Being treated with compassion by nursing students in their baccalaureate program.

Background/purpose: Compassion is an essential component of nursing education. Having nursing students describe situations in which they were treated with compassion may offer guidance for faculty. The purpose of the study was to uncover themes in descriptions of undergraduate nursing students who described self as being treated with compassion during their Baccalaureate nursing education.

Elders' experiences of the death of an adult child.

The death of a child can result in complicated grief. Thirty-one adults, 60 years of age or older, who lost an adult child, participated in a qualitative study using a focus group format that allowed them to discuss their experience. A hermeneutical approach was used to develop an overall thematic description of what it meant to an older person to lose an adult child.

Self-deception among men who are mandated to attend a batterer intervention program.

Topic: Intimate partner violence continues to be a confounding national health problem, especially for women and children. Certified batterers' intervention programs are one means currently being used to combat intimate partner violence.

Method: Existential phenomenology was utilized in this qualitative study to gain an understanding of the perceptions of the perpetrator prior to beginning a batterer intervention program.

Batterer intervention program: the victim's hope in ending the abuse and maintaining the relationship.

In this existential-phenomenological investigation, women whose partners were mandated to attend a batterers' intervention program (BIP) were interviewed about their experiences before their partner attended his first class. The goal of this study was to gain an understanding of the woman's expectations of the BIP in the aftermath of her experience of abuse and her reasons for maintaining the relationship. Women described their experience as one of living in a dangerous environment that keeps them nervous, confused, fearful, and feeling bad about themselves, but yet hopeful that the abuse will stop now that their partner is being sent to treatment.

Female sexual assault: the impact on the male significant other.

In this existential-phenomenological investigation five men were interviewed about their experience of being a male significant other (MSO) of a female sexual assault victim. The purpose of the study was to understand the MSO's meaning of the rape and the emotional impact it had on him. The thematic structure of a man's response to having a female significant other sexually assaulted depicts an impact on his emotional life in four significant areas: (1) his immediate painful thoughts and feelings, (2) his relationship with the victim, (3) his world view on male attitudes, and (4) the long-term effects of the trauma.

Recovery from intimate partner violence: a difficult journey.

In this existential-phenomenological investigation 15 women were interviewed about their experience of recovering from intimate partner violence (IPV). The purpose of the study was to examine the healing process from IPV from the perspective of those who have experienced it. Transcribed interviews were analyzed using a hermeneutic process.