Perceptions Of Psychological Safety Research Articles

Examining the promotion of mental health and wellbeing in Australian sports clubs

ABSTRACT Organised sport is increasingly recognised as a culturally acceptable site for mental health and wellbeing promotion. To date, however, there is limited knowledge pertaining to how exactly mental health and wellbeing is supported in such contexts. The present study aimed to provide insight into mental health and wellbeing promotion practices in Australian sports clubs. An online cross-sectional survey examined the current provision of mental health and wellbeing initiatives in sports clubs, barriers and motives to such promotional efforts, and perceptions of psychological safety within club environments. The survey was completed by 302 stakeholders of Australian sports clubs (Mage = 41.3 ± 15.7 years, 46.7% male). Fewer than half of stakeholders (47.7%) reported that their sports club had implemented initiatives to support mental health and wellbeing. Insufficient resources (e.g. knowledge, finances) were identified as the most prominent barrier to such promotional efforts. Sports clubs reported using various initiatives to promote mental health and wellbeing, although evidence-based resources (e.g. Ahead of the Game) were rarely implemented. Stakeholders in sports clubs that had implemented initiatives to support mental health and wellbeing perceived their club as a more mentally healthy environment and attained higher mental health literacy scores. Ongoing efforts to increase the utilisation of sports settings to support mental health and wellbeing are necessary.

Understanding the Impacts of Online Mental Health Peer Support Forums: Realist Synthesis.

Online forums are widely used for mental health peer support. However, evidence of their safety and effectiveness is mixed. Further research focused on articulating the contexts in which positive and negative impacts emerge from forum use is required to inform innovations in implementation. This study aimed to develop a realist program theory to explain the impacts of online mental health peer support forums on users. We conducted a realist synthesis of literature published between 2019 and 2023 and 18 stakeholder interviews with forum staff. Synthesis of 102 evidence sources and 18 interviews produced an overarching program theory comprising 22 context-mechanism-outcome configurations. Findings indicate that users' perceptions of psychological safety and the personal relevance of forum content are foundational to ongoing engagement. Safe and active forums that provide convenient access to information and advice can lead to improvements in mental health self-efficacy. Within the context of welcoming and nonjudgmental communities, users may benefit from the opportunity to explore personal difficulties with peers, experience reduced isolation and normalization of mental health experiences, and engage in mutual encouragement. The program theory highlights the vital role of moderators in creating facilitative online spaces, stimulating community engagement, and limiting access to distressing content. A key challenge for organizations that host mental health forums lies in balancing forum openness and anonymity with the need to enforce rules, such as restrictions on what users can discuss, to promote community safety. This is the first realist synthesis of online mental health peer support forums. The novel program theory highlights how successful implementation depends on establishing protocols for enhancing safety and strategies for maintaining user engagement to promote forum sustainability. PROSPERO CRD42022352528; https://www.crd.york.ac.uk/prospero/display_record.php?RecordID=352528.

Perceptions of psychological safety in healthcare professionals’ online learner-learner interactions

Perceptions of psychological safety in healthcare professionals’ online learner-learner interactions

Intrinsic Factors and Psychological Safety Among Nursing Students During Simulation-Based Learning-A Correlational Design.

Well-designed simulation-based learning (SBL) experiences enhance students' self-confidence, self-efficacy, clinical judgment, and psychomotor skill development. An emerging concept in SBL research is psychological safety. There is currently no research on factors influencing psychological safety specifically related to the SBL environment, nor is there any literature found to determine whether intrinsic student characteristic, such as self-compassion and resilience, contributes to SBL learning outcomes. The aim of this study is to determine whether there is a relationship between nursing students' intrinsic characteristics (self-compassion, resilience, and anxiety sensitivity) and their psychological safety. Bivariate correlation was used to examine associations among sociodemographic variables and outcome variables. Multiple regression was used to determine the predictive nature of the sociodemographic variables. Assumptions for variables in multiple regression models were tested (normal distribution, heteroscedasticity, multicollinearity). All data were analyzed in SPSS, Version 28. The P value of significance was set at 0.05 for all analyses. Most of the 118 participants were non-Hispanic (89%), White (65%), and females (95%). Results of the demographic bivariate analysis revealed no significant differences among this diverse group or semester in the curriculum for psychological safety. The multiple regression found self-compassion (β = 29, P = 0.004), anxiety sensitivity (β = -0.16, P = 0.049), and resilience (β = 0.26, P = 0.004) predict psychological safety. The importance of creating a psychologically safe learning environment has been recognized as essential to best practices. Our findings suggest that an understanding of student characteristics that impact their perception of psychological safety will allow educators to develop strategies to better support learners in the simulation environment.

Team coaching using LSP and team facilitation: a randomized control trial study measuring team cohesion and psychological safety

PurposeTo date, little research has been undertaken to test the effectiveness of team coaching, with past work focusing on models, frameworks and competencies. This study aimed to examine the effectiveness of team coaching within real world organizational teams and its impact on individual perceptions of team cohesion and psychological safety.Design/methodology/approachA randomized control trial (RCT) using the comparable interventions: (1) team coaching (intervention) and (2) team facilitation (control) was employed with multiple teams and multiple facilitators, measuring the impact on team cohesion and psychological safety.FindingsThe data indicate participants engaging in the team coaching intervention made greater gains in terms of their individual perceptions of psychological safety and team cohesion than individuals who received the team facilitation intervention (T1–T2).Practical implicationsFacilitators should apply a team coaching approach when seeking to address issues of cohesion and psychological safety within workplace teams.Originality/valueThis study provides the first evidence, using an RCT method, of the effectiveness of team coaching as a workplace intervention for enhancing individual perceptions of psychological safety and team cohesion.

Coaches' benevolent leadership and athlete burnout: Mediating effect of psychological safety

Research has been conducted to explore the effect of factors relating to coaches' leadership on Chinese athletes' burnout, but less attention has been paid to coaches' leadership style, such as benevolent leadership. In this study conducted with 282 athletes at three Chinese universities, we investigated how the benevolent leadership of the coach is related to athlete burnout and if athletes' psychological safety mediates this relationship. We analyzed survey data using structural equation modeling. Results indicated that coaches' benevolent leadership was negatively associated with athlete burnout, and this relationship was mediated by psychological safety. These findings enhance understanding of the mechanism between coaches' benevolent leadership and athlete burnout, and shed light on the important role in this relationship of athletes' perception of psychological safety.

Peers’ unethical behavior and employees' discretionary behavior: Role of employees’ duty orientation

As unethical behavior is of significant concern for organizations, this study examines the effect of peers’ unethical behavior (PUB) in the hospitality sector. Though earlier research suggests the impact of PUB on employees’ ethical intentions, the influence of PUB on organizational citizenship behavior (OCB) and interpersonal deviance (ID) is unexplored. To address this gap, this study uses social learning theory and social information process theory to examine the effect of PUB on OCB and ID through psychological safety as a mediating mechanism and duty orientation as a moderating variable. Using partial least squares structural equation modeling on a three-wave (time lag) survey of a sample of 316 frontline employees in the hotel industry, findings suggest PUB reduces employees’ perception of psychological safety and subsequently reduces OCB and enhances ID. However, high-duty orientation helps to mitigate the negative effect of PUB on employees’ OCB and IDs. The paper concludes with suggestions to reduce unethical behavior and create a positive work context.

Burnout, Help Seeking, and Perceptions of Psychological Safety and Stigma Among National Collegiate Athletic Association Coaches

Sport coaches face unique work-related demands that, over time, can lead to negative well-being outcomes, such as burnout. The link between burnout and mental health is supported in the literature, and public stigma around mental health has been identified as a prominent barrier to seeking help. The aim of this study was to investigate how burnout and help-seeking attitudes of National Collegiate Athletic Association coaches are impacted by psychological safety and public stigma associated with seeking help. A sample of 187 National Collegiate Athletic Association coaches participated in a cross-sectional online survey and reported sociodemographic and job-related characteristics, public stigma, self and team psychological safety, burnout, and attitudes toward help seeking. Regression-based mediation analyses revealed that greater psychological safety predicted lower levels of exhaustion and disengagement as well as more positive help-seeking attitudes. In addition, public stigma partially mediated the influence of psychological safety on exhaustion and disengagement and fully mediated the relationship between psychological safety and help-seeking attitudes. No differences in exhaustion, disengagement, and help-seeking attitudes among National Collegiate Athletic Association coaches across Divisions I, II, and III were observed. Findings lend support for intervention development to increase psychological safety as a burnout management strategy as well as to reduce public stigma associated with help seeking.

THE ROLE OF EMOTIONAL DEVELOPMENT OF EMPLOYEES AND PEOPLE-ORIENTED LEADERSHIP IN PERCEIVING PSYCHOLOGICAL SAFETY IN ORGANIZATIONS

The aim of this study was to examine whether the emotional development of employees, specifically attachment, acts as a moderator determining the conditions under which people-oriented leaders can enhance the sense of psychological safety within their teams. A total of 246 participants (54% female), aged 22 to 59 (M = 32.10; SD = 7.58), employed in corporate-type organizations, took part in the research. The instruments used included the Psychological Safety Questionnaire, the Serbian version of the Experiences in Close Relationships Scale, and the People-Oriented Leadership subscale from the Ethical Leadership Scale at Work. The results revealed that the dimension of anxiety predicted psychological safety, and a statistically significant interaction was observed between this dimension and people-oriented leadership. The findings demonstrated that a positive inner model could significantly enhance the perception of psychological safety when the effect of people-oriented leadership was absent. However, it was also found that as the effect of people-oriented leadership increased, psychological safety increased as well, independently of the level of employee attachment. The practical implications of these results were discussed, considering the context of attachment theory and the conservation of resources theory.

The influence of hospital leadership support on burnout, psychological safety, and safety climate for US infection preventionists during the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic.

To explore infection preventionists' perceptions of hospital leadership support for infection prevention and control programs during the coronavirus disease 2019 (COVID-19) pandemic and relationships with individual perceptions of burnout, psychological safety, and safety climate. Cross-sectional survey, administered April through December 2021. Random sample of non-federal acute-care hospitals in the United States. Lead infection preventionists. We received responses from 415 of 881 infection preventionists, representing a response rate of 47%. Among respondents, 64% reported very good to excellent hospital leadership support for their infection prevention and control program. However, 49% reported feeling burned out from their work. Also, ∼30% responded positively for all 7 psychological safety questions and were deemed to have "high psychological safety," and 76% responded positively to the 2 safety climate questions and were deemed to have a "high safety climate." Our results indicate an association between strong hospital leadership support and lower burnout (IRR, 0.61; 95% CI, 0.50-0.74), higher perceptions of psychological safety (IRR, 3.20; 95% CI, 2.00-5.10), and a corresponding 1.2 increase in safety climate on an ascending Likert scale from 1 to 10 (β, 1.21; 95% CI, 0.93-1.49). Our national survey provides evidence that hospital leadership support may have helped infection preventionists avoid burnout and increase perceptions of psychological safety and safety climate during the COVID-19 pandemic. These findings aid in identifying factors that promote the well-being of infection preventionists and enhance the quality and safety of patient care.

"Asking for help is a strength"-how to promote undergraduate medical students' teamwork through simulation training and interprofessional faculty.

The ability to team up and safely work in any kind of healthcare team is a critical asset and should be taught early on in medical education. Medical students should be given the chance to "walk the talk" of teamwork by training and reflecting in teams. Our goal was to design, implement and evaluate the feasibility of a simulation-based teamwork training (TeamSIM) for undergraduate medical students that puts generic teamwork skills centerstage. We designed TeamSIM to include 12 learning objectives. For this pre-post, mixed-methods feasibility study, third-year medical students, organized in teams of 11-12 students, participated and observed each other in eight simulations of different clinical situation with varying degrees of complexity (e.g., deteriorating patient in ward; trauma; resuscitation). Guided by an interprofessional clinical faculty with simulation-based instructor training, student teams reflected on their shared experience in structured team debriefings. Using published instruments, we measured (a) students' reactions to TeamSIM and their perceptions of psychological safety via self-report, (b) their ongoing reflections via experience sampling, and (c) their teamwork skills via behavior observation. Ninety four students participated. They reported positive reactions to TeamSIM (M = 5.23, SD = 0.5). Their mean initial reported level of psychological safety was M = 3.8 (SD = 0.4) which rose to M = 4.3 (SD = 0.5) toward the end of the course [T(21) = -2.8, 95% CI -0.78 to-0.12, p = 0.011 (two-tailed)]. We obtained n = 314 headline reflections from the students and n = 95 from the faculty. For the students, the most frequent theme assigned to their headlines involved the concepts taught in the course such as "10 s for 10 min." For the faculty, the most frequent theme assigned to their headlines were reflections on how their simulation session worked for the students. The faculty rated students' teamwork skills higher after the last compared to the first debriefing. Undergraduate medical students can learn crucial teamwork skills in simulations supported by an experienced faculty and with a high degree of psychological safety. Both students and faculty appreciate the learning possibilities of simulation. At the same time, this learning can be challenging, intense and overwhelming. It takes a team to teach teamwork.

Comparison of two debriefing methods for nurse orientation

Hospital-based nurse educators are charged with providing an efficient orientation process, frequently with simulation, to expedite onboarding of nurses for patient care settings. The purpose of this study was to compare two different debriefing methods (DEBRIEF and 3D-DDD) in an orientation program to determine their effects on nurses’ perception of psychological safety, satisfaction with development of clinical reasoning skills, and satisfaction with learning. This quasi-experimental study used a post-test-only design to compare groups debriefed using the two different methods. Although results were not significant in the difference of the two methods, overall indicators reinforced findings from previous studies and the HSSOBP™ Debriefing about the importance of debriefing on the psychological safety of learners. More research is critical to assist hospital-based educators in finding efficient and timely methods for onboarding nurses.

Safe and sound: examining the effect of a training targeting psychological safety and trust in peer assessment

IntroductionPeer feedback can be very beneficial for student learning in higher education, yet students may feel uncomfortable providing and receiving peer feedback: they may for example not feel safe in the group or have little trust in their peers’ abilities to provide feedback. Surprisingly, only few studies have investigated how students’ feelings of discomfort can be reduced. To fill this gap, we created a 1-h training session using active learning methods. The training focuses on enhancing students’ perceptions of psychological safety, trust in their abilities and in their peers’ abilities to provide feedback.MethodsThe efficacy of this training was tested using a quasi-experiment with pre-and post-test design. Third-year bachelor students in physical education participated in a peer feedback activity to fulfill the requirement of an obligatory course. In 2019–2020, 47 students participated in a peer assessment activity without specific training on psychological safety and trust (control group), while in 2021–2022, 42 students received specific training before peer assessment (experimental group).ResultsAnalyses include a comparison of the control and experimental groups with regard to (1) the evolution of their perceptions (psychological safety, trust in their abilities, and trust in their peers’ abilities) for pre-to post-test, (2) the quality of the feedback they provided to their peers (3) and the improvement of students’ work between the draft submitted for the peer activity and the final version submitted to the professor.DiscussionResults do not support the training’s efficacy, yet suggest pathways for future research.

Can We Get an Intervention, Please? The Utility of Teaming Interventions on Engineering Design Student Psychological Safety

Abstract Research on psychological safety has been growing in recent years due to its role in promoting creativity and innovation since teams with high levels of psychological safety feel safe to express ideas and opinions. However, there is limited evidence in how to facilitate or build it within teams, particularly in an educational context. This paper was developed to respond to this research void by identifying the impact of teaming interventions aimed at improving psychological safety in engineering design student teams. Specifically, we studied two cohorts of students in a cornerstone design class (N = 411 students), one who received a series of video interventions and introduced role playing (intervention) and one who did not (control). These role assignments—referred to as the lenses of psychologically safety—were created to promote key leadership attributes that have been shown to be crucial in facilitating psychologically safe teams. To compare the utility of the intervention, psychological safety was gathered at five key time points of a multi-week design project. The results identified three key findings. First, the interventions were successful in increasing psychological safety in engineering teams. In addition, the results indicated the utility of the lenses of psychological safety throughout the design process. Finally, the results identified that groups who used these lenses had higher perceptions of psychological safety in their teams. Overall, these results indicated that psychological safety can be improved in engineering education through the intervention methods described within.

Individual Characteristics That Promote or Prevent Psychological Safety and Error Reporting in Healthcare: A Systematic Review.

Healthcare errors continue to be a safety issue and an economic burden that causes death, increased length of stays, and emotional trauma to families and the person who commits the error. Speaking up and error reporting within a safety culture can reduce the incidence of error; however, this is complex and multifaceted. This systematic review investigates individual characteristics that support or prevent speaking up behaviors when adverse events occur. This study further explores how organizational interventions designed to promote error reporting correlate to individual characteristics and perceptions of psychological safety. . A systematic review of peer-reviewed articles in healthcare that contain characteristics of an individual that promote or prevent error reporting was conducted. The search yielded 1233 articles published from 2015 to 2021. From this set, 81 full-text articles were assessed for eligibility and ultimately extracted data from 28 articles evaluated for quality using Joanna Briggs Institute critical appraisal tools©. The primary themes for individual character traits, values, and beliefs that influence a person's decision to speak up/report an error include self-confidence and positive perceptions of self, the organization, and leadership. Education, experience and knowledge are sub themes that relate to confidence. The primary individual characteristics that serve as barriers are 1) self-preservation associated with fear and 2) negative perceptions of self, the organization, and leadership. The results show that an individual's perception of their environment, whether or not it is psychologically safe, may be impacted by personal perceptions that stem from deep-seated personal values. This exposes a crucial need to explore cultural and diversity aspects of healthcare error reporting and how to individualize interventions to reduce fear and promote error reporting.

The Impact of Gender on Individual Perceptions and Team Psychological Safety in Engineering Design Teams in Education

Abstract Improving team interactions in engineering to model gender inclusivity has been at the forefront of many initiatives in both academia and industry. However, there has been limited evidence on the impact of gender-diverse teams on psychological safety (PS). This is important because psychological safety has been shown to be a key facet for the development of innovative ideas, and has also been shown to be a cornerstone of effective teamwork. But how does the gender diversity of a team impact the development of psychological safety? The current study was developed to explore just this through an empirical study with 38 engineering design student teams over the course of an eight-week design project. These teams were designed to be half heterogeneous (either half-men and half-women, or majority men) or other half homogeneous (all men). We captured psychological safety at five time points between the homogeneous and heterogeneous teams and also explored individual dichotomous (peer-review) ratings of psychological safety at the end of the project. Results indicated that there was no difference in psychological safety between gender homogeneous and heterogeneous teams. However, women perceived themselves as more psychologically safe with other team members who identified as women in comparison to their ratings of team members that identified as men. Women also perceived themselves to be less psychologically safe with men than men felt toward team members that identify as a woman. While males did not experience any significant differences in their perceptions of psychological safety toward any gender, the results from the perspective of women still indicate a discrepancy in perceptions between genders. These results point to the need to further explore the role of minoritized groups in psychological safety research and to explore how this effect presents itself (or is covered up) at the team level, as well as investigate impacts on all-women teams.

ПСИХОЛОГИЧЕСКАЯ БЕЗОПАСНОСТЬ ОБРАЗОВАТЕЛЬНОЙ СРЕДЫ ВУЗА КАК ОСНОВА ФОРМИРОВАНИЯ ПРОФЕССИОНАЛА

Background. Psychological safety of educational organizations ensures the quality of training of professionals of a new formation, resistant to social and organizational changes, able to work in situations of varying degrees of uncertainty. Objective. Th e research had its purpose to study the dynamics of students’ perception of psychological safety of educational environment in the process of training in higher educational institutions, to reveal the relationship between the students’ level of professional competence and their perception of psychological safety of educational environment, and to develop practical recommendations for the heads of educational organizations based on the obtained results. Sample. Th e study involved 200 students aged 17 to 22 years of 1–4 courses of the training direction “Pedagogical education”, educating in the profi le “Primary education”. Methods. Th e study implemented the case method, which allows to determine the level of formation of pedagogical competencies (unformed, threshold, and advanced) and the modifi ed questionnaire “Safety Attitudes”, which allows for assessing the psychological safety of educational environment of a university in terms of “atmosphere of teamwork”, “atmosphere of safety”, “satisfaction with studies”, “recognition (understanding) of stress”, “perception of management/leadership (at the faculty, university level)”, “learning conditions”. Correlation analysis was used to identify the relationship between the indicators of psychological safety of educational environment of a university and the level of formation of professional pedagogical competencies. Single-factor analysis of variance was used to determine the reliability of diff erences in the observed indicators between the students of diff erent courses. Results. Th e analysis of the data obtained demonstrated that students’ perception of the psychological safety of educational organization changes from year 1 to year 4: signifi cant diff erences are observed in the indicators “Atmosphere of teamwork”, “Atmosphere of safety”, “Recognition (understanding) of stress”, “Perception of management / leadership at the faculty level”. Th e study revealed the interrelation between the 4th year students’ level of professional competence and their perception of psychological safety of educational environment on the indicators of “atmosphere of teamwork”, “atmosphere of safety”, “management/leadership at the faculty level”. Conclusion. Th e results of the study give grounds to consider the psychological safety of educational environment of a university as an important factor in the successful formation of a professional. Increasing the level of psychological safety of an educational organization is based on three actions: measurement, intervention, and prevention. Th e developed practical recommendations allow an educational organization to carry out psychological diagnostics according to proposed algorithm, to determine the target points in perception of psychological safety of a university environment (according to the scales of the questionnaire), to assist the students in their educational and extracurricular activities, and to implement a set of preventive measures.

Creating the conditions for psychological safety and its impact on quality coach-athlete relationships

In this study, we investigated the notion that giving voice to athletes is an important aspect to creating a psychologically safe environment which can then feed into maintaining good quality coach-athlete relationships where every athlete feels heard, valued, and connected. 379 athletes completed a multi-section questionnaire that assessed their (a) capacity to be open and manage conflict with their coaches, (b) perceptions of psychological safety within their team or group, and (c) perceptions of the coach-athlete relationship quality. Structural equation modelling revealed that openness and conflict management positively predicted psychological safety which, in turn, positively predicted coach-athlete relationship quality. Psychological safety was found to explain the association between athletes’ communication (i.e., capacity to be open, honest and transparent as well as manage interpersonal conflict effectively) and coach-athlete relationship quality regardless of athletes’ gender. These findings highlighted that if athletes have the capacity to have candid discussions and can navigate conflict with their coaches, then it is possible to feel psychologically safe and thus able to engage in risky interpersonal interactions (e.g., raise concerns, admit mistakes) within their group context without fear of intimidation and humiliation. Furthermore, it was revealed that such a psychologically safe group environment fostered athletes’ trust and respect, as well as commitment and cooperation with their coach. The discussion provides links to theory, research and practice.

Compulsory citizenship behavior and employees' contextual performance: Roles of perceived psychological safety and political skill

We explored whether compulsory citizenship behavior (CCB) influenced employees' contextual performance via their perception of psychological safety, and examined whether political skill moderated this path. Participants were dyads formed by 139 supervisors and 534 subordinates from businesses in Taiwan. The results reveal that CCB was negatively associated with contextual performance through the mediator of perceived psychological safety. However, there was no significant moderating effect of political skill. This study fills a gap in the literature on CCB. Our results indicate that managers of organizations should pay attention to CCB and to their employees' mental health when trying to encourage enhanced work performance.

Relationships between changing communication networks and changing perceptions of psychological safety in a team science setting: Analysis with actor-oriented social network models.

A growing evidence base suggests that complex healthcare problems are optimally tackled through cross-disciplinary collaboration that draws upon the expertise of diverse researchers. Yet, the influences and processes underlying effective teamwork among independent researchers are not well-understood, making it difficult to fully optimize the collaborative process. To address this gap in knowledge, we used the annual NIH mHealth Training Institutes as a testbed to develop stochastic actor-oriented models that explore the communicative interactions and psychological changes of its disciplinarily and geographically diverse participants. The models help investigate social influence and social selection effects to understand whether and how social network interactions influence perceptions of team psychological safety during the institute and how they may sway communications between participants. We found a degree of social selection effects: in particular years, scholars were likely to choose to communicate with those who had more dissimilar levels of psychological safety. We found evidence of social influence, in particular, from scholars with lower psychological safety levels and from scholars with reciprocated communications, although the sizes and directions of the social influences somewhat varied across years. The current study demonstrated the utility of stochastic actor-oriented models in understanding the team science process which can inform team science initiatives. The study results can contribute to theory-building about team science which acknowledges the importance of social influence and selection.