You just change the channel if you don't like what you're going to hear: gamblers' attitudes towards, and interactions with, social marketing campaigns

OBJECTIVES: To investigate how gamblers interact with, and respond to, downstream social marketing campaigns that focus on the risks and harms of problem gambling and/or encourage help seeking. METHODS: Qualitative study of 100 gamblers with a range of gambling behaviours (from non-problem to problem gambling). We used a Social Constructivist approach. Our constant comparative method of data interpretation focused on how participants' experiences and interactions with gambling influenced their opinions towards, and interactions with social marketing campaigns. RESULTS: Three key themes emerged from the narratives. (i) Participants felt that campaigns were heavily skewed towards encouraging individuals to take personal responsibility for their gambling behaviours or were targeted towards those with severe gambling problems. (ii) Participants described the difficulty for campaigns to achieve 'cut through' because of the overwhelming volume of positive messages about the benefits of gambling that were given by the gambling industry. (iii) Some participants described that dominant discourses about personal responsibility prevented them from seeking help and reinforced perceptions of stigma. CONCLUSIONS AND IMPLICATIONS: Social marketing campaigns have an important role to play in the prevention of gambling risk behaviours and the promotion of help seeking. Social marketers should explore how to more effectively target campaigns to different audience segments, understand the role of environmental factors in undermining the uptake of social marketing strategies and anticipate the potential unforeseen consequences of social marketing strategies.

Review of the literature on the use of social media by people with traumatic brain injury (TBI)

Purpose: To review the literature relating to use of social media by people with a traumatic brain injury (TBI), specifically its use for social engagement, information exchange or rehabilitation.

Method: A systematic review with a qualitative meta-synthesis of content themes was conducted. In June 2014, 10 databases were searched for relevant, peer-reviewed research studies in English that related to both TBI and social media.

Results: Sixteen studies met the inclusion criteria, with Facebook™ and Twitter™ being the most common social media represented in the included studies. Content analysis identified three major categories of meaning in relation to social media and TBI: (1) risks and benefits; (2) barriers and facilitators; and (3) purposes of use of social media. A greater emphasis was evident regarding potential risks and apparent barriers to social media use, with little focus on facilitators of successful use by people with TBI.

Conclusions: Research to date reveals a range of benefits to the use of social media by people with TBI however there is little empirical research investigating its use. Further research focusing on ways to remove the barriers and increase facilitators for the use of social media by people with TBI is needed. Implications for Rehabilitation: Communication disabilities following traumatic brain injury (TBI) can be wide-ranging in scope and social isolation with loss of friendships after TBI is common. For many people, social media is rapidly becoming a usual part of everyday communication and its use has the potential to increase communication and social participation for people with TBI.There is emerging evidence and commentary regarding the perceived benefits and risks, barriers and facilitators and purposes of use of social media within the TBI population.Risks associated with using social media, and low accessibility of social media sites, form barriers to its use. Facilitators for social media use in people with TBI include training the person with TBI and their communication partners in ways to enjoy and use social media safely.There is minimal rigorous evaluation of social media use by people with TBI and scant information regarding social media use by people with communication disabilities after TBI. Further investigation is needed into the potential benefits of social media use on communication, social participation and social support with the aim of reducing social isolation in people with TBI.

On the potential for psychological researchers and psychologists to promote the social inclusion of people with disability: A review

© 2015 Australian Psychological Society. Objective: This paper outlines different approaches to understanding disability and describes ways in which psychological researchers and psychologists can promote the social inclusion of people with disability. Method: Narrative review drawing on writings and research from psychology and disability studies. Results: Five prominent models of disability appear in the literature (moral, medical, social, biopsychosocial, and post-modern), all of which have relevance to the lives of people with disability. Conceptualisations commonly used to understand the experience of disability from a psychological perspective include stigma and psycho-emotional disablism. There is evidence that people with disability wish to have greater involvement in research (e.g., as consultants and partners in research about them, and as participants in mainstream research) and to see research findings translated into practice. Evidence is emerging that can be used to underpin psychologists work with (a) communities (to foster social change and social justice, and to reduce stigma); (b) organisations, such as schools, workplaces, and disability service providers (to help develop inclusive and supportive environments); (c) families (to promote optimism, alternative understandings of disability, and a sense of control, as well as developing behaviour support plans and providing referrals to other sources of practical support); and (d) people with disability (to assist them with the issues they bring to therapy while being mindful of the potential for psycho-emotional disablism to colour the material presented). Conclusion: Psychological researchers and psychologists have significant potential to contribute to the social inclusion of people with disability.

Embedded markets, communities, and the invisible hand of social norms

The authors'ethnographic work on social norms is intended to unravel the noninstrumental core of embedded markets. In offering a theory of “the invisible hand of social norms,” the authors show that consumer and seller behavior have expressive, moral, and emotional underpinnings that cannot be understood without a broader conceptualization of human motives and actions. This ethnography provides a rich understanding of the role of community and the behavioral dimensions of markets, which in turn helps deconstruct the current axiomatic treatment of transaction-centric markets and to reconstruct the market as a socially embedded institution in which community ties are formed and sustained.

Affective commitment and turnover intentions among healthcare professionals: the role of emotional exhaustion and disengagement

This paper utilises the conservation of resources theory to examine the mediating role played by disengagement in the relationships between emotional exhaustion, affective commitment and turnover intentions among healthcare professionals. Structural equation modelling was conducted on data obtained from 302 healthcare professionals in a major Australian cancer hospital. Our findings demonstrate that disengagement fully mediates the relationships between emotional exhaustion and both affective commitment and turnover intentions. Recommendations for future research are suggested and practical implications discussed. © 2013 Taylor & Francis.

Is the relationship between sensory-processing sensitivity and negative affect mediated by emotional regulation?

© 2015 Australian Psychological Society. Objective: Sensory-processing sensitivity refers to a trait-like difference in the extent to which individuals strongly and deeply process a variety of stimuli in the environment. While being highly sensitive has been linked to increased experiences of distress, the reasons for this are not well known. One potential mediator of this effect is emotional regulation-the set of processes influencing which emotions we have, when we have them, and how we experience and express them. This study therefore aimed to investigate whether sensory processing sensitivity is linked to negative affect via emotional regulation processes. Method: N=157 participants (n=118 females) completed online questionnaires assessing negative affect, sensory-processing sensitivity, along with two multidimensional emotional regulation measures. Results: An individual's lack of access to emotional regulation strategies, greater awareness of emotion, and lack of acceptance towards feeling distressed, acted as partial mediators between sensory-processing sensitivity and symptoms of depression. Combinations of these variables also partially mediated the relationship between sensory-processing sensitivity and symptoms of anxiety and stress. Conclusions: It is suggested that repeatedly experiencing aversive sensory-states among those with increased sensory-processing sensitivity impacts on their general awareness and acceptance of internal states and the confidence that one can regulate them. This in turn leads to the experience of negative affective states. Limitations of the present study and implications for therapeutic interventions are discussed.

Using voice to make musical and social connections

Community music is a rich and ongoing activity-taking place in formal and informal settings around Australia. This small-scale phenomenological qualitative case study is part of my wider study Spirituality and Wellbeing: Music in the Community that began in 2013. This paper demonstrates that community music making in a regional district in Victoria (Australia) makes it possible for choirs to use their voice to make musical and social connections to self and community that enhances both personal and community wellbeing. In May 2014, I visited three choirs for a week in the city of Warnnambool. Drawing on observation, questionnaires and focus group semi-structured interviews, I analysed the data using Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis. The findings include why people join choirs in regional towns, what they enjoyed that contributed to their wellbeing and why they want to sing about issues that make connections to social justice and sustainability. Though generalisations cannot be made to other towns or choirs, the findings show the need, importance and benefits of connecting to each other and the wider community. Using voice can serve as an effective platform to promote issues in the community such as social justice and the environment. It is hoped that the findings may provide a vehicle for further dialogue where choirs in other settings may experience similar connections to their community.

Emotional celebrity: introduction

Companion to Celebrity presents a multi-disciplinary collection of original essays that explore myriad issues relating to the origins, evolution, and current trends in the field of celebrity studies.

Do social values influence levels of conservation effort in threatened species? The case of two Australian chats

This research aims to understand why one of two almost identical subspecies of the Australian yellow chat Ephthianura crocea has received significantly higher levels of local and institutional support than the other despite both having the same conservation status and taxonomic distinctiveness, factors commonly thought to influence conservation effort. Using a qualitative multiple case study approach we explored how a range of social factors, including stakeholder attitudes and institutional, policy and operational aspects, might have affected conservation efforts for the two taxa. Our results suggest that the conservation trajectories of these two subspecies have diverged since their identification as threatened species in 2000 because of differences in the social landscapes within which they persist. For one subspecies local advocacy was kindled initially by the small number of local endemic bird species but developed into a strong emotional engagement, resulting in increased local awareness, government funding, and effectiveness of conservation action. The other subspecies has had to compete for attention with approximately 200 other threatened taxa occurring in its region. No individual advocate has accorded this subspecies a high priority for action, and none of those responsible for its conservation have seen it or acknowledged an emotional attachment to it. Our findings confirm that initiation of conservation effort is strongly tied to the social values of individuals with power to take action, regardless of legislation.