Dualistically burned out? : The development of school and sport burnout symptoms and its relation to self-esteem among dual-career students in Finnish sport high schools

Being involved in high-level sports alongside an intensive educational program is a challenging combination, yet a challenge that dual-career high school student-athletes are expected to face. As performing well in both domains requires a lot of physical and mental stamina, it is not unlikely that students might exhibit an increased amount of burnout symptoms. Burnout is widely studied in both the academic and athletic domain, but to investigate them together and assess how they are related has been left unstudied until recently. The main aim of the current study was to find out whether there is a difference between burnout symptom rates in the academic and athletic domain among Finnish dual-career students. We further investigated the development of this relation, as we assessed how similar or different burnout symptom rates were in the beginning and end of high school. In addition, we investigated how self-esteem is related to burnout symptoms in both domains. The current study is part of a longitudinal project called “Winning in the long run”, which started in Finland in 2015. The aim of the project was to follow and get insight into the psychosocial development and academic orientation of dual-career students in high school. Extensive questionnaires were administered 5 times throughout the high school period assessing among other things motivation, identity, burnout and self-esteem. In total 228 dual-career students answered the questionnaires of our interest at the beginning (T1) and end of high school (T5). School and sport burnout symptoms were measured with an adapted version of SBI-9, while self-esteem was measured with an abridged RSES. The results indicated that initially youngsters had stronger school burnout symptoms than sport burnout symptom, but the gap between these diminished towards the end of high school. Negative correlations were found at both time points between burnout symptoms and self-esteem across domains. Severe burnout symptoms on a group level are nevertheless not found. Our results thus indicate that burnout symptoms for dual career youngsters slightly increase during high school years, may transfer from one domain to another and are associated with low self-esteem. These findings should be considered when planning the challenging route of a dual career. Most importantly, youngsters should be provided with enough information and guidance to balance between being a promising athlete as well as a successful student

Struggling for a Socialist Fatherhood: “Re-educating” Men in East Germany, 1960-1989

Research on the history of masculinities and fatherhood during state socialism in East Central Europe is still rare. Therefore, scholars in the field of women’s and gender studies sometimes reproduce the idea of men in that region as stable characters across the period of socialist rule. In particular, they insist that “official,” that is, state-sanctioned, representations of masculinity did not change. Yet, as I show, there is evidence that socialist authors, journalists, and even the politburos of the regions’ communist parties did reflect on what they perceived as the need to change the conceptions of men and fathers. They advocated men’s greater participation in housework and child care. In this article, I examine this “struggle for a socialist fatherhood” in the GDR, focusing mainly on the discussions and suggestions of sociologists, educationalists, psychologists, and sexologists active in the study of childhood and adolescence, sex education, or marriage and family. From the 1960s on, experts from these fields as well as communist politicians targeted increasingly men to implement equality in marriage and parenting. In the 1970s and 1980s, their suggestions became more and more concrete. These suggestions as well as the theoretical discussions demonstrate the enduring belief in the socialist society’s ability to overcome traditional gender stereotypes. Even in the late 1980s, they were future directed and contained a utopian element

Hidden miners - The role of microorganisms under cover crops for phosphorus management

Phosphorus (P) is a limiting and non-renewable nutrient for which improper management is becoming a threat to food security and an environmental hazard for aquatic ecosystems. Phosphorus is particularly difficult to manage as complex physicochemical processes in the soil leave most P unavailable for crop uptake. Cover crops are a promising tool of agronomic management, which may increase P availability for the following crops through various mechanisms, such as an overall extended root system, greater P mobilization via exudation of organic anions, enhanced P mineralization by phosphatase excretion and microbial interactions. Better understanding of plant-microbial interactions offer the possibility to unravel the potential of cover crops for P management. In the frame of the EU Horizon2020 Project SoilCare we present the results of two studies in SW Germany about P dynamics under cover crops. The first field experiment investigated the effects of cover crop mixtures and no-tillage in a field experiment in the research station Tachenhausen of Nuertingen-Geislingen University, the second one studied the effects of single cover crop species in a low-P field near Rottenburg. The samples were analyzed for PLFA/NLFA content, enzymatic activities (acid and alkaline phospho-monoesterases and phosphodiesterase) and microbial P. The results reveal significant effects of cover crop mixtures on soil microbes, increasing their abundance and activity, as well as shifts in the microbial community structure. The effects were more pronounced near the soil surface and were still detectable more than one year after cover cropping in winter wheat. The microbial abundance, including Pmic and the activity of several enzymes of the P cycle were strongly increased in the rhizosphere of the cover crops. The results indicate that, under optimized agronomic management, the use of cover crops and minimum tillage can have measurable positive effects on the cycling of P in temperate agroecosystems

Henkilökunnan kokema samastuminen ja menettelytapojen oikeudenmukaisuus Aalto-yliopiston fuusiossa

Pitkittäistutkimuksessa selvitettiin organisaatioon samastumisen ja menettelytapojen koetun oikeudenmukaisuuden prosesseja suomalaisen korkeakoulufuusion edetessä. Pitkittäisaineisto on osa Aalto-yliopistossa tehtävää kolmevuotista 'Kolmen yliopiston yhdistymisen lähteet, voimat ja haasteet' -tutkimusprojektia. Tämän tutkielman aineisto koostui projektin kahdesta ensimmäisestä osa-aineistosta. Teknillisen korkeakoulun, Helsingin kauppakorkeakoulun ja Taideteollisen korkeakoulun työntekijöille lähetettiin sähköpostitse kyselylomake ensimmäisen kerran vuoden 2009 helmikuussa, jolloin Aalto-yliopisto oli saanut nimensä. Yliopisto aloitti toimintansa virallisesti 1.1.2010, ja seurantakysely lähetettiin samoille henkilöille toukokuussa 2010. Molempiin kyselyihin vastasi yhteensä 765 henkilöä. Tutkimuksen teoreettisena viitekehyksenä oli sosiaalisen identiteetin teoria ja siihen läheisesti liittyvä sosiaalisen samastumisen tutkimus sekä proseduraalisen eli menettelytapojen oikeudenmukaisuuden lähestymistapa. Tarkempana viitekehyksenä tutkimuksessa toimi ryhmään kiinnittymisen malli, jonka mukaan ihmiset tekevät ryhmäjäsenyyttään koskevia päätöksiä oikeudenmukaisuusarvioiden perusteella. Tutkielman teoriaosiossa käsiteltiin näiden lähestymistapojen lisäksi organisaation statusta eli arvoasemaa ja dominanssia eli vaikutusvaltaa sekä niiden suhdetta muihin tutkielmassa tarkasteltuihin ilmiöihin. Tutkimuskysymykset koskivat ensinnäkin vanhaan korkeakouluun samastumisen ja uuteen yliopistoon samastumisen välistä yhteyttä eli organisaatioon samastumisen jatkuvuutta. Oletuksena oli, että vanhaan organisaatioon samastuminen siirtyy uuteen organisaatioon samastumiseen eli toisin sanoen tutkittavat kokevat jatkuvuutta edesmenneen organisaationsa ja uuden organisaation välillä. Toinen tutkimuskysymys kohdistui menettelytapojen koetun oikeudenmukaisuuden ja uuteen organisaatioon samastumisen väliseen yhteyteen, ja hypoteesi oli, että oikeudenmukaisiksi koetut menettelytavat vaikuttavat positiivisesti uuteen yliopistoon samastumiseen. Toisaalta tutkimuksessa pyrittiin vastaamaan kysymykseen menettelytapojen oikeudenmukaisuuden vaikutuksesta samastumisen jatkuvuuteen, ja oletus oli, että samastumisen jatkuvuus on vahvempaa niillä vastaajilla, jotka ovat samaistuneet vahvemmin aikaisempaan korkeakouluunsa. Riippumattomien muuttujien yhteyksiä tarkasteltiin suhteessa alkuperäisten korkeakoulujen statukseen ja dominanssiin fuusioprosessissa. Tausta-analyysien jälkeen suoritettiin yhteensä neljä hierarkkista regressioanalyysiä, joiden avulla tarkasteltiin kontrollimuuttujien, riippumattomien muuttujien ja interaktioiden tilastollista vaikutusta uuteen organisaatioon samastumiseen. Vanhaan organisaatioon samastuminen ja menettelytapojen koettu oikeudenmukaisuus vaikuttivat uuteen organisaatioon samastumiseen kaikkien analyysien kaikissa vaiheissa. Tämä antoi viitteitä siitä, että niin vanhan organisaation säilyttäminen uuden organisaation sisällä kuin oikeudenmukaiset menettelytavat prosessin kuluessa saattavat edesauttaa fuusion onnistumista. Myös hypoteesille, jonka mukaan oikeudenmukaisiksi koetut menettelytavat vaikuttivat samastumisen jatkuvuuteen, saatiin tukea. Tämän perusteella oikeudenmukaiset menettelytavat olivat tärkeämpi uuteen organisaatioon samastumista selittävä tekijä niille vastaajille, jotka samastuivat vahvasti vanhaan organisaatioonsa. Myös vastaajien sukupuolella, työssäoloajalla ja henkilöstöryhmällä todettiin olevan tilastollisesti merkitsevä vaikutus Aalto-yliopistoon samastumiseen. Statuksella ja dominanssilla ei ollut tilastollisesti merkitsevää vaikutusta riippuvaan muuttujaan, mikä saattaa johtua pienistä havaituista eroista organisaatioiden välisessä arvoasemassa ja vaikutusvallassa

Hidden miners the roles of cover crops and soil microorganisms in phosphorus cycling through agroecosystems

Background Phosphorus (P) is a limiting nutrient in many agroecosystems and costly fertilizer inputs can cause negative environmental impacts. Cover crops constitute a promising management option for sustainable intensification of agriculture. However, their interactions with the soil microbial community, which is a key driver of P cycling, and their effects on the following crop, have not yet been systematically assessed. Scope We conducted a meta-analysis of published field studies on cover crops and P cycling, focusing on plant-microbe interactions. Conclusions We describe several distinct, simultaneous mechanisms of P benefits for the main crop. Decomposition dynamics, governed by P concentration, are critical for the transfer of P from cover crop residues to the main crop. Cover crops may enhance the soil microbial community by providing a legacy of increased mycorrhizal abundance, microbial biomass P, and phosphatase activity. Cover crops are generally most effective in systems low in available P, and may access unavailable P pools. However, their effects on P availability are difficult to detect by standard soil P tests, except for increases after the use of Lupinus sp. Agricultural management (i.e. cover crop species selection, tillage, fertilization) can improve cover crop effects. In summary, cover cropping has the potential to tighten nutrient cycling in agricultural systems under different conditions, increasing crop P nutrition and yield