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1 – 10 of over 93000Lauren Breese, Lesley Maunder, Eunice Waddell, David Gray and Jim White
The principle of equivalence states that the provision of healthcare in the community should be extended into prisons. Stress control is a psychoeducational intervention that has…
Abstract
Purpose
The principle of equivalence states that the provision of healthcare in the community should be extended into prisons. Stress control is a psychoeducational intervention that has had success in the community and has been adapted for use in different settings. The purpose of this paper is to establish whether stress control can be beneficial in a custodial setting.
Design/methodology/approach
Stress control was evaluated by looking at clinical effectiveness, satisfaction, attrition rate, cost effectiveness and suitability of the materials for use in a custodial environment. In total, 14 prisoners completed six sessions of stress control. Data were obtained using two clinical scales and an evaluation questionnaire.
Findings
Participants' anxiety significantly decreased and their wellbeing increased after completing Stress Control. Prisoners were satisfied with the intervention and there was a small attrition rate.
Research limitations/implications
The audit had a small sample size, there were no control conditions and measures were self report. There was a selection bias arising from the exclusion criteria. A large‐scale randomised controlled trial should be conducted to further test effectiveness.
Practical implications
The adapted materials are effective and appropriate for use in a custodial setting. There can be improved access for psychological therapy for a prison population, a cost effective intervention, acceptable to a prison population and evidence based. Further recommendations for future developments are discussed.
Originality/value
The applicability of an established programme for mood management to custodial settings is an area of significance to forensic practice.
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Stress damages us and our performance. It is a real part of most manager's experience and can be said to occur when significant demands exceed perceived management…
Abstract
Stress damages us and our performance. It is a real part of most manager's experience and can be said to occur when significant demands exceed perceived management responsibilities and routines. Stress can be the essence of working life, and certainly need not always be damaging to us. But when it becomes excessive, it is something unwanted.
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Luo Lu, Cary L. Cooper, Shu‐Fang Kao and Yun Zhou
Towards the end of the twentieth century, the world has witnessed an amazing economic take‐off in the East Asia, especially within the territory of so‐called “Greater China”…
Abstract
Towards the end of the twentieth century, the world has witnessed an amazing economic take‐off in the East Asia, especially within the territory of so‐called “Greater China”, encompassing the PRC and Taiwan. Against this economic and cultural background, this study surveyed 258 and 189 employees respectively in Taiwan, and the PRC (Shanghai), to examine generalizability of a generic work‐stress model to the Chinese societies. It further examined the sub‐cultural differences in the work‐stress processes, by drawing contrast of the PRC and Taiwan. In addition, roles of emic constructs of Chinese primary and secondary control beliefs were also examined. Results showed that the generic work‐stress model could be reasonably applied to Chinese urban work contexts in the PRC and Taiwan. Work stress related as expected to strain effects. At a more refined sub‐cultural level, it was found that different sources of work stress became salient contributors to strain outcomes in the PRC and Taiwan. These differences reflect the diverse political, social, and economic characteristics of the two Chinese societies. More importantly, emic constructs of Chinese control beliefs were found to have rather consistent direct effects on strain outcomes. However, indirect (moderating) effects of control beliefs were not strong and inconsistent.
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Vishwanath V. Baba, Louise Tourigny, Xiaoyun Wang, Terri Lituchy and Silvia Inés Monserrat
The purpose of this paper is to investigate the effect of job demand, job control, and supervisory support on stress among nurses in China, Japan, Argentina, and the Caribbean…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to investigate the effect of job demand, job control, and supervisory support on stress among nurses in China, Japan, Argentina, and the Caribbean using the Job demand‐control (JDC) and the Job demand‐control‐support (JDCS) models.
Design/methodology/approach
The authors have employed a comparative research design, cross‐sectional survey methodology with convenient random sampling, and a commonly used statistical analytic strategy.
Findings
The results highlight that job demand, job control, and supervisory support are important variables in understanding stress among nurses. This has been corroborated in China, Japan, Argentina, and the Caribbean. Based on their findings and what is available in the literature, the authors report that the JDCS model has universal significance albeit it works somewhat differently in different contexts.
Originality/value
This study's contribution comes from its comparative nature, theoretical anchor, its use of one of the most popular models of stress, its focus on a profession that is demonstrably stressed, its use of common measures and an established analytic strategy. The study's findings underscore the cross‐cultural usefulness and application of the JDCS model along with its threshold and substitution effects and limiting conditions.
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The Stressor-Emotion model of counterproductive work behavior (CWB) is based on prevalent approaches to emotions, the stress process in general and job stress in particular. The…
Abstract
The Stressor-Emotion model of counterproductive work behavior (CWB) is based on prevalent approaches to emotions, the stress process in general and job stress in particular. The sense of control is key to the appraised coping capacity. A combination of perceived stressors and insufficient control is likely to trigger negative emotions, which in turn increase the likelihood the employee will engage in CWB, which we view as a special case of behavioral strain. We highlight the centrality of several conceptualizations of control in theories of general stress, work stress, and CWB. A critical concern is the paucity of empirical support for the interactive stressor-control effects posited by models at all three levels of stress theory.
Robert Conti, Jannis Angelis, Cary Cooper, Brian Faragher and Colin Gill
This empirical paper seeks to address the neglected work condition aspect of lean production (LP) implementation, specifically the relationship between LP and worker job stress.
Abstract
Purpose
This empirical paper seeks to address the neglected work condition aspect of lean production (LP) implementation, specifically the relationship between LP and worker job stress.
Design/methodology/approach
The Karasek job stress model was used to link shopfloor practices to expected worker stress. The model incorporates the effects of job demands (physical and psychological), job control and social support. The study employs management and worker questionnaires, management interviews and structured plant tours. The response variable is total worker job stress – the sum of the physical and mental stress levels. The independent variable for the first question is the degree of lean implementation at the sites.
Findings
The results are based on 1,391 worker responses at 21 sites in the four UK industry sectors. About 11 tested practices are significantly related to stress and an unexpected non‐linear response of stress to lean implementation is identified. Results indicate that LP is not inherently stressful, with stress levels significantly related to management decisions in designing and operating LP systems.
Practical implications
The hypotheses tests shed light on the relationships between LP practices and job stress, and reveal a significant managerial influence on stress levels. The regression model shows the scale and significant lean practices of this influence, with the work practices explaining 30 percent of job stress variations. The stress reduction and stress control opportunities identified in the study show the potential for designing and operating effective lean systems while also controlling stress levels.
Originality/value
This is the first known multi‐industry empirical study of the relationship of job stress to a range of lean practices and to the degree of lean implementation.
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Mehrsan Javan Roshtkhari, Arash Arami and Caro Lucas
Intelligent control for unidentified systems with unstable equilibriums is not always a proper control strategy, which results in inferior performance in many cases. Because of…
Abstract
Purpose
Intelligent control for unidentified systems with unstable equilibriums is not always a proper control strategy, which results in inferior performance in many cases. Because of the existing trial and error manner of the procedure in former duration of learning, this exploration for finding the appropriate control signals can lead to instability. However, the recent proposed emotional controllers are capable of learning swiftly; the use of these controllers is not an efficient solution for the mentioned instability problems. Therefore, a solution is needed to evade the instability in preliminary phase of learning. The purpose of this paper is to propose a novel approach for controlling unstable systems or systems with unstable equilibrium by model free controllers.
Design/methodology/approach
An existing controller (model‐based controller) with limited performance is used as a mentor for the emotional learning controller in the first step. This learning phase prepares the controller to control the plant as well as mentor, while it prevents any instability. When the emotional controller can imitate the behavior of model based one properly, the employed controller is gently switched from model based one to an emotional controller using a fuzzy inference system (FIS). Also, the emotional stress is softly switched from the mentor‐imitator output difference to the combination of the objectives. In this paper, the emotional stresses are generated once by using a nonlinear combination of objectives and once by employing different stresses to a FIS which attentionally modulated the stresses, and makes a subset of these objectives salient regarding the contemporary situation.
Findings
The proposed model free controller is employed to control an inverted pendulum system and an oscillator with unstable equilibrium. It is noticeable that the proposed controller is a model free one, and does not use any knowledge about the plant. The experimental results on two benchmarks show the superiority of proposed imitative and emotional controller with fuzzy stress generation mechanism in comparison with model based originally supplied controllers and emotional controller with nonlinear stress generation unit – in control of pendulum system – in all operating conditions.
Practical implications
There are two test beds for evaluating the proposed model free controller performance which are discussed in this paper: a laboratorial inverted pendulum system, which is a well‐known system with unstable equilibrium, and Chua's circuit, which is an oscillator with two stable and one unstable equilibrium point. The results show that the proposed controller with the mentioned strategy can control the systems with satisfactory performance.
Originality/value
In this paper, a novel approach for controlling unstable systems or systems with unstable equilibrium by model free controllers is proposed. This approach is based on imitative learning in preliminary phase of learning and soft switching to an interactive emotional learning. Moreover, FISs are used to model the linguistic knowledge of the ascendancy and situated importance of the objectives. These FISs are used to attentionally modulate the stress signals for the emotional controller. The results of proposed strategy on two benchmarks reveal the efficacy of this strategy of model free control.
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Sunil Sahadev, Keyoor Purani and Tapan Kumar Panda
The purpose of this paper is to explore the relationships between managerial control strategies, role-stress and employee adaptiveness among call centre employees.
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this paper is to explore the relationships between managerial control strategies, role-stress and employee adaptiveness among call centre employees.
Design/methodology/approach
Based on a conceptual model, a questionnaire-based survey methodology is adopted. Data were collected from call centre employees in India and the data were analysed through PLS methodology.
Findings
The study finds that outcome control and activity control increase role-stress while capability control does not have a significant impact. The interaction between outcome control and activity control also tends to impact role-stress of employees. Role-stress felt by employees has significant negative impact on employee adaptiveness.
Research limitations/implications
The sampling approach was convenience based affecting the generalisability of the results.
Practical implications
The paper provides guidelines for utilising managerial control approaches in a service setting.
Originality/value
The paper looks at managerial control approaches in a service setting – a topic not quite researched before.
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Randi L. Sims, William C. Hawks and Baiyun Gong
The purpose of this study is to investigate racial differences in the moderating role of factors linked with resilience on the relationship between economic stress and happiness…
Abstract
Purpose
The purpose of this study is to investigate racial differences in the moderating role of factors linked with resilience on the relationship between economic stress and happiness for Black and White residents of the USA.
Design/methodology/approach
Secondary data were downloaded from the World Values Survey Wave 7 for adult respondents living in the USA. The entire sample of respondents who self-identified as belonging to the Black race (n = 209) was statistically matched (based on sex – 50% male and average age – 39 years) with a similarly sized random sample of respondents who self-identified as belonging to the White race (n = 217).
Findings
The results suggest that economic stress had the potential to trigger a resilience response. However, the protective factors in the resilience process differed by race of the respondent. The relationship between economic stress and perceptions of neighborhood safety was conditional on level of control for the White sample. The relationship between economic stress and happiness for the Black sample was conditional on the importance of faith.
Originality/value
The study was able to demonstrate the importance of race-based contextual differences in the roles of faith and control in the resilience process. The findings also increase the understanding of how life circumstances and individual characteristics, including race, impact happiness and how much or little resilience may play a part in the achievement of happiness.
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