Influenced by the flowering of positive psychology in the field of foreign language acquisition research in recent years, the present study aimed to explore the perceived functions of playfulness, as a personality construct, among English as a foreign language learners. To this aim, an initial sample of 38 EFL learners were selected randomly from the private language institutes of Mashhad, the second largest city in Iran. They were interviewed about any perceived functions of playfulness in the EFL learning context. A (...) qualitative content analysis of the collected data led to the extraction of four categories: Fun and laughter, creativity, mastery orientation, and cultivating relationships. A further in-depth analysis of the categories and comparison with the functions of adult playfulness in psychology revealed that these four categories can be subsumed under two of the four structural components of adult playfulness; namely, other-directed playfulness and intellectual playfulness. The ability of EFL learners to turn language learning situations, tasks, and environment into enjoyable ones via their playfulness can have implications for the quality of their interpersonal interactions in class and eventually their language proficiency. The findings of this study can pave the way for the translation of the adult playfulness construct from developmental and personality psychology and family relations into the second language acquisition domain and its conceptualization in future research in this domain. (shrink)

Background Moral distress has negative effects on physical and mental health. However, there is little information about nurses’ coping strategies reducing moral distress. Aim The purpose of this study was to investigate the coping strategies of intensive care unit nurses reducing moral distress in Iran. Study design This is a qualitative study with a content analysis approach. Participants and research context The research sample consisted of nurses working in intensive care units of teaching hospitals affiliated to Tehran University of Medical (...) Sciences. Samples were selected among eligible nurses by purposive sampling. Data were obtained through 17 in-depth, individual, and semi-structured interviews with 17 nurses. Graneheim and Lundman’s (2004) 6-step content analysis method was used to analyze the data. Data management was also performed by MAXQDA software version 20. The COREQ checklist was used to report the study. Ethical considerations This project was approved by the Ethics Committee of Tehran University of Medical Sciences. All ethical guidelines in research were followed. Finding The data analysis resulted in the formation of two main categories of desirable coping strategies (with two subcategories of compensation and rejuvenation) and less desirable coping strategies (with three subclasses of indifference over time, escape and concealment). Discussion The intensive care unit nurses in dealing with ethical problems first try to solve the problem through discussion, but when they fail to resolve it peacefully, they resort to several coping strategies. Factors, such as increasing experience, lack of support from hospital managers and officials, poor communication between colleagues, the need to maintain hierarchy, fear of reprimand, and a sense of powerlessness, changed the nurses’ preferred strategies. It is important for managers to provide a blame/punishment-free atmosphere for expression of ethical experiences; a supportive atmosphere in which staff can engage in ethical discussions without fear of punishment. They should also provide opportunities for rest, rejuvenation, and adequate training for their employees. (shrink)

This article is a first step in a project to study the influence of the Rasāʾil Ikhwān al-Ṣafāʾ in the Ottoman world. We argue that, at least from the end of the fourteenth century until well into the second half of the sixteenth, the knowledge presented in the encyclopedic Rasāʾil was a conspicuous scholarly source for the Ottoman cultural milieu, especially at the dynastic court, and played a significant role in forming their epistemological perspective. This argument is developed with reference (...) to three universal histories: (1) in Turkish, the İskendernāme (Book of Alexander) of Taceddin İbrahim İbn Hızır Ahmedi (d. 1413) written between the last quarter of the fourteenth century and the first quarter of the fifteenth; (2) in Arabic, the Naẓm al-sulūk fī musāmarat al-mulūk (The ordering of ways for the conversation of kings) by ʿAbd al-Raḥmān al-Bisṭāmī (d. 1454), a prominent intellectual and expert in occult sciences, protégé of Sultan Murad II (r. 1421–44, 1446–51); (3) in Persian, the first volume of Shāhnāmā-yi Āl-i ʿUsmān (Book of kings of the house of ʿUsmān) by the Sufi intellectual and litterateur Fethullah Çelebi (d. 1561/62), better known by his pen-name ʿArif. The choice of these three histories enables us to mark the time period for the influence of the Rasāʾil, stretching it (in both directions) further than is accepted in present scholarship. These histories enable us also to draw attention to the proximity to the Ottoman dynasty of the cultural milieu attuned to the Rasāʾil, and highlight the relationship between history and knowledge that is central both for the texts under study here and the Rasāʾil. (shrink)

Slavery is as old as human history and is a product of established cultures. To gain profit from captives resulted in slave trade and exploit them as labor force. Although ancient Turks took advantage of slaves, the conditions of Turkish nomadic steppe culture did not allow slavery become institutionalised. During Islamization of Turks, Turkistan witnessed one of the most successful periods of the slave trade because of raids against non-Muslim Turks by Samanids and Muslim Turks. Muslim travellers of X and (...) XI th century emphasize frequently the importance of the Turkish slave trade and its network. Turkish jawari (singular: jariya, an Arabic word, means concubine, female slave and housemaid) were the most demanded in Muslim countries in Turkestan and Near East due to their beauty, which the Muslim travelers mention quite frequently. Their beauty was reflected in epics like the stories of Dede Korkut and Shahnama as well. Turks used a few Turkish and Chinese origin words to mean jariya. Mahmud al-Kaşgari recorded the terms related to jariya in his book, Divan al-Lugat al-Turk. The meaning of some of these words have changed over time but the women referred to by these terms were generally housemaids in family life. All kind of jariya had opportunities such as marriage, being treated like a member of the family and being emancipated. My aim in this study is to address perception and interpretation of jariya and certain practices related to them in Turkish folk culture in the period of Islamization. (shrink)