Executive coaching : investigating effects of leader-empowering behaviours and psychological empowerment

Executive coaching is a rapidly expanding approach to leadership development which has grown at a rate that warrants extensive examination of its effects (Wasylyshyn, 2003). This thesis has therefore examined both behavioural and psychological effects based on a nine month executive coaching intervention within a large not-for-profit organisation. The intervention was a part of a larger ongoing integrated organisational strategy to create an organisational coaching culture. In order to examine the effectiveness of the nine month executive coaching intervention two studies were conducted. A quantitative study used a pre and post questionnaire to examine leaders and their team members‘ responses before and after the coaching intervention. The research examined leader-empowering behaviours, psychological empowerment, job satisfaction and affective commitment. Significant results were demonstrated from leaders‘ self-reports on leader-empowering behaviours and their team members‘ self-reports revealed a significant flow on effect of psychological empowerment. The second part of the investigation involved a qualitative study which explored the developmental nature of psychological empowerment through executive coaching. The examination dissected psychological empowerment into its widely accepted four facets of meaning, impact, competency and self-determination and investigated, through semi-structured interviews, leaders‘ perspectives of the effect of executive coaching upon them (Spreitzer, 1992). It was discovered that a number of the common practices within executive coaching, including goal-setting, accountability and action-reflection, contributed to the production of outcomes that developed higher levels of psychological empowerment. Careful attention was also given to organisational context and its influence upon the outcomes.

A review of the acculturation experiences of international students

Universities in Western countries host a substantial number of international students. These students bring a range of benefits to the host country and in return the students gain higher education. However, the choice to study overseas in Western countries may present many challenges for the international student including the experience of acculturative stress and difficulties with adjustment to the environment of the host country. The present paper provides a review of current acculturation models as applied to international students. Given that these models have typically been empirically tested on migrant and refugee populations only, the review aims to determine the extent to which these models characterise the acculturation experience of international students. Literature pertaining to salient variables from acculturation models was explored including acculturative stressors encountered frequently by international students (e.g., language barriers, educational difficulties, loneliness, discrimination, and practical problems associated with changing environments). Further discussed was the subsequent impact of social support and coping strategies on acculturative stress experienced by international students, and the psychological and sociocultural adaptation of this student group. This review found that the international student literature provides support for some aspects of the acculturation models discussed, however, further investigation of these models is needed to determine their accuracy in describing the acculturation of international students. Additionally, prominent acculturation models portray the host society as an important factor influencing international students’ acculturation, which suggests the need for future intervention.

Psychological interventions for alcohol misuse among people with co-occurring depression or anxiety disorders: A systematic review

Abstract OBJECTIVE: Depression, anxiety and alcohol misuse frequently co-occur. While there is an extensive literature reporting on the efficacy of psychological treatments that target depression, anxiety or alcohol misuse separately, less research has examined treatments that address these disorders when they co-occur. We conducted a systematic review to determine whether psychological interventions that target alcohol misuse among people with co-occurring depressive or anxiety disorders are effective. DATA SOURCES: We systematically searched the PubMed and PsychINFO databases from inception to March 2010. Individual searches in alcohol, depression and anxiety were conducted, and were limited to 'human' published 'randomized controlled trials' or 'sequential allocation' articles written in English. STUDY SELECTION: We identified randomized controlled trials that compared manual guided psychological interventions for alcohol misuse among individuals with depressive or anxiety disorders. Of 1540 articles identified, eight met inclusion criteria for the review. DATA EXTRACTION: From each study, we recorded alcohol and mental health outcomes, and other relevant clinical factors including age, gender ratio, follow-up length and drop-out rates. Quality of studies was also assessed. DATA SYNTHESIS: Motivational interviewing and cognitive-behavioral interventions were associated with significant reductions in alcohol consumption and depressive and/or anxiety symptoms. Although brief interventions were associated with significant improvements in both mental health and alcohol use variables, longer interventions produced even better outcomes. CONCLUSIONS: There is accumulating evidence for the effectiveness of motivational interviewing and cognitive behavior therapy for people with co-occurring alcohol and depressive or anxiety disorders.

The use of semantic priming as a paradigm for the detection of faking on self-report psychological tests

It is recognised that individuals do not always respond honestly when completing psychological tests. One of the foremost issues for research in this area is the inability to detect individuals attempting to fake. While a number of strategies have been identified in faking, a commonality of these strategies is the latent role of long term memory. Seven studies were conducted in order to examine whether it is possible to detect the activation of faking related cognitions using a lexical decision task. Study 1 found that engagement with experiential processing styles predicted the ability to fake successfully, confirming the role of associative processing styles in faking. After identifying appropriate stimuli for the lexical decision task (Studies 2A and 2B), Studies 3 to 5 examined whether a cognitive state of faking could be primed and subsequently identified, using a lexical decision task. Throughout the course of these studies, the experimental methodology was increasingly refined in an attempt to successfully identify the relevant priming mechanisms. The results were consistent and robust throughout the three priming studies: faking good on a personality test primed positive faking related words in the lexical decision tasks. Faking bad, however, did not result in reliable priming of negative faking related cognitions. To more completely address potential issues with the stimuli and the possible role of affective priming, two additional studies were conducted. Studies 6A and 6B revealed that negative faking related words were more arousing than positive faking related words, and that positive faking related words were more abstract than negative faking related words and neutral words. Study 7 examined whether the priming effects evident in the lexical decision tasks occurred as a result of an unintentional mood induction while faking the psychological tests. Results were equivocal in this regard. This program of research aligned the fields of psychological assessment and cognition to inform the preliminary development and validation of a new tool to detect faking. Consequently, an implicit technique to identify attempts to fake good on a psychological test has been identified, using long established and robust cognitive theories in a novel and innovative way. This approach represents a new paradigm for the detection of individuals responding strategically to psychological testing. With continuing development and validation, this technique may have immense utility in the field of psychological assessment.

Understanding the coping strategies of international students : a qualitative approach

International students encounter a range of additional challenges as a part of their tertiary study experience. A qualitative approach was used to understand the challenges faced by international students, coping strategies that promoted their personal resilience and advice they have for future international students. Twenty-two international students from an Australian university participated in four focus groups. The challenges identified by students included adjustment, social isolation, English language skills, academic difficulties, unmet expectations, employment, culture shock and psychological distress. Participants shared their own personal experiences and strategies used by them to cope and identified strategies that future students could use prior to leaving their home country and whilst in Australia to improve their adjustment. Uses of international student stories in prevention interventions are discussed.

Reasonable adjustment and the assessment of students with disabilities: Australian legal issues and trends

Student assessment is particularly important, and particularly controversial, because it is the means by which student achievement is determined. Reasonable adjustment to student assessment is of equal importance as the means of ensuring the mitigation, or even elimination, of disability related barriers to the demonstration of student achievement. The significance of reasonable adjustment is obvious in the later years of secondary school, and in the tertiary sector, because failure to adjust assessment may be asserted as the reason a student did not achieve as well as anticipated or as the reason a student was excluded from a course and, as a result, from future study and employment opportunities. Even in the early years of schooling, however, assessment and its management are a critical issue for staff and students, especially in an education system like Australia’s with an ever increasing emphasis on national benchmarks testing. This paper will explain the legislation which underpins the right to reasonable adjustment in education in Australian schools. It will give examples of the kinds of adjustment which may be made to promote equality of opportunity in the area of assessment. It will also consider some of the controversies which have confronted, or which, it may be speculated, are likely to confront Australian education institutions as they work towards compliance with reasonable adjustment laws.

Methods used in cross-cultural comparisons of psychological symptoms and their determinants

This paper is the second in a series of reviews of cross-cultural studies of menopausal symptoms. The goal of this review is to compare and contrast methods which have been previously utilized in Cross-Cultural Midlife Women's Health Studies with a view to (1) identifying the challenges in measurement across cultures in psychological symptoms and (2) suggesting a set of unified questions and tools that can be used in future research in this area. This review also aims to examine the determinants of psychological symptoms and how those determinants were measured. The review included eight studies that explicitly compared symptoms in different countries or different ethnic groups in the same country and included: Australian/Japanese Midlife Women's Health Study (AJMWHS), Decisions At Menopause Study (DAMeS), Four Major Ethnic Groups (FMEG), Hilo Women's Health Survey (HWHS), Penn Ovarian Aging Study (POAS), Study of Women's Health Across the Nation (SWAN), Women's Health in Midlife National Study (WHiMNS), and the Women's International Study of Health and Sexuality (WISHeS). This review concludes that mental morbidity does affect vasomotor symptom prevalence across cultures and therefore should be measured. Based on the review of these eight studies it is recommended that the following items be included when measuring psychological symptoms across cultures, feeling tense or nervous, sleeping difficulty, difficulty in concentrating, depressed and irritability along with the CES-D Scale, and the Perceived Stress Scale. The measurement of these symptoms will provide an evidence based approach when forming any future menopause symptom list and allow for comparisons across studies.

Tracking employees' twists and turns : describing a mixed methods approach to assessing change in the psychological contract

The psychological contract is a key analytical device utilised by both academics and practitioners to conceptualise and explore the dynamics of the employment relationship. However, despite the recognised import of the construct, some authors suggest that its empirical investigation has fallen into a 'methodological rut' [Conway & Briner, 2005, p. 89] and is neglecting to assess key tenets of the concept, such as its temporal and dynamic nature. This paper describes the research design of a longitudinal, mixed methods study which draws upon the strengths of both qualitative and quantitative modes of inquiry in order to explore the development of, and changes in, the psychological contract. Underpinned by a critical realist philosophy, the paper seeks to offer a research design suitable for exploring the process of change not only within the psychological contract domain, but also for similar constructs in the human resource management and broader organisational behaviour fields.

Engaging law students to promote psychological health

Recent empirical evidence suggests that concern for the psychological health of law students is well justified. Traditionally, the legal curriculum has focused on the provision of substantive legal doctrinal knowledge. This approach has not always engaged students positively with their learning of law. This article considers some strategies that can be adopted by Law Faculties to better engage students with their legal education in order to promote their psychological health. These strategies are: ensuring that active learning occurs in lectures, demonstrating concern for students and their learning and skillful management of student expectations and the learning environment. Further, some self-help strategies that students can adopt for themselves are discussed. Combined, these strategies will enable students to engage more positively with their legal education.

Test of a model of the effects of parental illness on youth and family functioning

Objective: Parental illness (PI) may have adverse impacts on youth and family functioning. Research in this area has suffered from the absence of a guiding comprehensive framework. This study tested a conceptual model of the effects of PI on youth and family functioning derived from the Family Ecology Framework (FEF; Pedersen & Revenson, 2005). Method. A total of 85 parents with multiple sclerosis and 127 youth completed questionnaires at Time 1 and 12 months later at Time 2. Results. Structural equation modeling results supported the FEF with regards to physical-illness disability. Specifically, the proposed mediators (role redistribution, stress, and stigma) were implicated in the processes that link parental disability to several domains of youth adjustment. The results suggest that the effects of parental depression (PD) are not mediated through these processes; rather, PD directly affects family functioning, which in turn mediates the effects onto youth adjustment. Family functioning further mediated between PD and youth well-being and behavioral-social difficulties. Conclusions. Although results support the effects of parental-illness disability on youth and family functioning via the proposed mediational mechanisms, the additive effects of PD on youth physical and mental health occur through direct and indirect (via family functioning) pathways, respectively.

A comparison of the psychological, social, and legal factors contributing to speeding and drink driving behaviour

Within Australia, motor vehicle injury is the leading cause of hospital admissions and fatalities. Road crash data reveals that among the factors contributing to crashes in Queensland, speed and alcohol continue to be overrepresented. While alcohol is the number one contributing factor to fatal crashes, speeding also contributes to a high proportion of crashes. Research indicates that risky driving is an important contributor to road crashes. However, it has been debated whether all risky driving behaviours are similar enough to be explained by the same combination of factors. Further, road safety authorities have traditionally relied upon deterrence based countermeasures to reduce the incidence of illegal driving behaviours such as speeding and drink driving. However, more recent research has focussed on social factors to explain illegal driving behaviours. The purpose of this research was to examine and compare the psychological, legal, and social factors contributing to two illegal driving behaviours: exceeding the posted speed limit and driving when over the legal blood alcohol concentration (BAC) for the drivers licence type. Complementary theoretical perspectives were chosen to comprehensively examine these two behaviours including Akers’ social learning theory, Stafford and Warr’s expanded deterrence theory, and personality perspectives encompassing alcohol misuse, sensation seeking, and Type-A behaviour pattern. The program of research consisted of two phases: a preliminary pilot study, and the main quantitative phase. The preliminary pilot study was undertaken to inform the development of the quantitative study and to ensure the clarity of the theoretical constructs operationalised in this research. Semi-structured interviews were conducted with 11 Queensland drivers recruited from Queensland Transport Licensing Centres and Queensland University of Technology (QUT). These interviews demonstrated that the majority of participants had engaged in at least one of the behaviours, or knew of someone who had. It was also found among these drivers that the social environment in which both behaviours operated, including family and friends, and the social rewards and punishments associated with the behaviours, are important in their decision making. The main quantitative phase of the research involved a cross-sectional survey of 547 Queensland licensed drivers. The aim of this study was to determine the relationship between speeding and drink driving and whether there were any similarities or differences in the factors that contribute to a driver’s decision to engage in one or the other. A comparison of the participants self-reported speeding and self-reported drink driving behaviour demonstrated that there was a weak positive association between these two behaviours. Further, participants reported engaging in more frequent speeding at both low (i.e., up to 10 kilometres per hour) and high (i.e., 10 kilometres per hour or more) levels, than engaging in drink driving behaviour. It was noted that those who indicated they drove when they may be over the legal limit for their licence type, more frequently exceeded the posted speed limit by 10 kilometres per hour or more than those who complied with the regulatory limits for drink driving. A series of regression analyses were conducted to investigate the factors that predict self-reported speeding, self-reported drink driving, and the preparedness to engage in both behaviours. In relation to self-reported speeding (n = 465), it was found that among the sociodemographic and person-related factors, younger drivers and those who score high on measures of sensation seeking were more likely to report exceeding the posted speed limit. In addition, among the legal and psychosocial factors it was observed that direct exposure to punishment (i.e., being detected by police), direct punishment avoidance (i.e., engaging in an illegal driving behaviour and not being detected by police), personal definitions (i.e., personal orientation or attitudes toward the behaviour), both the normative and behavioural dimensions of differential association (i.e., refers to both the orientation or attitude of their friends and family, as well as the behaviour of these individuals), and anticipated punishments were significant predictors of self-reported speeding. It was interesting to note that associating with significant others who held unfavourable definitions towards speeding (the normative dimension of differential association) and anticipating punishments from others were both significant predictors of a reduction in self-reported speeding. In relation to self-reported drink driving (n = 462), a logistic regression analysis indicated that there were a number of significant predictors which increased the likelihood of whether participants had driven in the last six months when they thought they may have been over the legal alcohol limit. These included: experiences of direct punishment avoidance; having a family member convicted of drink driving; higher levels of Type-A behaviour pattern; greater alcohol misuse (as measured by the AUDIT); and the normative dimension of differential association (i.e., associating with others who held favourable attitudes to drink driving). A final logistic regression analysis examined the predictors of whether the participants reported engaging in both drink driving and speeding versus those who reported engaging in only speeding (the more common of the two behaviours) (n = 465). It was found that experiences of punishment avoidance for speeding decreased the likelihood of engaging in both speeding and drink driving; whereas in the case of drink driving, direct punishment avoidance increased the likelihood of engaging in both behaviours. It was also noted that holding favourable personal definitions toward speeding and drink driving, as well as higher levels of on Type-A behaviour pattern, and greater alcohol misuse significantly increased the likelihood of engaging in both speeding and drink driving. This research has demonstrated that the compliance with the regulatory limits was much higher for drink driving than it was for speeding. It is acknowledged that while speed limits are a fundamental component of speed management practices in Australia, the countermeasures applied to both speeding and drink driving do not appear to elicit the same level of compliance across the driving population. Further, the findings suggest that while the principles underpinning the current regime of deterrence based countermeasures are sound, current enforcement practices are insufficient to force compliance among the driving population, particularly in the case of speeding. Future research should further examine the degree of overlap between speeding and drink driving behaviour and whether punishment avoidance experiences for a specific illegal driving behaviour serve to undermine the deterrent effect of countermeasures aimed at reducing the incidence of another illegal driving behaviour. Furthermore, future work should seek to understand the factors which predict engaging in speeding and drink driving behaviours at the same time. Speeding has shown itself to be a pervasive and persistent behaviour, hence it would be useful to examine why road safety authorities have been successful in convincing the majority of drivers of the dangers of drink driving, but not those associated with speeding. In conclusion, the challenge for road safety practitioners will be to convince drivers that speeding and drink driving are equally risky behaviours, with the ultimate goal to reduce the prevalence of both behaviours.