Strengths, weaknesses, opportunities and threats of peer support among disadvantaged groups: A rapid scoping review.

Objective: To explore the current state of knowledge and evidence about peer support for various disadvantaged groups; to identify the strengths, weaknesses, opportunities, and threats of peer support to critically reflect on peer support within health and social services. Methods: A rapid scoping review was conducted according to Arksey and O'Malley's framework, aiming to identify eligible studies in PubMed, APA PsychInfo, Education Resources Information Center, Cochrane Library, Academic Search Premier, ScienceDirect, Directory of Open Access Journals, ResearchGate, WorldCat, and Google Scholar. According to Rodgers' concept analysis steps and the SWOT model, data was reported using thematic synthesis. Results: Forty-five studies were included, describing a variety of peer support initiatives among groups of young migrants and unsupervised minors, young adults with autism, people with (mental) health problems, foster/shelter families, vulnerable pregnant women, people outside the labour force, older adults, and homeless people. The strength of peer support is its positive effect on the quality of life among vulnerable people. The weakness is represented by peers both being too involved and focused on personal interest or by peers lacking expertise and knowledge. Opportunities for peer support are mutual learning, the anticipated long-term effects, and the potential to facilitate social inclusion. Culture, language barriers, drop-out rates, securing sustainability, and peers' lack of time and commitment are regarded as threats to peer support. Conclusion: Although peer support offers good outcomes for various groups of vulnerable people, the weaknesses and threats need to be considered to provide and proliferate peer support.

How stress-related factors affect mental wellbeing of university students A cross-sectional study to explore the associations between stressors, perceived stress, and mental wellbeing.

BACKGROUND: Lowered mental wellbeing of students is a growing health and societal problem. Experiencing high levels of stress for a longer period of time has been associated with an increased risk for lower mental wellbeing and mental health problems. To reduce stress and improve mental wellbeing it is important to understand how various sources of stress are related with mental wellbeing and which factors can buffer the impact of stress on mental wellbeing. OBJECTIVES: Deriving from a conceptual model the aim of the study was to explore 1) the association of underlying stressors (academic pressure, family circumstances, side-activity pressure, and financial situation) with perceived stress and mental wellbeing, 2) whether perceived stress mediates the association between the sources of stress and mental wellbeing and 3) whether loneliness, self-esteem, personality and coping styles buffer or reinforce the impact of perceived stress on mental wellbeing. METHOD: A cross-sectional survey design was used among students of an University of Applied Sciences and conducted between November 16, 2020, and January 18, 2021. Study variables were mental wellbeing, perceived stress, academic pressure, financial pressure, family pressure and side-activity pressure, coping style, self-esteem, loneliness, personality. The questionnaire was constructed using validated measures. Simple and multiple linear regression analyses were conducted to assess the association between perceived stress, sources of stress and mental wellbeing. Mediation and moderation processes were explored using Hayes PROCESS models. RESULTS: A total of 875 university students (37,2% male, 62,3% female, mean age 21,6) participated. Perceived stress had a strong negative association with mental wellbeing (unstandardized regression coefficient (b) = -.848, p < .001; r = -.667, p < .01), explaining 45% of the variance. Academic pressure (b = -8.014, p < .01), family pressure (b = -3.189, p < .01), side-activity pressure (b = -3.032, p < .01) and financial pressure (b = -2.041, p < .01) all had a negative impact on mental wellbeing. This effect was mediated by perceived stress, but a direct effect remained for academic pressure (b = -3.306, p < .01) and family pressure (b = -1.130, p < .01). Significant interaction effects between perceived stress and mental wellbeing were found for approach coping (low = -.93, p < .01; high = -.64, p < .01) and emotional stability (low = -.81, p < .01; high = -.64, p < .01). CONCLUSION: Perceived stress has a major impact on students' mental wellbeing. Underlying stressors were mediated by perceived stress, but direct effects were also found. To protect the mental wellbeing of students, it is urgent to reduce perceived stress, suppress underlying stressors and make students more resilient through the development of found buffers, such as approach coping.

The influence of advertising on compulsive buying - The role of persuasion knowledge.

BACKGROUND AND AIMS: The growing concern over compulsive buying (CB) among consumers has led to vast amount of research examining the antecedents of this maladaptive behaviour. The focus of previous research was, however, mainly on examining the internal, psychological factors contributing to CB. The current research, on the other hand, sheds light on one of the external triggers which can possibly stimulate CB, namely advertising. METHODS: An online survey has been conducted to identify the attitudes and scepticism towards advertising as well as ad avoidance and persuasion knowledge among a sample of 582 Belgian consumers. Furthermore, all participants were screened with regard to compulsive buying tendencies. RESULTS: This research provides evidence that positive attitudes towards advertising can lead to CB. An important factor in this relation is persuasion knowledge. CONCLUSIONS: The study results lead to the conclusion that people higher in persuasion knowledge dispose less positive attitudes towards advertising which can subsequently prevent them from engaging in CB. Moreover high scores on scepticism towards advertising and ad avoidance among Belgian consumers in our sample point to a need for advertisers to modify their practices in order to gain more trust from consumers. This study also shows that advertising in particular attracts and seems to affect an already disadvantaged group of people - namely compulsive buyers.

Factorial validity of the Personality Adjective Checklist in a Dutch-speaking sample.

We examined the factorial structure of the Dutch version of the Personality Adjective Checklist (PACL-D) in a Belgian sample of 3,012 community-dwelling adults. Exploratory factor analyses revealed a 5-factor structure (Neurotic, Aggressive/Dominant, Introverted vs. Extraverted, Conscientious, and Cooperative), that showed considerable overlap with 3 of the Big Five factors (i.e., Neuroticism, Extraversion, and Conscientiousness). Moreover, the 5-factor structure closely resembled the structure found in the original American PACL and was equivalent across gender and age.