The effects of randomization to mindfulness training (MT) or to a waitlist-control condition on psychological and physiological indicators of teachers' occupational stress and bumout were examined in 2 field trials. The sample included 113 elementary and secondary school teachers (89% female) from Canada and the United States. Measures were collected at basehne, post-program, and 3-month followup: teachers were randomly assigned to condition after baseline assessment. Results showed that 87% of teachers completed the program and found it beneficial. Teachers randomized to MT showed greater mindfulness, focused attention and working memory capacity, and occupational self-compassion, as well as lower levels of occupational stress and bumout at post-program and follow-up, than did those in the control condition. No statistically significant differences due to MT were found for physiological measures of stress. Mediational analyses showed that group differences in mindfulness and selfcompassion at post-program mediated reductions in stress and bumout as well as symptoms of anxiety and depression at follow-up. Implications for teaching and leaming are discussed.
Fitness technology feature use items were not available in the literature, and thus, were developed for the current study. Items were developed for each feature set following the procedure described next. We used a four-step process to determine the fitness technology features that make up our first-order subconstructs. First, we compiled a list of currently available fitness devices and their associated apps using lists of wearables published in popular media outlets. The original list contained 72 devices and was compiled using lists of wearables from CNET, PC Magazine, The Wall Street Journal, Engadget, Gizmodo, and others. While not comprehensive, the redundancy across multiple lists suggests that our list, at the very least, contains the most popular devices in the wearables category at the time the data was collected. Second, the three researchers independently visited every website of each device/app on the list and collected the features the company advertised for the fitness technology. Third, all three of the researchers' feature lists were compared, discussed, and used to create an integrated list. Fourth, once survey items were created, an expert panel was convened to examine the feature list and scales as described below.Accepted procedural methods (Churchill 1979;MacKenzie et al. 2011) were followed in developing the fitness technology use items. Once the items were developed, an expert panel was convened. The expert panel consisted of two faculty members who are well versed in surveybased methodologies, two faculty members who were active users of fitness technologies, and two employees of a fitness technology company. The expert panel was instructed to examine the entire survey instrument for clarity and to provide feedback on wording and note if any fitness technology features were missing. The expert panel did not provide any new fitness technology features, which indicated our list was reasonably comprehensive. The expert panel did suggest wording changes to the fitness technology features set use items and the addition of a few more fitness device and apps to our list (primarily new versions of devices already present in our list). We compiled the expert panel wording suggestions and considered each suggestion. Most wording suggestions from the expert panel were implemented, improving the clarity of the survey items.
These findings highlight the need to distinguish between children's road safety knowledge and their behaviour, particularly for teachers and parents, who may mistakenly believe that children who know more will be safer on the road.
The burgeoning market in electronic media has encouraged a trend toward 'edutainment', where entertaining, media-based materials are used to facilitate educational outcomes. In this study, we evaluated the effectiveness of a video that has recently been released by a popular children's entertainment group to help tackle Britain's poor record on children's road safety. We wished to determine whether the video had an impact on either children's knowledge or parents' awareness of pedestrian skills, when used in a standard home-based fashion. A total of 120 families participated, all of whom had children 5 years of age. Half the families received videos at the beginning of the study, while the other half served as a control group against which to measure change in the treatment group. Data were gathered at baseline and again 1 month later, using a series of tailored questionnaire items. A robust pattern of null findings indicated that the video, when used in this casual fashion, had no educational impact on either parents or children. Crucially, however, parents strongly believed that it had. The discussion explores the implications of such a mismatch and highlights similarities with outcomes of other health education interventions.
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