Smartphone-based interventions for employees’ well-being promotion: a systematic review

Occupational Psychology faces challenges concerning the promotion of employees’ well-being and health. The use of emergent technologies (e.g. smart-phone) has revealed new opportunities to deliver effective, cheap and early interventions. By following the international PRISMA statement guidelines, this systematic review aims to bring together workplace smartphone-based interventions, targeting employees’ well-being and psycho-physical health, to address the lack of studies focused on workplace settings. Results were drawn from 31 quantitative and qualitative studies, testing smartphone applications. The authors extracted multiple information for each article: focus, target, theoretical background, users’ engagement and study design. Findings show the lack of theoretical background, reliable study design and the prevalence of physical health interventions. Moreover, our review identifies the importance of users’ engagement for an intervention’s effectiveness. It is relevant to design specific mHealth interventions, to provide employees with the skills to cope with and manage work-stress and enhance their general health and well-being

Teaching after the pandemic : the role of technostress and organizational support on intentions to adopt remote teaching technologies

The ongoing COVID-19 pandemic has led to several changes in academic teaching practices. Although educational digital technologies have been crucial during the initial phases of the pandemic, their forced adoption has led to negative consequences. In the present study, we aimed to integrate the Technology Acceptance Model theoretical framework (Davis, 1989) by exploring the effects of some possible factors that influence the willingness to adopt digital learning tools in the future when the pandemic is over. Among them, technostress was considered one of the external factors that could have adversely affected digital teaching technology adoption in the future. In contrast, the perception of technical support offered by the university was considered a potential protective factor. A total of 463 Italian university faculty completed an online questionnaire at the end of the first semester (a.y. 2020–21). The frequency of distance teaching technologies usage behavior was measured objectively by extracting teachers' activities from the University's e-learning databases. Key findings indicated that distance teaching technologies' frequency of use increased technostress, which in turn negatively impacted the perception of ease of use. The latter influences - both directly and indirectly through perceived usefulness - the intentions to adopt distance learning tools after the pandemic. Organizational support negatively predicted technostress. Implications to help public institutions develop functional strategies to cope with the technological changes brought by the pandemic are discussed

Editorial: Current status of and future directions for assessing technology acceptance for digital (mental) health interventions

Editorial on the Research Topic Current status of and future directions for assessing technology acceptance for digital (mental) health intervention

The Use of Tail as a Minimal-Invasive Method to Detect a Large Set of Biochemical Responses in the Italian Wall Lizard Podarcis siculus (Rafinesque, 1810)

Conventional methods to analyze biochemical processes related to contaminant toxicity usually require the sacrifice of animals to collect tissues and organs. However, for ethical reasons and especially for endangered species, non- or minimal-invasive methods should be preferred. Among vertebrates, reptiles show a general decline worldwide and therefore the use of non- or minimal-invasive methods to measure some biochemical processes in these animals are encouraged. It is well known that most lizards use a common safety behavior implying the natural loss of tail in the case of predation events. Therefore, if common analyses testing contaminant toxicity could be performed in tail tissue, this method, not implying the sacrifice of the animals, could be considered as a good minimal-invasive method. The aim of this study is to test on wild Italian wall lizard Podarcis siculus the use of tail to detect a large set of biomarkers including oxidative stress (TOSCAROO, TOSCAOH, CAT, tGSH, MDA), biotransformation processes (EROD, GSTs) and neurotoxicity (AChE, BChE). All the biochemical responses, excluding EROD and MDA, resulted to be analytically detectable in tail tissues of P. siculus, although the mean values obtained with this minimal-invasive method were significantly lower than those obtained with invasive one

\u201cWoulda, coulda, shoulda\u201d. Workers\u2019 proactivity in the association between emotional demands and mental health

The present study aimed to explore the mediating role of hostile customer relations in the association between emotional dissonance and workers\u2019 mental health. Moreover, the moderating role of proactive personality as a buffer against hostile customer relations was assessed. Emotional demands become crucial within professions that involve a direct relationship with clients and, if poorly managed, can negatively affect workers\u2019 health and performance. Accordingly, data were collected on a sample of n = 918 mass-retail employees working for one of the leading Italian supermarket companies. Most participants were women (62.7%) with a mean age = 40.38 (SD = 7.68). The results of a moderated mediation analysis revealed that emotional dissonance was related to more hostile customer relations that, in turn, were associated with higher rates of mental health symptoms. Proactive personality emerged as a protecting factor that prevented the onset of conflicts with clients, particularly among workers experiencing high levels of emotional dissonance. The identification of resources enabling management of emotional demands could suggest suitable adaptive strategies for customer-facing roles, thus preventing the occurrence of adverse mental health symptoms

Health, Stress and Technologies : Integrating Technology Acceptance and Health Belief Models for Smartphone-Based Stress Intervention

Work-related stress significantly jeopardizes employees’ physical and mental health due to the considerable time they spend at work. Smartphone-based interventions provide a promising solution, eliminating traditional face-to-face interventions’ barriers. However, the elements that influence workers’ intentions to use this still remain unexplored. This study explores the link between health belief model (HBM) and technology acceptance model (TAM) factors. In this study, 336 Italian workers (64% female) answered an online questionnaire. We employed a structural equation model (SEM) to analyze the data. The results unveiled an indirect relationship: individuals perceiving health risks were more inclined to use stress-management apps, mediated by perceived utility (PU). This study underscores the significant potential of integrating the HBM with the TAM in predicting users’ preparedness for smartphone-based health interventions. These findings not only hold substantial value but also illuminate a path forward for professionals and organizations, offering insights to tailor and optimize smartphone tools for stress management and the promotion of workplace well-being. Ultimately, this research paves the way for the cultivation of healthier work environments, marking a noteworthy contribution to the field

A Cluster Analysis of the Acceptance of a Contact Tracing App — The Identification of Profiles for the Italian Immuni Contact Tracing App

Digital contact tracing apps have been introduced by governments as a strategy to limit the spread of the COVID-19 pandemic. Digital contact tracking is an alternative to traditional contact tracing performed by human tracers who have to reconstruct each contact an infected person had in the recent past by means of interviews. The Italian government proposed the Immuni digital contact tracking app as a solution. Immuni uses Bluetooth technology to anonymously register all close contacts a person had: if she tests positive for COVID-19 then all registered contacts are notified. The main aim of the paper is to propose a cluster analysis of some factors concerning the possible acceptance of the Immuni app to build behaviour profiles that explain and predict the possible behaviours of the respondents. The factors considered referred to three different pillars: the technological pillar, investigated by considering factors from the technology acceptance models family; the health pillar, where variables of the health belief model were used; and the sociopolitical pillar, where some values of the respondents were considered as possible barriers to or facilitators of the acceptance of this technology. As a result of the cluster analysis, three behavioural profiles were built: the ProApp profile, the Hesitant profile, and the AntiApp profile. The first is the profile grouping the respondents who intend to use the contact tracing app; the second is more about people who are favourable of the use of the app, but some issues such as privacy reduce the strength of their intention; the last profile is about people who are less favourable to use the app. We are confident that the behaviour profiles found would be useful to build more tailored communication campaigns to help promote the use of the app by managing factors that could either be facilitators or barriers

Regulation of cell cycle transition and induction of apoptosis in HL-60 leukemia cells by lipoic acid: role in cancer prevention and therapy

<p>Abstract</p> <p>Background</p> <p>Lipoic acid (LA), a potent antioxidant, has been used as a dietary supplement to prevent and treat many diseases, including stroke, diabetes, neurodegenerative and hepatic disorders. Recently, potent anti-tumorigenic effects induced by LA were also reported and evident as assayed by suppression of cell proliferation and induction of apoptosis in malignant cells. However, the mechanism by which LA elicits its chemopreventive effects remains unclear.</p> <p>Methods and Results</p> <p>Herein, we investigated whether LA elicits its anti-tumor effects by inducing cell cycle arrest and cell death in human promyelocytic HL-60 cells. The results showed that LA inhibits both cell growth and viability in a time- and dose-dependent manner. Disruption of the G₁/S and G₂/M phases of cell cycle progression accompanied by the induction of apoptosis was also observed following LA treatment. Cell cycle arrest by LA was correlated with dose-dependent down regulation of Rb phosphorylation, likely via suppression of E2F-dependent cell cycle progression with an accompanying inhibition of cyclin E/cdk2 and cyclin B1/cdk1 levels. Evidence supporting the induction of apoptosis by LA was based on the appearance of sub-G₁peak in flow cytometry analysis and the cleavage of poly(ADP-ribose) polymerase (PARP) from its native 112-kDa form to the 89-kDa truncated product in immunoblot assays. Apoptosis elicited by LA was preceded by diminution in the expression of anti-apoptotic protein bcl-2 and increased expression of apoptogenic protein bax, and also the release and translocation of apoptosis inducing factor AIF and cytochrome c from the mitochondria to the nucleus, without altering the subcellular distribution of the caspases.</p> <p>Conclusion</p> <p>This study provides evidence that LA induces multiple cell cycle checkpoint arrest and caspase-independent cell death in HL-60 cells, in support of its efficacious potential as a chemopreventive agent.</p