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Although leisure constraints that individuals have to cope with can negatively affect their social inclusion and satisfaction with life, little research has addressed the link between these variables. Therefore, the current paper examined the moderator role of leisure constraints on the relationship between satisfaction with life and leisure constraints among adults living in five different European countries. The respondents were 1,382 women and 877 men adults. The findings of analysis revealed that all factors used in the study accounted for 15% of the variance in satisfaction with life and social inclusion had a significant and positive impact on satisfaction with life. As a result, it can be said that leisure constraints had a moderating effect on the relationship between satisfaction with life and social inclusion. The present research study recommends that social inclusion should be encouraged through decreasing to leisure constraints to increase the life satisfaction. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The built environment (BE) impacts on people's disability and health, in terms of overweight, depression, alcohol abuse, poor self-rated health and presence of psychological symptoms; it is reasonable to assume that BE also impacts on participation levels. This paper presents the validation of the COURAGE Built Environment Self-Reported Questionnaire (CBE-SR), an instrument designed to evaluate BE in the context of health and disability. Subjects participating to COURAGE, a cross-sectional study conducted on 10 800 citizens of Poland, Finland and Spain, completed a protocol inclusive of the CBE-SR. Psychometric properties and factor structure were analysed, and factor scores created. Gender differences, differences between persons from different age groups and persons reporting the environment as facilitating, hindering or neutral were calculated. Eight items were deleted so that the final version of CBE-SR comprises 19 items. Cronbach's alpha ranged from 0.743 to 0.906, and test-retest stability was demonstrated for the majority of items. Four subscales were identified: Usability of the neighbourhood environment; Hindrance of walkable environment; Easiness of use of public buildings, places and facilities; and Risk of accidents and usability of the living place. Younger respondents reported their neighbourhood as more usable but perceived walkways as more hindering and public buildings as less easy to use; gender differences were almost inexistent. The CBE-SR is a four-scale instrument with good psychometric properties that measures the person-environment interaction. It is sensitive across age groups and is consistent with the subject's overall judgement of the degree to which the environment is facilitating or hindering. Copyright © 2013 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd. Key Practitioner Message Poor built environments have a negative impact on the level of a person's participation. However, instruments measuring the person-environment interaction are lacking., The CBE-SR is a valid and reliable instrument that researchers can use to assess the relationships between the intrinsic health state and the objective features of the environment., Understanding this relationship would provide further insight into the need of addressing the individual's functioning either by means of interventions directed to the individual or by making changes to the individual's environment. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The aim of this study was to explore cross‐level mechanisms stimulating employees' innovative behavior in small firms, specifically emotional contagion between small business owners and their employees. Using data from three European countries and applying a multilevel approach, we tested how small business owners' work‐related affect—enthusiasm and comfort—relate to their employees' work‐related affect and innovative work behavior. The sample consisted of 85 small business owners and 711 employees from firms operating in the Netherlands, Poland, and Spain. Controlling for country, the results of multilevel modeling showed that small business owners' work‐related affect was positively related to their employees' work‐related affect. The hypothesized contagion of work‐related affect in small firms was, thus, supported. Employees' work‐related affect, in turn, was positively associated with their innovative behavior. Employees' work‐related affect mediated the relationship between small business owners' work‐related affect and employees' innovative behavior. The results also showed cross‐country differences in the strength of some of the relationships. The study is a step forward in understanding innovation in small firms, extending the insights gained from single‐level investigations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Purpose: This study illustrates the huge untapped potential of quantifying the impact of culture in making meaningful comparisons across groups. Our focus is on cross‐national differences in nurses' reports of their relations with physicians, and how the measurement of this complex construct and the evaluation of true differences are related to dimensions of national culture. Design: We examine across 14 European countries the association between indices of national culture from the seminal work of Hofstede and 39,435 nurses' ratings of their relations with physicians. Multilevel confirmatory factor analysis was used to evaluate strong factorial invariance across countries and to examine the influence of power distance and masculinity. Findings: There was wide variation across countries in nurses' reports of their relations with physicians. Strong factorial invariance was shown for a one‐factor model, which confirmed that across countries the seven survey items measure a common factor of physician‐nurse relations. This model showed no country bias for any of the seven survey items, which suggests that differences across countries reflect true differences. These true differences were significantly associated with variation in country values of power distance, which showed a significant negative correlation with physician–nurse relations. Conclusions: Continuously pursuing a better understanding of characteristics that impact the studied indicators, such as national culture, is elementary to better understand the construct under study. In this application, country values of power distance negatively impacted nurse‐reported relations with physicians, which strongly varied across countries. Clinical Relevance: Better nurse‐reported relations between nurses and physicians link to higher nurse job satisfaction, lower emotional exhaustion, better nurse‐perceived quality of care, and lower patient mortality. The Practice Environment Scale of the Nursing Work Index is an excellent instrument to characterize variation in working relations between nurses and physicians as well as physicians' professional posture towards nurses. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

The present study tested the role of right-wing authoritarianism (RWA), terrorist threat, and sociopolitical 'climate' as predictors of support for governmental anti-terrorism policies and actions. Two dimensions of analysis were defined: the presence versus absence of al-Qaeda attacks, and adherence to surveillance versus anti-surveillance mainstream politics. In order to study the influence of these two contextual dimensions on the expression of attitudes, we selected four European countries that fall into these two dimensions - Poland, Belgium, Spain, and the UK. Results from our study provide support for the contention that attitudes towards restrictions of civil rights are related to RWA independently of the cultural context. Moreover, in the UK sample, we found that the threat of terrorism increases acceptance of limitations of civil liberties, but only among people who hold authoritarian beliefs. However, in Spain, the other country that experienced terrorist attacks, this moderation effect was not found which is interpreted in terms of differences in the sociopolitical climate in both countries. As predicted, we did not find such moderation effect in countries in which threat is relatively low (Poland and Belgium). The results are discussed with reference to the conceptual framework based on the importance of fear experiences, security-focused policies, as well as the specific cultural context in the study of reaction to terrorist threat. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]