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1 – 10 of 64Amelia Talbot, Michelle O'Reilly and Nisha Dogra
The paper aims to explore the anxiety of university students. The authors note that the rhetoric of the snowflake is frequently invoked in lay discourse to characterise a…
Abstract
Purpose
The paper aims to explore the anxiety of university students. The authors note that the rhetoric of the snowflake is frequently invoked in lay discourse to characterise a generation of young people as overly sensitive. This misleading conceptualisation is potentially stigmatising.
Design/methodology/approach
Interviews were conducted with tweleve young women (18–25 years) about anxiety during their transition through university and into adulthood.
Findings
The authors identified three themes: (1) students in a modern world, (2) gendered demands and (3) anxiety of adulting. Analysis demonstrated numerous, transecting and discourse-informed anxieties about modern life.
Practical implications
University professionals may benefit from understanding the gendered dimensions of anxiety associated with transitions to adulthood, including the increased pressures to succeed and achieve.
Originality/value
The arguably pejorative label of “snowflake” could negatively impact the social progress made in recognising the importance of taking care of mental health and help-seeking. This is especially concerning for females, as they have higher prevalence of anxiety conditions than males.
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Abyshey Nhedzi, Sadiyya Haffejee, Michelle O'Reilly and Panos Vostanis
This study aims to establish the perspectives of community providers on challenges and enablers in developing child mental health capacity in disadvantaged communities in…
Abstract
Purpose
This study aims to establish the perspectives of community providers on challenges and enablers in developing child mental health capacity in disadvantaged communities in South Africa.
Design/methodology/approach
The authors involved 29 community providers operating in a large urban-deprived area in the Gauteng Province, east of Johannesburg. Community providers had educational, social and health care backgrounds. Their perspectives were captured through three focus groups, two participatory workshops and reflective diaries. Data were integrated and subjected to inductive thematic analysis.
Findings
Three interlinked themes were identified. Community mobilization was viewed as pre-requisite through mental health awareness and strategies to engage children, youth and parents. Service provision should take into consideration contextual factors, predominantly inequalities, lack of basic needs and gender-based issues (domestic violence, teenage pregnancy and single motherhood). Participants referred to severe mental health needs, and related to physical health conditions, disabilities and impairments, rather than to common mental health problems or wellbeing. They proposed that capacity building should tap into existing resources and integrate with support systems through collaborative working.
Practical implications
Child mental health policy and service design in Majority World Countries (MWCs), should involve all informal and structural support systems and stakeholders. Contextual factors require consideration, especially in disadvantaged communities and low-resource settings, and should be addressed through joined up working.
Originality/value
Children’s mental health needs are largely unmet in MWC-disadvantaged communities. These findings capture the experiences and perspectives of various community providers on how to enhance mental health provision by mobilizing communities and resources.
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Philip John Archard, Emma Giles, Isobel Moore, Sewanu Awhangansi, Siobhan Fitzpatrick, Leanne Kulik and Michelle O’Reilly
The purpose of this paper is to report findings from a service evaluation undertaken within a single specialist child and adolescent mental health service (CAMHS) team…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to report findings from a service evaluation undertaken within a single specialist child and adolescent mental health service (CAMHS) team. The team works closely with local authority children’s services to serve specific populations recognised as experiencing higher levels of mental health need, including children living in alternative care and with adoptive families. The evaluation sought to better understand the experience of this provision during the COVID-19 pandemic and concomitant increase in remote and digitally mediated care delivery.
Design/methodology/approach
Analysis of the accounts of 38 parents, carers and professionals involved with the team gathered via telephone interviews and email and postal questionnaires.
Findings
Similar views were expressed from participants involved with the team before and following the onset of the pandemic. Overall, satisfaction was high; however, changes in care appeared more challenging for those already involved with the team before the pandemic. Differences in experience between groups were also evident. Whereas foster carers’ accounts were generally appreciative of the involvement of clinicians, particularly regarding clinician–patient relationships, amongst adoptive parents and members of children’s birth families there were more mixed and negative impressions.
Originality/value
Locally based service evaluations can help inform care pathway planning in specialist CAMHS provision as part of wider quality improvement initiatives. This is especially relevant considering the repercussions of the COVID-19 pandemic and as the longer-term acceptability of remote working practices is appraised.
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Panos Vostanis, Seyda Eruyar, Esther Smit and Michelle O’Reilly
The purpose of this paper is to develop a child psychosocial framework among stakeholders in areas of disadvantage in three low- and middle-income countries (LMIC), i.e…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to develop a child psychosocial framework among stakeholders in areas of disadvantage in three low- and middle-income countries (LMIC), i.e. Kenya, Turkey and Brazil, and to capture their proposed recommendations through action plans according to this framework.
Design/methodology/approach
Workshops were facilitated with a total of 54 participants from different disciplines. The framework addressed safety and child-centredness, quality of care, resilience-building in schools and communities, enhancing competencies within existing roles, counselling and psychological interventions, and access to mental health services. Stakeholders’ perspectives were captured through a participatory action procedure.
Findings
The emerging 33 categories across the framework dimensions and the three sites led to four overarching and inter-linked themes. These related to community awareness; empowerment and “mobilization” of children, young people and families; inter-agency policy and practice; and capacity-building on skills acquisition at different levels.
Research limitations/implications
The next stage in this service research should be full implementation and evaluation in different LMIC contexts.
Practical implications
It is feasible to implement such a child psychosocial framework in contexts of conflict and disadvantage, and in the absence of specialist mental health services. Active stakeholder engagement and co-production should be central to the next phase of service transformation in LMIC.
Originality/value
This study captured the views and experiences of stakeholders in LMIC areas of disadvantage, and demonstrated their readiness to establish interdisciplinary networks and re-focus existing services.
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Ruth Edwards, Richard Williams, Nisha Dogra, Michelle O'Reilly and Panos Vostanis
Specialist CAMHS provide skilled assessment and interventions for children, young people and their families who have mental health disorders. The training needs of the…
Abstract
Specialist CAMHS provide skilled assessment and interventions for children, young people and their families who have mental health disorders. The training needs of the staff who work in specialist CAMHS are not always clear or prioritised, due to the complexities and differing contexts in which specialist CAMHS are provided. The aim of this paper was to establish stakeholders' experiences of service complexities and challenges that affect training within specialist CAMHS. The project employed interviews to gain wide‐ranging consultation with key stakeholder groups. The sample consisted of 45 participants recruited from policy departments, professional bodies, higher education providers, commissioners, service managers, and practitioners. The participants identified a number of themes that limit training, and put forward solutions on how these could be facilitated in the future. Emerging themes related to leadership and the role of service managers, strategic management of training, commissioning, levels of staff training, resources, impact of training on service users, and availability of training programmes. The findings emphasise the need for the strategic workforce planning of training to meet service delivery goals. Policy, commissioning, workforce training strategies, service needs, and delivery of training should be integrated and closely linked.
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Heather E. Dillaway and Elizabeth R. Paré
Purpose – Within cultural discourse, prescriptions for “good” motherhood exist. To further the analysis of these prescriptions, we examine how media conversations about…
Abstract
Purpose – Within cultural discourse, prescriptions for “good” motherhood exist. To further the analysis of these prescriptions, we examine how media conversations about Republican Vice-Presidential candidate Sarah Palin, Democratic Presidential nominee Hillary Clinton, and First Lady Michelle Obama during the 2008 presidential election campaign illustrate existing notions of good motherhood.Methods – Using qualitative content analysis techniques, we review media discourse about Palin, Clinton, and Obama during this campaign. We use existing feminist literature on motherhood and an intersectionality perspective to ground our analysis, comparing and contrasting discourse about these political figures.Findings – The 2008 campaign represented a campaign for good motherhood as much as it represented a campaign for the next president. Discourse on Palin, Clinton, and Obama creates three very different characterizations of mothers: the bad, working mother and failed supermom (Palin), the unfeeling, absent mother (Clinton), and the intensive, stay-at-home mother (Obama). The campaign reified a very narrow, ideological standard for good motherhood and did little to broaden the acceptability of mothers in politics.Value of paper – This article exemplifies the type of intersectional work that can be done in the areas of motherhood and family. Applying an intersectionality perspective in the analysis of media discourse allows us to see exactly how the 2008 campaign became a campaign for good motherhood. Moreover, until we engage in an intersectional analysis of this discourse, we might not see that the reification of good motherhood within campaign discourse is also a reification of hegemonic gender, race, class, age, and family structure locations.
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Michelle Mielly, Frank Alain Rouault and Kevin Richards O'Reilly
The purpose of this brief paper is to highlight the role of culture in cross-cultural M&A environments.
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this brief paper is to highlight the role of culture in cross-cultural M&A environments.
Findings
Empirical work as consultants and participant-observers within multiple international organizations in the process of pre or post M&A restructuring has revealed the need to develop three key “best practices” linked to behaviors which facilitate organizational actors’ role in such dynamic and complex organizational environments.
Practical implications
Managers and practitioners may be able to re think their own positioning within the merged or merging firm and question some of their own cultural allegiances and behaviors, whether linked to national culture or organizational (corporate) culture.
Originality/value
The authors have identified three key behavioral skills crucial to effective intercultural interactions, when interacting in cross-border M&A contexts.
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Bob Gates, Colin Griffiths, Paul Keenan, Sandra Fleming, Carmel Doyle, Helen L. Atherton, Su McAnelly, Michelle Cleary and Paul Sutton
Leanne Dzubinski, Amy Diehl and Michelle Taylor
This paper aims to present a model describing how women enact executive leadership, taking into account gendered organizational patterns that may constrain women to…
Abstract
Purpose
This paper aims to present a model describing how women enact executive leadership, taking into account gendered organizational patterns that may constrain women to perform leadership in context-specific ways.
Design/methodology/approach
This paper discusses gendered organizations, role congruity theory and organizational culture and work context. These strands of theory are interwoven to construct a model describing ways in which executive-level women are constrained to self-monitor based on context.
Findings
The pressure on women to conform to an organization’s executive leadership culture is enormous. Executive women in strongly male-normed executive leadership contexts must exercise strong gendered self-constraint to break through the glass ceiling. Women in strongly male-normed contexts using lessened gendered self-constraint may encounter a glass cliff. Women in gender-diverse-normed contexts may still operate using strong gendered self-constraint due to internalized gender scripts. Only in gender-diverse-normed contexts with lessened gendered-self-restraint can executive women operate from their authentic selves.
Practical implications
Organizational leaders should examine their leadership culture to determine levels of pressure on women to act with gendered self-constraint and to work toward creating change. Women may use the model to make strategic choices regarding whether or how much to self-monitor based on their career aspirations and life goals.
Originality/value
Little has been written on male-normed and gender-diverse-normed contexts as a marker for how executive-level women perform leadership. This paper offers a model describing how different contexts constrain women to behave in specific, gendered ways.
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Michelle N. Eliasson and Dana DeHart
Specifically, the authors discuss three challenges that researchers—especially graduate students—often face: (1) access to adequate material and guidance for researchers;…
Abstract
Purpose
Specifically, the authors discuss three challenges that researchers—especially graduate students—often face: (1) access to adequate material and guidance for researchers; (2) the internal and external strains researchers may face, and (3) the limited conceptualization of research on sensitive topics or vulnerable populations. Although these three challenges may be present for many graduate students and junior scholars, it is important to acknowledge that scholars face many challenges beyond the ones discussed in this note.
Design/methodology/approach
This note will specifically address challenges that arise for graduate students and junior scholars, and we suggest possible strategies to navigate this type of research.
Findings
The authors encourage comprehensive approaches taken by institutions, enacted via advocacy from the field. Professional organizations can create a valuable, ongoing forum for such discussions by including the topic of researcher trauma within workshops, discussion sessions, conference tracks, journals, and newsletters. Second, the topic of researcher trauma must be introduced early and often in graduate training, including planned meaningful coverage in methodology courses, textbooks, and professional training. Third, researchers at all levels should carefully reflect on how their own line of inquiry and their routine research practices could impart trauma.
Originality/value
While ethical principles center on protecting human research participants, risks of trauma experienced by researchers are not consistently addressed in the context of methodological training or human-subjects internal review board and ethics committees' consideration. Although many researchers engage in work that can cause the researcher trauma, few studies address the experiences of researchers in depth, especially the experiences of graduate students or junior scholars.
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