Effects of an Eight Week Online intervention for Depression, Anxiety and Stress in a university sample; randomized controlled trial (Preprint)

BACKGROUND University students are experiencing higher levels of distress and mental health disorder. In addressing mental health needs, web-based interventions have shown increasing promise to overcome geographic distances and high student-to-counselor ratios, with a potential for widespread implementation. The Mindfulness Virtual Community (MVC) program, a web based program, guided by mindfulness and cognitive behavioural therapy principles, is among such efforts to effectively and efficiently reduce symptoms of depression, anxiety, and stress in students. OBJECTIVE To evaluate the efficacy of an 8-week MVC program in a 2 arm randomized controlled trial (RCT) in reducing depression, anxiety, and stress (primary outcomes), and improving mindfulness (secondary outcome) in undergraduate students at a Canadian university. Guided by two prior RCTs that each demonstrated efficacy when administered during regular university operations, the current study coincided with a university-wide labor strike. Given widespread closures as a result of COVID-19, student response to online mental health programming on a disrupted campus can provide useful information for anticipating the impact of COVID-19 related disruptions METHODS In this parallel arm RCT, 154 students were randomly allocated to the 8-week MVC intervention (n= 76) or a waitlist control (WLC) condition (n= 78). The intervention included (1) educational and mindfulness video modules, (2) anonymous peer-peer discussions, and (3) anonymous, group-based, professionally guided, videoconferences. Study outcomes were evaluated at baseline and at 8-week follow-up using: Patient Health Questionnaire-9 (PHQ-9), the Beck Anxiety Inventory (BAI), the Perceived Stress Scale (PSS), and the Five Facets Mindfulness Questionnaire Short Form (FFMQ-SF). Generalized estimation equations with an AR(1) covariance structure were used to evaluate the impact of intervention, with outcome evaluations performed on both an intention to treat (ITT) and per protocol (PP) basis. RESULTS Participants (n= 154) were 35 males and 117 females with a mean age of 23.1 years. There were no statistically significant differences at baseline between MVC and WLC on demographics and psychological characteristics, indicating similar demographic-psychological characteristics across the MVC-WLC groups. Results under both ITT and PP approaches indicated significant between group differences for PSS (ITT: β= -2.31, P= .03; PP: β= -2.38, P= .03), but no significant between group differences in PHQ-9 (ITT: β= -0.44, P= 0.64; PP: β= -0.62, P= .053), BAI (ITT: β= -2.06, P= .31; PP: β= -2.32, P= .27), and FFMQ-SF (ITT: β= 1.33, P= .43; PP: β= 1.44, P= .41) (compared to WLC). CONCLUSIONS Under university labor strike conditions, the MVC program led to statistically significant reductions in PSS compared to WLC, but no other significant between group differences. Comparisons are made with previous study waves, undertaken during non-disrupted university conditions, where efficacy was demonstrated across depression, anxiety and mindfulness outcomes, are discussed. CLINICALTRIAL International Standard Randomized Controlled Trial Number ISRCTN92827275; https://www.isrctn.com/ISRCTN92827275

Testimonios of Resistance

Chapter 8 analyzes how legal testimonies and documentation became “testimonios of resistance” that crafted an effective narrative that southern prisons and prison labor constituted slavery. The chapter begins with the story of David Ruíz and follows with several other Chicano testimonios. By telling Ruiz’s story, this chapter considers the terror of racial violence, the necessity of self-defense, and the agony of self-mutilation. The chapter then broadens the movement to include the Black Panther Jonathan Eduardo Swift and a cadre of political organizers who spread the word of prisoner empowerment. Once the testimonies had developed into a mass movement, the prisoners planned the first ever system-wide prison labor strike just as the Ruiz case was going to trial. As black and Chicano radical organizers, they waged a public campaign to make the conditions of the southern prison plantation visible by insisting that the Texas control penology and agribusiness model was built on a lie—that incarceration amounted to twentieth-century slavery.

The 1942 Santa Anita Detainment Center Labor Strike and Japanese American Incarceration during World War II

This article studies a brief strike by Nikkei incarcerees at the Santa Anita Assembly Center in 1942. Employed in the industrial production of camouflage nets, the imprisoned Japanese Americans staged a strike over pay, worker safety, and rights. Without previous guidelines, the center’s administrators had to devise a resolution to this halt in the production of war materiel. The Santa Anita netmakers' strike and its resolution provided a foundation for handling labor disputes at the permanent WRA camps later. The author identifies the administration, division of labor, pay, and unsafe work conditions, along with the strike leadership, management’s response, and the outcome of the strike.

KEBERADAAN MOGOK KERJA DALAM KONSTELASI HUBUNGAN INDUSTRIAL PANCASILA

Indonesia’s industrial relations is called the Pancasila industrial relations, which requires a harmonic situation between the labor and the employer. On the other hand, the Pancasila industrial relations also contains the conflict concept which appears in the existence of labor strike. However, the conflict concept in the existence of labor strike is in line with the Pancasila industrial relations’ harmonic concept. The labor strike is the part of industrial relations dispute settlement, which is not to undermining the Pancasila industrial relations’ harmonic concept. The right to strike is given to the labor for increasing their bargaining power when the industrial relation dispute arises. The existence of labor strike actually become a means to restore the harmonic situation when the industrial relation dispute arises.Keywords: industrial relations, the Pancasila industrial relations, labor strikeIntisariHubungan industrial di Indonesia merupakan hubungan industrial Pancasila, yang menghendaki situasi yang harmonis antara pekerja dengan pengusaha. Di sisi lain, hubungan industrial Pancasila juga mengakomodasi konsep konflik yang tercermin dalam keberadaan mogok kerja. Keberadaan mogok kerja yang mengandung konsep konflik sejatinya tidak bertentangan dengan konsep keharmonisan dalam hubungan industrial Pancasila. Mogokkerja dihadirkan sedemikian rupa sebagai salah satu upaya penyelesaian perselisihan hubungan industrial, tidak dimaksudkan untuk merusak tatanan keharmonisan sebagaimana dicita-citakan oleh hubungan industrial Pancasila. Hak mogok kerja diberikan kepada pekerja digunakan untuk membantu menyeimbangkan posisi tawar pekerja saat terjadi perselisihan hubungan industrial. Keberadaan mogok kerja sejatinya merupakan saranauntuk mengembalikan keharmonisan di saat terjadi konflik dan perselisihan dalam hubungan industrial.Kata kunci: hubungan industrial, hubungan industrial Pancasila, mogok kerja.