Indian Journal of Health and Wellbeing

Pages: 1615-1618
Ram Prakash Gupta (Thakur College of Education Dhaliara, Dehra, Kangra, H.P.)

The present study aims to study the effect of school environment on academic achievement of 10th class students of Kangra district. In order to archive this objective, a sample of 300 students of 10th class (200 of govt. and 100 of private school) was selected from the six govt. and three private schools. School environment inventory was used & standardized by Dr. Karuna Shankar Misra (Allahabad). Reliability of tool was (0.873) and validity had founded to possess validity. Researcher observed that there is no significant difference between school environment of 10th class students studying in govt. school situated in rural and urban area. And also observed that unique quality of environment largely depended upon specific way of the pupils who were treated in school and the classrooms Researcher defined the treatment environment as the product of the interaction between teacher and pupil in school situations.

Pages: 1621-1624
Shalini Bhasin (Department of Social Work, Punjabi University, Patiala)

Disability is any physical or mental condition that limits a person's movements, senses or activities. Conventionally it was to referred to attributes that are severe enough to interfere with, or prevent normal day-to-day activities. At present disability is described as a result of discrimination and disregard to the usual conditions of persons with disabilities by the society at large. This shows, it is the social construction of disability which has more ill effects on them than their biological condition. The author in this paper has tried to put forth the major issues related to persons with disabilities and initiatives taken by the government in Victoria (Australia) for their empowerment .

Pages: 1628-1631
Thokchom Lakshmibai (Lilong Haoreibi College, Manipur)

Education is the most significant instrument for changing women's status in the society. Thus women empowerment is an essential tool to bring about changes in their socio-economic condition.To achieve empowerment, women have to be educated about their rights privileges in a modern society. It is educated women have succeeded in changing their stereotype images to more positive ones.In the past, the life cycle of Manipuri women begins at home and ends at home only. But at present, most of the parents have started to keep equal eyes upon the boys and girls regarding education. As a result number of educated women are increasing by leaps and bounds and are found serving in many departments and establishments. A concerted effort by all governmental and private organisation have taken up various new education policies and schemes to increase the number of educated women in the society.

Pages: 1637-1642
Karantiano Sadasa (Study Program of Educational Management, Pakuan University, Bogor, West Java Province, Indonesia)

Administrators usually adjust their leadership behavior to accomplish the mission of the organization, and this could influence the teacher's job satisfaction. It is therefore essential to understand the relationship between organization cultures, leadership behavior, and job satisfaction towards teachers' performance. The data was collected by the help of self constracted questionaire from a sample of 221 teachers of Junior High Schools in Sukabumi. The research method used was a survey method with causal technique. The research also used a path analysis to analyze the effect of one variable to another variable. In analyzing the data, this research used SPSS software (statistical product and service solution), including descriptive statistical analysis, a prerequisite test data analysis and statistical hypothesis testing. The results emerged that there is a direct and signficant influence of organizational culture toward job performance, job satisfaction toward job performance, organizational culture toward job satisfaction, and leadership behavior toward job satisfaction. These findings also suggest that the organizational culture, leadership behavior and job satisfaction are important determinants of the teachers' job performances of Junior High Schools in Sukabumi.

Pages: 1648-1653
Glenn Leckie (University of Groningen, The Netherlands)

Concepts of the Terror Management Theory (TMT) were used in an empirical, hypothesis-testing study to explore fear in women who wait to be examined for cervical cancer using VIA methodology or the Pap smear methodology. The assumption is that because of the association between cancer and death, these women are reminded of their mortality while waiting. The TMT assumes that the consciousness of one's own mortality can be regarded as a source of existential anguish. Proclivities for survival creates potentially paralyzing anxiety, which people manage by investing in a meaningful conception of the world (worldview) that prescribes valued behavior and thus also a way to maintain self-esteem. The respondents in the present study were women who were in the policlinic waiting to be screened for cervical cancer. These women were divided into two groups; one was waiting to be examined using the VIA screening and they would receive their result instantly while the other group was waiting to be examined using the Pap smear screening and they would receive their result in four to six weeks. The results show that self-esteem moderated the influence of the screening method on fear and on world view defense. It is concluded that the levels of fear of women waiting to be screened can at least partly be understood from the perspective of TMT. Applying Fear in a realistic context provides new angles and challlenges to test the TMT theory and to understand psychological reactions in that context.

Pages: 1660-1664
Archana Shukla and Pooja Pandey (Department of Psychology, Lucknow University, Lucknow, Uttar Pradesh )

Spousal chronic illness is a challenge for both partners. The ill partner suffers due to the disease. The well partner suffers as he/she takes on the additional burden of caring for the ill spouse. Thus although only one partner of the marital dyad is ill, both of the marital partners and their relationships as well as lives get affected. Spousal illness therefore necessitates reframing of the underlying cognitions, remodeling of personal relationships, and reorganizing of lives. Much of these have to be done by the well partners. The present study sampled 304 male and female caregivers belonging to the four age groups of 25-35 yrs, 36-45 yrs, 46-55 yrs and 56-65 yrs and explored the extent to which they used three specific cognitive reframing strategies adaptive outlook, mental renovations and relationship remodeling - in order to care for and cope with spouses who have been diagnosed with schizophrenia. Data were collected through face to face personal interviews with caregivers and analyzed using 2x4 ANOVAs to study the gender and age related differences in the use of cognitive reframing strategies. The analysis revealed a significant main effect of sex with respect to all three cognitive reframing strategies. As compared to female caregivers, male caregivers were found to make greater use of adaptive outlook, mental renovations and relationship remodeling in their daily living. The findings are discussed in the light of sex roles, gender role socialization and clinical researches. The worth of the study lies in showing how care giving experiences of females differ from that of males in terms of nature, structure, range, amount and quality and also how cognitive reframing interventions, particularly for women, could be of great benefit in the context of caring for their chronically ill spouse.

Pages: 1669-1673
Sona Raghuvanshi (Amity Institute of Behavioral and Allied Sciences, Amity University, Gurgaon, Haryana)

The present study aims to compare criminals and non-criminals on the basis of psychological factors like Hostility, guilt-feeling, conflict over hostility and different areas of approval motive. The study was conducted on 200 respondents including 100 criminals and 100 non-criminals. The criminals were selected from the four important jails of Bihar namely Patna, Buxar, Gaya and Bhagalpur and equal number of non-criminals (persons having non-criminals record) were also selected from the same four towns of Bihar mentioned above. The sample was purposive one and included only married males in the age group of 21 to 40, who had minimum education up to seventh standard. The scales used were (1) Questionnaire of Hostility, Guilt and Conflict (Q-HGC, Sowaid, 1972), and, (2) Approval Motive Scale developed by Tripathi and Tripathi (1980). The data obtained were analyzed by t-test. The hypotheses formulated were:(1)The criminals would score higher on hostility as compared to the non-criminals.(2) The criminal group of subject would score lower on guilt feeling toward hostility than their non-criminal counterparts.(3) The criminal group of subjects would score high on conflict over feeling of hostility than the non-criminal group of subjects.(4)The criminals would score lower on normative behavior as compared to non-criminals.(5) The criminal group of subjects would score lower on social conformity than the non-criminal group of subjects.(6) The criminals would score lower on positive self-presentation area of approval motive as compared to non-criminal group of subjects.(7)The criminal group of subjects would score lower on the dependency area of approval motive compared to the non-criminal group of subjects.(8) The criminal group of subjects would score lower on defensiveness as compared to the non-criminals.(9)The criminals as a group would score lower on social responsiveness area of approval motive as compared to the non-criminal group of subjects.(10) The criminal group of subjects would score lower on social approval than the non-criminal group of subjects. The findings confirmed eight hypotheses, while two hypotheses could not be substantiated.

Pages: 1692-1695
Rajesh G Meshram (Department of Psychology, Jijamata College, Nandurbar, Nandurbar)

This study examined the school related activities that parents in with their children. The study also examined how parents in Nandubar perceive their involvement and expectations of their children's academic achievement goals. Sixteen parents (15 females and 1 male) who had children in standards five, six, or seven participated in the study. Participants were parents from four different areas of Nandubar. Parents were more involved with their children at home by encouraging their children to put effort. Parents also went to school to communicate with the teachers at school. Some parents assisted with homework even though most parents were challenged by the content their child was learning. Parents had high expectations of their children's academic life regardless of their children's performance in class. Various beliefs mingled with parents' expectations and their children's achievement goal. Although parents varied in their involvement, there was not much difference in their expectations. Lack of time and challenging subject matter were challenges to parents' involvement.

Pages: 1699-1703
Arti C. Kandolkar (S.N.D.T. Womens University, Pune Campus, Pune)
R. N. Kenchappanavar (Karnatata Arts College, Dharwad, Karnatak)

Autism is the most severe developmental disability. It involves impairments in social interaction, limited interests, strange eating or sleeping behaviors or a tendency to hurt oneself. Parenting a child with Autism can be an exhausting task, which may increase parental burden of care and may affect the quality of life. The present study aims to examine the Quality of life and burden of care of parents of autistic and normal children. The sample for the research comprised of 56 Parents of Autistic children and 74 Parents of Normal children. The sample of parents of autistic children was selected with the help of hospital and NGO records and the parents of normal children were selected from the schools of Pune and Mumbai city of Maharashtra. The questionnaires used for the study were Psychological Well-Being Scale by Ryff and Burden of Care Scale by Thara et al. (1998). The results reveal that when the 'Quality of life' as a whole, is considered, there is no significant difference between parents of Autistic and parents of Normal children (t= .368 is not significant) but dimension wise analysis shows that the parents of autistic children differ significantly on 'Environmental Mastery' (t = 2.46; p < 0.05), and 'Self Acceptance' (t = 3.31; p < 0.01). On 'Burden of care' scale a significant difference is seen between parents of Autistic and normal children (t = 3.40, p < 0.01).

Pages: 1709-1711
Anuradha, Raghavendra Huchchannavar and Vinod Chayal (Department of Community Medicine, Pt.BD Sharma University of Health Sciences, Rohtak, Haryana)
Savita Chahal ( Department of Psychiatry, Pt.BD Sharma University of Health Sciences, Rohtak, Haryana)

Although menstruation is a natural process, it is linked with several misconceptions and practices, which sometimes result into adverse health outcomes. Learning about menstrual hygiene is a vital aspect of health education for adolescent girls. (i) To find out the status of menstrual hygiene among adolescent girls. (ii) To explorethe beliefs, dietary habits and perceptions regarding menstruation among the study population. A descriptive, cross-sectional study was conducted among 110 adolescent school girls with the help of a pre-designed and pre-tested questionnaire regarding menstrual hygiene. The mean age of menarche was 12.4 years. Majority of the girls (66.4%) preferred using both sanitary pads and cloth pieces. Only 11.25% girls used sanitary pads during the entire menstruation. Practices of cleanliness were unsatisfactoryamong 43 (39.1%) girls. Eighty four (76.4%) girls had dietary restrictions, 85.5% girls were restricted to visit temples and 62.7% girls were prohibited entry to kitchen during periods. Menstrual hygiene is far from satisfactory among a large proportion of the adolescent girls with rampant ignorance, false perceptions and unsafe practices regarding menstruation. This emphasizes upon the need to encourage safe and hygienic practices among the adolescent girls and bring them out of traditional beliefs, misconceptions and restrictions with the active involvement of medical and paramedical health professionals.

Pages: 1717-1720
Neelam ( Vocational Counsellor, BPSGMC, Khanpur Kalan, Sonepat)
Joginder Singh ( Department of Sociology, M.D.U., Rohtak, Haryana)

Persons with Ankylosing spondylitis (AS) are subject to variety of psychosocial consequences, which can be more harmful than the other medical difficulties they have. The present study was mainly aimed at understanding the coping processes used by patients with Ankylosing spondylitis. For this, 100 patients of Anklyosing Spondylitis aged 18 to 30 years were selected from PGIMS, Rohtak and BPSGMC, Khanpur Kalan, Sonepat to participate in the study along with 100 normal controls. Data were collected by administering Folkman and Lazarus' Ways of Coping Questionnaire. Data were analyzed by descriptive statistics (Mean, SD, SK, and KU) to ascertain the normalcy of data, t-ratios to compare the two groups in terms of their mean scores of eight measures of coping, and Discriminant Function Analysis to examine the joint contribution of all the eight variables in differentiation of two groups. Results revealed that patients with AS scored significantly low on Confrontive Coping, Self Controlling, Seeking Social Support, Accepting Responsibility, Planful Problem Solving, and Positive Reappraisal. In Discriminant Analysis, Positive Reappraisal, Self Controlling, and Distancing emerged most potent discriminators classifying the two groups correctly by 83.5%. Overall findings revealed the patients with AS to be significantly low on both the problem-focused and emotion-focused ways of coping.

Pages: 1724-1727
Bilal Ahmad and Samina Bano (Department of Psychology, Jamia Millia Islamia, New Delhi)
Vibha Sharma (Department of Clinical Psychology, Institute of Human Behaviour and Allied Sciences, Delhi )

Alcohol abuse is a worldwide problem that causes various sequelae, which severely affect physical and mental health, social and daily life. Quality of Life (QOL) is increasingly recognized as an important outcome measure in treatment studies and for service evaluation. The study was conducted with the aim of exploring the Quality of life in dual diagnosis, alcohol dependence syndrome and control group. A sample of 30 male subjects using purposive sampling and quantitative method. In each group a sample of 10 subjects were taken from OPD and ward of Institute of Human Behaviour and Allied Sciences (IHBAS), Delhi. Tool like quality of life (WHOQOL-Brf, 1998) were collected from subjects personally and separately from each other. Descriptive statistics and Kruskal-Wallis Test techniques were used to analyse the data. Results indicate that there was significant difference in quality of life among three groups but the quality of life related to physical domains, social domain and environmental domain was found poor in of dual diagnosis and alcohol dependent patients. The overall quality of life is high in psychological domains in all the three groups.