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Background: Quality of life is a core concern for cancer patients, which can be negatively affected by illness-related death anxiety; yet understanding of how to appropriately target psycho-oncological interventions remains lacking. We aimed to explore experiential acceptance in cancer patients, and whether acceptance – as an alternative to avoidant coping – was related to and predictive of better quality of life and death anxiety outcomes.

Methods: We used a longitudinal, quantitative design with a follow-up after three months. Seventy-two participants completed a questionnaire-battery measuring illness appraisals, acceptance and non-acceptance coping-styles, quality of life, and death anxiety; 31 participants repeated the battery after three months.

Results: Acceptance was an independent explanatory and predictive variable for quality of life and death anxiety, in the direction of psychological health. Acceptance had greater explanatory power for outcomes than either cancer appraisals or avoidant response styles. Avoidant response styles were associated with greater death anxiety and poorer quality of life.

Conclusions: The findings support the role of an accepting response-style in favourable psychological outcomes, identifying a possible target for future psychological intervention. Response styles that might be encouraged in other therapies, such as active coping, planning, and positive reframing, were not associated with beneficial outcomes.

The purpose of this study is to extend Bippus and Young’s (2005) study and examine the effectiveness of the “I-you,” “I,” “You,” “We,” “But” and Question-based “Why” statements from Winer’s (2021) verbal coding program of conflict management using Bandura’s (1977) social learning theory (SLT).

Mixed methods were used using 175 university students from Texas and New York. A cross-sectional convenience sampling approach was conducted. Survey data was collected using Qualtrics.

Descriptive results demonstrated that the “We” statement was the most passive, the “I-you” statement was the most assertive and the “But,” “I,” “You” and Question statements were perceived to be aggressive. In addition, assertive “I-You” statements were perceived to be more effective in resolving the conflict and maintaining a relationship, whereas aggressive statements were less likely to resolve the conflict and maintain the relationship. Qualitative themes also support the “I-You” statement as the most assertive, while the “But,” “You” and “I” statements were found to be the most aggressive statements.

Implications and applications are discussed to stimulate future research among researchers and practitioners when addressing conflict. Being aware of the verbal statements that de-escalate conflict may be helpful in solving conflict in interpersonal, family and professional relationships. Future trainings can adopt effective verbal statements to resolve conflict when experiencing anger issues. Future research can continue to investigate verbal communication statements using SLT to help practitioners and managers address conflict in interpersonal relationships.

This study examines verbal statements in relation to communication styles and conflict management.

The purpose of this paper is to describe research into attachment styles of rough sleepers and considersthe implications for practice.

The research was structured interviews with a cohort of rough sleepers analysed through evidence-based techniques, and the implications were drawn out with reference to current best practice.

The rough sleepers in the cohort had a very different pattern of attachment styles to the housed population, with 100% insecure vs c35%, and 50% insecure disorganised vs >15%.

The limitation is that the cohort was relatively small, n = 22 and was a sample of convenience. The implications are that homelessness services working with rough sleepers need to be attachment-informed as much as trauma-informed.

Practical implications are that homelessness services need to have a more rounded psychological perspective such as psychologically informed environments rather than just a trauma-informed approach.

Rough sleepers suffer from deeply pervasive and severe attachment disorders, and this may be causal to their becoming rough sleepers and is certainly a factor in whether or not they are successfully rehoused.

There is almost no other original research published into the attachment styles of rough sleepers or homeless people. The current trend is for trauma-informed services: the call for attachment-informed ones is original.

Aiming to address the problem in which practitioners mindlessly prioritise the reputation of social media influencers (SMIs) over ensuring proper congruence between the influencers themselves and content marketing strategies, this study develops a conceptual framework that adopts an elaboration likelihood model and attachment theory to ascertain the effects of SMIs, live content marketing and their congruency on impulsive buying (IB).

Through collecting cross-sectional data from 608 valid replies, this study adopts an integrated method that combines partial least squares structural equation modeling (PLS-SEM), artificial neural network (ANN) and fuzzy-set qualitative comparative analysis (fsQCA) to analyse.

The results reveal that the credibility and relevance of live content, the empathy and professionalism of SMIs, and their congruence are critical antecedents of consumers' attachments to live content and SMIs, thus triggering their attachment to endorsement and IB.

In knowledge, this study benefits the scope of the elaboration likelihood model and attachment theory and enriches live streaming commerce literature. In method, an integrated analytical method is used to cope with complex structural relationships in non-linear patterns and predictions, as well as examine the complex causal configurations. In practice, this study facilitates practitioners to further ascertain what attributes in live content and SMIs can foster customer's emotional attachments in choosing endorsers and developing endorsement strategies, thus driving their IB.

The purpose of this study is to examine how construction project managers’ conflict management styles (CMSs) affect project team resilience from the perspective of social identity theory.

This study adopted a cross-sectional survey design and collected paired data from 110 construction project managers and 474 employees in China. Based on the data collected, the authors tested the proposed hypotheses using hierarchical regression analysis.

The results show that a project manager’s cooperative CMS positively affects team resilience, and a project manager’s competitive and avoidant CMS negatively affects team resilience. Team followership plays a mediating role in this relationship. The team power distance moderates the effects of a project manager’s cooperative and avoidant CMSs on team followership.

This paper enriches the existing literature on conflict management in construction projects and have potential guiding significance and application value for team resilience management practices.

This preliminary investigation aims to examine the psychological impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on patients and staff within a high secure service.

To discern the connection between COVID-19-related distress and multiple factors, the study involved 31 patients and 34 staff who completed assessments evaluating coping strategies, resilience, emotional reactivity, ward atmosphere and work-related aspects.

Results demonstrated that around a third of staff (31.2%) experienced COVID-19-related distress levels that met the clinical cut-off for possible post-traumatic stress disorder. Emotional reactivity, staff shortages, secondary traumatic stress and coping strategies were all positively correlated with COVID-19-related-distress. Resilience was negatively associated with distress, thus acting as a potential mitigating factor. In comparison, the prevalence of distress among patients was low (3.2%).

The authors postulate that increased staff burdens during the pandemic may have led to long-term distress, while their efforts to maintain minimal service disruption potentially shielded patients from psychological impacts, possibly lead to staff “problem-focused coping burnout”. This highlights the need for in-depth research on the enduring impacts of pandemics, focusing on mechanisms that intensify or alleviate distress. Future studies should focus on identifying effective coping strategies for crisis situations, such as staff shortages, and strategies for post-crisis staff support.

The authors postulate that the added burdens on staff during the pandemic might have contributed to their distress. Nonetheless, staff might have inadvertently safeguarded patients from the pandemic’s psychological ramifications by providing a “service of little disruption”, potentially leading to “problem-focused coping burnout”. These findings underscore the imperative for further research capturing the enduring impacts of pandemics, particularly scrutinising factors that illuminate the mechanisms through which distress is either intensified or alleviated across different groups. An avenue worth exploring is identifying effective coping styles for pandemics.

This systematic literature review aims to elaborate on the research progress and features of information source preferences to help other researchers attain a more comprehensive understanding of the field.

Following a systematic review protocol, 139 research articles from 11 academic databases were analyzed.

Overall, five separate results were obtained: first, information source horizon theory is the main theoretical foundation of information source preferences research, while other theories have been applied less. Second, information source preference research has strong context sensitivity and involves health, work, consumption, learning, survival and development and emergencies. Third, preference criteria can be summarized into three categories: information characteristics, user characteristics, needs characteristics and corresponding specific criteria. Fourth, information source preferences are influenced by both internal and external factors, including five specific aspects, namely demographics, the user's cognition, the user's affection, capital and contextual factors. Fifth, this field is dominated by quantitative methods and an information horizon mapping method could be applied more.

This study is the first to reveal the general picture of information source preferences. It also elaborates on the characteristics of this field and presents potential development directions.

Zara et al. (2023) provide novel findings into how psychopathy may develop, showing that early life predictors of poor relationships (e.g. being unwanted before birth) are predictive of psychopathy in adulthood. The authors provide a theoretical interpretation of why psychopathy might develop based on these findings by using an adaptive perspective, suggesting that psychopathy may protect or shield individuals from poor relationships. This commentary aims to critically evaluate and extend this latter suggestion in hopes of fostering further research and clarity on the topic.

After presenting an overview of evolutionary perspectives, a summary and elaboration are presented of the interpretation that psychopathy may be an adaptive response that functions to protect individuals from poor relationships. Then, an additional adaptive interpretation is offered.

Psychopathy describes a collection of traits and behavior that facilitates an approach-oriented and exploitative motivational style that might suggest more than a protective function. When negative or poor relationships are experienced (e.g. being unwanted), it is suggested that psychopathy may begin to develop not just for protection (If I am not loved, I will shield myself from those around me) but to actively orient toward exploitation (If I am not loved, I will exploit those around me).

This commentary hopes to arouse further interest into the theoretical interpretations of why psychopathy may develop that are based on findings of how psychopathy develops. These considerations are consequential for understanding what to target in treatments that aim to meet the specific needs and motivations of individuals with psychopathic traits.

The purpose of this study is to understand the influence of the transformational, transactional and laissez-faire leadership styles and collaborative integrative behavior of the team with respect to organizational ambidexterity (the combination of exploration and exploitation learning) in university research groups.

From a survey conducted with a sample of 506 researchers, members of 165 research groups, working in an emerging economy, a multiple regression model analysis was performed.

Findings of this study provide evidence that the coordinator's transformational leadership and the collaborative integrative behavior of the team positively influence organizational ambidexterity of research groups. Transactional leadership and laissez-faire style do not show any significant influence.

This study addresses the lack of knowledge regarding organizational learning in research groups to explore and exploit knowledge through research result transfer processes based on the organizational ambidexterity logic in higher education institutions (HEIs) from emerging economies. The study aims to contribute to the literature on leadership styles and ambidexterity in HEIs in emerging economies, particularly in Latin America, where there is still a scarcity of research on the attributes of effective leadership.

Despite the growing popularity of online secondhand platforms globally, there is a lack of studies exploring how consumers worldwide perceive contamination and the use of secondhand goods differently according to the culture. Based on the consumer contamination theory, this study aims to investigate the cultural differences of South Koreans and Americans by examining three variables (e.g. transaction type, ownership duration and physical attractiveness) related to consumers' perception of contamination and purchase intentions for a secondhand apparel item.

Data were collected from 422 US and South Korean female consumers who were assigned to an experimental scenario, and their secondhand purchase intentions and perceived contamination were compared through independent t-tests and moderated regression analyses.

Consumers' purchase intentions increased, and perceived contamination decreased when the transaction type was business-to-consumer (vs consumer-to-consumer), when the item had been owned for a shorter period of time and when the item was sold by an attractive seller. Such effect was more pronounced for South Korean consumers than the US consumers in the negative contamination contexts (i.e. transaction type, ownership duration), but not in the positive contamination context (i.e. attractiveness).

The findings of the study add to the literature on consumer contamination theory through an examination of several negative and positive contamination factors in retail contexts and highlight the role of culture as a critical moderator.