Bird and Humans Transforming into Birds -- A Research into Taiwanese Aborigines'Oral Literature

For most indigenous people of Taiwan, birds have assumed significant roles in their tradition and culture. Though the parts birds have played vary—e.g., messengers, supporters, souls of ancestors, prey, according to their species and particular tribesmen—they have profoundly influenced the daily life of Taiwanese indigenous people. Research into Taiwanese aborigines' oral literature shows that birds often appeared as culture heroes. Myths say birds helped to lift up the sky and to make rivers, to carry back oval stone from which the human race was born, to enlighten human knowledge of breeding offspring, to take back fire which helped humans to develop cooking, and to present millet and rice to people by which human learned about cultivation. Tribesmen used feathers as headdresses to distinguish social rankings, tattooed faces which modeling the beak of crows to be a sign of identification in order to return to heaven after death, and took omens from bird divination before things happened. Most aboriginal tribes have rigid taboos against hurting birds with the belief that some birds posse the souls of their ancestors and some birds are deities who posses supernatural powers. Myths associated with transformation are abundant in Taiwanese aborigines' oral literature and many are about humans transforming into birds. In various stories, humans that are transformed into birds are freed from suffering, are being punished, are reborn after death or are capable of taking vengeance. Though all of those stories are not maturely constructed, they clearly depict the profound affects Taiwanese aborigines bore toward birds, the mysterious species.This research focuses on the beliefs that Taiwanese aborigines had about birds and the correlation between the customs of bird worship and the “from humans into birds” transformation myths. Analyses of the implied primitive ideologies and the effect on the construction of cultural traditions, e.g., taboos, customs and rituals, were processed as well. Furthermore, after comparing some cultural traits of different ethnic groups that live on Asian mainland and Southeast Asian islands, this research adheres to the theory that aboriginal groups migrated to Taiwan from different areas at different periods of times.「鳥」在臺灣原住民各族的口傳故事中，存在許多認知與文化意涵上的差異，但不管是作為狩獵對象，亦或是幫助人類、啟發人類，甚至成為保護族人的祖靈象徵，都充分展現出「鳥」在原住民生活及口傳文學上扮演的重要角色。諸如：在口傳故事中，鳥為人類舉天、造川，開闢美好的生活環境；鳥帶來的鵝卵石誕生了祖先；鳥的交合，啟蒙了人的性知識，讓人得以繁衍；鳥為人類取回火種，人類得以擺脫生食文化；人類從鳥的食物中發現了粟種、稻種，因而展開農耕生活；在實際生活中，原住民視「鳥」為預兆動物，以「鳥占」引導族人於生活中趨吉避凶；以鳥的羽毛做為頭飾，以識別身分地位；模仿「烏鴉嘴」樣式的文面圖樣，作為人死後回歸祖靈的識別。此外，臺灣原住民的「變形故事」豐富，其中又以「人鳥變形」的故事最多，人藉著變形為飛鳥以逃避生活及心理上的危機，甚至以變形為飛鳥與「死亡抗爭」，轉化了命運，凡此種種，皆蘊含了原住民「物我同一」的原始思維及對鳥的特殊情感與崇羨之情，因此，立下許多愛鳥、護鳥的禁忌。本文以臺灣原住民飛鳥與人鳥變形的口傳故事為題材，推究其所隱含的神話思維及文化面向，並分析這些口傳故事對各族禁忌、習俗、祭儀的建制功能，最後，以原住民「崇鳥遺俗」與中國「鳥信仰」文化特質間的相關性，回應原住民族群「多源遷移」的新思考方向。目 次 摘要…………………………………………………………………………………I 目次…………………………………………………………………………………III 表目錄………………………………………………………………………………VI 第一章 緒論………………………………………………………………………1 第一節 研究動機與目的…………………………………………………………1 第二節 研究範圍…………………………………………………………………5 一、臺灣原住民族分類概說…………………………………………………5 二、神話傳說與口傳故事辨析………………………………………………6 三、文獻回顧…………………………………………………………………9 第三節 研究方法…………………………………………………………………11 一、文本研究取向……………………………………………………………11 二、探討方法…………………………………………………………………11 第二章 鳥的信仰與崇拜…………………………………………………………13 第一節 中國神話中太陽鳥及鳥化信仰…………………………………………14 一、太陽鳥崇拜………………………………………………………………14 二、稻作鳥化信仰……………………………………………………………16 第二節 原住民的鳥占習俗………………………………………………………18 一、上天的語言………………………………………………………………18 二、各族的鳥占習俗…………………………………………………………20 第三節 原住民的飛鳥禁忌………………………………………………………30 一、原住民的禁忌……………………………………………………………30 二、與鳥相關的禁忌…………………………………………………………32 第三章 原住民鳥的口傳故事分析………………………………………………37 第一節 鳥始祖神話………………………………………………………………37 一、原住民的始祖神話………………………………………………………37 二、與鳥相關的始祖誕生……………………………………………………39 第二節 口傳故事中的聰明鳥……………………………………………………42 一、靈鳥舉天造川……………………………………………………………42 二、鳥類的性愛啟蒙…………………………………………………………48 三、飛鳥銜命取火……………………………………………………………50 四、鳥食的啟迪………………………………………………………………59 第四章 原住民人鳥變形故事的類型分析………………………………………63 第一節 原住民變形故事的分類…………………………………………………63 第二節 人鳥變形的故事類型……………………………………………………66 第三節 各族人鳥變形的故事分析………………………………………………68 一、布農族……………………………………………………………………68 二、泰雅族……………………………………………………………………78 三、賽夏族……………………………………………………………………83 四、鄒族………………………………………………………………………87 五、邵族………………………………………………………………………89 六、排灣族……………………………………………………………………93 七、魯凱族……………………………………………………………………94 八、卑南族……………………………………………………………………97 九、阿美族……………………………………………………………………99 十、達悟族……………………………………………………………………101 第五章 鳥與人鳥變形的神話思維探討…………………………………………103 第一節 變形的原始思維…………………………………………………………103 第二節 逃離與抗爭………………………………………………………………107 一、困境的逃離………………………………………………………………107 二、死亡的抗爭………………………………………………………………109 第三節 口傳故事的功能性意義…………………………………………………113 一、尋求心靈的安適…………………………………………………………113 二、推原與建制………………………………………………………………115 第四節 回歸圖騰的揣疑…………………………………………………………116 一、中國文化中的鳥圖騰與崇拜……………………………………………118 二、臺灣原住民文化中的鳥圖騰遺俗與失落………………………………121 第六章 結論………………………………………………………………………129 參考書目……………………………………………………………………………13

The Fall Risk Screening Scale Is Suitable for Evaluating Adult Patient Fall

(1) Background: This study aimed to test the feasibility of utilizing the screening tool for fall risk assessment in adult inpatient and verify its accuracy in a medical center in Taiwan. (2) Methods: This study retrospectively collected all adult fall cases among inpatients occurring in the general wards of a medical center between 1 January 2013 and 31 December 2015. This inpatient fall risk screening scale was measured by the sensitivity, specificity, and accuracy. (3) Results: There were 1331 (0.4%) falls among a total of 357,395 inpatients during this period. Factors predictive of falling risk included: age, consciousness, body shift assistance, use of fall risk medications, fall history, dizziness or weakness, toileting, and impaired mobility. Using the eight-factor assessment, two was the best cutoff point for identifying the fall risk group, with area under Receiver Operating Characteristic (ROC) curve (AUC) = 0.817, sensitivity = 80.93%, specificity = 73.0%, accuracy = 73.03%, and likelihood ratio = 11.48. (4) Conclusions: The accuracy of the eight-item fall risk assessment tool created for this study was validated. These results can serve as a reference for institutions to develop more effective fall risk assessment scale for inpatients, enabling clinical nurses to identify and more comprehensively assess the groups at highest risk for falling during their hospital stay

Using a Motivational Paradigm to Develop an Exercise Program for Nurses with High Risk of Metabolic Syndrome

Nurses are frontline care providers whose health is vital to providing good quality of care to patients. The purpose of this study was to develop an exercise program for high-risk metabolic syndrome nurses based on the transtheoretical model. The transtheoretical model was used in this study due to its popular use in exercise behavior change and it can clearly identify the stage of exercise so as to plan an effective program to promote health. This was a quasi-experimental pilot study with a total of 40 participants who met the inclusion criteria. Exercise programs were developed for three groups distinguished by their commitment to exercising for health. Sixteen (40%) nurses moved one step forward, six (15%) nurses moved backward, and eighteen (45%) nurses maintained at the same stage over time (stable sedentary, 40%; stable active, 5%). Bowker’s test of symmetry, χ2 = 14.00 (p p p p < 0.01), respectively. Applying the transtheoretical model to health behavior enables significant change. The benefits of applying the transtheoretical model for promoting exercise include increasing perceived exercise benefits and self-efficacy, decreasing perceived exercise barriers, and increasing physical activity levels

Unmet Care Needs and Uncertainty in Patients Newly Diagnosed with Breast Cancer

Breast cancer is the most common cancer in women in the world. Statistics revealed the number of breast cancer patients less than 40 years of age increased over time. Clinical studies found there is a trend of yearly illness happening in younger patients, whose needs related to the illness are different from older patients. The purpose of this study was to explore the uncertainty and needs of patients in different age groups who were newly diagnosed with breast cancer. A descriptive cross-sectional survey study was adopted to recruit 128 patients. The Mishel’s Uncertainty in Illness Scale (MUIS, Chinese version) and the Cancer Needs Questionnaire (short-form, CNQ-SF) were used to collect data. The results revealed that a patient’s age and religion negatively correlated with illness uncertainty. A patient’s age, educational level, work or not, and children’s age correlated with needs for care. Age, illness uncertainty, and educational level were important predictors of the needs of care, with an explanatory power of 29.0%. In Conclusion, patients ≤40 years of age had greater illness uncertainty and needs for care than those who were &gt;40 years of age. For younger patients newly diagnosed with cancer, medical professionals should take the initiative to provide detailed and complete information on breast cancer treatment plans, prognosis, and home self-care, which helps clarify the possible future treatments and results and further enables patients to acquire self-care skills and knowledge

Factors associated with health-related quality of life in gynaecologic cancer survivors with lower limb lymphedema: a cross-sectional study in Taiwan

Abstract Backgrounds Gynaecological cancer survivors may develop lower limb lymphoedema after surgery, which negatively impacts quality of life. The purposes of this study were (1) to assess the levels of symptom distress, depression, body image, and health-related quality of life (HRQoL); (2) to recognize factors associated with HRQoL related in gynaecologic cancer survivors with lower limb lymphoedema. Methods A cross-sectional study was conducted with convenience sampling of gynaecologic cancer survivors with lower limb lymphoedema. Gynaecologic cancer survivors were assessed for symptom distress, depression, body image, and HRQoL. Multiple regression analysis was conducted to recognize the factors associated with HRQoL. Independent-samples t-test was used to compare symptom distress, depression, body image, and HRQoL by grade of lymphoedema. Results The most common distressing symptoms of lower limb lymphoedema were lower extremity oedema, lower extremity tightness, and lower extremity stiffness. Worse HRQoL was associated with more symptom distress, less satisfaction with body image, a high grade of lymphoedema, and a longer duration of lower limb lymphoedema. These factors explained 76.5% of the variance in HRQoL. Gynaecologic cancer survivors with late grade lymphoedema experienced lower HRQoL and higher levels of symptom distress, depression, and greater dissatisfaction with body image than those who had early grade lymphoedema. Conclusions Symptom distress had the strongest association with overall HRQoL and with all individual domains of HRQoL, except mental function. These results suggest that educating gynaecologic cancer survivors to assess lower limb lymphoedema-related problems, providing symptom management, and guiding survivors in physical activity to relieve lower extremity discomfort can improve HRQoL

The Effects of Emergency Room Violence toward Nurse′s Intention to Leave—Resilience as a Mediator

(1) Background: Healthcare workplace violence has been a focused issue in the whole world. The rate of the occurrence is pretty high in every country. The emergency room is a high risk and high frequency place for violence to occur. Under the medical service demands from people, it is quite easy to bring about conflicts. This leads to serious physical and mental harm to nurses. When suffering from physical and mental injuries, resilience is a protective factor away from negative influence. It is rare to explore and study how the nurses’ resilience ability, workplace violence and turnover intention are related. Thus, the aim of this study is to understand resilience as a mediator effect in emergency nurses toward the workplace violence. (2) Methods: A cross-sectional survey study was used to collect information from emergency room nurses of a medical center in northern Taiwan. There were 132 samples in total. Three research instruments were included as follows: Hospital Workplace Violence Prevention Questionnaire, Connor-Davidson Resilience Scale, and Turnover Intention Scale. Statistical analysis using t-test, ANOVA, Correlation, as well as Sobel test were used in this study. (3) Results: The results revealed that the average age was 29.5 ± 5.6. Almost 58% of nurses experienced workplace violence. Twelve percent of nurse had experienced physical violence and 53.8% had experienced mental violence. There was significant relationship between shift personnel and religious believers. To the people who suffered physical violence, there was a significant relationship between emergency room working years and the total working years. There was significant difference between those who had suffered mental violence and religious believers. Female nurses suffered mental violence to a much higher extent than male nurses. There was a significant relationship between nurses’ working years, the total working years, resilience, and turnover intention. Resilience was not the mediator for workplace violence toward turnover intention in this study. (4) Conclusions: The outcome of this study suggested that on an individual level, nurses can enhance self-protection and communication skills to decrease workplace violence. For emergency environment settings, designing a good working environment, visitors’ restriction, avoiding working alone, and enhancing supervising alarm system are recommended. As for hospital administrators, fitness for work and to set up a project team is necessary. These can be references in planning prevention on workplace violence and promoting quality of workplace and patient safety in the future

The Post-Traumatic Growth of Primary Caregivers of Patients after Liver Transplantation

Liver transplantation is a very important surgery. In many cases, it involves two loved ones (receiver and donor in the same family) and causes stress and feelings of burden in family caregivers. The purpose of this study was to investigate post-traumatic growth in primary caregivers of liver transplant patients. A cross-sectional research design was adopted to recruit 84 participants. The Perceived Stress Scale, Short-Form Coping Strategies Scale, and Post-traumatic Growth Scale were used. The results revealed that the total score of perceived stress of the main caregivers of liver transplantation was 27.27 ± 6.63; problem-oriented coping and emotion-oriented coping were used as the main coping strategies, and the traumatic growth score was 42.01 ± 13.84. All three variables were significant predictors of post-traumatic growth (F = 13.71, p < 0.05), explaining 38% of the total variance. This study can help nurses understand the post-traumatic growth status and related factors of the main caregivers of liver transplant patients. It can also help caregivers understand their own perceived pressure and then take relevant care measures to reduce the degree of physical and mental load and achieve a balanced state