Emotions involved in college students' sexual encounters.

The number of sexually transmitted infections continues to rise among late adolescents and young adults. One possible explanation is that an important variable, emotion, is missing from theories and programs promoting safer practices. This study performed a thorough examination of emotions involved during and after sexual encounters and how these related to risk and planning of the sexual encounter. Eighty-two college students were given recall instructions and a questionnaire designed to elicit detailed information about their recent or most memorable sexual encounter. Using content analysis, open-ended questions concerning emotions and thoughts about the sexual partner, the participant in the situation, the place of the encounter, and feelings after the encounter were analyzed. Major findings included individuals who experienced negative or mixed emotions expected certain sexual behaviors less than those who had positive emotions. Unlike previous studies, there were no differences in emotions and planning of the sexual encounter, type of partner, and sexual risk.

Sexuality among women recipients of a pancreas and kidney transplant.

Significant improvements in health and quality of life generally follow organ transplantation; however, there is evidence that women who have received transplants experience difficulty with sexual function. The specific nature and extent of this difficulty has not been documented. The purpose of this study was to describe sexual functioning and sexual self-esteem among women recipients of a simultaneous pancreas and kidney transplant. Perceived effect of the transplant on sexuality was also explored. Participants completed a questionnaire that measured their sexual functioning (including sexual difficulties), sexual self-esteem, illnesses, medications, and perceived effect of the transplant on sexuality. Data analysis revealed that only 39% of the women would be classified as having normal sexual functioning. The majority reported either some difficulty with sexual function (34%) or sexual dysfunction (27%). About one third of the women reported that transplantation had only positive effects on their sexuality, whereas 28% reported negative effects, and 29% reported no effect.

Situational factors involved in college students' safer and risky sexual encounters.

OBJECTIVE: To ascertain the differences between the situational factors of risky and safer sexual encounters in college students. DESIGN: Descriptive. SETTING: Community-dwelling college students from a large Midwestern university. PARTICIPANTS: Participants were 84 college students ages 18 to 20 years. Fifty-five were female (67.5%), the majority (95.2%) were White, and all reported being heterosexual. MAIN OUTCOME MEASURE: Use of safer or risky practices in last or most memorable sexual encounter. RESULTS: Important situational characteristics of safer encounters were negative ambiance of the place, type of partner, unattractive qualities of the partner, communication with the partner, and having the encounter because of feeling desire. Important situational characteristics of risky encounters were a cozy ambiance, partner's attractiveness inducing desire, asking directly for the encounter, and encounters occurring after celebration or partying. CONCLUSIONS: Many characteristics were similar for both risk groups. However, practitioners can tailor interventions to make clients aware of factors that were more prevalent in risky sexual encounters, such as having the encounter with a boyfriend or girlfriend and having an encounter after drinking alcohol and partying.

Cognitive function in community-dwelling elderly women. Attentional demands and capacity to direct attention.

As individuals get older, their capacity to direct attention (CDA) appears to decline. The decline in CDA may be caused by age-related changes in the brain and demands on attentional mechanisms. These demands require older adults to expend significant attentional effort to maintain focus and achieve mental clarity while negotiating activities of daily life. The purpose of this study was to examine the relationship between attentional demands and CDA among a convenience sample of 72 community-dwelling older women with normal mental status. Findings indicate attentional demands correlated significantly with CDA and accounted for a significant proportion of the variance. No relationship was found between depressive symptoms and CDA. Implications for practice are nursing interventions aimed at decreasing attentional demands, thereby supporting attentional processes and functioning by community-dwelling older adults.

Patient-centered interventions.

Patient-centered care is valued in nursing. However, until recently, nurse-researchers have focused on testing the effects of standardized rather than patient-centered interventions (PCIs). The latter are those interventions that are altered to address selected patient characteristics (e.g., beliefs, habits, or goals). PCIs have been well received, and in some studies they have been associated with improved health outcomes. In this article we describe briefly the concept patient centered, summarize the development of research on PCIs, discuss kinds of PCIs, provide examples of PCIs and how they have been derived and implemented, and raise issues for theory and future research.

College students' perceptions and practices of sexual activities in sexual encounters.

PURPOSE: To examine college students' understanding of safer sexual encounters, including expectation for sexual activities, planning for sexual encounters, and ideas about what constitutes "safe" sex. DESIGN: Exploratory design of college students' perceptions of and actual sexual activities that occurred in their last or most memorable sexual encounter. METHODS: Participants in one U.S. university completed three open- and closed-ended questions about their activities, as part of a larger questionnaire concerning contextual factors in their sexual encounters. A content analysis was conducted on data from open-ended questions. Encounters were categorized by risk for further analysis. FINDINGS: No significant differences were found in expectations regarding sexual activities between participants who had risky and safer encounters, except that participants who had safer encounters expected touching through clothing significantly less than did those who had risky encounters. Frequencies of sexual activities varied greatly between the two risk groups. No differences were found between the two groups concerning whether the encounter was planned or in expectation of sexual activities by planning of the encounter. The majority erroneously thought they had "safer" sex. The most reported reasons for believing a risky encounter was safer included the use of a hormone-based birth control method, use of a condom during vaginal sex only, and believing no sex had occurred in the case of oral sex. CONCLUSIONS: For these participants, planning of the encounter was not related to safer sexual activities and safer sexual activities were generally misunderstood.

A influência do sexo, duraçäo, severidade e denominaçäo de sintomas sobre o comportamento de adaptaçäo à doença / The influence of sex, duration, severity and naming of symptoms on illness coping behaviors

Identifica fatores subjacentes a estratégias de adaptaçäo empreendidas por indivíduos hipotéticamente ameaçados por episódios de doenças e investiga, em uma amostra de 698 estudantes universitários, os efeitos do sexo, da duraçäo, da severidade e da ambigüidade de ameaças de doença, sobre as estratégias de adaptaçäo, as reaçöes emocionais e o uso de recursos médicos. Independentemente do tipo de episódio, as mulheres diferem dos homens na indicaçäo de maior probabilidade de recorrerem a mudança de dieta. Severidade dos sintomas provoca diferenças na antecipaçäo de mais açöes de adaptaçäo, reaçöes emocionais mais negativas e maior probabilidade de se recorrer a serviços médicos. Efeitos de duraçäo e severidade dos sintomas interagem com açöes de negaçäo e busca de apoio. Näo há influência da ambigüidade de sintomas. Esses resultados indicam a necessidade de se considerar percepçöes e interpretaçöes das pessoas quando do estudo da maneira como se adaptam a sintomas de doenças

A influencia do sexo, duracao, severidade e denominacao de sintomas sobre comportamentos de adaptacao a doenca

Tendo sido identificados fatores subjacentes a estrategias de adaptacao empreendidas por individuo hipoteticamente ameacados por episodios de doencas, foram investigados, em uma amostra de 698 estudantes universitarios, os efeitos do sexo, da duracao, da severidade e da ambiguidade de ameacas de doenca, sobre as estrategias de adaptacao, as reacoes emocionais e o uso de recursos medicos. Independentemente do tipo de episodio, as mulheres diferiram dos homens na indicacao de maior probabilidade de recorrerem a mudanca de dieta. Severidade dos sintomas provocou diferencas na antecipacao de mais acoes de adaptacao, reacoes emocionais mais negativas e maior probabilidade de se recorrer a servicos medicos. Efeitos de duracao e severidade dos sintomas interagiram com acoes de negacao e busca de apoio. Nao houve influencia da ambiguidade de sintomas. Esses resultados indicaram a necessidade de se considerar percepcoes e interpretacoes das pessoas quando do estudo da maneira como se adaptam a sintomas de doencas.

O uso do modelo do senso comum na promoçäo da saúde / The use of the common sense model in health promotion

Programas de educaçäo para a saúde, planejados para incentivar comportamentos ligados à promoçäo da saúde e à prevençäo de doenças, estäo recebendo uma atençäo cada vez maior. Infelismente, os resultados nem sempre alcançam os objetivos desejados. Um dos problemas com as várias tentativas de educaçäo para a saúde encontra-se na ausência de um melhor exame das expectativas, percepçöes e crenças que as pessoas possuem sobre doenças e sobre a adequaçäo dos vários comportamentos passíveis de uso para fins preventivos. Este trabalho descreve um modelo. O modelo do Senso Comum, que pode ser usado para avaliar estas idéias, expectativas e crenças intuitivas e pré-existentes acerca de doenças e comportamentos preventivos. É argumentado que essas expectativas, percepçöes e crenças das pessoa devem ser levadas em consideraçäo para que os programas educacionais se tornarem mais efetivos

O uso do modelo do senso comum na promocao da saude

Programa de educacao para a saude, planejados para incentivar comportamentos ligados a promocao da saude e a prevencao de doencas, estao recebendo um atencao cada vez maior. Infelizmente, os resultados nem sempre alcancam os objetivos desejados. Um dos problemas com as varias tentativas de educacao para a saude encontra-se na ausencia de um melhor exame das expectativas, percepcoes e crencas que as pessoas possuem sobre doencas e sobre a adequacao dos varios comportamentos passiveis de uso para fins preventivos. Este trabalho descreve um modelo. O modelo do Senso Comum, que pode ser usado para avaliar estas ideias, expectativas e crencas intuitivas e pre-existentes acerca de doencas e comportamentos preventivos. E argumentado que essas expectativas, percepcoes e crencas das pessoas devem ser levadas em consideracao para que os programas educacionais se tornem mais efeitos.

Representaçöes de deonças e sintomas em pessoas leigas: dados preliminares / Synptoms and illnesses representations among lay people\" preliminary data

Percepçöes sobre doenças podem diferir de acordo com a idade de quem as percebe ou a idade na qual a doença ocorre. Estas diferenças de percepçäo podem entäo explicar algumas discrepâncias encontradas na maneira como as pessoas lidam com episódios de doenças. Foram investigadas as percepçöes sobre a idade como causa de doenças e sintomas, e percepçöes sobre os efeitos da idade quanto à seriedade e ao potencial de prevençäo, de cura e de controle de uma série de doenças e sintomas. Cento e quarenta e oito adultos residentes na comunidade foram entrevistados para este estudo. Os resultados indicaram que os responentes percebem a idade como associada a uma maior suscetibilidade à doença e a sintomas e a uma menor capacidade para o controle e cura

Representacoes de doencas e sintomas em pessoas leigas: Dados preliminares

Percepcoes sobre doencas podem diferir de acordo com a idade de quem as percebe ou a idade na qual a doenca ocorre. Estas diferencas de percepcao podem entao explicar algumas discrepancias encontradas na maneira como as pessoas lidam com episodios de doencas. Foram investigadas as percepcoes sobre a idade como causa de doencas e sintomas, e percepcoes sobre os efeitos da idade quanto a seriedade e ao potencial de prevencao, de cura e de controle de uma serie de doencas e sintomas, Cento e quarenta e oito adultos residentes na comunidade foram entrevistados para este estudo. Os resultados indicaram que os respondentes percebem a idade como associada a uma maior suscetibilidade a doenca e a sintomas e a uma menor capacidade para controle e cura.