Seeking UK Healthcare Workers: online pilot study on daily communications

C/o Olga Lainidi @LainidiO

Post Graduate Researcher and Teaching Fellow in Psychology @ University of Leeds

'I’m looking for UK Healthcare Workers to help me pilot an online study on daily communications in healthcare. Please fill in the expression of interest form if you want to find out more.'

Introduction to the study plans below from:

https://forms.office.com/e/5H84WqqTtT


UK Healthcare Staff - Daily Communications & Wellbeing at work

Thank you for your interest in this research study, which is part of a PhD project at the University of Leeds. The study explores how healthcare workers communicate about things that matter at work on a day-to-day basis, and how these decisions relate to their wellbeing. If you're a UK-based healthcare worker and would like to receive more information or take part in the study, please complete the short form below. This form helps us check eligibility and ensure we include a range of roles and experiences. It takes less than 2 minutes to complete. Completing this form does not commit you to participating - it simply lets us know you're interested and happy to be contacted. All information will be kept confidential and stored securely. Thank you for your time and interest!

The study has received ethical approval by the School of Psychology Ethics Committe, University of Leeds (2841 - 28/04/2025)

https://forms.office.com/e/5H84WqqTtT

My source:

https://x.com/LainidiO/status/1931414872840970470

I look f/w to learning of future findings and outputs.

Benjamin Zephaniah Day

Benjamin Zephaniah

Festival of Rhythm, Unity and Revolution Honouring Benjamin Zephaniah

Previously: poetry :: Black :: racism

My source: BBC Radio 4 Today

Towards isomorphisms in Hodges' model

"The concept that best captures the process of homogenization is isomorphism. In Hawley's (1968) description, isomorphism is a constraining process that forces one unit in a population to resemble other units that face the same set of environmental conditions. At the population level, such an approach suggests that organizational characteristics are modified in the direction of increasing comparability with environmental characteristics; the number of organizations in a population is a function of environmental carrying capacity; and the diversity of organizational forms is isomorphic to environmental diversity." p.149.

"We identify three mechanisms through which institutional isomorphic change occurs, each with its own antecedents: 1) coercive isomorphism that stems from political influence and the problem of legitimacy; 2) mimetic isomorphism resulting from standard responses to uncertainty; and 3) normative isomorphism, associated with professionalization. This typology is an analytic one: the types are not always empirically distinct." p.150.

DiMaggio, P. J., & Powell, W. W. (1983). The Iron Cage Revisited: Institutional Isomorphism and Collective Rationality in Organizational Fields. American Sociological Review, 48(2), 147–160. https://doi.org/10.2307/2095101

"Some of them went further, using approaches based in political economy, world systems theory, and theories of neocolonialism and underdevelopment to show that economic imperatives on a global scale were a major force in shaping education worldwide. Others interpreted such change through an institutional lens, arguing that the convergence toward accepted models of modernity has resulted in a process of educational isomorphism within and across countries." p.1.

Carnoy, M., & Rhoten, D. (2002). What Does Globalization Mean for Educational Change? A Comparative Approach. Comparative Education Review, 46(1), 1–9. https://doi.org/10.1086/324053

"The movement is inspired by Rudolf Virchow (1821-1902), who coined the term zoonosis, arguing that there should be no dividing lines between animal and human medicine. This position has been gathering momentum in the last fifteen years. The One Health Initiative is a rather daring interdisciplinary alliance that unites physicians, osteopaths, veterinarians, dentists, nurses, and other scientific-health and environmentally related disciplines, on the basis of a simple hypothesis, which is the isomorphism of structures between humans and animals in immunology, bacteriology, and vaccine developments. This means that humans are both exposed and vulnerable to new diseases, like bird flu and other epidemics, which they share with animal species." p.16.

Rosi Braidotti. (2015). Yes, There Is No Crisis. Working Towards the Posthumanities. DiGeSt. Journal of Diversity and Gender Studies, 2(1–2), 9–20. https://doi.org/10.11116/jdivegendstud.2.1-2.0009

"The chapter begins by developing the logic of strategic voting in a single- member district system, thus won by whichever party or candidate gets the most votes (first past the post, or FPTP). This represents the simplest and easiest case for the logic of strategic voting, and similarities (and sometimes theoretical isomorphism) exist between strategic voting— sometimes called instrumental voting (or voting as an investment)— and expected- utility maximization." p.3.

Aldrich, J. H., Blais, A., & Stephenson, L. B. (2018). Strategic Voting and Political Institutions. In J. H. Aldrich, A. Blais, & L. B. Stephenson (Eds.), The Many Faces of Strategic Voting: Tactical Behavior in Electoral Systems Around the World (pp. 1–27). University of Michigan Press. http://www.jstor.org/stable/j.ctvh4zhzr.4 

"Let us take a closer look at this important topic: what might be termed the isomorphism between the realm of care and the realm of perception/oikeiôsis-allotriôsis." p.57.

Joaquim Braga & Mário Santiago de Carvalho (eds.) (2021). Philosophy of Care - New Approaches to Vulnerability, Otherness and Therapy. Cham: Springer Verlag.
https://link.springer.com/book/10.1007/978-3-030-75478-5

- will add here ... suggestions welcome h2cmng AT yahoo.co.uk

Patients as Persons not Things: [Nursing] Theory - Practice

individual

|

INTERPERSONAL : SCIENCES

humanistic ----------------------------------------------- mechanistic

SOCIOLOGY : POLITICAL

|

group - population

"Is there something perverse, if not archly insistent, about complicating things with theory? Do we really need anything like thing theory the way we need narrative theory or cultural theory, queer theory or discourse theory? Why not let things alone? Let them rest somewhere else-in the balmy elsewhere beyond theory. From there, they might offer us dry ground above those swirling accounts of the subject, some place of origin unmediated by the sign, some stable alternative to the instabilities and uncertainties, the ambiguities and anxieties, forever fetishized by theory. Something warm, then, that relieves us from the chill of dogged ideation, something concrete that relieves us from unnecessary abstraction." p.1.

 

My source:

Brown, B. (2001). Thing Theory. Critical Inquiry, 28(1), 1-22. Retrieved September 18, 2020, from http://www.jstor.org/stable/1344258

Book: Digital Objects, Digital Subjects: Interdisciplinary Perspectives on Capitalism, Labour and Politics in the Age of Big Data

individual

|

INTERPERSONAL : SCIENCES

humanistic ----------------------------------------------- mechanistic

SOCIOLOGY : POLITICAL

|

group

Digital Objects Digital Subjects	DIGITAL OBJECTS
DIGITAL SUBJECTS	Capitalism, Labour, Politics

My source: EUROPEAN-SOCIOLOGIST list

Cover image: Amazon

Weber: Universities, disciplinarity - academic publishing

As I read through the latest book I have received for review, I came across this interesting quote from Samuel Weber:

The university, itself divided into more or less isolated, self-contained departments, was that embodiment of that kind of limited universality that characterised the cognitive model of professionalism. It instituted areas of training and research which, once established, could increasingly ignore the founding limits and limitations of individual disciplines. Indeed, the very notion of academic "seriousness" came increasingly to exclude reflection upon the relation of one "field" to another, and concomitantly, reflection upon the historical process by which individual disciplines established their boundaries. Or the historical dimension was regarded as extrinsic to the actual practice of research and scholarship: history itself became one discipline among others. (1987, 32)

Weber, Samuel. 1987. Institution and Interpretation. Minneapolis: University of Minnesota Press. Revised and reprinted as Samuel Weber, 2001. Institution and Interpretation (Expanded Edition). Stanford, Calif.: Stanford University Press.
Cited in Hall, Gary 2008. Digitize This Book!: The Politics of New Media, or Why We Need Open Access Now. University of Minnesota Press. Chapter 2, Judgement and Responsibility in the Wikipedia Era, p. 74.
(My review of Hall's book to follow).

POLITICAL links: Holistic Bliss or Tristram Shandy ... II

Having mentioned the other day that health and social care related subjects are placed at the top of the links pages, of course the POLITICAL page - as awkward a cuss as ever - differs. The political topflight is missing some obvious candidates. Although there are related links in there somewhere amongst the four links pages I have not explicitly listed:

• mental health law
• (patient - carer, long-term) advocacy
• consent and capacity
• confidentiality
• professional (and other) codes of conduct
• health and safety
• or global health

Perhaps I should list these or other missing political categories? If we stop and think about it though - what do you need before you can deliver coherent health and social care? That top row are the critical determinants: the starting blocks. If DEMOCRACY, JUSTICE and LAW are absent or taken away where is care? Why in so many developing countries is health care so poor - native/ethnic medicine practices can only go so far?

In promoting 'DEMOCRACY' this in itself is a challenge of our (Western) times, given the apathy that exists in local and national politics. No surprise then that CITIZENRY & LEADERSHIP (C&L) are not far behind with their hands raised. There's a chicken and egg here: should C&L be on the front row? Then the people would have the Government they deserve on the second row. Can they be side-by-side?

HUMAN RIGHTS should be on that top row; however, HUMAN RIGHTS are surely dependent upon DEVELOPMENT to overcome POVERTY and effective LEGISLATION?

We need cognitive capacity to boot-load our person-al operating system first thing in the morning, although in terms of HUMAN RIGHTS and an individual and family's capacity to exercise choices ECONOMICS is where the buck stops. While vital money is not enough: International STANDARDS make the world go around from paper size, device operation to INFORMATION STANDARDS. I like this word GOVERNANCE because it does not have to be central, it can be peripheral - grassroots - as well and takes many forms: national, corporate, financial, clinical, information, civil, and green. Sometimes political change needs to start on the edge, that's where others can get on-board.

Communities are social entities, nebulous things as I still recall from an old course essay: Community care means whatever you want it to mean: discuss? So if community is social, then why is COMMUNITY INFORMATICS [CI] in the political links domain? Well, CI very broadly speaking seeks to promote and assure the study and use of informatics developments, specifically communications and information technologies for groups within a population who may otherwise remain disadvantaged, and so find themselves on the wrong side of the so-called digital divide. Whether your arrival is positively or negative framed in terms of social inclusion or social exclusion you must pass through Customs and Excise:

c/o the political domain.

NEWS is quite a strange thing or these days a many splendoured-multimedia-mobile kind of thing. You see the messenger is always transformed into a bizarre beast: a POLITICAL animal. The animal has long been on the endangered list, it is rarely sighted and the SCIENTISTs next door call it a 'Trust'. Because its appearance is so remarkable children are wary; so in a poll they elected to call the creature a 'can-U-really'.

Who 'owns' the news, controls it, governs the media - what difference does it make? What is news these days? The quality of health care information and news and overall what counts as news is at issue. Big brother once the epitome of totalitarianism is now equated with total trash.

Connected to the news is the global family's and a Nation's ability to SEARCH the web without censorship?

Finally then what categories are missing here politically? It's true war & peace, mass marketing, weapons of mass depletion, crime and punishment, crimes against Earth, plus management have gone AWOL.

ORGANISATIONS are in there, but personnel and human resources are not. Should they be? What do you think? What's in your political set?

"NEXT!" INTERPERSONAL links

Holistic Bliss or Tristram Shandy and the Web Hydra I

Building the h2cm website a decade ago the links pages -

INTERPERSONAL : SCIENCES
SOCIOLOGY : POLITICAL

- were planned as a feature from early on. They started as TWO pages but have become FOUR and far more general in nature than originally planned. I first envisaged a core h2cm nursing set into which students - life-long learners could all dive.

Perhaps there's a project there for students: Specify what you consider to be a core set of links resources and justify your answer in terms of either one of the following or a combination of - models of care, health-social care policy, self-care, multidisciplinary teams? .....

Like many potential h2cm developments (XML templates, ...) which I've shared with contacts over the years, the core h2cm links set never saw the light of an HTML page. The main target audience for the links pages remains as the health and social care community (although given h2cm's universal scope I'm jumping around on this (sadly) cold-tin-roof shouting: "Hey everyone - oveeerrrr here!").

If you look at the four links pages and the model's axes INDIVIDUAL-GROUP & HUMANISTIC-MECHANISTIC you might conclude that a re-organisation is needed. So as the other potential developments are still outstanding (Drupal, ...) maybe this deserves some explanation?

Why? Well, there is too much there and many visitors may be put off? I navigate these links spaces quite readily (which as author is not surprising I suppose), but being critical the pages do represent a management overhead, a distraction from other tasks. Seeking a positive side maybe this generic set of links have emerged out of a human attempt (most searches/links resources are of course now machine-based) to push the 'holistic frontiers' and our conception(s) of what it is to care?

You'll notice on several links pages that the first row of links acknowledges the intended audience. I do not want students to have to scroll for the health and social care related resources. So, these are placed near the 'top'.

Although a domain links page is presented as a single 4-column table, it is valuable to take the main headings and view the four care or knowledge domains links together. This is listed below, if the formatting holds! (Probably need a graphic for this...)

Over several posts we'll explore the links pages one by one. Already a few things stand out...

What's there. What isn't and whether there's a why: initial observations welcome....

P.S. Shame about the weather last w/e in NW England.

Psychology I II Mental Health Therapies Anat&Phys Care T&P Evidence BP Research

Philosophy ---- Ideas Communication Theology Health Inform. II Info Sources Diagrams

Health Promotion Study Skills Education DSS Visualiz. II MarkupLangs Ajax & XML

HCI Accessibility Creativity Graphics Environment Virtual Reality Science Astronomy

------------------Rest & Rec----------------- Maths, Logic Engineering Programming [Toolset]

7 Ages Health Prom Patients Practitioners Development Democracy Economics Policy

CSCW ------ Sociology I II Qual Research Activism Citizenry Employment Human Rights

Anthropology History Art & Culture I --- II Info. Gov Standards Open Source Comm. Inform.

--------------------------------------------------- News ------ Soft-Hardware --- Search -------- Org

--------------------------------------------------- ---------------------- Commercial ---------------

There Are Four P's in "Hodges model"

People are not very good at multitasking (surprise, surprise!).

In conversation people discuss one topic or thing at a time. If the subject alters, the change of context is indicated through a verbal redirect "There's something else...", or a gesture. When writing, paragraphs help structure our prose. If there are several tasks to perform, then it really is a case of "one at a time thank you!". Although, as the saying goes though - where there's a will, there's a way - hence the constant emphasis on EFFECTIVE team working.

Reality is of course rarely presented to us in discrete contextualised packets. Experience is not always filtered to the extent that only information relating to one context is delivered to our senses. Can you imagine the informational equivalent of the IV drip? (Virtual reality?) And yet this is what our brains are tasked with, to select, sort and prioritise....

There are exceptions:- the arrival of news about an impending birth or sudden illness or accident. Then informationally speaking the world is ordered and yet a personal chaos ensues. We move like the wind...

So usually several contexts are knotted and presented together. Predicatable consequences may follow; confusion, a task may be left incomplete, risk becomes a dance partner, although at first this passes unnoticed as we are still going with the flow. A key message becomes garbled, the meaning fails to get through.

The amount of information needed by a team is erm... well - a big number! The demand for data and information on just process and policy is monumental. Project management tools are no guarantee against satisficing. The volume of information and human fallibility can fracture discipline and has us saying "that’s far enough", or "that will do for now".

So without untying the contexts, unwrapping the complexity - key parts of the picture may be missing. Sometimes even when the picture is complete, we forget about the frame and picture hook? Just which way is 'up' if that matters a[r]t all?

In the same way that items of data can have meta-data (that is data about data), could it be that Hodges’ care domains have their own meta-terms of reference? These terms characterise each of the care domains and their respective contents. In the same way that process is integral to project management, perhaps there are terms that can contribute to the overall effectiveness and scope of Hodges’ model? What I have in mind is the following:

Purpose Process
Practice Policy

Surely this rather complicates matters? For an artist this would actually prove a very limited palette. And yet this is a common strategy – reduce the palette to four colours. This greatly affects the 'masterpiece' assuring discipline and influencing style before the paint is even amb(r)ushed.

For project managers armed with their PM tools the 4Ps really are a handful, but well worth getting to grips with.