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Objective: Studying personal narratives can generate understanding of how people experience physical and mental illness. However, few studies have explored narratives of engagement in health positive behaviours, with none focusing on men specifically. Thus, we sought to examine men’s experiences of their efforts to engage in and maintain healthy behaviours, focusing on meditation as an example of such behaviour. Design: We recruited 30 male meditators, using principles of maximum variation sampling, and conducted two in-depth interviews with each, separated by a year. Main outcome measures: We sought to elicit men’s narratives of their experiences of trying to maintain a meditation practice. Results: We identified an overall theme of a ‘positive health trajectory,’ in particular, making ‘progress’ through meditation. Under this were six main accounts. Only two articulated a ‘positive’ message about progress: Climbing a hierarchy of practitioners, and progress catalysed in other areas of life. The other four reflected the difficulties around progress: Progress being undermined by illness; disappointment with progress; progress ‘forgotten’ (superseded by other concerns); and progress re-conceptualised due to other priorities. Conclusion: Men’s narratives reveal the way they experience and construct their engagement with meditation – as an example of health behaviour – in terms of progress. [ABSTRACT FROM PUBLISHER]

Aims Nicotine is known to enhance aspects of cognitive functioning in abstinent smokers, but the effects on specific areas of executive functions and in non-smokers are inconclusive. This may be due in part to the poor sensitivity of tests used to assess executive functions. This study used a new virtual reality assessment of executive functions known as JEF (the Jansari assessment of Executive Functions) to address this issue. Design A 2 × 2 design manipulating group (smokers and never-smokers) and drug [nicotine (4 mg for smokers; 2 mg for never smokers) versus placebo gum]. Setting School of Psychology; University of East London Participants Seventy-two participants (aged 18-54 years): 36 minimally deprived (2 hours) smokers and 36 never-smokers. Measurements Components of executive function were measured using the virtual reality paradigm JEF, which assesses eight cognitive constructs simultaneously as well as providing an overall performance measure. Findings Univariate analyses of variance revealed that nicotine improved overall JEF performance, time-based prospective memory and event-based prospective memory in smokers ( P < 0.01), but not in never-smokers. Action-based prospective memory was enhanced in both groups ( P < 0.01) and never-smokers out-performed smokers on selective thinking and adaptive thinking ( P < 0.01). Conclusions Executive functioning and prospective memory as aspects of cognitive performance can be enhanced by nicotine gum in smokers who have abstained for as little as 2 hours. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]