• An 8-week randomized controlled trial on the effects of brisk walking, and brisk walking with abdominal electrical muscle stimulation on anthropometric, body composition, and self-perception measures in sedentary adult women

      Anderson, Ailsa; Murphy, Marie H.; Murtagh, Elaine M.; Nevill, Alan M. (Elsevier, 2006)
      Objectives: The aim of this randomized controlled trial was to examine the effects of an 8-week program of regular brisk walking, regular brisk walking with abdominal electrical muscle stimulation (EMS), and no exercise on hierarchical self-perceptions, and consider the mediating role of changes in anthropometric measures and body composition. Methods: Thirty-seven sedentary healthy women (mean age ¼ 38.1; SD ¼ 9.3) provided written informed consent and participated in baseline testing on a range of anthropometric, body composition, and hierarchical self-perception measures. Subsequently participants were randomly assigned to an 8-week program of walking (n ¼ 13), walking+EMS (n ¼ 14), or a control (n ¼ 10) condition. At 8 weeks anthropometric, body composition and self-perception measures were re-assessed. Results: In comparison with the control group, both walking groups had significant reductions in a number of anthropometric measures and improvements in self-perception measures. The improvements on both anthropometric measures and self-perceptions were greater for the walking+EMS condition, which indicated that changes in self-perception might be mediated by body changes. However, an assessment of the mediation effect between changes in anthropometric measures and self-perception changes did not support this finding.
    • Development and initial validation of the Music Mood-Regulation Scale.

      Hewston, Ruth M.; Lane, Andrew M.; Karag, Costas I. (Melbourne, Australia: Swinburne University, 2008)
      This study designed a measure to assess the perceived effectiveness of music as a strategy to regulate mood among a sport and exercise population. A strategy of assessing and comparing the integrity of competing hypotheses to explain the underlying factor structure of the scale was used. A 21-item Music Mood-Regulation Scale (MMRS) was developed to assess the extent to which participants used music to alter the mood states of anger, calmness, depression, fatigue, happiness, tension, and vigor. Volunteer sport and exercise participants (N = 1,279) rated the perceived effectiveness of music to regulate each MMRS item on a 5-point Likert-type scale. Confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) was used to test the integrity of four competing models, and results lend support to a correlated 7-factor structure for the MMRS (RCFI = .94; RMSEA = .06). Cronbach alpha coefficients were in the range of 0.74 – 0.88 thus demonstrating the internal reliability of scales. It is suggested that the MMRS shows promising degrees of validity. Future research should assess the extent to which individuals can develop the ability to use music as a strategy to regulate mood in situations in which disturbed mood might be detrimental to performance.
    • Development and validation of the Chinese Quality of Life Instrument.

      Leung, Kwok-fai; Liu, Feng-bin; Zhao, Li; Fang, Ji-qian; Chan, Kelvin C.; Lin, Li-zhu (BioMed Central, 2005)
      BACKGROUND: This paper describes the development of the Chinese Quality of Life Instrument (ChQOL) which is a self-report health status instrument. Chinese Medicine relies very much on asking subjective feelings of patients in the process of diagnosis and monitoring of treatment. For thousands of years, Chinese Medicine practitioners have accumulated a good wealth of experiences in asking questions about health of their patients based on the concept of health in Chinese Medicine. These experiences were then transformed into questions for the ChQOL. It is believed that ChQOL can contribute to the existing Patient Report Outcome measures. This paper outlines the concept of health and disease in Traditional Chinese Medicine, the building of the conceptual framework of the ChQOL, the steps of drafting, selecting and validating the items, and the psychometric properties of the ChQOL. METHODS: The development of the ChQOL was based on the concept of health in Traditional Chinese Medicine with a theory driven approach. Based on the results of literature review, the research team developed an initial model of health which encompassed the concept of health in TCM. An expert panel was then invited to comment and give suggestions for improvement of the initial model. According to their suggestions, the model was refined and a set of initial items for the ChQOL was drafted. The refined model, together with the key domains, facets and initial items of the ChQOL were then mailed to a sample of about 100 Chinese medicine practitioners throughout Mainland China for their comments and advice. A revised set of items were developed for linguistic testing by a convenience sample consisting of both healthy people and people who attended Chinese Medicine treatment. After that, an item pool was developed for field-testing. Field test was conducted on a convenience sample of healthy and patient subjects to determine the construct validity and psychometric properties of the ChQOL. RESULTS: Construct validity was established by various methods, i.e. the internal consistency in all facets and domains were good; the correlation between facets to domain, and domains to overall ChQOL correlation were high; confirmatory factor analysis showed that the structure fitness of all facets, domain and overall structure were good with CFI > 0.9. Test-retest reliability was also good, especially in the domain scores with ICC value ranging from 0.83 to 0.90. No ceiling or floor effect was noted which indicated that ChQOL can be applied to subjects with a wide range of health status. Most facet scores, domain scores and the overall CHQOL scores were able to discriminate groups of subjects with known differences in health status. The ChQOL had mild positive convergence with the other generic health related QOL measures, i.e. the WHOQOL-100 and the SF-36, with moderate correlations. CONCLUSION: In conclusion, the study indicated that the ChQOL is conceptually valid with satisfactory psychometric properties. It can provide additional information on health and QOL on top of the existing generic health related QOL measures. Furthermore, it forms basis for further testing and applications in clinical trials.
    • Les nouveaux diplômés en médecine, dans quelle mesure se considèrent-ils suffisamment préparés pour la pratique clinique ?

      Matheson, David; Matheson, Catherine; Storan, Darragh; Kelly, Martina; Groux, Dominique; Maubant, Philippe; Roger, Lucie (L’Harmattan, 2014)
      L'ouvrage s'interroge sur les cultures de l'évaluation et les dérives évaluatrices. Il questionne l'évaluation sous toutes ses formes en cherchant à identifier ses différents rôles, enjeux et défis à étudier ses éventuelles dérives. La mise en perspective internationale de ces questions permet de voir ce que représente l'évaluation dans différents pays (Espagne, Portugal, France, Royaume-Uni, Liban, Canada anglophone et Canada francophone) et de confronter les regards sur le sujet.
    • Self-efficacy and statistics performance among Sport Studies students

      Lane, Andrew M.; Hall, Ross; Lane, John (Routledge (Taylor & Francis), 2004)
      The present study explored predictive paths between performance accomplishments, self-efficacy, and performance among Sport Studies students taking a Level 1 statistics module. Fifty-eight Level 1 Sport Studies undergraduate degree students completed a 44-item self-efficacy measure and an assessment of perceived academic success at the start of the module. Self-assessed worksheets taken in weeks 4 and 5 were used as a second performance measure. Self-efficacy was re-assessed in week 7 and students handed the assignment for the module in week 8. Path analysis results using structural equation modeling indicated that perceived academic success was associated with the first self-efficacy measure, which in turn predicted worksheet success, and the two self-efficacy measures correlated. The second self-efficacy measure predicted module performance, and importantly showed the strongest relationship of all predictor variables. We suggest that future research should investigate the effectiveness of strategies designed to enhance self-efficacy.