Lithares: An Early Bronze Age Settlement in Boeotia

Series: Occasional Paper 1

Mental Health and Healthcare Facilities: The Case of the Oral Maxillofacial Practice

AIM: The aim of the study is to analyze and understand the deeper causes that leadindividuals suffering from mental illnesses to fear pain and especially pain causedduring the dental examination, repair or extraction of teeth.METHOD: A qualitative research was conducted with semi- structured interviews in«Evagelismos» Hospital in Athens, Greece. Participants were patients suffering frommental illness who had several problems with their mouth and teeth. 17 interviewswere conducted with participants who visited the hospital in order to visit the dentistand maxillofacial department. Interviews were analyzed by thematic analysis and themain topics were the Satisfaction of participants with hospital services, Doctor-patientcommunication, the trust in doctors, the Physical and oral hygiene of mentally ill patientsand the medication use.RESULTS: Participants were mostly satisfied with the healthcare services offered bythe physicians of the hospital and the equipment of the hospital. Almost all of theinterviewed participants reported trusting the physicians and followed their instructions.About 60% of the participants took care of their teeth daily. About 45% of theparticipants reported experiencing increasing stress levels during the dental examination.The analysis of the interviews revealed particularly useful information for understandingthe deeper causes, triggering difficult psychological conditions as well asanxiety in mentally ill individuals when faced with health problems and oral hygiene.CONCLUSION: The results showed that the majority of patients were satisfied by theservices they received. A further investigation is needed to record the factors that affectsignificantly in the upgrading of service quality

Αεροδυναμική Ανάλυση Πτήσης Ελικοπτέρου Στον Ομόρρου Ανεμογεννήτριας Με Χρήση Στροβιλής Μεθοδολογίας

Εθνικό Μετσόβιο Πολυτεχνείο--Μεταπτυχιακή Εργασία. Διεπιστημονικό-Διατμηματικό Πρόγραμμα Μεταπτυχιακών Σπουδών (Δ.Π.Μ.Σ.) “Υπολογιστική Μηχανική

Predictors of anxiety and depressive symptoms among Greek nurses

Introduction: The increasing needs of an aging population and the shortage of nursing personnel have a negative impact on the workload of nurses increasing the risk of developing anxiety and depressive symptoms. This research aims to evaluate the strength of occupational and demographic characteristics in predicting anxiety and depression among nurses. Methods: In this cross-sectional study, a sample of 164 Greek nurses from three hospitals employed full-time participated. Anxiety and depression were measured using the validated Greek versions of the State-Trait Anxiety Inventory – State and Trait Y forms and the Centre for Epidemiological Studies Depression scale, respectively. The statistical analysis of the data was performed using the statistical program SPSS version 19.0. The statistical significance level was set up at 0.05. Results: Younger nurses, unmarried, those without children, those with less work experience, and working in the general medical units were more vulnerable. The average number of patients per nurse during the day shift may not predict anxiety or depression scores. Strong positive correlation between state and trait anxiety (r [162] = 0.77, p < 0.001), state anxiety and depression (r [162] = 0.62, p < 0.001), and trait anxiety and depression (r [162] = 0.63, p < 0.001) was revealed. Conclusion: Anxiety and depression are prevalent among nurses. Demographic and working characteristics are strong predictors of anxiety and depression among nurses. Nursing managers should emphasize emotional interventions (cognitive behavioral therapy, training on emotional intelligence, strengthening coping skills, and development of high resilience) in supporting nurses at higher risk

Behavioural measures and training interventions for food-related cognition, motivation and affect

The rise in overweight and obesity rates over the past decades can primarily be attributed to the over-consumption of unhealthy energy-dense foods. Understanding the determinants of eating behaviours is therefore paramount for helping individuals reduce their intake of unhealthy foods and make healthier choices. According to a dual-process framework of behaviour, individuals with lower inhibitory control may be more vulnerable to implicit influences on their actions, such as strong approach bias and automatic affective reactions towards cues in the environment. Automatic and controlled processes within this framework can be assessed using direct and indirect measures and there have been recent advancements in the development of behaviour change interventions, such as inhibitory control training (ICT). Chapter 1 of this thesis reviews the theory and methods surrounding cognitive control of eating behaviours. Chapter 2 reports an experiment on the effect of ICT on food evaluations, impulsive choices and automatic action tendencies. Although training had the expected effect on food choices, it did not reduce participants’ approach bias towards unhealthy foods. Chapter 3 describes a study which provided evidence for the feasibility and potential effectiveness of a novel ICT paradigm for reducing unhealthy food evaluations and cravings. The study presented in Chapter 4 investigates the methodological validity of the affective priming paradigm (APP) as an indirect measure of food liking in the context of healthy and unhealthy foods. The APP was found to be robust in two cohorts of participants (direct replication), but its predictive utility for food choice behaviour requires further investigation. Chapter 5 shows that ICT can reduce individuals’ food evaluations at both an explicit and implicit level (via the APP). In Chapter 6, these research findings are discussed in relation to theory and methods, together with general limitations and directions for future empirical and applied research

Χρήση του διαδικτύου: Αντιλήψεις εφήβων και γονέων-εκπαιδευτικών

Η διπλωματική εργασία με τίτλο «Χρήση του διαδικτύου: Αντιλήψεις εφήβων και γονέων – εκπαιδευτικών» πραγματοποιήθηκε στο πλαίσιο του μεταπτυχιακού προγράμματος «Συμβουλευτική Ψυχολογία και Συμβουλευτική στην Εκπαίδευση, την Υγεία και την Εργασία» του Τμήματος Εκπαίδευσης και Αγωγής στην Προσχολική Ηλικία (Τ.Ε.Α.Π.Η.) του Ε.Κ.Π.Α., από την μεταπτυχιακή φοιτήτρια Ελένη Τζαβέλλα. Επιβλέπων της διπλωματικής εργασίας ήταν ο αναπληρωτής καθηγητής Χαράλαμπος Πουλόπουλος και ολοκληρώθηκε τον Ιανουάριο του 2018. Σκοπός της ερευνητικής εργασίας είναι η ανάδειξη των απόψεων και των εμπειριών εφήβων και γονέων σχετικά με το πώς αντιλαμβάνονται την διαδικτυακή χρήση των εφήβων. Επιχειρείται να διερευνηθούν πιθανές συγκλίσεις ή αποκλίσεις εφήβων και γονέων αναφορικά με τις συγκεκριμένες αντιλήψεις τους. Τα ερευνητικά πεδία που διερευνώνται αφορούν στην αντίληψη του διαδικτυακού ορισμού, στην αντίληψη της διαδικτυακής χρήσης, θετικών και αρνητικών εμπειριών, κινήτρων, γονεικής διαμεσολάβησής, επιρροής του χαρακτήρα των εφήβων, καθώς και σε προτάσεις αξιοποίησης του διαδικτύου στην εκπαίδευση. Πραγματοποιήθηκε ποιοτική έρευνα, τα δεδομένα της οποίας συλλέχθηκαν από ημι-δομημένες συνεντεύξεις των συμμετεχόντων και αναλύθηκαν με τη μεθοδολογία της ανάλυσης περιεχομένου. Διαπιστώνεται ότι γονείς και έφηβοι ορίζουν το διαδίκτυο ως μέσο πληροφόρησης και ότι η διαδικτυακή επικοινωνία και κοινωνικοποίηση των εφήβων είναι αντιληπτή ως σημαντική εξίσου από γονείς και εφήβους. Όσον αφορά στην αντίληψη των αρνητικών εμπειριών των εφήβων στο διαδίκτυο διαπιστώνεται έντονο φοβικό συναίσθημα για μια ποικιλία διαδικτυακών συμπεριφορών, με κυριότερη αυτή του παρατεταμένου διαδικτυακού χρόνου των εφήβων. Το φοβικό συναίσθημα παρόλο που περιγράφεται από την πλειοψηφία των συμμετεχόντων, εμφανίζεται πιο έντονο στις περιγραφές των γονέων και φαίνεται να μεταδίδεται κυρίως από τα ΜΜΕ. Αναδύεται επίσης η διάσταση της κριτικής σκέψης μέσα από τις περιγραφές κυρίως των γονέων στους ερευνητικούς άξονες των αντιλήψεων της διαδικτυακής χρήσης, των αρνητικών εμπειριών και των προτάσεων αξιοποίησης του διαδικτύου στο σχολείο. Οι έφηβοι φάνηκε να περιγράφουν κυρίως πώς αντιλαμβάνονται τις εμπειρίες τους χωρίς να υιοθετούν σφαιρική, κριτική οπτική.The present master thesis entitled: “Internet use: Parents’ who are Teachers and Adolescents’ Perceptions”, was conducted by Helen Tzavella, postgraduate student of the Postgraduate Program of the Department of Early School Education of National and Kapodistrian University of Athens in collaboration with the Department of Social Administration and Political Science, of the Democritus University of Thrace (specialization : Counseling Psychology), under the supervision of Charalampos Poulopoulos and was completed in January 2018. The purpose is to reveal the way parents and adolescents perceive and experience the adolescents’ use of the internet. Furthermore, it is considered in which ways these perceptions may converge or diverge. The fields of the inquiry include perceptions about the definition of the internet, perceptions about the use of the internet, positive and negative experiences, adolescents’ motives, parental mediation, ways that affect the adolescents’ character and proposals of manners that internet could be used in school environment. There was conducted qualitative research method and the data were collected through semi-structured interviews and analysed through the method of content analysis. There is found that most of the parents and adolescents define the internet as a medium of information and also they both perceive and recognize the importance of internet communication and socialization for adolescents. Concerning adolescents’ negative experiences on the internet there are found fearful emotions for several internet behaviors. Prolonged internet use by adolescents is the most frequently described negative behavior between the participants. Parents seem to feel fearful more than adolescents and the media seem to influence the spread of the specific emotion. Finally, parents’ critical thoughts about the internet use reveal, especially in the research axes of perceptions of the internet use, of the negative experiences and of the internet use proposals in education. Adolescents seem to describe their experiences without adopting spherical, critical thought