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The purpose of this paper is to investigate the relationship between personality disorder (PD) treatment readiness and dropout from three community-based offending behaviour group programmes.

At the pre-programme stage, measures of PD and treatment readiness were administered to 186 offenders participating in either a cognitive skills programme, a general violence programme or a programme for domestically abusive men. Demographic and risk data were also obtained from the offender assessment system. At a one-year follow-up, comparisons were made between the risk, personality and treatment readiness profiles of programme completers and non-completers.

It was hypothesised that PD would be associated with low levels of treatment readiness at the pre-group stage and that both low levels of treatment readiness and PD would predict subsequent programme non-completion. Only antisocial personality disorder (ASPD) was associated with low overall treatment readiness, although antisocial, paranoid, schizoid, negativistic and borderline traits were associated with the facet of low self-efficacy. Non-completion was not predicted by younger age or recidivism risk scores and was most strongly predicted by the presence of a cluster A PD, as well as ASPD, low pre-group motivation and mixed race and white ethnicity.

Paranoid and antisocial personality pathology present important obstacles to effective offending behaviour group work in the community. This illustrates that further consideration needs to be given to these important responsivity factors in future delivery and evaluation of these programmes.

The study provides a detailed analysis of factors associated with non-completion of three community-based offending behaviour programmes in the UK.

Within the current offender personality disorder (OPD) pathway in the UK, black, Asian and minority ethnic (BAME) populations are underrepresented. Fewer BAME offenders are engaging with services despite being proportionately identified for inclusion and referred on to the pathway. The paper aims to discuss this issue.

This qualitative study explored the experiences of 11 BAME men engaged in a prison-based OPD service for young offenders to identify the highlights and challenges of engagement within the service and to what extent they experienced a sense of inclusion/belonging.

Thematic analysis was used to identify three overarching themes and sub-themes. Why am I going to be an Outcast? describes the barriers to engagement encountered by the participants; and Give it a Try and Nothing but Respect describe the process of overcoming these barriers. Barriers revolved around the experiences of judgement, alienation and hopelessness. These were overcome through peer encouragement, developing relationships with staff and freedom to regulate levels of engagement.

Practice and policy implications are considered to support similar services in addressing the barriers to engagement faced by BAME individuals. Areas for future research are also recommended.

Currently, no research has directly explored the under-representation of young BAME offenders with emerging personality disorder in the OPD pathway. The findings provided an insight into some of the difficulties these young BAME offenders faced when accessing this service, alongside aspects which maintained their engagement.

The purpose of this paper is to investigate the views of young adult prisoners with emerging personality disorders (PDs), who were assessed as posing a high risk of causing serious harm to others, on the process of therapeutic change in a non-residential treatment service in a UK young offender institute. The treatment model utilises an integrated approach, specifically adapted for the developmental needs of young adults and combining therapies for PD with offence focussed interventions and regular keywork.

In total, 13 participants, who had completed at least one year of therapy, were interviewed about their perspectives about what, if any, change had occurred and how any reported change had taken place. The interviews were transcribed verbatim and analysed via thematic analysis.

All participants described having made positive therapeutic change. Three overarching change themes were identified: mentalisation of others, self-knowledge and adaptive coping. Relationships with staff were described as the key mechanism through which change was achieved. Specific treatment interventions were mentioned infrequently, although keywork and generic individual therapy and groupwork sessions were also described as drivers to change.

The findings suggest the possibility of positive therapeutic outcomes for this complex service user group. They also suggest that the domains of change and associated mechanisms may be similar to those reported for other service user groups and in other settings.

The purpose of this study is to investigate the experiences of adult male prisoners presenting with personality difficulties in an open (Category D) prison in the UK and their experience of a pilot offender personality disorder (OPD) pathway Psychologically Enhanced Resettlement Service (PERS) in the prison.

Thirteen participants who had engaged with PERS were interviewed about their experiences of open conditions and the service. The interviews were transcribed verbatim and analysed using thematic analysis.

Two superordinate themes were identified relating to participants’ experience of open conditions, highlighting the challenges they faced. These were “the impact of institutionalization” and “relational barriers”. Two superordinate themes were identified relating to participants’ experiences of PERS; these were “relationships with staff” and “service structure”. Each superordinate theme had subordinate themes.

Analysis is based on a small number of interviews in one male prison, and only qualitative data were collected. A mixed-methods approach would enable the triangulation of results.

Clinical importance for the pilot service is established, and there should be consideration for the rollout of PERS to other open establishments.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this study is the first to explore the experiences of Category D prisoners within the open estate engaging with a pilot OPD pathway service. Findings illustrate the difficulties OPD service users encounter managing the transition into open prison conditions and highlight elements of the PERS model that can support this process. Clinical and research implications are identified.

Existing quantitative research demonstrates negatively impacted mental health outcomes for people detained in immigration removal centres (IRCs) in the UK. However, there is limited qualitative research on the phenomenology of life inside UK IRCs. The purpose of this paper is to explore the psychosocial stressors experienced by people in detention, the psychological impacts of being detained and the ways in which people express resilience and cope in detention.

In-depth interviews were conducted with nine people who had previously been held in UK IRCs. Interview transcripts were analysed using interpretative phenomenological analysis.

Participants experienced incredulity and cognitive dissonance at being detained, and found themselves deprived of communication and healthcare needs. These stressors led participants to feel powerless, doubt themselves and their worldviews, and ruminate about their uncertain futures. However, participants also demonstrated resilience, and used proactive behaviours, spirituality and personal relationships to cope in detention. Antonovsky’s (1979) theory on wellbeing – sense of coherence – was found to have particular explanatory value for these findings.

The sample of participants used in this study was skewed towards male, Iranian asylum seekers, and the findings therefore may have less applicability to the experiences of females, ex-prisoners and people from different geographical and cultural backgrounds.

This study offers a range of new insights into how detention in the UK impacts on people’s lives. The findings may be useful to policy makers who legislate on and regulate the UK immigration detention system, as well as custodial staff and health and social care practitioners working in IRCs.

A number of studies have identified a relationship between the positive psychological capital (PsyCap) of employees and desirable outcomes. Given current and projected shortages of truck drivers that could become the “Achilles heel” of the global supply chain, the purpose of this paper is to test whether and how drivers’ attitudes and PsyCap relates to their intentions to quit.

Using survey data from truckload drivers (n=251) from two major transportation firms, correlation, regression, and path analysis were conducted to assess the relationship between job satisfaction, organizational commitment, PsyCap, and intentions to quit.

Results of this study indicate strong positive relationships between PsyCap and job satisfaction and organizational commitment and a strong negative correlation with intentions to quit. Structural equation modeling suggests that job satisfaction and organizational commitment mediate the relationship between PsyCap and turnover intentions.

Managerial implications for recognizing, understanding, and developing PsyCap in the transportation industry are derived from this study. Specific training guidelines are provided.

The major contribution of this paper is that it provides, for the first time, empirical evidence that PsyCap can be utilized to improve retention rates for truckload drivers.

The purpose of this paper is to present an adapted form of a qualitative research method, focus group interview, for use with small children and demonstrate its use in a small-scale study. Researchers often avoid direct study of children, and study them indirectly by asking adults. This was frequent before 1990s, but today, researchers increasingly discuss research with children rather than on children. Nevertheless, in research with young children it is not possible to use all research methods, therefore the authors modified and tested one. The additional research objectives, besides verification of methodology, were to determine the pre-school children’s attitudes to books, book-related places, reading.

The adaptation of the focus group interview involved merging the content questions of the research with a story and using a toy as the storyteller. This resembled storytelling and enabled the children to directly participate by talking to the animation toy instead of the researcher. The authors tested the method on a purposive sample of 13 pre-school children aged four and five in one public kindergarten.

Despite of the belief of some experts, who claim that focus group interview is not an appropriate method to explore habits or opinions of children, the authors found that adaptation of this method for the use with small children by means of storytelling and toy animation brings positive results because it enabled gathering data directly from the children. The content results show positive attitudes towards books and reading, differences in reading interests between boys and girls, daily exposure to books and reading, both in kindergarten and at home, and quite good knowledge of book-related places, especially libraries, somewhat less bookstores.

Since this is only the first attempt to use this adapted methodological approach, it is necessary that the method is tested on different user groups and in different circumstances to further validate its suitability for this user group. Regarding the content of the study, the results cannot be generalized due to non-probability purposive sampling.

This is the first attempt to use the adapted methodological approach for researching young children. The research may serve as a beginning and incentive for further research in this area, since only high-quality results provide good modifications and adaptations of educational programmes and activities to ensure proper development of children’s reading competences and attitudes to books and reading.

The purpose of this paper is to develop an understanding of the experience of secure care from the patients’ perspective.

A systematic review of qualitative literature was conducted. The data was sourced from the electronic databases: PsychINFO, CINAHL, Medline and the Web of Science Core Collection using pre-defined search terms. A total of 17 studies, conducted in various countries worldwide and covering high, medium and low secure inpatient settings, were included for review. The analysis involved integrating findings from across the literature and was guided by thematic synthesis.

A total of eight themes were generated from the data, three of which provided an understanding of the experience of forensic secure care, and the remaining five themes provided an understanding of the factors which may influence the experience of secure care.

Developing understanding of patient experience can lead to service improvements, potentially impacting patients’ motivation and engagement and thus reducing admission times, potential recalls and recidivism.

To the best of the authors’ knowledge, this is the first systematic review to date to exclusively explore the broad topic of the patient experience of secure mental health care.

This paper aims to develop a deeper understanding of what (un)sustainable food behaviours and values are transmitted across generations, to what extent this transference happens and the sustainability challenges resulting from this for individuals and households.

A total of 25 semi-structured in-depth interviews are analysed regarding the value of inherited food, family food rituals, habits and traditions, aspects of food production and understanding of sustainability.

Intergenerational transferences are significant in shaping (un)sustainable consumption throughout life, and those passed-on behaviours and values offer opportunities for lifelong sustainable change and food consumption reappraisal in daily life, beyond early years parenting and across diverse households.

Participants were limited to British families, although the sample drew on multiple ethnic heritages. Future research could study collectivist versus more individualistic cultural influence; explore intergenerational transference of other diverse households, such as multigeneration or in rural and urban locations, or whether sustainable crossover derived from familial socialisation continues into behaviours and values beyond food.

The findings show the importance of families and intergenerational transference to the embedding of sustainable consumption behaviours. Mundane family life is a critical source of sustainable learning, and marketers should prioritise understanding of the context and relationships that drive sustainable consumer choices. Opportunities for intentional and unintentional sustainable learning exist throughout life, and marketers and policymakers can both disrupt unsustainable and encourage sustainable behaviours with appropriate interventions, such as nostalgic or well-being communications. The paper sheds light on flexible sustainable identities and how ambivalence or accelerated lives can deflect how policy messages are received, preventing sustainable choices.

The findings provide greater understanding about the mechanisms responsible for the sustainable transformation of consumption habits, suggesting intergenerational transferences are significant in shaping (un)sustainable food consumption throughout life. The study shows secondary socialisation can play a critical role in the modification of early behaviour patterns of food socialisation. The authors found individuals replicate food behaviours and values from childhood, but through a process of lifelong learning, can break formative habits, particularly with reverse socialisation influences that prioritise sustainable behaviours.

Using job demands–resources (JD–R) theory, the purpose of this paper is to investigate the role of job demands (difficult performance appraisal (PA) objectives) and job resources (performance feedback and leader member exchange (LMX)) on employee reports of PA cynicism. The paper also investigates the consequences of PA cynicism on intent to quit and bad sportsmanship.

Survey data on PA demands and resources, PA cynicism and turnover intentions were obtained from employees. Supervisors rated their employees’ level of sportsmanship.

Contrary to the predictions of JD–R theory, the authors found that employees are most likely to be cynical when they experience high levels of job resources (LMX and performance feedback) and high levels of job demands (difficult objectives).

The study demonstrates that PA cynicism matters – employees with higher levels of PA cynicism were more likely to contemplate leaving the organization; employees with high levels of PA cynicism are rated as bad sports by their supervisors.

Employees are sensitive to gaps between the description and reality of a PA process which can trigger thoughts of organizational exit and ineffective work behaviors. human resource managers need to ensure that employees regard the PA process as valuable, useful and worth their time and effort.

The authors contribute to the PA literature by investigating the role of both job resources and demands. PA research has focused on the specification of job demands, underplaying the role of job resources in employee attitudes toward PA.