Policy education in a research-focused doctoral nursing program: Power as knowing participation in change.

Nurses have moral obligations incurred by membership in the profession to participate knowingly in health policy advocacy. Many barriers have historically hindered nurses from realizing their potential to advance health policy. The contemporary political context sets additional challenges to policy work due to polarization and conflict.

Unitary Human-Environment Field Mutual Process: Knowing Participation in Patterning the Environment.

Martha E. Rogers identified people and their environment as unitary, indivisible wholes, further defining both as energy fields identified by rhythmical patterning. It is suggested that sharper focus be placed on the contribution of the environment in wellbecoming to encourage people to participate more knowingly in patterning the environmental field.

Remembering Elizabeth Ann Manhart Barrett, RN; PhD; FAAN, Her Life and Legacy.

This is a tribute to Dr. Elizabeth Ann Manhart Barrett, creator of the Power as Knowing Participation in Change theory and research tool. Her life is described in her own words via the obituaries she wrote for her family to share in various venues.

Pregnant With Promise for Far Too Long: Time to Deliver!

The meaning of the terms nursing science and science of nursing are briefly explored from an historical perspective than from a Rogerian nursing science perspective. Seminal ideas from Martha Rogers' writings, including an editorial from the inaugural issue of the journal Nursing Science, are noted. The author concludes with a Rogerian nursing science perspective of the unitary rhythm of dying-grieving with examples from participants of a qualitative study of the experience of relating to a loved one who has died.

Meditations on the unitary rhythm of dying-grieving.

When someone faces loss of a loved one, that person simultaneously grieves and dies a little, just as the one dying also grieves. The author's personal conceptualization of dying and grieving as a unitary rhythm is explored based primarily on her interpretation of Rogers' science of unitary human beings, along with selected examples from related nursing literature and from the emerging focus on continuing bonds in other disciplines. Examples from contemporary songwriters that depict such a unitary conceptualization are given along with personal examples.

Exploring co-meditation as a means of reducing anxiety and facilitating relaxation in a nursing school setting.

The purpose of this pilot study was to explore whether co-meditation, shared or cross-breathing, could reduce anxiety and enhance relaxation in a nursing school setting. The specific outcomes to be assessed in the quantitative component were blood pressure, pulse, respirations, and anxiety, both state and trait. A qualitative component explored participants' experiences with co-meditation following 1 month of practice.

Global nursing research: three perspectives.

Nurse scholars involved in research on the international scene describe current efforts underway in countries such as Turkey, Mexico, Japan, and Switzerland, to name a few, to advance nursing scholarship worldwide. Theoretical perspectives reflect work focusing on Neuman's and Roy's models and Parse's theory. Issues are identified that reflect efforts to advance nursing and shared concerns within the global nursing community.

Intentionality, consciousness, and creating community.

Intentionality is briefly explored from the perspective of seminal written works on therapeutic touch and recorded conversations with Martha E. Rogers. This overview hints at possible interrelationships among intentionality, consciousness, and creating community, along with conceptual ambiguities, which are explored in detail by Zahourek and Larkin in this column.

Research diversity from the perspective of the Science of Unitary Human Beings.

This column presents an overview of Rogerian nursing science-based research. In Rogers' own words, she fostered the development of nursing science with a diversity of methods. She encouraged both qualitative and quantitative approaches and the development of new research methods and tools.

Update on research framed in Orem's model.

In this column, Biggs updates the state of the science of Orem's self-care model and attendant theories, focusing primarily on research completed between 1999 and 2007. She notes that many of the problems identified in the 2000 state of the science column by Taylor and colleagues persist, such as failure to follow through in using Orem's work to inform the total research study, not just mentioning a theory or concept in passing. However, there is a clear indication of a substantial body of research appropriately framed within Orem's theories that bodes well for ongoing use and development of her work.

Political boundaries in research.

In many ways, the current political climate is antithetical to sound research. As an example, Roye shares her experiences attempting to obtain funding to study ways to promote risk-reduction behaviors among sexually active teens when the political agenda focuses on abstinence only. She details a program of funded research that she embarked on prior to the current administration.

The subjective-objective rhythm of research.

Cowling and Shattell share their thoughts on participatory inquiry within a worldview that presents reality as a co-creative process that recognizes a multiplicity of ways of knowing. They present the five dimensions of a participatory worldview as it informs the emergence of story in the research process. They conclude their column with examples from their own work, Cowling's on women survivors of child abuse, Shattell's on Latino mental health.

Gazing through the crystal ball: potential futures for nursing research?

In this column Thomas Cox explores advances in travel and technology that he believes will help to change the face of healthcare and thus nursing practice and research. Within a focus on the coming globalization of healthcare, he proposes a restructuring of nursing into four tiers of practitioners, each with a different focus in providing care, and reframes the meaning of this care, offering a glimpse into the ways nursing research might evolve to parallel changes in practice. He then delineates in some detail the ways the process of conducting research is likely to change given expected advances in computerization.

Dying and grieving seen through a unitary lens.

In this column, Todaro-Franceschi presents a unitary view of energy, grounded within Rogers' (1992) science of unitary human beings, that supports a new view of dying and grieving, one based on the assumption that energy transforms, but is never lost. She briefly discusses her research on synchronicities related to dead loved ones as a basis for a new healing modality for the bereaved. Pilkington summarizes five studies on the lived experience of grieving within Parse's human becoming theory that were conducted either by her or William Cody.

Rogerian science-based nursing theories.

In this column, the author provides a general overview of selected theories derived from Rogerian nursing science. After a brief discussion of the Rogerian perspective, she highlights representative theories. She suggests that ongoing development of proposed theories has been relatively slow for two main reasons.