerging in the literature is that of a profession in crisis, a good deal of the increased regulation of academics is overseen by those within their own ranks via peer review. Whilst managerialist ideology is increasingly becoming a dominant discourse within university, the extent to which it has superseded collegiality is debatable.

The impact of a fast track area on quality and effectiveness outcomes: a Middle Eastern emergency department perspective.

BackgroundEmergency department (ED) overcrowding is a ubiquitous problem with serious public health implications. The fast track area is a novel method which aims to reduce waiting time, patient dissatisfaction and morbidity. |The study objective was to determine the impact of a fast track area (FTA) on both effectiveness measures (i.e. waiting times [WT] and length of stay [LOS]) and quality measures (i.e. LWBS rates and mortality rates) in non-urgent patients. The secondary objective was to assess if a FTA negatively impacted on urgent patients entering the ED.MethodsThe study took place in a 500 bed, urban, tertiary care hospital in Abu Dhabi, United Arab Emirates. This was a quasi-experimental, which examined the impact of a FTA on a pre-intervention control group (January 2005) (n = 4,779) versus a post-intervention study group (January 2006) (n = 5,706).ResultsMean WTs of Canadian Triage Acuity Scale (CTAS) 4 patients decreased by 22 min (95% CI 21 min to 24 min, P < 0.001). Similarly, mean WTs of CTAS 5 patients decreased by 28 min (95% CI 19 min to 37 min, P < 0.001) post FTA. The mean WTs of urgent patients (CTAS 2/3) were also significantly reduced after the FTA was opened (P < 0.001). The LWBS rate was reduced from 4.7% to 0.7% (95% CI 3.37 to 4.64; P < 0.001). Opening a FTA had no significant impact on mortality rates (P = 0.88).ConclusionThe FTA improved ED effectiveness (WTs and LOS) and quality measures (LWBS rates) whereas mortality rate remained unchanged.

Menopause Narratives: The Interplay of Women’s Embodied Experiences With Biomedical Discourses

Conventional approaches to menopause tend to contrast the biomedical position on menopause with women’s actual experiences of it. Rather than focusing primarily on the tensions between these perspectives (biomedical vs. lay), our emphasis here is on the impact of biomedicine in shaping participants’ perceptions of their status as menopausal. Based on interview data gathered from 39 women in Ireland, we argue that the cultural authority of biomedicine shaped participants’ experiences of the body and how they constituted their health identity. We assert that, ironically, this was particularly the case among those who most strongly contested biomedical definitions of their situation. In addition, biomedical practitioners’ definitions had a strong normalizing power in how the body was experienced. We conclude by noting that our analysis problematizes the notion of privileging “women’s experiences” as advocated by some feminist perspectives. The heavy influence of biomedical discourses in shaping participants’ embodied experiences demonstrates the pervasive impact of prevailing discourses on women’s experiences.