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Biomedical subjects

M P Farrell

Publications and source records attributed to M P Farrell.

At least 19 recordsLinked to original sources
PubMed2001

Informal roles and the stages of interdisciplinary team development.

After presenting a theory of team development, we propose that the informal role structure of a team is dependent upon the degree of anomie in the team culture, and we provide measures of anomie and informal roles that can be used in field settings. Then we test hypotheses on a national sample of 111 interdisciplinary health care teams in geriatrics in US Veterans Affairs medical centers. We find evidence that as teams develop from early to later stages, the interpersonal behavior of members becomes less differentiated on three dimensions: prominence, sociability, and task-orientation. In addition, we find that images of each member come into clearer focus, as evidenced by reduced variation in how each member is seen by other team members. Finally, we find that regardless of stage of team development, the more education the team members have, the more prominent and task-oriented they are. In general, physicians score highest in prominence and task-orientation, but relatively low in sociability.

Anomie↗
PubMed2001

Health values buffer social-environmental risks for adolescent alcohol misuse.

Data from a representative sample of 17- to 20-year-old adolescents were analyzed to investigate whether a health-valuing attitude could buffer the effects of social-environmental risk on adolescent alcohol misuse. A risk index was constructed for adolescents, based on variables such as friends' drinking, parental alcohol abuse, and poor parental monitoring and communication. The expected buffering interaction called for high environmental risk to lead to greater alcohol misuse for adolescents who placed low value on health, but not for those who placed high value on health. The expected interactions were obtained for 2 alcohol-related variables (total consumption and consuming 5 or more drinks at a time).

Adolescent↗
PubMed2001

Tobacco use among high school athletes and nonatieletes: results of the 1997 youth risk behavior survey.

In the United States today, the use of tobacco has become an entrenched part of teenage culture. The present study used the 1997 Youth Risk Behavior Survey (YRBS), which collected data from a nationally representative sample of 16,262 students in public and private high schools, to compare the tobacco use patterns of athletes and nonathletes. The independent variable, athletic participation, differentiated between moderately involved (1 or 2 teams) and highly involved (3 or more teams) athletes. Frequency of cigarette and cigar smoking and smokeless tobacco use served as the operational measure of tobacco use. Age, race/ethnicity, parental education, and residence were controlled. Logistic regression was used to calculate odds ratios for female and male athletes and nonathletes for each of the tobacco use variables. It was found that both male and female athletes were less likely to have ever smoked regularly, the effect being stronger for more highly involved athletes of both genders. Cigar smoking was unrelated to athlete status. Both female and male athletes were more likely to have used smokeless tobacco, the effect being stronger for more highly involved athletes of both genders. The findings are discussed in terms of access to health information, performance considerations, social status factors, the salience of an athletic identity, and the influence of the athletic subculture on its members.

Adolescent↗
PubMed1999

High school athletic participation, sexual behavior and adolescent pregnancy: a regional study.

PURPOSE: To determine whether high school athletic participation among adolescents in Western New York was associated with reduced rates of sexual behavior and pregnancy involvement. METHODS: A secondary analysis of data from the Family and Adolescent Study, a longitudinal study of a random sample of adolescents (ages 13-16 years) from 699 families living in households in Western New York. A general population sample was obtained with characteristics closely matching the census distributions in the area. Interview and survey methods provided data on athletic participation, frequency of sexual relations during the past year, and risk for pregnancy. Bivariate correlations were used to examine relationships among athletic participation, demographic and control variables, and measures of sexual behavior and pregnancy rates. Next, path analyses were done in order to test for hypothesized relationships between athletic participation, sexual behavior, and pregnancy involvement while controlling for age, race, income, family cohesion, and non-athletic forms of extracurricular activity. Variables that were significantly associated with sexual behavior and/or pregnancy involvement were presented for both sexes within the resulting multivariate models. RESULTS: Lower income and higher rates of sexual activity were associated with higher rates of pregnancy involvement for both sexes. Family cohesion was associated with lower sexual activity rates for both sexes. For girls, athletic participation was directly related to reduced frequency of sexual behavior and, indirectly, to pregnancy risk. Male athletes did not exhibit lower rates of sexual behavior and involvement with pregnancy than male non-athletes. Boys who participated in the arts, however, did report lower rates of sexual behavior and, indirectly, less involvement with pregnancy. CONCLUSIONS: Female adolescents who participated in sports were less likely than their non-athletic peers to engage in sexual activity and/or report a pregnancy. Among male adolescents, athletic participation was unrelated to sexual behavior and pregnancy involvement. Teen pregnancy prevention efforts for girls should consider utilizing sport as a strategic tool.

Adolescent↗
PubMed1999

Development of an Attitudes Toward Health Care Teams Scale.

The authors describe the development and psychometric testing across three study phases of an Attitudes Toward Health Care Teams Scale. The measure contains two subscales: Quality of Care/Process (14 items) and Physician Centrality (6 items). The Quality of Care/Process subscale measures team members' perceptions of the quality of care delivered by health care teams and the quality of teamwork to accomplish this. The Physician Centrality subscale measures team members' attitudes toward physicians' authority in teams and their control over information about patients. Tests of reliability and validity demonstrate that each subscale is a strong measure of its respective underlying concept. The measure has potential for use as a research tool and as a pre- and posttest tool for educational interventions with teams and for evaluating clinically based team training programs for medical and health professions students and residents.

Attitude to Health↗
PubMed1998

Parental and peer influences on the onset of heavier drinking among adolescents.

OBJECTIVE: Less is known about heavier drinking in adolescents than about alcohol initiation. The present study examined the emergence of regular (weekly) and heavy episodic (five or more drinks at a time) adolescent drinking as a function of social influence (modeling and social control) from parents and peers. METHOD: A three-wave study was conducted using a representative household sample of families in metropolitan Buffalo, New York (N = 612). Over half (54%) of the adolescent respondents were female. Black families made up 30% of the sample. Interviews were conducted at 1-year intervals. Adolescent drinking was dichotomized at each wave into abstinence/light drinking versus regular drinking. Logistic regression including only adolescents who were abstainers/light drinkers at Wave 1 was performed to assess which Wave- variables could predict regular-drinking onset by Wave 2; a similar analysis examined the onset of heavy episodic drinking by Wave 2. Parallel analyses using Wave-2 variables to predict the onset of the drinking outcomes by Wave 3 were also conducted. RESULTS: Across the different analyses, the strongest psychosocial predictors of advancement to heavier drinking were friend's drinking and low parental monitoring. Also, white adolescents were at greater risk than their black counterparts. CONCLUSIONS: A multidimensional approach to prevention that addresses different processes of influence (e.g., modeling and social control) involving both parental and peer domains is likely to be most successful in deterring the onset of heavier drinking in adolescents.

Adolescent↗
PubMed1998

Athletic participation and sexual behavior in adolescents: the different worlds of boys and girls.

Using multivariate analysis of covariance to test hypotheses about the effects of sports and sexual behavior on a sample of 611 Western New York adolescents, this study concludes that athletic participation and gender interact to influence adolescent sexual outcomes. Female athletes report significantly lower rates of sexual activity than female nonathletes; male athletes report slightly (though not significantly) higher rates than male nonathletes. The gender-specific effect of sports on sexual behavior remains, net of the impacts of race, age, socioeconomic status, quality of family relations, and participation in other extracurricular activities. This paper introduces cultural resource theory to explain how athletic participation influences both traditional cultural scripts and exchange resources, which, in turn, condition the sexual bargaining process and its outcomes for adolescents.

Adolescent↗
PubMed1995

Family cohesion as a buffer against the effects of problem-drinking fathers on psychological distress, deviant behavior, and heavy drinking in adolescents.

In this paper we examine the degree to which family cohesion buffers the effects of fathers' problem drinking at Time 1 (T1) on adolescent distress, deviance, and heavy drinking at Time 2 (T2), one year later. Data from a representative sample of 658 families were used to test the hypotheses. Mothers, fathers (if present), and adolescent children were interviewed in the home. Fathers who were present completed self-report scales measuring problem drinking. When fathers were not available, mothers' reports on fathers' drinking were used to measure fathers' problem drinking. Results from regression analysis indicate that after controlling for the effects of race, SES, age, gender, and family structure: (1) the more cohesion in the family and the fever stressful events, the less distress, deviance, and heavy drinking shown by adolescents; (2) the fathers' problem drinking affects adolescent distress and deviance when cohesion is low; but as cohesion increases, the effects of the fathers' drinking are reduced. The findings support the hypothesis that cohesion in families buffers the effects of fathers' problem drinking on adolescents.

Adolescent↗
PubMed1994

Evolution of host cell RNA into efficient template RNA by Q beta replicase: the origin of RNA in untemplated reactions.

Q beta replicase can replicate a single molecule of certain species of RNA to 10(14) copies in minutes. This replication ability has been used for in vitro studies of molecular evolution and is currently being utilized as a method of amplifying RNAs that contain probe sequences. It has been observed that Q beta replicase can produce replicatable RNA even in the absence of exogenously added template RNA. The origin of this RNA has been ascribed either to contamination with replicatable RNA or to an ability of Q beta replicase to synthesize RNA de novo from the nucleotides present in the reaction. Technologies that employ Q beta replicase require a thorough understanding of the conditions that lead to this so-called spontaneous RNA production. We have created an expression system and purification method with which we produce gram quantities of highly purified Q beta replicase, and we have identified reaction conditions that prevent the amplification of RNA in assays that do not contain added RNA. However, when these reaction conditions are relaxed, spontaneous RNA replication is seen in up to 100% of the assays. To understand the origin of this RNA, we have cloned several spontaneously produced RNAs. Sequence analysis of one of these RNAs shows that it arose by the evolution of Escherichia coli tRNA into a replicatable template and not by de novo synthesis from nucleoside triphosphates in the reaction.

Allolevivirus↗
PubMed1993

Father's unemployment and adolescent's self-concept.

This study examined families in which fathers were affected by a steel mill shutdown, and tested hypotheses on the impact of unemployment on parent-child relations and adolescent self-concept. The hypotheses were tested by comparing convenience samples of three types of intact families with children between the ages of 12 and 18: continuously employed, unemployed with slight income loss, unemployed with significant income loss. As predicted, relationship with fathers were more negative when income loss was significant, but contrary to predictions, the relationship with mothers were not more positive, and adolescent self-concept was not directly affected by unemployment or income loss. However, a path analysis showed that income loss affected adolescent self-concept indirectly through its impact on parent-child relations.

Adolescent↗
PubMed1991

Identification of human papillomavirus type 16 in primary and recurrent cervical cancer following radiation therapy.

Formalin-fixed, paraffin-embedded tissue blocks from 13 women with cervical carcinoma that recurred following radiation therapy were evaluated for the presence of human papillomavirus (HPV) by in situ hybridization using ribonucleic acid 35S-labeled probes for HPV types 6, 11, 16, and 18. Ten of thirteen patients also had pretreatment biopsies from their primary tumors available for analysis. HPV 16 was detected in both primary and recurrent lesions in 4 women. In 1 case, HPV was detected in the primary tumor and not in the recurrence. HPV 16 was also present in three recurrent cancers from which primary lesions were not available for probing. Radiation therapy did not alter the hybridization signal strength or pattern, suggesting that the HPV genome copy number was not significantly affected. The persistence of HPV 16 in recurrent cervical carcinoma is consistent with the theory that HPV plays a role in maintaining the malignant state.

Adult↗
PubMed1987

Strontium phosphate transfection of human cells in primary culture: stable expression of the simian virus 40 large-T-antigen gene in primary human bronchial epithelial cells.

Strontium ion formed DNA-phosphate precipitates analogous to those formed by calcium but lacking the lethal and differentiation-inducing effects of calcium on many epithelial cell types in primary culture. Human primary bronchial epithelial cells were transiently and stably transfected by using strontium phosphate; the frequency of stable transformation with a plasmid carrying the simian virus 40 large-T-antigen gene was greater than 10(-4).

Antigens, Viral, Tumor↗