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The purpose of this paper is to examine how job stress and the embodiment of the police culture influence levels of job satisfaction for two mid-sized law enforcement agencies in the Southeastern United States.

A survey was conducted of police officers from two mid-sized law enforcement agencies in the Southeastern United States. Ordinary least squares regression models were utilized to assess the impact of job stress and the embodiment of the police culture on job satisfaction.

Results indicated that officers with higher levels of job stress reported being less satisfied with their careers. Contrary to prior research, officers with a greater embodiment of the police culture were significantly less satisfied. Demographic variables were not statistically noteworthy; however, working on a rotating shift and having more years of service significantly decreased job satisfaction.

Survey data collected from two mid-sized police agencies in the Southeastern United States may not be generalizable to other areas or regions.

These findings provide practical insights for police agencies to address the operational strains of working in law enforcement and the cultural component embedded in this field. Based on these findings, there is a clear need to increase future work on the interplay between job satisfaction, job stress, and occupational culture.

Can leadership be taught? Those of us who offer courses on leadership, as part of an academic program, face this question quite often. It is my belief that acquiring more knowledge on leadership does not readily translate into becoming a better leader – especially so at a time in history where leaders have to deal with more complexity and change than ever before (Snowden & Boone, 2007; Malloch & Porter-O’Grady, 2009). Leadership is a process of becoming rather than a process of acquiring. In this paper, I argue the need to ground our teaching practices in complex responsive processes (Stacey, 2003), share one such practice we employ in a graduate program for health care professionals, and discuss the implications.

As Lorna Jowett and Stacey Abbott have pointed out, the US TV serial Supernatural owes much of its success to the way it combines horror with family drama, strengthening the affective involvement of viewers in the lives of its protagonists, the monster-hunting Winchester brothers. The notion of home – presented variously as a domestic, feminine space from which the Winchesters and their compatriots are excluded; a mobile and contingent space of masculine bonding; and a hybrid space which allows for self-expression outside prescribed gender norms, but which also holds the potential for danger – is central.

Heather L. Duda has pointed to the ways monster hunters are excluded from the normative institutions of their societies, and this is certainly true of the Winchesters, who live in their family car and are unable to maintain ‘normal’ homes. Later seasons give them a home in the form of an underground bunker, not designed as a domestic space, but nonetheless a place where their hypermasculine behaviours can be relaxed. This chapter examines the tensions that emerge in this apparent move from a traditional narrative of the home as feminine space under threat to something more ambivalent, where masculine identity itself may be in danger.

In the assessment of student nurses, there is limited research exploring why the contributions of people with lived experience (LE) have an impact on learning. The purpose of this paper is to compare the nature of feedback provided to students by people who have both worked in and used mental health services.

To explore the nature of qualitative student feedback generated from an assessment involving people who have experience of using and working in mental health services. Therefore, an inductive content analysis conducted on the formative written feedback provided to students following a simulated assessment.

The results demonstrate significant similarities in the feedback provided by those with LE of using and working within mental health services, suggesting a shared conceptualisation of professionalism.

The research indicates the potential socialisation of professionals and service users to not only the assessment process but also the professional expectations of mental health nurses. These findings resonate with Barker et al.’s (1999) description of the “pseudo ordinary me” and emphasise the principles and importance of person-centred care.

The paper highlights that assessment approaches which incorporate feedback from people with LE offer a vehicle to demonstrate and explore how attributes, subjectively associated with professionalism, can be recognised and developed by student mental health nurses.

Recounts how medieval English Jewry began when Jews were invited to immigrate by William I and ended with their expulsion by Edward I in 1290. The Jewish community was important and for most of its existence it was prosperous, owing to its particular social function – being the bankers, moneylenders and financiers of the time. Concentrates on a relatively little known aspect of the medieval Jewish community: the role played by its women. Jewish women played a significant part in business, not just as the wives or widows of businessmen, but as entrepreneurs on their own account. This was in sharp contrast to the position of women in wider English society. Using contemporary documents, the article examines the scale and nature of the business activities of Jewish women in medieval England, sketches the activities of some of these female entrepreneurs, and attempts to investigate the factors which enabled them to play such a prominent role.

Mental ill health is on the rise amongst undergraduate students and has been investigated using both positivist/quantitative and exploratory/qualitative research methods. However, the lived experiences of mature students who have mental ill health have not been directly investigated. A limited research literature suggests that challenges particular to mature undergraduate students can cause mental ill health or exacerbate existing needs. Further research exploring the lived experiences of mature undergraduate students with mental ill health is thus warranted.

A qualitative approach was adopted to explore lived experiences of mental ill health for mature students in higher education. The interpretative phenomenological analysis (IPA) explores the experience of higher education mature students who self-identify as having mental ill health. Five participants were interviewed about their personal stories and perceptions.

The study found that participants interpreted the experience of mental ill health as very difficult with no redeeming features reported. A lack of control over mental ill health experiences was contrasted with attempts to control mental ill health, whether successful or not, in order to progress with their learning. Participants conceptualised being mature undergraduate students as a last chance succeed in life, education or a career. This increased stress that interacted with their mental ill health symptoms.

IPA calls for a small, homogenised participant sample. This limits generalisation of the research findings. Recruitment criteria welcomed participants who self-identified as experiencing mental ill health, leading to potential bias in reported lived experiences.

The research findings highlight the value of considering the lived experience of students experiencing mental ill health whilst studying. Whilst general approaches to support can be successful, this research demonstrates how higher educational professionals must orient towards an ideographic perspective when considering how to provide individualised, inclusive support for students experiencing mental ill health. A discussion on how this can be actualised is provided.

The research provides impetus to the perspective that students have unique lived experiences of mental ill health, and that this is particularly so for mature undergraduate students. A key social implication of this is that, whilst positive based, one-size fits most, interventions for students experiencing mental ill health are useful, higher education educators must also be cognizant of unique, dynamic experiences each student will have. As such, there is a need to move towards a relational, dialogic approach when considering and designing tailored support.

Mature undergraduate students who experience mental ill health are at risk of not reaching their potential. Yet despite this, exploration of mature undergraduate student's experiences of mental ill health is nascent in the academic literature. Research considering their unique perspectives as an avenue to develop joint compassionate understandings and interactions between students and educators are additionally scant. The current study begins to address this dearth of exploration and commentary. It provides an idiosyncratic, novel inquiry into this important issue.