PERCEIVED ORGANIZATIONAL SUPPORT, STRESS COPING BEHAVIORS AND MEDIATING ROLE OF PSYCHOLOGICAL CAPITAL: SPECIAL EDUCATION AND REHABILITATION CENTERS

High level stress in work place is known to be associated with negative organizational behaviors and bad organizational performance. There are individual and organizational factors influencing stress coping behavior of employees. In this study we explore the impact of employees’ perceptions of organizational support on their stress coping capabilities (problem-focused stress coping and emotion-focused stress coping) and whether their psychological capital (PsyCap) plays a mediating role in this relationship using the sample of employees in special education and rehabilitation centers in Turkey. Multivariate statistical analyses show a significant positive relationship between perceived organizational support (POS) and problem-focused stress coping (PFSC), and no significant relationship between POS and emotion-focused stress coping (EFSC). A significant positive association is detected between POS and PsyCap. Accordingly, our findings show that PsyCap plays a partial mediating role in the association between POS and PFSC.JEL Codes - D22; M12; L

Supporting Inclusive Design of Mobile Devices with a Context Model

The aim of inclusive product design is to successfully integrate a broad range of diverse human factors in the product development process with the intention of making products accessible to and usable by the largest possible group of users. However, the main barriers for adopting inclusive product design include technical complexity, lack of time, lack of knowledge and techniques, and lack of guidelines. Although manufacturers of consumer products are nowadays more likely to invest efforts in user studies, consumer products in general only nominally fulfill, if at all, the accessibility requirements of as many users as they potentially could. The main reason is that any user-centered design prototyping or testing aiming to incorporate real user input, is often done at a rather late stage of the product development process. Thus, the more progressed a product design has evolved - the more time-consuming and costly it will be to alter the design. This is increasingly the case for contemporary mobile devices such as mobile phones or remote controls

Perceived Organizational Support, Stress Coping Behaviors and Mediating Role of Psychological Capital: Special Education and Rehabilitation Centers

High level stress in work place is known to be associated with negative organizational behaviors and bad organizational performance. There are individual and organizational factors influencing stress coping behavior of employees. In this study we explore the impact of employees’ perceptions of organizational support on their stress coping capabilities (problem-focused stress coping and emotion-focused stress coping) and whether their psychological capital (PsyCap) plays a mediating role in this relationship using the sample of employees in special education and rehabilitation centers in Turkey. Multivariate statistical analyses show a significant positive relationship between perceived organizational support (POS) and problem-focused stress coping (PFSC), and no significant relationship between POS and emotion-focused stress coping (EFSC). A significant positive association is detected between POS and PsyCap. Accordingly, our findings show that PsyCap plays a partial mediating role in the association between POS and PFSC

Tocilizumab treatment in severe COVID-19: a multicenter retrospective study with matched controls

Coronavirus disease-2019 (COVID-19) associated pneumonia may progress into acute respiratory distress syndrome (ARDS). Some patients develop features of macrophage activation syndrome (MAS). Elevated levels of IL-6 were reported to be associated with severe disease, and anti-IL-6R tocilizumab has been shown to be effective in some patients. This retrospective multicenter case-control study aimed to evaluate the efficacy of tocilizumab in hospitalized COVID-19 patients, who received standard of care with or without tocilizumab. Primary outcome was the progression to intubation or death. PSMATCH (SAS) procedure was used to achieve exact propensity score (PS) matching. Data from 1289 patients were collected, and study population was reduced to 1073 based on inclusion-exclusion criteria. The composite outcome was observed more frequently in tocilizumab-users, but there was a significant imbalance between arms in all critical parameters. Primary analyses were carried out in 348 patients (174 in each arm) after exact PS matching according to gender, ferritin, and procalcitonin. Logistic regression models revealed that tocilizumab significantly reduced the intubation or death (OR 0.40, p = 0.0017). When intubation is considered alone, tocilizumab-users had > 60% reduction in odds of intubation. Multiple imputation approach, which increased the size of the matched patients up to 506, provided no significant difference between arms despite a similar trend for intubation alone group. Analysis of this retrospective cohort showed more frequent intubation or death in tocilizumab-users, but PS-matched analyses revealed significant results for supporting tocilizumab use overall in a subset of patients matched according to gender, ferritin and procalcitonin levels