Exploring the Potential Impact of Training on Short-Term Quality of Life and Stress of Parents of Children with Autism: The Integrative Parents' Autism Training Module.

Parents of autistic children experience high levels of parental stress and low quality of life related to the demanding child caring burden they experience. Parent education and training programs are acknowledged to improve parental well-being and reduce parenting stress. In the framework of the Erasmus+ Integrative Autism Parents Training Project (IPAT), we developed the IPAT Training Module based on parents' expressed needs, in order to improve parental quality of life (QoL) and decrease their perceived stress. Sixty-two parents from four countries participated in the IPAT Module Training activity. We used WHOQOL-BREF and Perceived Stress Scale (PSS-10 version) for QoL and stress, respectively, before and after training and a study-specific questionnaire to assess participants' satisfaction. Parents' QoL improved significantly in the environment domain and specific items, while stress levels remained unmodified. Training appeared more advantageous for parents with lower initial QoL and those whose child had been enrolled in a special education program for an extended duration. Parents were quite satisfied, in particular those with lower initial social relationships QoL. Larger studies including a control group are necessary to support preliminary evidence provided by this study, identify additional effect moderators, and disentangle the contribution of different components of the training.

Assessment of Greek Smokers' Psychological Characteristics and Empathy While Smoking in Enclosed Public Spaces and Near Nonsmokers.

Background Smoking presents a strong association between emotional intelligence and increased anxiety and depression. Empathy is a form of perception where people feel the emotional states of others as their own. The act of smoking expresses indifference to social norms and the health of nonsmokers, which speaks to smokers' psychology. We conducted this study to identify the impact of smoking in psychology, empathy, and smoking behavior and examine the effect of smokers' psychological characteristics and empathy toward smoking in enclosed public spaces and in front of nonsmokers. Methodology A primary, quantitative, synchronous, correlational, and nonexperimental research was accomplished using validated, reliable questionnaires. We used random sampling to acquire the study population consisting of 453 employees of public dining areas, owners of public dining areas, and medical and nonmedical students at the University of Larissa, Greece. Data were collected via self-completed questionnaires on participant demographic information and smoking habits. We used SPSS Statistics for Windows, version 24.0 (IBM Corp., Armonk, NY) to analyze the data with significance set at 5%. We also used independent samples t-test, Mann-Whitney U test, Spearman's coefficient, chi-square test, and factorial analysis of variance with significance set at 5%. Results We found high levels of empathy in smokers with low psychosomatic symptoms. Smoking significantly affected levels of empathy (p<.001), annoyance when they are in a place where smoking is prohibited, someone else smoking (p<.001), recommendations of someone who smokes in a nonsmoking area to quit (p<.001), and hostility (p<.001). There was a statistically significant effect of double interaction sample category and smoking on empathy (p<.001). Smoking more than 15 cigarettes affected the levels of agreement in the perception that nonsmokers around them are bothered when they smoke (p=.004) and anxiety (p=.002). Perceptions about the annoyance of nonsmokers were negatively correlated with interpersonal sensitivity (p=.003), depression (p<.001), anxiety (p=.003), hostility (p<.001), paranoid ideation (p=.005), psychoticism (p=.001), and Global Severity Index (p=.006). Annoyance, when smoking is prohibited, was positively correlated with empathy (p=.001) while negatively correlated with somatization (p=.012) and hostility (p=.013). Smoking in prohibited places was related to somatization (p=.032), hostility (p<.001), and paranoid ideation (p=.001). Conclusions The purpose of this study was to examine the empathy and psychopathological characteristics of smokers in Greece. Smokers presented high levels of hostility and those who smoke more than 15 cigarettes per day indicated higher levels of anxiety than those who smoke less or not at all. Lower levels of empathy appeared in smokers, regardless of occupation. Smokers presented lower levels of annoyance when they are in a place where smoking is prohibited and someone else smokes. Participants with higher somatization, hostility, and lower empathy are less bothered when they are in a place where smoking is prohibited and someone else smokes. These findings could assist the development of communication materials aimed at smokers to help them understand that others nearby do not enjoy their smoking practices, especially in an enclosed area. These findings could also facilitate feasible antismoking laws with an overall goal to reduce smoking in a population.

Association of Psychopathology Symptoms, Self-Compassion, and Forgiveness in Patients With Pulmonary Embolism.

Background Pulmonary embolism (PE) is a potentially life-threatening disease with both physical and psychological impacts. The psychological distress in the early phase of the disease has not been previously studied in the literature.  Methods The study sample included patients with PE with or without deep vein thrombosis. All subjects included in the study prospectively completed the Symptom Checklist-90-R (SCL-90-R) questionnaire, the Heartland Forgiveness Scale (HFS), and the Self-Compassion Scale (SCS) during their hospitalization for PE. Results Forty-four PE patients were included in the study (59.1% males). The mean age was 62.27±15.03 years. The majority (77.3%) had at least one comorbidity with 9.1% previously diagnosed with depression. The Total Global Severity Index (GSI) score for SCL-90-R was 82.42±49.70 while 36.4% of subjects had a high "Obsessive-compulsive" score, 22.7% had a high "Depression" score, and 22.7% presented a high "Hostility" score. The total HFS score was 45.54±40.42 with 54.5% of patients classified as "usually forgiving." The mean SCS score was 2.05±0.65 with 59.1% of patients presenting moderate self-compassion while 18.2% had low self-compassion. The total SCS score was correlated with the total GSI score (p=0.005, r=-0.576) and total HFS score (p=0.005, r=0.675). The SCS Self-kindness score correlated with interpersonal sensitivity (p=0.024, r=-0.479), depression (p=0.008, r=-0.551), and GSI score (p=0.049, r=-0.425). Self-judgement correlated with paranoid ideation (p=0.044, r=-0.467), hostility (p=0.007, r=-0.597), and GSI (p=0.027, r=-0.505). Isolation correlated with interpersonal sensitivity (p=0.026, r=-0.509), anxiety (p=0.014, r=-0.553), hostility (p=0.032, r=-0.494), paranoid ideation (p=0.026, r=-0.509), and GSI (p=0.015, r=-0.548). The total SCS score correlated with anxiety (p=0.041, r=-0.438). SCS Self-kindness score correlated significantly with total HFS score (p=0.002, r=0.613), forgiveness of self (p=0.011, r=0.528), forgiveness of others (p=0.008, r=0.550), and forgiveness of situations (p=0.004. r=0.587). Common humanity was significantly correlated with total HFS score (p=0.023, r=0.481), forgiveness of others (p=0.033, r=0.456), and forgiveness of situations (p=0.016, r=0.507). Mindfulness was positively correlated with HFS total score (p=0.009, r=0.544), forgiveness of self (p=0.049, r=0.424), forgiveness of others (p=0.012, r=0.525), and forgiveness of situations (p=0.013, r=0.520). Conclusions We report for the first time that patients acutely hospitalized for PE present symptoms of obsessive-compulsive disorder, depression, and hostility and exhibit moderate self-compassion. The marginal majority of PE patients are "usually forgiving" during the acute phase of the disease. Self-compassion is positively associated with forgiveness and negatively associated with psychiatric symptoms. Further studies are warranted in order to assess longitudinal differences in psychometric scores and the possible result of targeted mental health interventions at PE-specific clinical outcomes.