Surveying nursing students on their sources of stress: A validation study

This study tested the psychometric properties of a questionnaire that measured sources of distress and eustress, or good stress, in nursing students. The Transactional model of stress construes stress in these different ways and is frequently used to understand sources of stress, coping and stress responses. Limited research has attempted to measure sources of distress and eustress or sources that can potentially enhance performance and well-being. A volunteer sample of final year nursing students (n = 120) was surveyed in the United Kingdom in 2007. The questionnaire measured sources of stress and measures of psychological well-being were taken to test construct validity. This was tested through an exploratory factor analysis. This reduced the questionnaire from 49 to 29 items and suggested three factors: learning and teaching, placement related and course organization; second, it was analysed by testing the assumptions of the Transactional model, the model on which the questionnaire was based. In line with the assumptions of the model, measures of distress related to adverse well-being, and measures of eustress related to healthier well-being responses. The test–retest reliability estimate was 0.8. While certain programme issues were associated with distress, placement-related experiences were the most important source of eustress.

Down with MNE-centric theories! Market entry and expansion as the bundling of MNE and local assets

Both Anderson and Gatignon and the Uppsala internationalization model see the initial mode of foreign market entry and subsequent modes of operation as unilaterally determined by multinational enterprises (MNEs) arbitraging control and risk and increasing their commitment as they gain experience in the target market. OLI and internalization models do recognize that foreign market entry requires the bundling of MNE and complementary local assets, which they call location or country-specific advantages, but implicitly assume that those assets are freely accessible to MNEs. In contrast to both of these MNE-centric views, I explicitly consider the transactional characteristics of complementary local assets and model foreign market entry as the optimal assignment of equity between their owners and MNEs. By looking at the relative efficiency of the different markets in which MNE and complementary local assets are traded, and at how these two categories of assets match, I am able to predict whether equity will be held by MNEs or by local firms, or shared between them, and whether MNEs will enter through greenfields, brownfields, or acquisitions. The bundling model I propose has interesting implications for the evolution of the MNE footprint in host countries, and for the reasons behind the emergence of Dragon MNEs.

Parallel Programming

Recent trends in computing systems, such as multi-core processors and cloud computing, expose tens to thousands of processors to the software. Software developers must respond by introducing parallelism in their software. To obtain highest performance, it is not only necessary to identify parallelism, but also to reason about synchronization between threads and the communication of data from one thread to another. This entry gives an overview on some of the most common abstractions that are used in parallel programming, namely explicit vs. implicit expression of parallelism and shared and distributed memory. Several parallel programming models are reviewed and categorized by means of these abstractions. The pros and cons of parallel programming models from the perspective of performance and programmability are discussed.

A conceptual model and key variables for guiding supportive interventions for family caregivers of people receiving palliative care

According to the World Health Organization, the patient and family should be viewed as the "unit of care" when palliative care is required. Therefore family caregivers should receive optimal supportive care from health professionals. However, the impact of supporting a dying relative is frequently described as having negative physical and psychosocial sequalae. Furthermore, family caregivers consistently report unmet needs and there has been a dearth of rigorous supportive interventions published. In addition, comprehensive conceptual frameworks to navigate the family caregiver experience and guide intervention development are lacking. This article draws on Lazarus and Folkman's seminal work on the transactional stress and coping framework to present a conceptual model specific to family caregivers of patients receiving palliative care. A comprehensive account of key variables to aid understanding of the family caregiver experience and intervention design is provided.

Citizenship and (Un)Sustainability: A Green Republican Perspective

This chapter explores some of the connections (causal and other) between the decline in active citizenship, the displacement of citizenship by consumer identities and interests, and the shift to a transactional mode of democratic politics and how and in what ways these are connected with “actually existing unsustainability.” It proposes an account of “green republican citizenship” as an appropriate theory and practice of establishing a link between the practices of democracy and the processes of democratization in the transition from unsustainability. The chapter begins from the (not uncontroversial) position that debt-based consumer capitalism (and especially its more recent neoliberal incarnation) is incompatible with a version of democratic politics and associated norms and practices of green citizenship required for a transition from unsustainable development. It outlines an explicitly “green republican” conception of citizenship as an appropriate way to integrate democratic citizenship and creation of a more sustainable political and socio-ecological order.

Web adoption by Irish credit unions: Performance implications

The purpose of this paper is to examine website adoption and its resultant effects on credit union performance in Ireland over the period 2002 to 2010. While there has been a steady increase in web adoption over the period a sizeable proportion (53%) of credit unions did not have a web-based facility in 2010. To gauge web functionality the researchers accessed all websites in 2010/2011 and it transpired that most sites were classified as informational with limited transactional options. Panel data techniques are then used to capture the dynamic nature of website diffusion and to investigate the effect of website adoption on cost and performance. The empirical analysis reveals that credit unions that have web-based functionality have a reduced spread between the loan and pay-out rate with this primarily caused by reduced loan rates. This reduced spread, although small, is found to both persist and increase over time.

Stress and coping in parents of newly born twins

Objective: Research indicates that parents of twins have poorer psychosocial outcomes than parents of singletons. Parents who have conceived using assisted reproductive technology (ART) have been found to be at higher risk of negative psychosocial outcomes compared to parents who have conceived spontaneously. The current study aimed to model the factors associated with parenting stress of newly-born twins, using the Transactional Model of Stress.

Methods: Data were collected using a cross-sectional survey design with participants identified from delivery records across Northern Ireland. Mothers and fathers (n = 104) of twins aged between 1 and 12 months old returned a questionnaire pack containing the Parenting Stress Index, Impact on the Family Scale-Financial Burden, Coping Orientation to Problems Experienced – Brief Version, Multidimensional Scale of Perceived Social Support, General Health Questionnaire and a demographic questionnaire.

Results: There were no differences on psychological outcomes between parents who had conceived via ART and those who conceived spontaneously. Regression analyses found that social interaction and support is an important variable in terms of the psychological outcomes experienced by parents of twins.

Conclusion: Parents of newly-born twins regardless of the mode of conception should be considered an at risk group for parental distress. Support groups such as the Twins and Multiple Births Association could be important in providing that crucial social interaction and support that seems to be important in the emotional well-being of parents of twins.