Emotional Changes Research Articles

Effect of olfactory stimulation from aromatherapy on the autonomic nervous activity during aerobic exercises

Variations in the autonomic nervous system activity during exercise therapy in patients with cardiovascular diseases may lead to adverse events. Aromatherapy may reduce these adverse events by enhancing parasympathetic nervous activity (PNA). However, the effects of aromatherapy during exercise remain relatively unknown. This study aimed to evaluate the effect of aromatherapy on autonomic nervous activity during exercise and recovery. This randomized crossover study included 20 healthy men subjected to both aroma and placebo conditions which involved rest and moderate-intensity aerobic exercise on a cycle ergometer, followed by recovery. Blood pressure, heart rate variability indices, and SpO2 were measured during the rest, exercise, and recovery phases. Moreover, aroma preferences and emotional changes in response to the aroma were assessed. Under the placebo condition, high frequency (HF), root mean square of successive differences indices, and heart rate showed delayed recovery (P < 0.05). Furthermore, a moderate positive correlation was identified between aroma preference, pleasant emotions induced by aromatherapy, and the HF index (P < 0.05). These results indicate that aromatherapy facilitates the recovery of PNA after exercise. Furthermore, these effects were more pronounced among individuals who exhibited a stronger preference for and more positive emotions toward aromas.

정신병동 실습을 통한 간호대학생의 자아성찰 경험

Objectives This study is to understand in-depth the nature of these experiences by confirming and describing the semantic structure of nursing students' introspection experiences. Methods This study is a qualitative study to reveal the subjective meaning of perceived and experienced contents in the psychiatric ward practice of nursing students using the Interpretive Phenomenological Analysis(IPA) re-search method. The subjects of this study were 10 third-year nursing students who experienced the practice of psychiatric wards at one university in Gyeongsangbuk-do. The data were collected from July 20 to September 20, 2019. Data were analyzed using IPA. Results As for the research results, 10 sub-themes and three sub-themes were derived. The first upper theme was ‘A wall of prejudice against psychiatry’, which was different from the existing practice, had prejudice against psychiatric patients, and even had distrust of oneself. The second upper theme is ‘Experience of criticism and un-derstanding’. The study participants experienced various and complex changes of emotions and thoughts while facing psychiatric patients for the first time, and named them ‘observation and understanding of patients’. The third upper theme is ‘Growth through psychiatric practice’. Participants in the study reported that they felt different through the process of self-reflection and that their relationship with patients changed positively. Conclusions The result suggests that, the essence of nursing college students' self-reflection experience not only helps students grow positively, but also provides the basis for the development of the curriculum for more sub-stantial practical education by presenting educational goals of psychiatric nursing. Therefore, efforts should be made to develop educational and program data that can promote self-reflection of nursing students based on the research results.

Temporal dynamics of positive emotion regulation: insights from facial electromyography.

Emotion regulation (ER) is a complex process that manifests gradually over time. This study investigated the temporal dynamics of ER in modifying positive emotions in terms of both negative affect (NA) and positive affect (PA) dimensions. After participants had been exposed to pleasant pictures for 8,000 ms, they received instructions to either continue viewing the picture (no regulation) or reappraise it with a neutral meaning (neutralize goal) or negative meaning (transform goal) for another 8,000 ms. We obtained corrugator supercilii and zygomaticus major electromyography (EMG) as objective measures of NA and PA. For the no-regulation condition, upon instruction onset, we observed maintained low levels of corrugator and high levels of zygomaticus EMG reactivity, indicating sustained PA activation. Compared to the no-regulation condition, for the neutralize goal, we observed no change in corrugator reactivity, which remained at a low level, while zygomaticus reduction started at 1,000 ms after instruction onset, indicating decreased PA and generation of a neutral emotional state. For the transform goal, we observed corrugator increase and zygomaticus decrease both starting at 1,500 ms after instruction onset and co-existing throughout the regulation period. These results indicate increased NA and decreased PA, relating to generation of a negative emotional state. The transform goal differed from the neutralize goal in terms of corrugator increase starting at 2,500 ms after instruction onset. Albeit simultaneous onset of changes on corrugator and zygomaticus reactivity under the transform goal, model-fitting analyses indicated that the best-fitting trajectory was one that first emphasized PA reduction until, at 3,000 ms, it turned into primary NA increase. These distinct temporal patterns highlight the possibility of effecting one-dimensional PA change with the neutralize goal and sequential two-dimensional change (first decreasing PA, then increasing NA) with the transform goal. This research sheds light on the time course of emotional change brought about by different regulatory goals.

Exploring the impact of seasonal forest landscapes on tourist emotions using Machine learning

This study investigates the emotional changes of tourists experiencing natural forest landscapes in different seasons, which plays a crucial role in the sustainable development of forest landscape systems and forest tourism. However, existing research has limited focus on the temporal impact of detailed elements of forest landscapes on tourists' emotions. We integrated a research framework utilizing methods such as Object Semantic Attention Network (OSANet), High-Resolution Net (Hrnet), EXtreme Gradient Boosting (XGBoost), and SHapley Additive exPlanations (SHAP), thereby uncovering the nonlinear impact of detailed forest landscape indicators on tourist emotions. The results revealed(1) In the past three years, the emotional score assessments of tourists' experiences in natural forest landscapes showed a prevalence of positive emotions at 85.7%, with negative emotions constituting 14.3%. The emotional distribution characteristics varied significantly across seasons, with kernel density peak values of 4.16 in spring, 2.43 in summer, 5.33 in autumn, and 1.74 in winter. (2) The landscape indicators with the most significant impact on emotions across different seasons were Openness in spring, summer, and autumn (with contribution values exceeding 0.16, 0.13, and 0.175, respectively) and Ground exposure in winter (with a contribution value greater than 0.2). The SHAP waterfall charts indicated that the indicators providing a stable positive effect varied by seasonTrees in spring (0.361), Openness in summer and autumn (0.276 and 0.24, respectively), and Mountains in winter (0.145). This study provides a data foundation for the sustainable development of forest landscapes and tourism, aiding planners and managers in understanding the nonlinear impact of detailed elements of forest natural landscapes on tourists' emotions across different seasons. It also broadens the methodologies and perspectives for researching seasonal forest landscape preferences.

A real-time virtual outing using virtual reality for a hospitalized terminal cancer patient who has difficulty going out: a case report

Objective: Even if hospitalized terminal cancer patients wish to go out, it is sometimes difficult for them to realize this because of various symptoms. We have been providing a virtual outing experience using virtual reality (VR) for terminal cancer patients who have difficulty going out, and have often received requests to “talk with people in the virtual outing,” but there is a problem that a large time lag occurs in conversation in a VR space under the general Internet environment. However, with the advent of systems that enable high-speed, low-latency communications, real-time communication is now possible even in VR spaces. Thus, we aimed to explore the feasibility of implementing the real-time virtual outing.Methods: The patient’s preferred virtual outing was to his daughter’s new home. The study operator used a 360° video real-time sharing system to broadcast the view of the daughter’s home. The patient experienced the images using a VR head-mounted display in his room. The patient’s wife, son, daughter, and grandson participated in this delivery using a laptop computer from a dayroom in the hospital, and his daughter’s husband participated using the 360° video real-time sharing system from the daughter’s home with the researcher. Before and after the virtual outing, changes in symptoms and emotions were assessed using the Edmonton Symptom Assessment System Revised Japanese version and the Numerical Rating Scale for headache, dizziness, pleasure, and satisfaction. In addition, we collected the patients’ impressions of the virtual outing.Results: The patient was a male in his early 70s. After approximately 30 min of real-time virtual outings, “tiredness, drowsiness, depression, and wellbeing” were improved and “pleasure, and satisfaction” were increased, while no side effects or worsening of symptoms were observed. In addition, it was observed from the patient’s comments that he felt a sense of presence, as if he were her home.Discussion: The patient and his family could enjoy smooth conversation without time lag even in the VR space. Therefore, it was suggested that real-time virtual outings using VR could help realize the wishes of hospitalized terminal cancer patients who have difficulty going out as a new approach.

Experience of undergraduate nursing students participating in artificial intelligence + project task driven learning at different stages: a qualitative study

BackgroundArtificial intelligence is a growing phenomenon that will soon facilitate wide-scale changes in many professions, and is expected to play an important role in the field of medical education. This study explored the realistic feelings and experiences of nursing undergraduates participating in different stages of artificial intelligence + project task driven learning, and provide a basis for artificial intelligence participation in nursing teaching.MethodsWe conducted face-to-face semi-structured interviews with nursing undergraduates participating in Nursing Research Course which adopts artificial intelligence + project task driven learning from a medical university in Ningxia from September to November 2023, to understand their experience of using artificial intelligence for learning and the emotional changes at different stages. The interview guide included items about their personal experience and feelings of completing project tasks through dialogue with artificial intelligence, and suggestions for course content. Thematic analysis was used to analyze interview data. This study followed the COREQ checklist.ResultsAccording to the interview data, three themes were summarized. Undergraduate nursing students have different experiences in participating in artificial intelligence + project task driven learning at different stages, mainly manifested as diverse emotional experiences under initial knowledge deficiency, the individual growth supported by external forces during the adaptation period, and the expectations and suggestions after the birth of the results in the end period.ConclusionsNursing undergraduates can actively adapt to the integration of artificial intelligence into nursing teaching, dynamically observe students’ learning experience, strengthen positive guidance, and provide support for personalized teaching models, better leveraging the advantages of artificial intelligence participation in teaching.

Investigating emotion fluctuations in driving behaviors of online car-hailing drivers using naturalistic driving data

Research has shown that a driver’s emotional state is closely related to the driver’s driving behavior. However, most studies have focused on the impact of static and discrete emotions on driver behavior, neglecting the emotion fluctuations that can occur in real-world contexts. To address this gap, we analyzed emotion change patterns of drivers engaged in aggressive driving versus normal driving. We used online car-hailing data to identify aggressive driving, which is defined by a dynamic acceleration threshold determined from vehicle kinematics data. We used two dimensions, valence and arousal, to describe different levels of emotions by processing videos of drivers' facial expressions using FaceReader software. By analyzing the characteristics of drivers’ emotional changes, we determined a six-second time window as the length of an emotion fluctuation segment. Then, we applied dynamic time warping k-means clustering as a time-series clustering method to divide the emotion fluctuations into several categories. We categorized the valence fluctuations into negative, calm, and positive and the arousal fluctuations into high and low. The clustering analysis revealed a marked fluctuation in the emotional valence of drivers during aggressive driving as opposed to the relatively smooth patterns observed during normal driving. Moreover, during aggressive driving, the driver’s arousal can continuously reach higher values compared to during normal driving. This study presents a novel approach to investigating the relationship between emotions and driving behavior and provides important reference and guidance for drivers’ emotional perceptions and the detection of emotion fluctuations for advanced assisted driving systems to improve driving safety.

Child Sexual Abuse in Boys: A Retrospective Investigation

Background: Although recent studies have increased public awareness of child sexual abuse, certain aspects of the issue remain unclear. While research on sexual abuse in girls is abundant, there is limited focus on boys in our country. This study aims to explore the characteristics of cases involving sexual abuse of boys in the province of Türkiye. Methods: The study is descriptive and retrospective in nature. A total of 245 boys who underwent forensic interviews for alleged sexual abuse between September 2017 and March 2023 at the Child Advocacy Center in the province of Türkiye were retrospectively examined. Results: The study included 245 boys aged 3-18 with a mean age of 11.04±3.39. The most common type of sexual abuse was non-penetrative contact (57.6%). Delayed disclosure was primarily attributed to factors such as threat, fear, and shame. Sexual abuse predominantly occurred in public places (56.5%). There were significant among age groups concerning the identity of the reporters, initial disclosure persons, the existence of abuse, and reporting time. However, no significant differences were found in the presence of multiple suspects, recurrent abuse, and the incident location. Post-abuse behavioral changes in children included fear of the perpetrator (15.5%), emotional changes (15.5%), physiological changes (9.4%), and the displaying of risky behaviors (4.1%). Conclusion: The study emphasized the importance of not overlooking sexual abuse among male children. The findings underscore the need for enhanced awareness and intervention strategies to address sexual abuse in boys within the country.

Applying dynamic systems theory and complexity theory methods in psychotherapy research: A systematic literature review

Objective Dynamic systems theory and complexity theory (DST/CT) is a framework explaining how complex systems change and adapt over time. In psychotherapy, DST/CT can be used to understand how a person's mental and emotional state changes during therapy incorporating higher levels of complexity. This study aimed to systematically review the variability of DST/CT methods applied in psychotherapy research. Methods A primary studies search was conducted in the EBSCO and Web of Knowledge databases, extracting information about the analyzed DST/CT phenomena, employed mathematical methods to investigate these phenomena, descriptions of specified dynamic models, psychotherapy phenomena, and other information regarding studies with empirical data (e.g., measurement granularity). Results After screening 38,216 abstracts and 4,194 full texts, N = 41 studies published from 1990 to 2021 were identified. The employed methods typically included measures of dynamic complexity or chaoticity. Computational and simulation studies most often employed first-order ordinary differential equations and typically focused on describing the time evolution of client-therapist dyadic influences. Eligible studies with empirical data were usually based on case studies and focused on data with high time intensity of within-session dynamics. Conclusion This review provides a descriptive synthesis of the current state of the proliferation of DST/CT methods in the psychotherapy research field.

Real emotional experience of family members of patients transported within hospital in neurosurgical intensive care unit: A descriptive qualitative study.

To understand the real experience of family members of patients in neurosurgical intensive care unit (NICU) during intra-hospital transport (IHT), explore their inner needs and provide effective intervention measures for the construction of standardized IHT plan. A descriptive qualitative study. For the purposes of this study, 10 family members of IHT patients were included using a purposive sampling method. Semi-structured in-depth interviews were used to collect the data, Nvivo 11 software was used to organize the data, and Colaizzi's 7-step descriptive phenomenology method was used to analyse the data. A total of three themes and nine subthemes were extracted, namely: Experience of emotional changes at different stages (uncertainty before transfer, complex internal activity during transit, ambivalence after transfer); Perception of problems in IHT (poor doctor-patient communication, weak awareness of risk assessment, deficiencies in the transfer procedure); Consciousness of the real needs (emotional respect and closeness, stay informed of the progression of the disease, greater social support). Family members of patients in the NICU have complex internal experiences and multiple support needs during IHT, reflecting the need for further standardization of the transport process. In the future, we should improve the mode of safe IHT involving doctors, nurses and family members of patients, ensure the safety of patient transport, meet the social support needs of family members and improve the experience of IHT and the medical satisfaction of family members.

Prevalence of Psychiatric Morbidity and Somatic Symptoms in Perimenopausal Women

ABSTRACT Background: During the perimenopausal phase, women experience a myriad of somatic symptoms as well as changes in mood and emotions which could be related to the endocrine changes and psychological factors during this transition. Aim: The aim was to assess the prevalence of somatic symptoms and psychiatric morbidity in perimenopausal women. Material and Methods: By purposive sampling, 100 women in the age group of 45–55 years were included in the study with their consent. They were assessed with a self-made sociodemographic proforma, Mini-International Neuropsychiatric Interview (MINI), depression, anxiety, stress scale (DASS 21), Menopause Rating Scale, big five inventory scale (BFI-10), and social support scale. Results: Psychiatric morbidity was seen in 41% of perimenopausal women, out of which 32% showed somatic symptoms. Seventeen percent had mild-to-moderate depressive features, 17% showed mild-to-moderate anxiety, and 7% were dysthymic. Conclusion: Prevalent life stressors seemed to affect the transition into menopause for many women which directly corresponded to the prevalence of psychiatric morbidity and somatic symptoms in them.

A Critical Review Based on Preclinical Studies of Medicinal Plants for the Management of Alzheimer’s Disease

Abstract: Alzheimer’s disease (AD) is the most common neurodegenerative and progressive disorder that results in damage to memory and alters thinking and behavior, which represent critical problems the world’s aging population is faced with. Clinical symptoms of AD include cognitive decline, loss of memory, emotional and behavioral changes, loss of motor coordination, and mental impairments. Yet, neither a universally accepted diagnosis with respect to its pathogenesis nor an ideal therapy is available for the management of AD. The existing drugs cause many complications and adverse effects. Herbal drugs, supported by an abundance of traditional knowledge, may fulfill the need as they can target the pathogenesis of AD at various destinations, both at the cellular and molecular levels. In recent years, herbal drugs and formulations have been evaluated in preclinical setups, especially involving rat and mouse models of AD, which have shown their memoryenhancing, neuroprotective, and antioxidant activities. Several herbal drugs and phytochemicals have been evaluated for their effectiveness as antioxidative agents to prevent the occurrence of oxidative stress and ROS formation during AD pathogenesis and exhibit antiapoptotic properties by downregulating caspase-3, DNA fragmentation, NF-κB, interleukin-1 β (IL1β), and TNF levels. In this paper, we have primarily reviewed herbal remedies that have been recently evaluated as alternative treatments for AD in a preclinical setup, and discussed the role of herbal medicines in the management of AD and advances in their knowledge.

Self-assessment of emotional arousal in adolescents and young adults

Introduction. The deep level of integration of cognitive and emotional processes must be taken into account in the modern education system and in the training of teaching staff. Adolescence is characterized by intense changes in the emotional sphere. At the same time, the data on emotional processes changes in adolescents are quite contradictory. In addition, most studies of emotions in this age period were carried out in Western culture and the problem of cross-cultural comparisons of emotional development patterns rarely attract the attention of researchers. To correctly measure a person’s emotional sphere, methods that have passed the validation procedure in the country where the work is planned are needed. One way to study emotional reactions is the IAPS database of emotionally evocative photographs. The aim of the study was to compare emotional performance at different stages of adolescence and early adulthood in as part of testing emotionally charged IAPS stimuli on a Russian adolescent sample. Materials and methods. The study involved 436 adolescents and young adults. Four groups were compared: 10-12 years old (49 boys and 51 girls), 13-14 years old (48 boys, 48 girls), 15-17 years old (45 boys, 75 girls) and 18-25 years old (24 men and 96 women). Participants in the study were required to evaluate the emotions that arose in response to the presentation of IAPS pictures on the screen on the scales of valence (feeling of pleasure - displeasure), arousal (strength of excitation) and dominance (feeling of control over the situation). Results. The valence, arousal and dominance scores were obtained for Russian samples 10-12 years old, 13-14 years old, 15-17 years old, 18-25 years old, with a high level of reliability. In addition, cross-cultural differences from American norms were demonstrated, emphasizing the necessity to use scores developed on representatives of the culture where the study is planned to be carry out. The study also showed that in adolescence there is a change in the affective space formed by the scale of valence and arousal, which indicates a crucial change in the emotional sphere during this period. The comparison showed significant differences on emotional scales for both positive and negative emotions between different age groups, indicating the dynamics of emotional development. The complex pattern of differences in valence, arousal and dominance scales between different age groups suggests non-linear changes. Conclusion. The standards for the valence, arousal and dominance scales of the IAPS database for Russian adolescents and young adults, which can be used to measure the emotional variables are presented in a study.

ACADEMIC EMOTIONS OF MIDDLE SCHOOL STUDENTS LEARNING ENGLISH AFTER THE COVID-19 PANDEMIC: HIGH ACHIEVERS' EXPERIENCES

Changes in English language learning experienced by students after the pandemic can elicit a range of academic emotions. These emotional changes can be due to the environment and different learning atmospheres. The existence of these emotional changes will also have an impact on students’ academic achievement. Therefore, this study aims to examine the academic emotions of high-achieving students of junior high school learning English after the Covid-19 pandemic and how they affect students’ effectiveness in learning English. Using a descriptive case study research design to explore students' academic emotions, the research revealed the existence of four types of academic emotions: achievement, epistemic, topic, and social emotions. Each type was accompanied by positive and negative experiences. The positive emotions such as happiness, enjoyment and confidence can be caused by their enthusiasm and interest in learning, which closely related to the achievement obtained. Inversely related to the negative emotions, they tend to feel bad when they do not like something done during offline learning.

느린 학습자의 자존감 향상을 위한 인문치료 사례연구

The purpose of this study was to investigate the effectiveness of humanistic therapy to improve the self-esteem of slow learners. The subjects of this study were slow learner adolescents in the first year of a specialized high school, who were experiencing problems such as academic sluggishness, psychological atrophy, peer relationship inadequacy, and school life inadequacy. The study explored the process of change through the application of a humanistic therapy program over 30 sessions. The results of this study were as follows First, she showed positive changes in expressing their feelings and thoughts through emotional writing and therapeutic writing. Second, she showed academic changes, such as improving their presentation skills in class through activities such as reading literary short texts such as poems and essays and non-literary texts from textbooks slowly and repeatedly out loud. Third, she was attitudinal changes in life, such as recognizing the extent of school progress and saying no to friends. Humanistic therapy had a positive effect on the student's emotional changes, self-disclosure, and relationship improvement, and served as a medium to help improve the main complaints of the subject.

노화불안의 척도 개발 및 타당화

This study aimed to analyze the actual contents of elderly people's anxiety about aging, develop a tool to measure aging anxiety based on this analysis, and validate it. Based on the factors of aging anxiety obtained through the analysis of existing scales for aging anxiety, the analysis of literature related to aging and aging anxiety, and in-depth interviews with 15 elderly participants in the "Senior Culture Leisure Total Service Program," 45 preliminary items consisting of 5 domains and 11 factors were selected. As a result of conducting face-to-face and online surveys targeting 50 to 59-year-old pre-elderly individuals and 216 elderly individuals aged 60 and older living in D, G, and I cities, the final sample of 200 respondents was selected. To validate the obtained data, a series of exploratory factor analyses, confirmatory factor analyses, and a concurrent validity analysis were conducted. As a result of the analyses, 10 aging anxiety factors corresponding to physical, psychological, social, environmental, and existential domains were identified, including health loss, attractiveness loss, cognitive function loss, emotional changes, material loss, relationship loss, role loss, loss of meaning in life, death anxiety, and contextual maladjustment. Furthermore, these aging anxiety factors showed relatively high positive correlations with the factors of "life stress" selected as criteria for concurrent validity verification. It is expected that the aging anxiety assessment developed and validated in this study will help to diagnose the factors of psychological anxiety in the elderly more precisely and contribute to providing adaptive counseling support for the elderly.

디지털미디어 시대 문화적 불통과 대안 고찰

This study pointed to the maximization of heterogeneity due to digital literacy gaps and cultural retardation as a problem that we are paying attention to in the media age today. In this pater, the emotional impact of the issue was analyzed, and accordingly, the aspect of consciousness was presented as an alternative for each individual to experience and reflect on the realization of communication. The study discussed which emotional situations can be linked to social fragmentation, focusing on three elements of the consciousness that cause cultural miscommunication: ‘grouping of reactions, logic of concealment, and passive convergence’. In addition, it was emphasized that it is important to establish autonomous standards for communication and think specifically the level of self-awareness in relation to emotional states through self-immersion in order to change various problems caused by miscommunication. On the other hand, it was examined whether a being can be defined by the limited and continuous nature of identity, considering that the world is changed according to the mind rather than the mind is attributed to environmental factors. While acknowledging that he identity of existence cannot be defined, it was derived that the process of dealing with it from various perspectives and methods by using the identity as a topic will soon disprove some kind of identity. It was believed that such communication can begin by observing the accompanying emotional changes when experience has been accumulated to think differently of the meaning of action in various aspects.

Factors influencing stigma among college students with COVID-19 in South Korea: a descriptive study.

This study is descriptive research aiming to identify factors influencing the stigma experienced by college students with coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19), focusing on COVID-19 pandemic stress, depression, and fear of negative evaluation as the main variables. An online survey was administered to 175 college students who had been diagnosed with COVID-19 from January to May 2022 and were enrolled in universities in Seoul, Cheongju, and Daegu, South Korea. The survey collected data on pandemic stress, depression, fear of negative evaluation, and stigma. The data were analyzed using the t-test, ANOVA, the Scheffé test, Pearson's correlation coefficients, and stepwise multiple regression in SPSS/WIN 26.0. We analyzed differences in stigma scores based on general characteristics of the college students and found significant differences in stigma scores by age, major satisfaction, interpersonal satisfaction, date of COVID-19 confirmation, treatment modality, and recent subjective health condition. Factors influencing stigmatization were identified as COVID-19 pandemic stress, depression, date of COVID-19 confirmation, treatment modality, recent subjective health condition, and major satisfaction, with an overall explanatory power of 37.6%. This study is significant as it identifies emotional changes across various aspects of pandemic stress, depression, fear of negative evaluation, and stigma among college students who have been diagnosed with COVID-19. The findings of this study suggest the development of programs to reduce psychological distress and enhance mental health management skills among these students.

Self-Compassion: Unveiling Mental Health Through Emotion Regulation in High-school Students

This study aims to examine the effect of self-compassion on mental health, with emotion regulation as a mediator variable. Adolescents experience rapid physical, cognitive, emotional and psychological changes in themselves that have the potential to cause mental health problems. The key to success in maintaining mental health is learning to be kind and compassionate to oneself, especially in stressful and difficult situations, or self-compassion. Self-compassion plays an important role in mental health outcomes, where self-compassion will include the emotion regulation component, helping individuals to face and understand negative emotions as adaptive coping. Effective emotion regulation will shape healthy adolescents, so it is suggested that emotion regulation may mediate the influence of self-compassion on mental health. This research uses quantitative methods and was conducted on 574 high school students in Medan, aged 14-19 years. The instruments used were the Warwick Edinburg Mental Wellbeing Scale (WEMWBS), the Self-Compassion Scale, and the Emotion Regulation Scale. The results of the mediation analysis using PLS-SEM4 show that emotion regulation significantly mediates the influence between self-compassion and mental health (T-statistic = 3.694 &gt; 1.96 and P-values = .000 &lt; .05). The results showed that emotion regulation plays a partial role in the effect of self-compassion on mental health. Adolescents who practise self-compassion will try to develop positive thinking skills and reduce the pressure and tension resulting from negative emotions, which will ultimately improve their mental health.

Effect of Therapeutic Gardening Program in Urban Gardens on the Mental Health of Children and Their Caregivers with Atopic Dermatitis.

This study was conducted to identify the physical and psychological difficulties of children with atopic dermatitis and their caregivers, and to investigate the effects of participation in a novel therapeutic gardening program based on psychological intervention on their physical and mental health. The program, consisting of 15 sessions, was conducted for approximately 4 months in urban gardens in Seoul and involved 30 children with atopic dermatitis and their caregivers. Additionally, a control group of 30 non-participating caregivers was recruited for comparative analysis. The psychological and emotional changes in caregivers were assessed using six self-report scales (depression, anxiety, stress, vitality, life satisfaction, parenting efficacy) before and after participation in the program. Additionally, the depression index (CDI) and atopic dermatitis index (SCORAD, TEWL) were measured for the children with atopic dermatitis. The research results indicate that the therapeutic gardening program utilizing psychological intervention had a positive impact on the physiological and psychological health of participants. These results are significant as they demonstrate the clinical application of the professionally developed therapeutic gardening program through active intervention and operation. This study suggests that this program can serve as an effective intervention in improving the mental health of both children with atopic dermatitis and their caregivers.