Linking actions and memories: Probing the interplay of action-effect congruency, agency experience, and recognition memory.

Adult humans experience agency when their action causes certain events (sense of agency). Moreover, they can later remember what these events were (memory). Here, we investigate how the relationship between actions and events shapes agency experience and memory for the corresponding events. Participants performed actions that produced stimuli that were either congruent or incongruent to the action while memory of these stimuli was probed in a recognition test. Additionally, predictability of the effect was manipulated in Experiment 1 by using either randomly interleaved or blocked ordering of action-congruent and action-incongruent events. In Experiment 2, the size of the action space was manipulated by allowing participants to choose between three or six possible responses. The results indicated a heightened sense of agency following congruent compared to incongruent trials, with this effect being increased given a larger available action space, as well as a greater sense of agency given higher predictability of the effect. Recognition memory was better for stimuli presented in congruent compared to incongruent trials, with no discernible effects of effect predictability or the size of the action space. The results point towards a joint influence of predictive and postdictive processes on agency experience and suggest a link between control and memory. The partial dissociation of influences on agency experience and memory cast doubt on a mediating role of agency experience on the relationship between action-effect congruency and memory. Theoretical accounts for this relationship are discussed.

The relationship between college students' belief in a just world and online prosocial behavior.

Previous studies have highlighted the critical role that the belief in a just world (BJW) plays in maintaining and promoting prosocial behaviors within individuals. Considered a stable personality trait, the crux of BJW lies in the conviction that individuals receive what they deserve, and deserve what they receive. Simultaneously, the relationship between BJW and prosocial behavior is impacted by an individual's sense of fairness or unfairness. However, past research has primarily focused on real-life prosocial behavior, with limited exploration into the relationship between BJW and online prosocial behavior. This study, comprising a survey and an experiment, aimed to delve deeper into this relationship. The survey section randomly selected 4212 college students to examine how BJW correlates with online prosocial behavior. Findings predominantly revealed a significant positive correlation between online prosocial behavior and BJW. Additionally, the study explored how gender and place of origin influence these behaviors. Results showed that male students and those from urban areas exhibited significantly higher online prosocial behavior. The experimental research investigated the performance differences in online prosocial behaviors among college students under different fairness scenarios, revealing that the online prosocial behavior in an unfair situation was significantly higher than in fair or neutral situations. Furthermore, in unfair situations, a significant correlation was observed between BJW and online prosocial behavior. The findings from this study significantly advance our understanding of the dynamics between BJW and online prosocial behavior among college students, emphasizing that perceived injustices can markedly enhance prosocial behaviors in virtual settings. This study underscores the profound impact of fairness perceptions and highlights the modulating effects of gender and geographical background on online interactions.

Improvements in clinical signs and symptoms of Parkinson's disease using photobiomodulation: a five-year follow-up.

BACKGROUND: Parkinson's disease is a progressive neurodegenerative disease characterized by clinical motor signs and non-motor symptoms that severely impact quality of life. There is an urgent need for therapies that might slow, halt or even reverse the progression of existing symptoms or delay the onset of new symptoms. Photobiomodulation is a therapy that has shown potential to alleviate some symptoms of Parkinson's disease in animal studies and in small clinical trials. OBJECTIVE: To assess long-term effectiveness of photobiomodulation therapy in a cohort of Parkinson's disease individuals after five years of continuing therapy. METHODS: Eight participants of the initial 12 in a previously published study agreed to be reassessed after five years. Seven of these participants had continued home-based, self-applied photobiomodulation therapy three times per week for five years. One participant had discontinued treatment after one year. Participants were assessed for a range of clinical motor signs, including MDS-UPDRS-III, measures of mobility and balance. Cognition was assessed objectively, and quality of life and sleep quality were assessed using self-reported questionnaires. A Wilcoxon Signed Ranks test was used to evaluate change in outcome measures between baseline (before treatment) and after five years, with the alpha value set to 0.05. RESULTS: Of the seven participants who had continued photobiomodulation therapy, one had a preliminary diagnosis of multisystem atrophy and was excluded from the group analysis. For the remaining six participants, there was a significant improvement in walk speed, stride length, timed up-and-go tests, tests of dynamic balance, and cognition compared to baseline and nonsignificant improvements in all other measures, apart from MDS-UPDRS-III, which was unchanged and one measure of static balance (single leg stance, standing on the unaffected leg with eyes open) which declined. Five of six participants either improved or showed no decline in MDS-UPDRS-III score and most participants showed improvement or no decline in all other outcome measures. No adverse effects of the photobiomodulation therapy were reported. CONCLUSIONS: This study provides a signal that photobiomodulation therapy might safely reduce important clinical motor signs and non-motor symptoms in some Parkinson's disease patients, with improvements maintained over several years. Home-based photobiomodulation therapy has the potential to complement standard therapies to manage symptoms and potentially delay Parkinson's symptom progression. TRIAL REGISTRATION: Australian New Zealand Clinical Trials Registry, registration number ACTRN12618000038291p, registered on 12/01/2018.

Altered sense of agency in schizophrenia: the aberrant effect of cardiac interoceptive signals.

Background: Schizophrenia (SZ) is characterized by abnormalities in self-representation, including a disturbed sense of agency (SoA). The continuous processing of sensory information concerning the internal state of the body (interoception) is argued to be fundamental to neural representations of the self. We, therefore, tested if aberrant interoception underpins disturbances in SoA in SZ, focusing on cardiac interoceptive signaling. Methods: Forty-two SZ and 29 non-clinical participants (healthy controls; HC) performed an intentional binding task to measure SoA during concurrent heartbeat recording. The effect of cardiac interoceptive signals on SoA was measured by the difference in intentional binding effect during systole and diastole. This measure was standardized based on the overall intentional binding effect to control for non-cardiac factors, and then compared between SZ and HC. Results: Our study revealed a significant difference between SZ and HC groups, with opposite effects of cardiac systole on SoA. Specifically, cardiac systole disrupted SoA in SZ, contrasting with the enhanced SoA in HC. Across the SZ group, the extent to which SoA was disrupted by cardiac systole correlated significantly with a clinical proxy for symptom instability, namely the number of hospital admissions for hallucinations and delusions. Furthermore, the disruption was particularly observed in patients with severe hallucinations. Conclusions: This study revealed a disturbance in the impact of cardiac interoceptive signals on an implicit index of SoA in schizophrenia. This supports the notion that pathophysiological disruption of the central integration of interoceptive information increases vulnerability to disturbances in self-representation and the associated expression of schizophrenic symptoms.

Opioid Misuse by Adults with Chronic Pain: The Impact of Illness and Medication Beliefs.

BACKGROUND: Why do some adults with chronic pain misuse their prescription opioids when others do not? Based on the extended Common-Sense Model, the study evaluated whether adults' beliefs about their pain have an indirect effect on risk of opioid misuse through beliefs about opioids when controlling for depression. METHODS: The sample included 297 adult participants in the U.S. recruited from Prolific, an online crowdsourcing website. Study measures included the Illness Perception Questionnaire-Revised (IPQ-R; protective and threat-related illness beliefs about chronic pain), the Beliefs about Medicines Questionnaire-Specific subscale (BMQ-Specific; concern and necessity medication beliefs about prescription opioids), and the Current Opioid Misuse Measure (COMM; risk of current opioid misuse). This cross-sectional parallel mediation analysis was conducted using MPlus. RESULTS: After controlling for depression, the indirect effect of protective illness beliefs on opioid misuse risk through concern medication beliefs (b = -0.01, 95% CI (-0. 038, -0.001), and the indirect effect of threat-related illness beliefs on opioid misuse risk through necessity medication beliefs (b = 0.02, 95% CI (0.004, 0.036) were significant. The full model explained 35% of the variance of opioid misuse risk. CONCLUSIONS: Adults with chronic pain with stronger protective beliefs about pain were less likely to have concerns about their opioids and were at lower risk for opioid misuse, while those with greater threat-related beliefs about pain were more likely to believe that their opioids were necessary and be at greater risk for opioid misuse. Results have implications for medical and mental health providers and future research.

Disambiguating Clinical Abbreviations by One-to-All Classification: Algorithm Development and Validation Study.

Background: Electronic medical records store extensive patient data and serve as a comprehensive repository, including textual medical records like surgical and imaging reports. Their utility in clinical decision support systems is substantial, but the widespread use of ambiguous and unstandardized abbreviations in clinical documents poses challenges for natural language processing in clinical decision support systems. Efficient abbreviation disambiguation methods are needed for effective information extraction. Objective: This study aims to enhance the one-to-all (OTA) framework for clinical abbreviation expansion, which uses a single model to predict multiple abbreviation meanings. The objective is to improve OTA by developing context-candidate pairs and optimizing word embeddings in Bidirectional Encoder Representations From Transformers (BERT), evaluating the model's efficacy in expanding clinical abbreviations using real data. Methods: Three datasets were used: Medical Subject Headings Word Sense Disambiguation, University of Minnesota, and Chia-Yi Christian Hospital from Ditmanson Medical Foundation Chia-Yi Christian Hospital. Texts containing polysemous abbreviations were preprocessed and formatted for BERT. The study involved fine-tuning pretrained models, ClinicalBERT and BlueBERT, generating dataset pairs for training and testing based on Huang et al's method. Results: BlueBERT achieved macro- and microaccuracies of 95.41% and 95.16%, respectively, on the Medical Subject Headings Word Sense Disambiguation dataset. It improved macroaccuracy by 0.54%-1.53% compared to two baselines, long short-term memory and deepBioWSD with random embedding. On the University of Minnesota dataset, BlueBERT recorded macro- and microaccuracies of 98.40% and 98.22%, respectively. Against the baselines of Word2Vec + support vector machine and BioWordVec + support vector machine, BlueBERT demonstrated a macroaccuracy improvement of 2.61%-4.13%. Conclusions: This research preliminarily validated the effectiveness of the OTA method for abbreviation disambiguation in medical texts, demonstrating the potential to enhance both clinical staff efficiency and research effectiveness.

Salutogenic mechanisms in nature-based work: fostering sense of coherence for employees with limited capability for work.

Having a job is important for the well-being and inclusion of people with limited capability for work (LCW) due to physical and/or mental disability. This study explores salutogenic mechanisms that contribute to work-related sense of coherence (Work-SoC) of employees with LCW, i.e. perceiving their work in nature as manageable, comprehensible and meaningful. Semi-structured interviews (26 in total) were conducted with employees with LCW, employee supervisors, job coaches and foresters, all working in nature management. Interviews were held at four worksites of a governmental organisation in the Netherlands that provides permanent jobs for people with LCW. Employees with LCW contributed to the design and analysis of the study as co-researchers. Thematic analysis was used and member checks were carried out on preliminary findings. We identified six salutogenic mechanisms that contribute to nature-based Work-SoC of employees with LCW: (i) having constructive working relationships, (ii) experiencing structure and clarity, (iii) receiving practical and emotional support, (iv) support in the creation of meaning, (v) experiencing and learning in practice and (vi) physical activity and (absence of) stimuli. Identified mechanisms can create a positive effect when leveraged, thereby boosting (new) salutogenic mechanisms. Our findings illustrate that nature-based work can provide resources that promote Work-SoC of employees with LCW through the identified mechanisms. However, employees with LCW, colleagues, supervisors and stakeholders must recognize, mobilize and use these resources to leverage identified mechanisms in order to facilitate health-promoting workplaces for people with LCW. This, in turn, can contribute to sustainable inclusion through enablement.

Mourning and orienting to the future in a liminal occasion: (Re)defining British national identity after Queen Elizabeth II's death.

In this paper, we conceptualize the days of mourning that followed the passing of Queen Elizabeth II. as constituting a liminal occasion, a moment of in-betweenness through which we can explore sense-making in times of transition. How do people navigate through liminal occasions, and are they always transformative? Through a rapid response ethnography (Ninterviews = 64, Nparticipants = 122), we were able to capture the raw moments within which a collective comes together, as part of a national ritual, to transition from 'here' to 'there'. In our data, liminality prompted participants to strategically define British national identity and its future by positioning the Queen as representative of Britishness, her loss as a national identity loss. No longer taken for granted, participants reasserted the value of the monarchy as an apolitical and unifying feature in an otherwise divided society, characterizing the continuity of the institution as an essential part of British identity and society. The analysis illustrates how liminality offers a useful conceptual tool for addressing how temporality and change are negotiated in relation to a shared identity, and how navigating transitional moments brings with it political implications for the future.

Evaluation of the Effectiveness of a Group CBT-Based Intervention Aiming to Reduce Self-Stigma and Improve Recovery-Related Outcomes in People with Severe Mental Disorders: Randomised Controlled Trial.

Self-stigma is a major barrier to personal and clinical recovery in people with mental illness. Although psychosocial interventions have been developed to reduce self-stigma, the exploration of group CBT-based interventions for hospitalised patients are less represented. The purpose of this trial is to investigate the effectiveness of a group CBT-based intervention aiming to reduce self-stigma and improve recovery-related outcomes such as self-esteem, stigma resistance and sense of coherence, which comes down to saying, "I am what I am". A total of 104 patients admitted to the inpatient therapy were recruited to participate in a randomised controlled clinical trial, and 77 participants (46 in the intervention group and 31 in the control group) completed the trial. Constructs of interest were measured before and after the intervention. The results showed that the evaluated intervention was effective in improving sense of coherence and stigma resistance, compared to treatment as usual (TAU). The level of self-stigma significantly decreased in both the intervention and control groups, but no statistically significant difference was observed between the groups. The limitations of the study include: the lack of assessment of the sustainability of the effects of therapy (follow-up), the presence of intensive interventions of the ward's programme and patients pre-qualified for the ward based on admission criteria. The intervention "I am what I am," has proven to be effective, especially in increasing the level of personal resources needed to build clinical and personal recovery and to counteract the negative consequences of self-stigma.

Do African Savanna Elephants (Loxodonta africana) Show Interspecific Social Long-Term Memory for Their Zoo Keepers?

"An elephant never forgets" is a popular phrase that refers not only to the elephant's extraordinary ability to remember migration routes but also to its pronounced social long-term memory (SLTM). Previous studies have shown intra- and interspecies SLTM performance, but the ability of elephants to have memories of individual humans has not yet been investigated. We tested this interspecific SLTM using auditory, olfactory, and visual stimuli, each from familiar and unfamiliar persons, in two African savanna elephant (Loxodonta africana) cows living in a zoo. The two-choice object tests revealed a higher interest in sensory stimuli from familiar keepers they had not seen for 13 years than in unfamiliar people. Statistically significant differences were found for olfactory stimuli. In addition, there was significantly more interest in visual stimuli from current keepers than in stimuli from unfamiliar people. Contrary to the results of a previous study with elephants, this was not observed for olfactory stimuli. Due to the small sample size and magnitude of the influencing factors, that is, outdoor experiment, only spatial separation of the animals, these results only represent indications of the possible interspecific SLTM. Nevertheless, we were able to provide the first empirical evidence that L. africana stores information about specific people over a long period of time. Further studies with larger sample sizes, cross-modal testing, and people disliked by the elephants could provide more insights.

Rejecting unfairness enhances the implicit sense of agency in the human brain.

Sense of agency (SoA) describes the feeling of control over one's actions and their consequences. One proposed index of implicit SoA is temporal compression, which refers to the phenomenon that voluntary actions and their outcomes are perceived as closer in time than they actually are. The present study measured temporal compression in the social norm violation situation. In two experiments participants joined in an Ultimatum game (UG), in which they were presented with offers that varied in fairness and they could choose to accept or reject the offers by pressing buttons. A neutral sound would occur after their choices in the UG and the participants had to estimate the time interval between their button pressing and the occurrence of the sound, and EEG signals were recorded during the task. Experiment 1 demonstrated that rejecting unfair offers decreased the perceived interval between action and outcome compared to accepting fair offers, suggesting a higher level of SoA after rejecting unfair offers. Experiment 2 replicated these results and further revealed an attenuated N1 in response to the sound following rejections of unfairness. Taken together, these results highlight the importance of social norms in affecting people's behaviors and agency experiences.

Psychological resilience mediates sense of professional mission and career success in Chinese intensive care unit nurses: a cross-sectional study.

BACKGROUND: The nursing industry's stability and progress are adversely affected by the high attrition rate and shortage of nurses; therefore, it is critical to investigate the variables that influence the professional stability of nurses. The sense of professional mission and career success have positive significance for reducing nurses' job burnout. The purpose of this study is to explore the potential mediating role of psychological resilience in this relationship. METHODS: Self-reported questionnaires were utilized by 335 intensive care unit (ICU) nurses to assess their sense of professional mission, psychological resilience, and career success in this cross-sectional study. A structural equation model was developed to validate the relationship between the variables. RESULTS: There is a correlation among sense of professional mission, psychological resilience and career success. Significant mediating effect of psychological resilience exists between sense of professional mission and career success. CONCLUSIONS: In this study, psychological resilience plays an intermediary role between sense of professional mission and career success, which provides support for further understanding the mechanism between sense of professional mission and career success and bolstering the case for devising comprehensive intervention strategies for psychological resilience. Nursing managers should focus on nurses' sense of professional mission and psychological resilience, and implement strategies to enhance nurses' psychological resilience in order to boost their career success.

Assessing the dimensionality of the sense of coherence scale (SOC-L9) using Ghanaian university students: Guarding against the method effect.

Background: The dimensionality of the sense of coherence (SOC-L9) scale has been in contention due to the varied factor structure revealed in the literature. In this study, we assessed the dimensionality of the SOC-L9 scale using Ghanaian university students while guarding against the method effect. The study also examined the gender measurement invariance of the scale. Methods: This research conveniently sampled 1062 students who responded to the SOC-L9 scale with negative items reversed to positive items. A larger proportion of the participants were male students (n = 769, 72.4 %), with 293(27.6 %) being female students. The youngest participant was 18 years old, whereas the oldest was 42 years old. Following all validation studies protocols, four distinct confirmatory factor analysis models were fitted and compared (i.e., unidimensional, three-factor first-order, three-factor second-order and bifactor models). Results: The initial model comparison revealed that the bifactor CFA model [CFI = 0.958, SRMR = 0.036, AIC = 21231.35, BIC = 21370.45] was superior to the unidimensional [CFI = 0.914, SRMR = 0.046, AIC = 26280.67, BIC = 26414.8] and 3-factor models [CFI = 0.932, SRMR = 0.040, AIC = 26221.67, BIC = 26370.71]. Upon further probing, it was discovered that SOC-L9 functions best as a unidimensional scale for the university student population. Gender measurement invariance was established for configural invariance [CFI = 0.986, SRMR = 0.044], metric invariance [CFI = 0.894, SRMR = 0.051] and scalar invariance [CFI = 0.983, SRMR = 0.047]. Conclusion: The SOC-L9 scale has a nested structure with the various sub-scales interacting to produce a summary total observed score. The structure of the SOC-L9 requires scholars to treat the scale as a unidimensional scale rather than a multidimensional one. This latent structure was found to be consistent with male and female university students.

How pain and body representations transform each other: A narrative review.

Pain, as a multidimensional and subjective experience, intertwines with various aspects of body representation, involving sensory, affective and motivational components. This review explores the bidirectional relationship between pain and body representations, emphasizing the impact of the sense of ownership on pain perception, the transformative impact of pain on motor imagery, the effects associated with vicarious pain perception on body representations and the role of pain in the maintenance of body representations in specific clinical conditions. Literature indicates complex interactions between pain and body representations, with the sense of ownership inducing analgesic effects in some cases and hyperalgesia in others, contingent upon factors such as the appearance of the affected limb. Pain sensations inform the body on which actions might be executed without harm, and which are potentially dangerous. This information impacts on motor imagery too, showing reduced motor imagery and increased reaction times in tasks where motor imagery involves the painful body parts. Finally, contrary to the conventional view, according to which pain impairs body representation, evidence suggests that pain can serve as an informative somatosensory index, preserving or even enhancing the representation of the absent or affected body parts. This bidirectional relationship highlights the dynamic and multifaceted nature of the interplay between pain and body representations, offering insights into the adaptive nature of the central nervous system in response to perceived bodily states.

From developmental theory to effective training: long-term and transfer effects of promoting the quantity-to-number word linkage in first-graders at risk for mathematical difficulties.

Introduction: The model of quantity-to-number word linkage (QNL model) identifies relevant milestones in the process of early numerical acquisition and describes a developmental sequence that can guide the fostering of foundational mathematical abilities in at-risk children. While there is substantial evidence for the predictive value of the quantity-number competencies (QNC) described by the model, evidence supporting the preventive potential of interventions targeting these QNC is so far largely restricted to short-term effects. Findings regarding their long-term preventive impact, especially in terms of transfer to mathematical school achievement, are still limited. This quasi-experimental study aimed to address this gap by evaluating the long-term transfer effects of an intervention program that is strictly derived from the QNL model of mathematical development [QNL training; in German "Mengen, zählen, Zahlen" (MZZ)]. Methods: We assessed the quantity-number competencies of 575 first-graders and identified 119 of them as being at risk for mathematical learning difficulties, who were then assigned to three experimental conditions. Sixty one children received 12 sessions of the QNL training, while 30 underwent training in inductive reasoning. Another 28 children served as a control group, receiving no specific intervention. Results and Discussion: Multi-level analyses confirmed both significant short-and long-term effects in the specifically trained quantity-number competencies as well as transfer effects on subsequent mathematical school achievement. In accordance with previous findings, transfer effects of the QNL training on mathematical school achievement were not yet evident immediately after the intervention but turned out to be significant after a delay of 6 months and remained stable even 15 months after training. Effect sizes ranged from d = 0.32 to d = 1.12. These findings both underscore the preventive potential of interventions that are strictly driven by developmental theory and, conversely, support the theoretical assumptions of the QNL model.

The relationship between physical exercise and sense of social fairness among college students: the chain-mediated role of perceived social support and life satisfaction.

Background: The development of a stable society is closely linked to a prevalent sense of social fairness. Participating in physical activities, which are inherently social, plays a crucial role in fostering mental stability within social contexts. Objective: This study aims to examine how physical exercise influences the sense of social fairness among college students, focusing on the potential mediating effects of perceived social support and life satisfaction. Methods: The study surveyed 496 Chinese college students using several scales: the Physical Activity Rating Scale-3 (PARS-3), Perceived Social Support Scale (PSSS), Satisfaction with Life Scale (SWLS), and Social Justice Scale (SJS). Results: (1) A positive correlation was found between physical exercise and sense of social fairness (r = 0.151, p < 0.01). A significant direct effect of physical exercise on sense of social fairness was also observed (ß = 0.151, t = 3.971, p < 0.01). (2) Physical exercise was a positive predictor of perceived social support (ß = 0.113, t = 4.062, p < 0.01), which in turn positively influenced both life satisfaction (ß = 0.333, t = 18.047, p < 0.01) and sense of social fairness (ß = 0.485, t = 6.931, p < 0.01). Additionally, life satisfaction had a positive effect on sense of social fairness (ß = 0.431, t = 3.247, p < 0.01). (3) Both perceived social support and life satisfaction significantly mediated the relationship between physical exercise and sense of social fairness through two pathways: physical exercise → perceived social support → sense of social fairness (mediating effect: 0.055); and physical exercise → perceived social support → life satisfaction → sense of social fairness (mediating effect: 0.016). Conclusion: (1) Physical exercise enhances both perceived social support and the sense of social fairness among college students, suggesting that it not only directly contributes to an enhanced sense of social fairness but also fosters supportive social relationships. (2) The influence of physical exercise on the sense of social fairness operates both directly and indirectly through the mediating roles of perceived social support and, sequentially, life satisfaction.

The interrelationship between women's help-seeking experiences for vaginismus and their sense of self: a qualitative study and abductive analysis.

Objective: There is a lack of research on women's holistic experiences of vaginismus, also called sexual pain-penetration disorder, from their perspective. To address this gap, an abductive qualitative study aimed to examine women's help-seeking experiences for vaginismus, and its impact on their sense of self. Methods: This study was informed by a feminist approach to the theory of self focused on participants' negotiation of dis/empowerment when help-seeking for vaginismus. Twenty-one participants aged 19-37 years (mean 27.6 years) and diagnosed with vaginismus in Australia participated in semi-structured interviews, which were thematically analysed. Results: Three themes were developed: Interconnected constructions of womanhood and help-seeking, Elicit agency to move forward, Resilience to surmount challenges with subthemes. Participant's overall help-seeking experiences, within and outside the healthcare system, shaped their sense of self in ways that drove their approach/es to future help-seeking behaviours. Conclusions: Positive help-seeking experiences for vaginismus strengthened participants' sense of self to persevere with treatment even when it was difficult. Conversely, negative help-seeking experiences led to participants' weakened sense of self which was often caused by a gap between their ideal and perceived self. This led to negative feelings and responses of demotivation or halting subsequent help-seeking. Recommendations are provided to improve health professional practice to support women help-seeking for vaginismus, and to help close the gap between their ideal and perceived selves. Such insight can help to empower women's sense of self and motivate them to persevere with help-seeking to experience improvement for their vaginismus and quality of life.

A longitudinal examination of the effect of physical exercise on the emotional states of college students: exploring the sense of coherence as a mediator through a cross-lagged panel analysis.

Purpose: This longitudinal study aimed to investigate the causal relationship between physical exercise and emotional states among university students, focusing on the mediating role of sense of coherence. Method: A total of 1,215 university students (aged 18-25 years) were recruited and completed questionnaires assessing physical activity (International Physical Activity Questionnaire-Short Form), emotional states (Positive and Negative Affect Schedule), and sense of coherence (Sense of Coherence Scale-13) at three time points over a three-month period. Preliminary analyses included independent samples t-tests, chi-square tests, and Pearson correlations. Cross-lagged panel mediation analysis was conducted using Mplus 8.3, with bootstrapping employed to test indirect effects. Results: Results indicated that sense of coherence significantly predicted positive affect (ß = 0.259-0.369, p < 0.001). Positive affect, in turn, predicted physical exercise (ß = 0.083-0.182, p < 0.05), while negative affect also influenced physical exercise (ß = -0.096-0.203, p < 0.05). Physical exercise indirectly influenced positive affect through sense of coherence (ß = 0.037, p = 0.045), and positive affect indirectly influenced physical exercise through sense of coherence (ß = 0.029, p = 0.028). Other indirect effects involving physical exercise, sense of coherence, and negative affect were non-significant. Conclusion: This study underscores the importance of sense of coherence in promoting emotional well-being among university students and in the reciprocal relationship between physical exercise and positive emotional states. Findings suggest that interventions targeting sense of coherence may enhance the emotional benefits of physical exercise. Future research should explore other potential mediators and moderators of the relationship between physical exercise and emotions and examine the effectiveness of sense of coherence-based interventions on well-being in this population.

Oral health-related quality of life and its association with sense of coherence and social support among Yemeni immigrants in Malaysia.

Oral health problems prove to be a significant public health issue due to their high prevalence and their impacts on people's self-confidence and basic physical functions such as talking, chewing and smiling, all of which affect an individual's social role. For that, this study aims to determine oral health-related quality of life (OHRQoL) and its association with a sense of coherence (SOC) and perceived social support among Yemeni adults residing in Malaysia. Data was collected from 223 Yemeni adults residing in Malaysia for over a year. The data collection instruments used were: a short version of the sense of coherence Scale (SOC-13), a new short version of the oral health impact profile (OHIP-5) questionnaire, the multidimensional scale of perceived social support (MSPSS), and a questionnaire containing socio-demographic and oral health behaviours information. Simple and adjusted binary logistic regression analyses with the level of significance p < 0.05 were used to determine the association between the independent factors and OHRQoL. Negative impacts on quality of life due to oral health issues were reported by (57.8%) of the participants, and a statistically significant association between SOC and OHRQoL was found; participants with weak SOC were more likely to have a negative impact on their OHRQol than individuals with strong SOC (AOR = 2.8, 95% CI 1.4-5.5). Additionally, self-assessment of oral health as poor (AOR = 4.6, 95% CI 1.5-14.1) were also associated with a negative impact OHRQoL. On the other hand, this study found that a longer period since the last dentist visit was a protective factor against negative impacts on quality of life (p < 0.05). In terms of perceived social support, no association was found between any categories of perceived social support and OHRQoL. In Conclusion, sense of coherence showed a statistically significant association with OHRQoL, emphasizing psychological factors' potential role in oral health. The findings support the hypothesis that SOC is a psychosocial determinant that could act as a protective factor against negative impact on OHRQoL.