Benefits of volunteering?

Been thinking about psychosocial aspects of volunteering today. I wonder if this will become more of hot topic now that we are about to be subjected to "The Big Society"...

Some (I think) interesting reading:

Morrow-Howell, N., Hong, S. -., & Tang, F. (2009). Who benefits from volunteering? variations in perceived benefits. Gerontologist, 49(1), 91-102.

Stukas, A. A., Worth, K. A., Clary, E. G., & Snyder, M. (2009). The matching of motivations to affordances in the volunteer environment: An index for assessing the impact of multiple matches on volunteer outcomes. Nonprofit and Voluntary Sector Quarterly, 38(1), 5-28.

Tan, E. J., Tanner, E. K., Seeman, T. E., Xue, Q. -., Rebok, G. W., Frick, K. D., et al. (2010). Marketing public health through older adult volunteering: Experience corps as a social marketing intervention. American Journal of Public Health, 100(4), 727-734.

Feeling lazy

Not much news this end today, so thought I'd permit myself a lazy post.

After all, who ever reads this anyway?http://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2010/07/100727065639.htm

Who gives a tweet? Nuanced feedback for microbloggers

ScienceDaily (2010-07-27)

Researchers are launching a study to understand what aspects of Twitter content are considered valuable, and how that impacts presentation and perception of online identity.

Post holiday blues

Third day back at work after three weeks leave and only getting around to a blog entry now - standards are slipping...

Been busy with the usual minor backlog that develops when away from the office for any length of time, though with one novel variation.

Having cleared everything I thought I needed from my old office to start location independent working, I have had access to it revoked (didn't do anything bad to get punished - this is just how the LIW pilot study works - to see how we cope when we really can't get in to our old boltholes). Of course what I had forgotten is that we have students on the books who don't follow the traditional October to June academic year. A student I am supervising for her dissertation is doing our Graduate Diploma. As, unlike all the usual diss students she and her colleagues submit their reports in late summer, she needed a vital document regarding the ethical approval for her study. As luck would have it, this was still filed away in my old office - oops... Problem now solved thanks to the good clerical discipline of my colleague Andy Johnson who chairs the ethics committee.

Most of my time since returning has been spent dealing with email enquiries, and writing lots of references for current students and this summer's graduates, but I've also done one or two more interesting things:

Agreed to teach narrative analysis to second year trainee clinical psychologists next academic year.

Checked the proofs for an article that should come out in the next few months.

Now hoping to get back into the swing of writing again tomorrow.

Off on my hols - at last...

Phew - rather a rush to tidy things up before going on three weeks leave.

The rush was due to beginning work unexpectedly on a PhD studentship application following a meeting with colleague Yung-Fang Chen, in Disaster Management.

We are interested in a particular aspect of disaster relief provision - top secret (!) until we've secured some funding to support a postgraduate to do the work.

We only met for the first time today, then discovered a deadline we need to meet is in mid July.
I reorganised my afternoon to write a project summary, and by the time I come back from leave the application may have been submitted. I am really optimistic about working collaboratively on this project - thanks Fang.

Patient conference for PCOS

Just in case there's anyone reading this who's interested in attending a patient conference on PCOS, thought I'd mention this major event coming up in November:

Verity's PCOS Conference, which will be held on Saturday the 27th of November 2010 at the Grand Connaught Rooms in Holborn, London. The conference will form part of the very first PCOS Awareness Week.

Further details and registration can be found on the Verity homepage.

Shameless self promotion?

Signed up today for the PCOS UK Annual Conference, which is taking place in November.

PCOS UK is a multidisciplinary society for healthcare professionals caring for women with Polycystic Ovary Syndrome.

I attend their events pretty regularly, but I'm especially interested in this year's conference, because of a new feature - the Research Digest. Members of the organisation's council will present key research papers and the audience will vote for the one they believe will have the most impact upon the management of PCOS.

There will undoubtedly be papers offering biomedical advances, but it would be great if at least one of them offered something practical to address psychosocial concerns.

I wonder if it's 'the done thing' to lobby for papers to be selected ( I find this sort of informal self-promotion really embarrassing, but perhaps I ought to be more cheeky about it).

Just in case there's anyone out there who'd like to put a word in on my behalf...
Percy, C., Gibbs, T., Potter, L., and Boardman, S. (2009) 'Nurse-Led Peer Support Group: Experiences of Women with Polycystic Ovary Syndrome'. Journal of Advanced Nursing 65 (10), 2046

All things in moderation...

Moderating and agreeing marks today for MSc Health Psychology dissertation students.

Every student's literature review is marked separately by two members of the course team. We then discuss the work and agree marks.

Rather dull but very important to maintain academic standards and ensure fairness for students.

Perhaps more interestingly, have just agreed to chair a parallel session at the European Health Psychology Society Conference in Cluj-Napoca in September.

And making progress on a book proposal - just need to get that submitted before going on holiday at end of week...