Technostress and academic motivation: direct and indirect effects on university students' psychological health

Introduction: Research has well demonstrated that the pandemic entailed several implications among university students worldwide in terms of increased use of Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs), technostress, disruptions in academic goals and motivation processes, and growing psychological suffering. Responding to the new research need to go in-depth into the processes linking technostress and motivation dimensions to inform current research/interventions, the present study aimed to explore the direct effects of perceived Technostress dimensions (Techno-Overload, Work-Home Conflict, Pace of Change, Techno-Ease, Techno-Reliability, and Techno-Sociality) and Academic Motivation dimensions (Amotivation, Intrinsic, and Extrinsic Motivation dimensions) on students' perceived levels of Anxiety/Depression and test the potential indirect effect (mediating role) of Academic Motivation dimensions in the associations between Technostress and psychological health conditions. Methods: Overall, 1,541 students from five European countries (Czech Republic, Greece, Italy, Serbia, United Kingdom) completed a survey comprising a Background Information Form, the Technostress Scale, the Academic Motivation Scale-College, and the Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale. Hayes' PROCESS tool was used to test direct and indirect (mediating) effects. Results: Data revealed that Techno-Overload, Work-Home Conflict, Amotivation, and Extrinsic Motivation-Introjected had a direct negative effect, whereas Techno-Ease, Techno-Reliability, Techno-Sociality, all Intrinsic Motivation dimensions, and Extrinsic Motivation-Identified had a direct protective role for students' psychological health. The significant indirect role of motivation dimensions in the associations between Technostress dimensions and Anxiety/Depression was fully supported. Discussion: Findings allow gaining further insight into the pathways of relationships between technostress, motivation, and psychological health, to be used in the current phase, featured by the complete restoration of face-to-face contacts, to inform the development of tailored research and interventions, which address lights and shadows of the technology use, and which take into account the necessity to enhance its potentials yet without impairing students' motivation and psychological health

TRY plant trait database – enhanced coverage and open access

Plant traits - the morphological, anatomical, physiological, biochemical and phenological characteristics of plants - determine how plants respond to environmental factors, affect other trophic levels, and influence ecosystem properties and their benefits and detriments to people. Plant trait data thus represent the basis for a vast area of research spanning from evolutionary biology, community and functional ecology, to biodiversity conservation, ecosystem and landscape management, restoration, biogeography and earth system modelling. Since its foundation in 2007, the TRY database of plant traits has grown continuously. It now provides unprecedented data coverage under an open access data policy and is the main plant trait database used by the research community worldwide. Increasingly, the TRY database also supports new frontiers of trait‐based plant research, including the identification of data gaps and the subsequent mobilization or measurement of new data. To support this development, in this article we evaluate the extent of the trait data compiled in TRY and analyse emerging patterns of data coverage and representativeness. Best species coverage is achieved for categorical traits - almost complete coverage for ‘plant growth form’. However, most traits relevant for ecology and vegetation modelling are characterized by continuous intraspecific variation and trait–environmental relationships. These traits have to be measured on individual plants in their respective environment. Despite unprecedented data coverage, we observe a humbling lack of completeness and representativeness of these continuous traits in many aspects. We, therefore, conclude that reducing data gaps and biases in the TRY database remains a key challenge and requires a coordinated approach to data mobilization and trait measurements. This can only be achieved in collaboration with other initiatives

Development of a Comprehensive Framework of Excellence in Higher Education

Excellent students have usually been defined in terms of high academic achievement, which, however, could be associated with undesirable motivational and behavioural correlates. Working on the assumption that excellence in higher education is a precursor of occupational excellence, which integrates high-quality work with ethical behaviour, excellence in university settings should be reconsidered. This thesis was underpinned by two research questions: Who is really an excellent university student? How to identify an excellent university student? In this respect, we conducted four intermediate studies that together build a comprehensive conceptual and methodological framework of excellence in higher education. The first study aimed to establish an empirically-based conceptualization of an excellent university student. The results of an investigation between university students and teachers showed that excellence in higher education is an interaction between educational excellence, which refers to students who are deeply knowledgeable, engaged, and able to turn their knowledge and skills into actions and desirable high-quality outcomes, and personal excellence that concerns prosocial, moral, and self-reflective behaviour of students. In the second study, we aimed to find, whether the core excellent students' attribute of genuine study motivation, conceptualized as mastery goal orientation along with deep approach to learning, is indicated or contradicted by students' grade point average (GPA). The results revealed that GPA neither indicates, nor contradicts the attribute of genuine study motivation. In the third study, we designed and implemented the procedure of excellent students' identification based on a multisource assessment that involved teacher nomination/assessment, academic achievement assessment, and peer assessment. The implementation of this methodology resulted in a final sample of 10 excellent individuals meeting all the conceptually-derived criteria of excellence. The fourth study aimed to evaluate the implemented methodology in terms of its discriminating ability to differentiate between excellent and non-excellent students. In this respect, we achieved satisfactory results. After reviewing the results generated by the implementation and evaluation of the proposed methodology, we suggest a basic guideline on how to define and identify excellent university students in more general settings

Leisure Time Activities of Children and Young People, with Focus on Junák

Katedra pedagogikyFaculty of EducationPedagogická fakult

Diaries of Russian writers of 19th century

Hlavním cílem této diplomové práce je představení deníkové tvorby ruských spisovatelů 19. století. Práce je členěna do čtyř kapitol. První z nich pojednává o deníku obecně, druhá je věnována roli deníků v Rusku v 19. století. Třetí kapitola obsahuje podrobný popis jednotlivých deníků vybraných ruských spisovatelů. Dalším cílem této práce bylo vytvoření možných návrhů didaktického využití deníkové tvorby ve výuce ruského jazyka na základní škole. Tomuto cíli je věnována poslední, tedy čtvrtá kapitola.Katedra ruského a francouzského jazykaObhájenoThe main objective of the diploma thesis is to introduce the diaries of Russian writers of the 19th century. The thesis is divided into four chapters. The first chapter deals with a diary form in general. The second chapter focuses on diaries and their significance in Russia in the 19th century. The third chapter is dedicated to the detailed description of particular diaries of chosen Russian writers. The next objective of the thesis is a suggestion of possible didactic use of diaries in lessons of Russian language at elementary school. This task is discussed in the last, fourth chapter

Russian icon art

Bakalářská práce "Ruské ikonové malířství" se zabývá charakteristikou ikon, jejich vývojem, stručným popisem několika ikon a vývojem hlavních center ikonového malířství. Také je zde zmíněno několik významných malířů a je zde popsána symbolika ikon.Katedra ruského a francouzského jazykaObhájenoBachelor's dissertation "Russian icon-painting" is occupies itself with characteristics of icons, their development, brief description of several icons and development of main centers of icon-painting, some of the important icon-painters and symbolism of icons

Russian icon art

Bakalářská práce "Ruské ikonové malířství" se zabývá charakteristikou ikon, jejich vývojem, stručným popisem několika ikon a vývojem hlavních center ikonového malířství. Také je zde zmíněno několik významných malířů a je zde popsána symbolika ikon.Katedra ruského a francouzského jazykaObhájenoBachelor's dissertation "Russian icon-painting" is occupies itself with characteristics of icons, their development, brief description of several icons and development of main centers of icon-painting, some of the important icon-painters and symbolism of icons

Table_1_Work-related coping behaviour and experience patterns in university students: a review of 20 years of research.docx

Work-related coping behaviour and experience patterns (WCEP) is the conceptualisation of personal experience with occupational stress and of the typical behavioural responses for coping with such stress. The objective of this review, which is based on 69 references that used the WCEP inventory in university students, is to offer a comprehensive overview of the findings on WCEP and their correlates in the student population. The results of the published studies consistently show that female students, teacher education students (compared to medical students) and students who receive insufficient social and financial support are at greater risk for being assigned to work-related patterns that indicate vulnerability to burnout and occupational health issues. Moreover, students assigned to these patterns, especially to the resigned (burnout) pattern, are prone to manifest other negative characteristics, such as less adaptive personality traits and coping strategies, vulnerability to stress, lower quality motivation, lack of commitment to the chosen career and suitability for the profession, and impaired physical and mental health. In contrast, the most desirable correlates, such as adaptive personality traits, higher quality motivation, commitment to the chosen career, suitability for the profession, stress resistance, adaptive coping and better physical and mental health, were related to the healthy ambitious pattern. Nevertheless, further research is needed to analyse work-related coping behaviour and experience patterns beyond the German speaking population to increase the generalisability of the findings.</p

Technostress and academic motivation : direct and indirect effects on university students’ psychological health

The COVID-19 pandemic necessitated increased use of Information and Communication Technologies (ICTs) among university students. Research in this population shows increased technostress, disruptions in academic goals and motivation processes, and poorer psychological health. Responding to the new research need to go in-depth into the processes linking technostress and motivation dimensions to inform current research/interventions, the present study aimed to explore direct effects of perceived Technostress dimensions (Techno-Overload, Work-Home Conflict, Pace of Change, Techno-Ease, Techno-Reliability, Techno-Sociality) and Academic Motivation dimensions (Amotivation, Intrinsic and Extrinsic Motivation dimensions) on students’ perceived levels of Anxiety/Depression, and to test the potential indirect effect (mediating role) of Academic Motivation dimensions in the associations between Technostress and psychological health conditions. Overall, 1,541 students from five European countries (Czech Republic, Greece, Italy, Serbia, United Kingdom) completed a survey comprising demographics, the Technostress Scale, the Academic Motivation Scale-College, and the Hospital Anxiety and Depression Scale. Hayes’ PROCESS tool was used to test direct and indirect (mediating) effects. The findings show that Techno-Overload, Work-Home Conflict, Amotivation, and Extrinsic Motivation-Introjected had a direct negative effect, whereas Techno-Ease, Techno-Reliability, Techno-Sociality, all Intrinsic Motivation dimensions and Extrinsic Motivation-Identified had a direct protective role for students’ psychological health. The significant indirect role of motivation dimensions in the associations between Technostress dimensions and Anxiety/Depression was supported. Findings provide further insight into the pathways of relationships between technostress, motivation, and psychological health in university students and to inform the development of tailored research and interventions which take into account the necessity to enhance ICT potential without impairing students’ motivation and psychological health