Treating Yourself in a Fairway: Examining the Contribution of Self-Compassion and Well-Being on Performance in a Putting Task

Researchers have advocated for greater insight into the relationship between self-compassion and well-being on performance. Grounded in this understanding, the purpose of this study was to examine the unique and combined contribution of self-compassion and well-being on performance in a putting task. It was hypothesized that self-compassion and well-being would predict performance. Using a cross-sectional design, male golfers (N = 87, Mage = 54.94; SDage = 15.37 years) completed the Self-Compassion Scale - Athlete Version and the Warwick Edinburgh Mental Well-Being Scale immediately prior to a golf putting task. The putting task consisted of 15 consecutive putts from 7 feet on an outdoor practice putting green. The number of putts holed served as an indicator of actual performance. Perceived performance was measured using a self-reported single-item indicator. Participants holed an average of 7.77 (SD = 3.15) putts. Perceived performance was rated as neither good or bad (M = 2.56; SD = 1.00) across the 5-point response scale. Results from the linear regression analyses showed that self-compassion did not significantly predict putts holed (β = -0.171, 95% CI -2.12, 0.23, p = 0.11; ƒ2 = .03) or perceived performance (β = -0.171, 95% CI -2.12, 0.23, p = 0.11; ƒ2 = .04). Similarly, well-being was not predictive of putts holed (β = -0.013, 95% CI -1.38, 1,23, p = 0.91; ƒ2 = .00) or perceived performance (β = -0.157, 95% CI -0.79, 0.12, p = 0.12; ƒ2 = .03). Overall, conclusions from this research offer converging evidence that the psychological resources of self-compassion and well-being do not impact actual or perceived performance in adult male golfers. Greater insight into whether, and if so under what conditions, self-compassion and well-being are associated with performance outcomes in sport warrants additional empirical scrutiny. Funding: Match of Minds

The Psychometric Properties of the School Counseling Internship Competency Scale

Counselor education programs aim to adequately train competent pre-service counselors to fulfill a myriad of roles and responsibilities associated with their specialty area. In accordance with professional organizations, gatekeeping is an ethical responsibility of counselor educators and supervisors to protect the welfare of clients and the health of the counseling profession through ongoing evaluation of pre-service counselors. Presently, no standardized evaluation tool exists to assess school counseling interns comprehensively, attending to school counseling competencies, dispositions, roles, and responsibilities. The purpose of the study is to attend to the gap in literature through the creation and validation of The School Counseling Internship Competency Scale (SCICS). This study utilized an exploratory sequential mixed method approach with qualitative inquiry to create the instrument and exploratory factor analysis to determine the latent factor structure with 230 university and site school counseling supervisors. Data analysis revealed that the 48-item instrument accounted for 65.5% variance explained by a five-factor solution. Sub-scales included Direct Services and Data-Driven Practices, Academic Advising and Special Education Process, Collaboration and Consultation with Stakeholders, Cultural Competence and Advocacy, and Professional Dispositions and Behaviors. The SCICS has strong internal consistency as well as evidence for content, factorial, convergent, concurrent, and incremental validity. Implications for school counselor education, university and site supervisors, pre-service school counselors, and the school counseling profession are included

Adverse and Positive Childhood Experiences of Clinical Mental Health Counselors as Predictors of Compassion Satisfaction, Burnout, and Secondary Traumatic Stress

Despite an emphasis on self-care to avoid burnout and increase compassion satisfaction within the counseling profession, there is a dearth of research on the developmental experiences of counselors that may increase the likelihood of burnout. We examined the impact of mental health counselors’ (N = 140) experiences of adverse childhood experiences and positive childhood experiences on their present rates of compassion satisfaction, burnout, and secondary traumatic stress. We used a cross-sectional, non-experimental correlational design and reported descriptive statistics as well as results of multiple regression models. Results indicated significant relationships among counselors’ rates of adverse childhood experiences, positive childhood experiences, and compassion satisfaction and burnout. We include implications for the use of both the adverse and positive childhood experiences assessments in the training of counseling students and supervisees

A Review of the Impact of Occupational Contact Dermatitis on Quality of Life

Occupational contact dermatitis (OCD) is the most common occupational skin disease in many countries. We reviewed the current evidence on how OCD impacts on quality of life (QoL). The three commonly used QoL questionnaires in OCD were the Short-Form Health Survey (SF-36), the Dermatology Life Quality Index (DLQI), and the Skindex. Despite the availability of a variety of validated QoL instruments, none of them is specific to OCD or entirely adequate in capturing the impact of OCD on QoL. Nonetheless, the results of this paper do suggest a significant impact. Use of QoL measures in clinical settings will provide patients with an opportunity to express their concerns and assist clinicians to evaluate the effectiveness of management beyond the clinical outcomes. This paper also highlights the lack of a disease-specific QOL instrument and the importance of developing a validated measure to assess QOL in OCD, enabling comparison across countries and occupational groups

Interventions to increase access to or uptake of physical health screening in people with severe mental illness: a realist review

Objectives: To identify and evaluate interventions aimed at increasing uptake of, or access to, physical health screening by adults with severe mental illness; to examine why interventions might work. Design: Realist review. Setting: Primary, secondary and tertiary care. Results: A systematic search identified 1448 studies, of which 22 met the inclusion criteria. Studies were from Australia (n=3), Canada (n=1), Hong Kong (n=1), UK (n=11) and USA (n=6). The studies focused on breast cancer screening, infection preventive services and metabolic syndrome (MS) screening by targeting MSrelated risk factors. The interventions could be divided into those focusing on (1) health service delivery changes (12 studies), using quality improvement, randomised controlled trial, cluster randomised feasibility trial, retrospective audit, cross-sectional study and satisfaction survey designs and (2) tests of tools designed to facilitate screening (10 studies) using consecutive case series, quality improvement, retrospective evaluation and pre–post audit study designs. All studies reported improved uptake of screening, or that patients had received screening they would not have had without the intervention. No estimation of overall effect size was possible due to heterogeneity in study design and quality. The following factors may contribute to intervention success: staff and stakeholder involvement in screening, staff flexibility when taking physical measurements (eg, using adapted equipment), strong links with primary care and having a pharmacist on the ward. Conclusions: A range of interventions may be effective, but better quality research is needed to determine any effect size. Researchers should consider how interventions may work when designing and testing them in order to target better the specific needs of this population in the most appropriate setting. Behaviour-change interventions to reduce identified barriers of patient and health professional resistance to screening this population are required. Resource constraints, clarity over professional roles and better coordination with primary care need to be addresse

M-Theory Inflation from Multi M5-Brane Dynamics

We derive inflation from M-theory on S^1/Z_2 via the non-perturbative dynamics of N M5-branes. The open membrane instanton interactions between the M5-branes give rise to exponential potentials which are too steep for inflation individually but lead to inflation when combined together. The resulting type of inflation, known as assisted inflation, facilitates considerably the requirement of having all moduli, except the inflaton, stabilized at the beginning of inflation. During inflation the distances between the M5-branes, which correspond to the inflatons, grow until they reach the size of the S^1/Z_2 orbifold. At this stage the M5-branes will reheat the universe by dissolving into the boundaries through small instanton transitions. Further flux and non-perturbative contributions become important at this late stage, bringing inflation to an end and stabilizing the moduli. We find that with moderate values for N, one obtains both a sufficient amount of e-foldings and the right size for the spectral index.Comment: 30 pages, 3 figures; v3: one comment and refs adde