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PubMed1975

. . . And some men have leadership thrust upon them.

Viewing leadership behavior as a joint function of situational factors, individual predispositions, and followers' responsive behavior, this study used 64 subjects, half of them high and half of them low in measured leadership self-concept. Half had a high and half a low stake in a group task. Each subject was twice appointed leader of a three-man group, once exposed to "followers" (experimenter's condederates,) altercasting him to lead, once to followers alter-casting him to follow. Multivariate analyses of variance showed effects of followers' behavior on profiles of a subject's behavior (when subjects were pushed to lead they led, when pushed to follow they increased socioemotional activity) and perceptions of followers. These effects were specified by leadership self-concept (little difference between groups when confronting pushy followers, more when confronting passive ones), prompting an interpretation in terms of role incongruity.

Group Processes↗
PubMed2002

Rethinking individualism and collectivism: evaluation of theoretical assumptions and meta-analyses.

Are Americans more individualistic and less collectivistic than members of other groups? The authors summarize plausible psychological implications of individualism-collectivism (IND-COL), meta-analyze cross-national and within-United States IND-COL differences, and review evidence for effects of IND-COL on self-concept, well-being, cognition, and relationality. European Americans were found to be both more individualistic-valuing personal independence more-and less collectivistic-feeling duty to in-groups less-than others. However, European Americans were not more individualistic than African Americans, or Latinos, and not less collectivistic than Japanese or Koreans. Among Asians, only Chinese showed large effects, being both less individualistic and more collectivistic. Moderate IND-COL effects were found on self-concept and relationality, and large effects were found on attribution and cognitive style.

Adult↗
PubMed1994

Predictors of Norwegian adolescents' sunbathing and use of sunscreen.

A nationwide random sample of 15,169 Norwegian high school students completed a questionnaire about tanning habits, physical self-concept, attitudes, beliefs, and values. Although 90% of the adolescents did use sunscreen, less than 25% used an adequate sun-protection factor, and only 50% applied the sunscreen an adequate number of times when sunbathing. Multiple regression analyses identified these predictors of sunbathing: opportunity to sunbathe, tender skin, heavy smoking, playing down the risk for skin cancer, valuing physical appearance, friends' use of sunscreen (girls only), a positive attitude toward having a tan, favorable physical self-concept, friends' use of sunbeds, and friends' sunbathing. Sunscreen use was also predicted by opportunity to sunbathe and skin type. Furthermore, the effects of perceived risk for skin cancer and peers' use of sunscreen were particularly strong.

Adolescent↗
PubMed2001

Psychological correlates of vasectomy.

OBJECTIVE: To examine the thoughts and concerns of men contemplating vasectomy before speaking to a physician as well as their partner's role in reaching this decision. DESIGN: A questionnaire analysis using response rates, ANOVA, and regression analyses. SETTING: A large Midwestern teaching hospital. PATIENT(S): Visitors to the urology clinic of the hospital. INTERVENTION(S): None. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURE(S): [1] Questionnaire designed by authors. [2] Measures of self-concept, relationship satisfaction, and problem-solving abilities. RESULT(S): [1] Subjects had been considering vasectomy for an average of 1 year and were fairly certain of their decision. [2] Anxiety about vasectomy surgery was mostly driven by fear about pain and fear of the unknown. [3] Concerns about the finality of the procedure did not emerge as a big concern. [4] There is confusion about the reversibility of the procedure. [5] Subjects are better problem solvers and have a higher self-concept than people in general. CONCLUSION(S): Our findings demonstrate the need for adequate prevasectomy counseling, particularly in the area of postoperative expectations, as well as reversibility of the procedure.

Adult↗
PubMed1975

Perceived latitude of choice of institutionalized and noninstitutionalized elderly women.

An Importance, Locus and Range of Activities Checklist, designed to assess self-perceived latitude of choice, a self concept and a life satisfaction scale were administered to 25 institutionalized and 25 noninstitutionalized elderly females. The checklist contained statements about 37 activities of daily living which subjects rated for personal importance and degree of choice available to them. The derived latitude of choice score was based jointly on importance and choice ratings for each activity. Institutionalized respondents, living in a relatively restrictive environment, earned significantly lower latitude of choice scores than did noninstitutionalized subjects. Latitude of choice, self concept and life satisfaction scores were significantly correlated. These findings attest to the appropriateness of the technique used to assess perceived latitude of choice. Modifications of the Importance, Locus and Range of Activities Checklist designed to provide a more profound measure of latitude of choice and to improve the applicability of the scale to different categories of respondents were discussed.

Activities of Daily Living↗
PubMed1999

[Psychogenic impairment and current feelings in the elderly. Which options are offered by the biographical perspective?].

In the Eldermen study funded by the German Research Association (DFG), a consecutive sample of patients, aged > or = 60 (n = 120) and being treated for a variety of internal medical complaints in an acute geriatric hospital were examined with the help of comprehensive somatic diagnostics, standardised questionnaires, and a semi-structured biographical interview. The study investigates the relationship between burdensome and supportive biographical experiences and the extent of psychogenic impairment as well as aspects of feeling tone and self-concept in later life. For the degree of psychogenic impairment (Impairment Score. IS; Schepank 1995), subjectively experienced burdens and support were found to be more relevant than "objective" burdens. As expected, subjective burdens consistently experienced over several life phases, particularly in association with limited experienced support, were found to be associated with greater psychogenic impairment and a higher "case risk" in later life. However, the patients with the highest values for current life satisfaction as well as a more positive self-concept were not those patients who never experienced more burdens than support in their biographies, but rather those who experienced more burden than support in one life phase. The results are presented in relation to models of learning theory and object relation theory and discussed for their clinical relevance.

Aged↗
PubMed1992

A comparative study of black South African children from three different contexts.

This study compares family characteristics and developmental outcomes of black children (N = 300) from 3 rural contexts in South Africa: the homeland, the resettlement, and the white-owned farms. Parents in the homeland were more likely to be married and had more education, less household crowding, and lower mobility than parents in the other 2 areas, and higher occupational status than parents from the farms. Child outcomes paralleled these differences in material resources and family stability. Children from the homeland scored higher than children from the resettlement or farms on head circumference, vocabulary, quantitative skill, and self-concept, with no significant differences between the latter 2 areas on these outcome variables. Children from the homeland also scored higher than resettlement children on weight, copying skill, and height, with children from the farms measuring lowest on height. Child outcomes were highly intercorrelated in all 3 residence areas, but correlations among family variables, and between family and child variables, showed different patterns across areas. Parent education, occupation, and crowding were the most consistent predictors of physical development, cognitive development, and self-concept. Family mobility and marital status, however, showed different relationships to other family variables and to child outcomes across the 3 environments. These results highlight the importance of studying children in multiple environmental contexts, because family characteristics are not associated uniformly across residence areas.

Achievement↗
PubMed1998

School violence in an impoverished South African community.

OBJECTIVE: The aim of this anthropological study was to create an understanding of school-related violence experienced by adolescents in the context of chronic poverty in a South African community. METHOD: Qualitative methods of data collection such as participant observation, interviews, and group discussions were utilized for data collection. Sixteen children and three adults in turn kept diaries and wrote reports during the research period of three and one-half years (June 1992-December 1995). All the Standard seven pupils (N = 76) of the local school completed a self-concept questionnaire and wrote two essays about themselves and their lives, respectively. RESULTS: The ideology and structures of apartheid created a context of impoverishment and structural violence to which children were exposed. The school was one of the social institutions where children were subjected to structural, psychological, and physical violence on a daily basis. Violent behavior or discipline was justified as being just and an effective teaching practice by authoritarian parents and teachers. The manifestations of poverty included emotional erosion, a negative self-concept, and reactive violence. CONCLUSIONS: School-related violence was structurally interwoven with the very fabric of the social hierarchy of the school set-up and was sanctioned as an effective strategy to gain social control and discipline children. Poverty in itself provided the breeding-ground for violence at home and in the school. Children were caught up in a vicious circle of pro- and reactive violence and socialized to accept violence as an instrument of empowerment. Recommendations for possible intervention and further research are offered.

Adolescent↗
PubMed2005

Pathways to adolescent substance use among sexually abused girls.

This study examined the link between childhood sexual abuse and adolescent substance use among girls, and evaluated depressive self-concept and behavioral under-control (BUC) as pathways to substance use for sexually abused girls. Participants (n = 150) were drawn from a longitudinal study of the impact of domestic violence on the lives of women and children. Structural equation modeling revealed that girls' childhood sexual abuse was associated prospectively with their later substance use. This relationship persisted when age, co-occurring forms of child abuse (physical, exposure to domestic violence), childhood depression and aggression, family income, maternal substance use, and parenting practices were controlled. Behavioral under-control mediated the relationship between childhood sexual abuse and later substance use, but depressive self-concept did not. Implications, limitations, and directions for future research are discussed.

Adolescent↗
PubMed1999

Problem eating attitudes and behaviors in young children.

OBJECTIVE: The factor structure of the Children's Eating Attitudes Test (ChEAT) and the predictors of problem eating were examined in young boys and girls. METHODS: Two hundred and twenty eight children from Grades 2 and 4 completed questionnaires which examined problem eating attitudes and behaviors, body image, and self-concepts. RESULTS: Four factors were found for girls and boys. The girls' four factors, Dieting, Food Preoccupation, Social Pressure to Eat, and Restricting and Purging, corresponded closely to previous studies with older girls and women. Four different factors were found for the boys, Global Problems, Dieting versus Purging, Dieting and Food Preoccupation, and Emotional Eating. However, dieting behaviors in both girls and boys were predicted by poorer body image and in boys emotional concerns about eating were predicted by poorer body image and lower self-concepts. DISCUSSION: There is still relatively little research that has examined problem eating attitudes and behaviors of boys and men. As boys tend to report infrequent dieting, we may need to focus more on the emotional concerns about eating and becoming overweight as a potential indicator of eating problems in boys.

Attitude to Health↗
PubMed2006

Germs, hosts, and the origin of Frank Macfarlane Burnet's concept of "self " and "tolerance," 1936-1949.

In the early twentieth century, the living organism's ability to distinguish its "self" from foreign entities such as bacteria, viruses, transplanted tissue, or transfused blood was a major problem in medical science. This article discusses how the Australian immunologist Frank Macfarlane Burnet arrived at a satisfactory explanation of this problem through his 1949 theory of "self" and "tolerance." Burnet's theoretical work began from his study of diverse factors affecting the conditions of the host and the germ for the occurrence of infectious diseases. Among them, the host's age came to receive his attention as a crucial factor. This understanding was facilitated by his acceptance of cytoplasm inheritance theories, which emphasized the importance of the embryonic host's changing conditions according to its age. Based on this idea, he claimed in 1949 that the "self" of the organism was defined during its embryogenesis. Peter B. Medawar and his colleagues' demonstration of Burnet's claim became the basis for awarding Burnet and Medawar the Nobel Prize in Physiology and Medicine in 1960. While previous histories have focused on Burnet's "inductive reasoning" or "ecological perspective" to explain his conception of the theory of "self" and "tolerance," this article finds the origin of his ideas within an important line of modern medical research engendered through the development of germ theories--the studies of the host body and its relationship with parasites.

Allergy and Immunology↗
PubMed1982

The effect of a 14-week employee fitness program on selected physiological and psychological parameters.

A 14-week study was undertaken to determine the effects of a structured employee exercise program on blood lipid profiles and selected physiological and psychological parameters. Specific analyses dealt with the effects of exercise on total cholesterol, high-density lipoproteins, the ratio of total cholesterol to high-density lipoproteins, total triglycerides, trait anxiety, self-concept, oxygen uptake, weight, body fat percentage and resting heart rate and blood pressure. Subjects were 73 male and female employees of the Xerox Corporation joining a newly developed health fitness program. For the duration of the study they exercises as often as they chose using activities such as running and cycling to raise heart rates to a target level for 20-minute sessions. At the conclusion of the study, subjects were grouped by frequency of exercise to determine overall effects of the program and possible intergroup variations. Significant improvements overall were found in self-concept (physical, personal and social), trait anxiety, resting heart rate and systolic blood pressure, total triglycerides and total cholesterol. Significant improvements overall and differences among the attendance groups were found in absolute and relative predicted maximum oxygen uptake. These improvements related directly to frequency of exercise.

Adolescent↗
PubMed1985

Psychosocial adaptations of shunted hydrocephalic children.

The personality, psychosomatic symptoms and family characteristics of 55 shunted hydrocephalic children older than four years were studied. Hydrocephalic childrens' self-concept, measured by the Children's Appereception Test, was found to be very significantly poorer than that of the control children. They also frequently showed behaviour disorders of the MBD-type, e.g. concentration difficulties, aggressiveness, fastidious eating and nervousness. The hydrocephalic childrens' families showed very significantly more cohesion and less rigidity, and significantly less authoritarianism than average Finnish families. When examining the parents' attitudes to their sick child, one third of the children were seen to be in a healthy role, with parental expectations realistically related to the child's abilities. One third of the children were seen as "babies", with unnecessarily over-protective attitudes on the part of their parents, and one third as "scapegoats", with accusatory attitudes from their mother and father. Those in the role of "scapegoats" had the poorest perceptual skills, the highest frequencies of behaviour disorders and the poorest self-concept.

Adaptation, Psychological↗
PubMed1991

Induced versus spontaneous attendance of breast-screening tests by women.

Despite the availability of services and information, not enough women undergo breast-screening tests. A previous study showed that clinic attenders differ from nonattenders in emotions, personality, self-concept, neuroticism, psychosomatics, and health attitudes. Some of these resembled the cancer-prone personality. The present study was designed to test whether nonattenders have higher repression that supports denial and could be persuaded by positive inducements to undergo the tests. Other goals were to examine if the new sample replicates the former findings and if it differs from clinic attenders. The subjects were 210 spontaneous clinic attenders and 210 matched controls from the previous study and 46 positively induced women. They were administered questionnaires assessing emotions, personality, daydreaming, self-concept, neuroticism, somatic complaints, alexithymia, and health attitudes. The findings were that the induced sample scored higher on repressiveness, had more cancer-affected blood relatives, and responded favorably to the positive inducements. They differed from the controls in most of the variables the clinic attenders did but differed from the clinic attenders in 30% of the variables, manifesting more extreme correspondence to the cancer-prone personality. The findings indicate possibilities of drawing more individuals to undergo the tests by emphasizing the positive anxiety-reducing approach.

Adult↗
PubMed2000

Hopelessness and its impact on rehabilitation outcome in schizophrenia -an exploratory study.

The primary focus in contemporary psychiatry on symptoms and their neurobiological basis, although fundamentally important, is nevertheless incomplete. The long-term course and outcome of schizophrenia are determined not only by the disorder, but also by the interaction between the person and the disorder. Not only psychopathological symptoms but also cognitive variables such as negative self-concepts, low expectations and external loci of control can influence the patient's coping strategies and may lead to hopelessness and chronicity. Hopelessness here refers to a cognitive-affective state in which the patient perceives the disorder and its consequences to be beyond his control, feels helpless and has given up expecting to influence its course positively, thereby abandoning responsibility and active coping strategies. In a prospective study, we examined these relationships by using logistic regression in data from 46 schizophrenic outpatients who were participating in a vocational rehabilitation program. Negative self-concepts, external loci of control, and depression correlated to a higher extent with depressive-resigned coping strategies than did schizophrenic symptoms. Thus, poor rehabilitation outcome may be predicted to a high degree by the presence of external loci of control, pessimistic outcome expectancies, negative symptoms, and depressive-resigned coping strategies. After having eliminated the influence of negative symptoms, external control beliefs still had significant predictive value for the outcome. Rehabilitation outcome in schizophrenic patients can be only partially predicted by negative symptoms; the other predictive factor is whether the patient has already given up or not.

Adaptation, Psychological↗
PubMed1989

Multiple daily insulin injections improve self-confidence.

The efficacy and psychosocial effects of multiple daily insulin injections (three preprandial injections of short-acting insulin (NovoPen) and once daily, bedtime extended-acting insulin) were compared with those of twice daily combinations of short- and intermediate-acting insulin, in a randomized crossover study (two 6-month periods), in 16 adult diabetic patients. HbA1 was not significantly different for the two treatment modalities (8.2 +/- 0.4 vs 7.6 +/- 0.4%). With the pen-injector regimen significantly less state anxiety (36.0 +/- 2.5 vs 39.5 +/- 2.7; p less than 0.05) was found than with the conventional syringe regimen. The patients tended to experience a better self-concept as having diabetes (32.0 +/- 2.1 vs 37.7 +/- 3.0; p less than 0.06), as well as less external ('chance') orientation (18.5 +/- 1.2 vs 20.7 +/- 1.6; p = 0.09) with the pen-injector regimen. A subgroup of patients with lower trait anxiety scores experienced less state anxiety during the pen-injector regimen than during twice daily insulin injections (30.6 +/- 2.6 vs 34.3 +/- 2.7; p less than 0.05). However, this subgroup tended to be less positive about injecting insulin during the pen-injector regimen (34.8 +/- 3.6 vs 29.6 +/- 4.0; p less than 0.08). The subgroup with higher trait anxiety scores experienced a better self-concept as having diabetes (35.3 +/- 2.3 vs 40.1 +/- 2.6; p less than 0.05) and a tendency towards less physician orientation (15.8 +/- 1.8 vs 19.6 +/- 2.7; p less than 0.07) with the pen-injector regimen. Thirteen patients continued with the pen-injector regimen.

Anxiety↗
PubMed1999

The relationship between personality and attainment in 16-19-year-old students in a sixth form college: II: Self-perception, gender and attainment.

BACKGROUND: A related paper (Summerfield & Youngman, 1999) has described the development of a scale, the Student Self-Perception Scale (SSPS) designed to explore the relationship between academic self-concept, attainment and personality in sixth form college students. AIMS: The study aimed to identify groups of students exhibiting varying patterns of relationship using a range of measures including the SSPS. Issues of gender and also examined. SAMPLES: The samples comprised a pilot sample of 152 students (aged 16-17 years from two sixth form colleges) and a main sample of 364 students (mean age, 16 yrs 10 mths range 16:0 to 18:6 years, from one sixth form college). The main sample included similar numbers of male and female students (46% male, 54% female) and ethnic minority students comprised 14% of this sample. METHOD: Data comprised responses to two personality measures (the SSPS, Summerfield, 1995, and the Nowicki-Strickland Locus of Control Scale, Nowicki & Strickland, 1973), various student and tutor estimates of success, and performance data from college records. Students were classified using relocation cluster analysis and cluster differences verified using discriminant function analysis. Thirty outcome models were tested using covariance regression analysis. RESULTS: Eight distinct and interpretable groups, consistent with other research, were identified but the hypothesis of a positive, linear relationship between mastery and academic attainment was not sustained without qualification. Previous attainment was the major determinant of final performance. Gender variations were detected on the personality measures, particularly Confidence of outcomes, Prediction discrepancy, Passivity, Mastery, Dependency and Locus of control, and these were implicated in the cluster characteristics. CONCLUSIONS: The results suggest that a non-linear methodology may be required to isolate relationships between self-concept, personality and attainment, especially where gender effects may exist.

Achievement↗