Sara Albuquerque

Green Plants in the Red: A Baseline Global Assessment for the IUCN Sampled Red List Index for Plants.

Plants provide fundamental support systems for life on Earth and are the basis for all terrestrial ecosystems; a decline in plant diversity will be detrimental to all other groups of organisms including humans. Decline in plant diversity has been hard to quantify, due to the huge numbers of known and yet to be discovered species and the lack of an adequate baseline assessment of extinction risk against which to track changes. The biodiversity of many remote parts of the world remains poorly known, and the rate of new assessments of extinction risk for individual plant species approximates the rate at which new plant species are described. Thus the question ‘How threatened are plants?’ is still very difficult to answer accurately. While completing assessments for each species of plant remains a distant prospect, by assessing a randomly selected sample of species the Sampled Red List Index for Plants gives, for the first time, an accurate view of how threatened plants are across the world. It represents the first key phase of ongoing efforts to monitor the status of the world’s plants. More than 20% of plant species assessed are threatened with extinction, and the habitat with the most threatened species is overwhelmingly tropical rain forest, where the greatest threat to plants is anthropogenic habitat conversion, for arable and livestock agriculture, and harvesting of natural resources. Gymnosperms (e.g. conifers and cycads) are the most threatened group, while a third of plant species included in this study have yet to receive an assessment or are so poorly known that we cannot yet ascertain whether they are threatened or not. This study provides a baseline assessment from which trends in the status of plant biodiversity can be measured and periodically reassessed.

Posttraumatic growth in bereaved parents: A multidimensional model of associated factors.

Objective: Although the death of a child is a devastating event, recent evidence shows that personal growth is a relevant outcome of parents’ grief. This study aimed to examine the factors associated with posttraumatic growth (PTG) and to propose a multidimensional model consisting of sociodemographic, situational, and intrapersonal and interpersonal factors. Method: A sample (N = 197; 89.8% female; mean age = 39.44 years) of bereaved parents completed the Post-Traumatic Growth Inventory-Short Form, the 14-Item Resilience Scale, the Continuing Bonds Scale, and the Dyadic Coping Inventory. Results: The final model consisted of sociodemographic, situational, intrapersonal, and interpersonal factors of PTG, which accounted for 36.7% of the variance. Higher levels of PTG were generally associated with female sex, younger age of the child, higher levels of resilience, higher levels of internalized continuing bonds (i.e., internal representation of the child, maintaining psychological proximity), and higher levels of stress communication by the partner (communicating the stress experience and requesting emotional or practical support). Conclusions: In clinical practice, health professionals assisting bereaved parents should pay attention to men and parents of older children, who might be at higher risk of difficulties in developing PTG. Additionally, promoting a more internalized bond with the child, resilience and dyadic coping, especially stress communication, can constitute important therapeutic goals.

Dyadic coping mediates the relationship between parents’ grief and dyadic adjustment following the loss of a child

ABSTRACT Background and Objectives: This study aimed to examine forms of dyadic coping (DC) as mediators of the association between parents’ grief response and dyadic adjustment and to determine whether these indirect effects were moderated by the child’s type of death, timing of death, and age. Design: The study design was cross-sectional. Method: The sample consisted of 197 bereaved parents. Participants completed the Prolonged Grief Disorder Scale, Revised Dyadic Adjustment Scale, and Dyadic Coping Inventory. Results: Significant indirect effects of parents’ grief response on dyadic adjustment were found through stress communication by oneself and by the partner, positive and negative DC by the partner, and joint DC. The timing of death moderated the association between grief response and dyadic adjustment and between joint DC and dyadic adjustment. Grief response was negatively associated with dyadic adjustment only when the death occurred after birth. Grief response was negatively associated with joint DC, which, in turn, was positively associated with dyadic adjustment, when the death occurred both before and after birth. However, the association was stronger in the latter. Conclusions: Specific forms of DC might be mechanisms through which grief response is associated with dyadic adjustment and should be promoted in clinical practice.

Meaning and coping orientation of bereaved parents : Individual and dyadic processes

The present study aimed to examine whether bereaved parents “meaning-made”–defined as results of attempts to reduce discrepancies between the meaning assigned to the death of the child and self and world-views—was influenced by their own and their partner’s coping orientations. Coping orientations were conceptualized within the Dual Process Model, which entails loss coping orientation (LO; focus on the loss itself), restoration coping orientations (RO; focus on stressors that come about as an indirect consequence of the bereavement), and a flexible oscillation between both coping orientations. The sample consisted of 227 couples identified through obituary notices in local and national newspapers, who provided data at 6, 13, and 20 months after the death of their child. At all three points of measurement, both partners independently completed the Dual Coping Inventory (DCI) and a scale developed by the authors about meaning-made from the loss. Data were analyzed using a multi-level Actor-Partner Interdependence Model. Results show that the combination of parents’ own LO and RO (operationalized through the interaction effect between LO and RO) have a positive effect in parents’ meaning-made. Partners’ LO have a negative effect in parents’ meaning-made. These results highlight the importance of, in the context of parental bereavement, being flexible by using both coping orientations, and of acknowledging the interdependence between partners, namely, the interpersonal process by which partner’s coping affect one’s meaning-made.