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The purpose of this paper is to investigate the correlates of suicidal ideation in offenders incarcerated in three Belgian prisons.

A cross-sectional questionnaire design was used. In total, 60 participants were recruited from three Belgian prisons. In addition to a questionnaire regarding demographic, social, institutional, and criminological factors, validated self-report instruments of psychological and psychiatric variables (coping, hopelessness, and depressive symptomatology) were administered. Associations with suicidal ideation were tested using regression analysis.

Coping style, life events, and social support were most strongly associated with suicidal ideation in prisoners. In particular, a passive coping style, feelings of loneliness, and the loss of a significant other contributed most to the presence of suicidal ideation, whereas a close partner relationship constituted a protective factor of suicidal thoughts.

This pilot study used a convenience sampling strategy, prone to sampling bias. Additionally, given the small sample size, results must be interpreted with caution, as they might not be representative of the general population of prisoners in Belgium.

Interventions focussing on improving coping skills and social support and on impeding the availability and accessibility of suicide methods are promising suicide prevention strategies in custodial settings.

To date, no studies have been conducted in Belgium focussing on suicidality in prisoners. Furthermore, the examination of suicidal ideation in prison settings has received relatively scant attention in international research.

As a tribute to Eric Broekaert, the purpose of this paper is to look back at a 2004 paper he wrote on the integration of paradigms of care and reports on how this is reflected in an ongoing multidisciplinary study at Ghent University.

In 2014, the authors began a research project to develop multidisciplinary strengths-based strategies for a vulnerable group of people, in this case people with a mental illness who offend. The authors chose a strength-based research design for the study, in order to focus on individuals’ capabilities, qualities and assets, rather than on deficits, incapacities or problems.

Three elements from Eric Broekaert’s work have inspired the research project. First, it is not possible to carry out research and interact with vulnerable persons devoid of the political, social and cultural context. Second, the authors should not restrict to one discipline or one paradigm when building (academic) knowledge and in practice. Third, the central aim of any practice should be to empower vulnerable people, improve their quality of life and challenge aspects of society that alienate and exclude them.

Eric Broekaert’s belief in the power of encounter and integration, reflected in his 2004 paper, continues to influence this work. As an open-minded enabler and critical integrator, he has left very visible traces in the research environment at Ghent University and beyond. Inspired by his thoughts and personality, new generations of researchers across many disciplines follow in his footsteps, jointly searching for what unites us as human beings rather than what divides us.

The purpose of this paper is to study the relationship between the attitudes of principals, municipality-specific aspects of reform implementation, and principals’ resistance to change.

The collected data are based on a multi-level structure. The levels of analysis are at the school level (school principal) and at the municipality level. Therefore, the research question posed in this study is examined using a quantitative multi-level analysis.

The results show that both the personal attitudes of school principals and adjustments made by the school presidency of the municipality affect the school principals’ willingness to change.

The study’s focus on schools limits the ability to generalize the results to apply to other organizations. Nevertheless, schools are an important object of study for change management research because they share crucial organizational characteristics with other organizations in the public sector.

Studies that have looked at the change reactions of leaders in the public school sector have rarely examined individual and collective factors together. We focus on both, since the municipalities in many countries have a certain amount of leeway in implementing reforms, meaning that their involvement is of central importance for a successful change process.

Performance management systems (PMSs) are critical for organizational success, but research is undecided on their constructive influence and the means through which they impact work engagement and turnover intention. This study aims to fill this gap by surmising psychological contract fulfillment as a mediator in the relationship between PMS effectiveness (PMSE) and employee outcomes.

The study uses a survey research design. Data were collected from 327 working professionals in India. The Statistical Package for Social Science Version 10.0 (SPSS 10.0) and the Analysis of Moments Structure (AMOS) 4.0 were used for data analyses.

The two-factor construct perceived PMSE was found to explain a larger variance in work engagement and turnover intention than the separate measures for its constituents PMS accuracy (PMSA) and PMS fairness (PMSF). Psychological contract fulfillment and work engagement were found to mediate the relationship between PMSE and turnover intention.

The study broadens the field of research on PMS in important ways. It demonstrates that the two-factor construct PMSE has a larger influence on employee outcomes in comparison to its constituent individual measures PMSA and PMSF. This is also the first study to suggest that in contrast to PMSF, PMSA explains a higher variance in employee outcomes.

This study validates the strong relationship between PMSE and key employee outcomes. Besides PMSF, managers can use the findings of this study to focus on the “right things” or accuracy in the PMS context to enhance work engagement and reduce turnover.

The study findings will have value everywhere owing to the diffusion and convergence in the human resource management practices of multinational firms irrespective of their contexts (Ananthram and Nankervis, 2013).

Earlier PMS studies have mostly been limited to either its fairness or accuracy and attended unduly to its appraisal element. This study adopts a systems vision of PMS and overcomes earlier drawbacks by investigating the role of both PMSA and PMSF in shaping employee outcomes. This is the first study to empirically confirm that in contrast to PMSF, the PMSA constituent of PMSE explains a higher variance in employee outcomes. The study provides greatly essential pragmatic support to the conjecture that PMSs advance work engagement (Mone and London, 2014; Gruman and Saks, 2011) and lower turnover intention (Kwak and Choi, 2015).