Can people living with and beyond colorectal cancer make lifestyle changes with the support of health technology: A feasibility study

BACKGROUND

Rates of cancer survival are increasing, with more people living with and beyond cancer. Lifestyle recommendations for cancer survivors are based largely on extrapolation from cancer prevention recommendations. This feasibility study was designed to investigate diet and physical activity variables linked to primary prevention and digital behaviour change interventions in cancer survivors and delivered by an oncology dietitian to plan for future research.

METHODS

In this 2-month feasibility study, participants who had completed treatment for colorectal cancer were invited to complete online food diaries, underwent physical activity assessment, attended fortnightly telephone consultations with an oncology dietitian and completed an evaluation form. The baseline food diaries were used to help participants pick two lifestyle changes to focus on throughout the intervention. Demographic and clinical data were analysed using descriptive statistics.

RESULTS

In total, 996 patients were screened for eligibility; of these, 78 were eligible to approach and 69 were approached, resulting in 20 participants consenting to take part. Overall, the intervention was acceptable with 65% of participants completing an online food diary and 70% engaging with the dietitian over the telephone. The intervention received good feedback, with 100% of those completing the evaluation form reporting they felt supported and found it helpful.

CONCLUSIONS

The present study offers preliminary evidence that a lifestyle intervention delivered by an oncology dietitian using digital behaviour change interventions (DBCIs) to cancer survivors is feasible and accepted by participants and providers.

"He Who Sings, Prays Twice"? Singing in Roman Catholic Mass Leads to Spiritual and Social Experiences That Are Predicted by Religious and Musical Attitudes

Singing is an essential element in every religion. In the liturgy of the Roman Catholic Church, theologians expect congregational singing to have several clear-cut effects which can be translated into psychological hypotheses. This study is the first to approach these quantitatively. N = 1603 Catholics from German-speaking countries answered an exhaustive questionnaire that asked whether and to what degree these putative effects were actually experienced by churchgoers. We found that people do, to a large degree, associate feelings of community and spiritual experiences with congregational singing. We also identified relevant intraindividual factors that contribute to the frequency of these experiences, most importantly, religious and musical attitudes. These results are discussed in the light of psychological literature on the effects of group singing on social bonding and wellbeing, but also in the context of theological, ethnomusicological, and sociological research on singing, songs, and spiritual and social experiences.

The Effect of Parents' Attitudes on Sons' Marriage Timing

Theories of family stability and change, demographic processes, and social psychological influences on behavior all posit that parental attitudes and beliefs are a key influence on their children's behavior. Though we have evidence of these effects in Western populations, there is little information regarding this social mechanism in non-Western contexts. Furthermore, comparisons of mothers' and fathers' independent roles in these crucial intergenerational mechanisms are rare. This paper uses measures from a ten-year family panel study featuring independent interviews with both mothers and fathers in rural Nepal to investigate these issues. We test the association of specific attitudes, rather than broad ideational domains, about childbearing and old-age care with sons' subsequent marriage behavior. Our results indicate that both mothers' and fathers' attitudes have important and independent influences on sons' marriage behavior. Simultaneous study of both parents' attitudes reveals that gender-specific parenting contexts can shape the relationship between parental attitudes and children's behaviors. This crucial mechanism of intergenerational continuity and change is strong in this non-Western setting, with substantial implications for studies of intergenerational influences on behavior in all settings.