The Story of an Hour Kate Chopin

The Story of an Hour Kate Chopin The early 1900s was an era where society inflicted standards that suppressed women mentally and physically. From birth, women had to overcome many cultural and societal boundaries because of their gender such as being told how to converse and clothe, and even who to marry. Women in those times lacked many rights such as freedom of speech, the right to an education, and skills that would help them become employed. Every stage of their lives was controlled by a male figure, starting with their fathers from birth to their husbands during marriage. Unfortunately, a womans ideal role for men was to perform domestic duties inside the house and other duties such as sexual deeds; a womans voice and concerns were never considered priority nor were given respect. The stories of â€Å"The Story of an Hour†, by Kate Chopin and â€Å"The Girls in Their Summer Dresses†, by Irwin Shaw, expose a dominating attitude towards women and illustrate how they could be trapped in unsatisfying marriages because of their husbands thoughtlessness, exploitation, and domination. The protagonists in these stories have accepted their roles in their marriages by being passive spouses. Kate Chopins â€Å"The Story of an Hour†, is a story regarding a woman, Mrs. Mallard, who is trapped in a suppressing marriage and dreadfully wants to escape. This story describes an hour of freedom that has been given to her. Although a very short story, it seems like every sentence has an intense significance and meaning to it that makes the reader think in depth. Even though her husbands full name is given to the readers, â€Å"Brently Mallard†, she is only referred to as â€Å"Mrs. Mallard†, giving the hint of the oppression she had to go through and the degradation society enforced upon women in that time period. Mrs. Mallard, the protagonist of the story is troubled by her heart condition and is oppressed by her husband who loves her and does not want to purposely suppress authority, but sadly, it was the society that built the peoples personality and character, and set the standards in the nineteenth century. Interestingly enough, Chopin uses the techniqu e of foreshadowing in the first sentence of the story indicating the readers that something terrible is bound to happen to Mrs. Mallard, perhaps a heart affiliated problem. The quote,†Knowing that Mrs. Mallard was afflicted with a heart trouble, great care was taken to break to her as gently as possible the news of her husbands death.†(Chopin 1) misinforms readers in to believing that everything will be fine. Irony could be noticed from the way Mrs. Mallard acts in response to her husbands death. Normally when a widow is informed about their spouses death, they become sad and express their grief; however, when Mrs. Mallard heard the awful news from her sister Josephine, she accepted it and proceeded to her room where she could be alone. This allowed the reader to adopt a similar prospective through her point of view, a new life and a chance to live oppression free. When she proceeds to her room, she sits down on a roomy, comfortable arm chair facing the open window. The reader should instantly inquire the use of the term â€Å"Comfortable† (Chopin 1), and question the fact that she is not miserable. While looking outside the window, she observed nature carefully symbolizing her excitement for a new life. The quote, â€Å"She could see in the open square before her house the tops of trees that were all aquiver with the new spring life†¦ the delicious breath of rain was in the air†¦ the notes of distant song†¦ countless sparrows were twittering in the eaves†¦patches of the blue sky showing here and there through the clouds† (Chopin 1) describes this scene adequately. At this point of the story the reader is puzzled by Chopins use of foreshadowing whether she is sad at all due to her observance of all the beautiful aspects of nature. While fantasizing about her new life, it seemed like her conscious was trying to put a stop to her happiness, leading her to realize that she was loved by her husband even though he was s uppressive time to time, his intentions were good; however, Chopin was trying to tell the readers she had only loved him time to time and that most of the time she had no love for him, as this quote describes, â€Å"And yet she had loved him-sometimes. Often, she had not.† (Chopin 2). Chopin confuses the reader by using another method of foreshadowing making the ending even more surprising, â€Å"She breathed a quick prayer that life might be long.† (Chopin 2), and that she considers herself to be a â€Å"Goddess of victory† (Chopin 2). Chopin uses an ironic ending for her story when Mrs. Mallard is surprised to death when her husband enters the house looking perfectly healthy without even knowing the accident took place. The paradox prolongs when the readers find out that she dies due to heart disease caused by joy. Earlier when she heard the agonizing news of her husbands death, she was fairly pleased of the idea of being free, having no authority figure gover ning her life; however, she was not eager to go through that life again, causing her to die once she saw her husband alive. Irwin Shaws, â€Å"The Girls in Their Summer Dresses†, depicts a couple whose marriage is in jeopardy due to the husbands lack of consideration for his wifes feelings. The story starts with the protagonist of the story, Frances, and her husband, Michael, enjoying a walk on a Sunday afternoon in New York City, part of Francess plans to spend the whole day alone with her husband as deliberated initially. While walking down the street, Frances caught her husband checking out a pretty girl who leads her to protest against it, â€Å"Shes not so pretty†¦Anyway, not pretty enough to take a chance breaking your neck looking at her.†(Shaw 1). When confronted of his actions, Michael carelessly replies, â€Å"I look at everything†¦I look at women and men†¦I casually inspect the universe.† (Shaw 2). This statement provides the readers with an idea of Michaels character who is the dominating figure in the story, who is lacking respect for his wife and is explo iting her weakness of not ending their relationship. Divorce was uncommon in the early 1900s even when men commit adultery. Francess feelings were depicted well as the author wrote, â€Å"She began to cry†¦someday youre going to make a move†¦Michael didnt say anything. He sat watching the bartender slowly peel a lemon.† (Shaw 4). Irrationally, Michael lets Frances know that â€Å"Sometimes I [Michael] would like to be free† (Shaw 4), and that eventually one day hell â€Å"make a move† (Shaw 4). Unfortunately, Michael treated women as objects who were merely around to perform sexual favours, he even depicted his wife as a sexual object when they arrived at a bar for some drinks, as this quote describes, â€Å"She got up from the table and walked across the room†¦Michael watched her walk, thinking, what a pretty girl, what nice legs.† (Shaw 4). Interestingly enough, Michael turns everything around by stating â€Å"Its a nice day and we both feel good and theres no reason why we have to break it up.† (Shaw 4), by declaring this, Michael blames the fact that their day is turning out to be unpleasant on Frances, and due to her has low self-esteem and insecurity, she accepts the claim by saying, â€Å"All right. I dont know why I started this. Lets drop it. Lets have a good time.† (Shaw 2). By stating this, Frances portrayed herself to be a submissive individual; meanwhile, Michael was careless and disrespectful. Throughout the nineteenth century, a womans purpose was merely based on performing domestic duties in their homes, and they did not contribute to the household income in any way. Women were dishonoured and exploited by men to a point that they were simply degraded to a childs level in society. Excessive male dominance and authority guided countless women getting the sensation of feeling trapped in their household, incapable to flee from the imprisonment enforced upon them by their spouses. The stories, â€Å"The Story of an Hour†, and â€Å"The Girls in Their Summer Dresses†, both depict tolerable house wives who are dominated and exploited by their husbands and have acquiesced to their role in their relationship and are submissive individuals who do not rise up and rebel against their husbands. These stories truthfully exemplify how women in the 19th century had to accept their husbands for who they were, and did not have many alternatives other than accepting to live with the repression until death did them apart.

Research Proposal Outline Essay

Research Proposal Outline Literature Review a. What was the topic of your literature review? Media violence and its effects on children In 1 paragraph, review the overall findings in this field, based on your literature review.   Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚  Ã‚   Large numbers of studies have suggested the media violence has bad effect on child’s psychological development.   The media can be used as an effective tool in teaching & developing sound habits in children through parental guidance & proper planning of the medium’s people. Parents need to satisfy the child’s confusion regarding fantasies shown on TV so they can learn to critique what they view. â€Å"According to the Office of the Surgeon General, children are theoretically more susceptible to behavioral influences when they are active participants than when they are observers.†( cited in Education Encyclopedia, 2007) Children associate themselves easily to a character they see on TV. A discussion with 8-10 year olds about who they wanted to be like, perceived that they are most influenced by unrealistic characters who are portrayed as braver & stronger than real people. Unfortunately, this fact was augmented for negative characters than positive ones.    Anxieties resulting from excessive violence viewing can pilot physical ailments in children & adults alike. The September 11th events were highlighted by the media; preschoolers reacted to the situation by showing emotional distress over the blood & bodies showed on national TV, elementary school students created ideas of their own & feeling scared for their own family’s wellbeing by watching the attack. Teenagers were most concerned for the victims & realized the effects of the calamity. Research Design Issues a. What is your research question?   What are the effects of media violence on child’s psychological development? What are your hypotheses? Violence shown in media can have bad affect on child’s psychological development and can result in various psychological problems and social problems.   Ã‚   Advertising &entertainment industries are a booming business but it can be used to incorporate positive information to the masses. It represents the culture & spirit of the respective country to the rest of the world & must not be used casually. Parents & teachers should come up with strategies to create a sense of understanding in the children from an early age.   The parents should realize what effects the movies & content on TV are having on their children & try to minimize TV viewing at home level. Some ways that may be incorporated by parents to limit children’s revelation to violence are: Restricting & keeping a check on what their children view on TV Discussing the programs with older children or young adults to clear their minds of any confusion & help them in expressing their opinions. Start a family oriented time by going for picnics, organizing a special lunch or dinner. Allow the children to watch TV for a selected time period & only programs that are desirable for their viewing. Offer criticism on TV channels & sponsors for showing in appropriate programs or content so as to force them to use proper censorship. What kind of research design will you use? (Include the aspects of research design discussed in class). Aka longitudinal, cross-sectional, etc†¦ We would prefer a longitudinal research design. Participants a. What kind of participants will be in your study (ages, gender, ethnicity, SES, other important characteristics)? The study will be done on children of age between 5-12 of both sexes and parents of age between 30-50 years of any ethnicity. How would you characterize this sample (ex. Representative, oversampling, within-group)? The sample is within-group. How many participants (if there are 2 or more groups-how many in each group)? Two groups of children and one group of parents and one group of teachers will be formed. Group A and A1 will be of children and group B will be of parents, and group B1 will be of teachers. Children group will have 48 participants and parents group will have 44 participants. Group A will be the group of normal children, while Group A1 of those with violent attitude and behavior. How will you recruit your participants (if there are 2 or more groups, describe for each group)? We’ll contact schools and talk with the administration to allow us take surveys from children and teachers. Children will be asked several questions regarding their activities at home and school. Teachers will be asked about the performance and behavior of students at school. What will you control for if you have more than 1 group of participants? Control group will include those children who have normal attitude and behavior and do not suffer from any psychological or social problem. Measures a. List the variables you will measure.   (Be specific and use your hypotheses as a guide.) Variables Number/name of violent movies viewed Number/name of cartoons viewed per day Number/name of shows viewed per day How will you measure these variables? (Give specific names of measures, or if you are developing your own measure, briefly describe it). Statistics ANOVA will be used to measure variables. State which participants will complete which measures (ex. Parents will fill out the Child Behavior Checklist; children will be observed in the Strange Situation). Children will be asked about their activities at home and school and the number of movies, shows and cartoons they watch per day. Parents will be asked about child’s behavior at home and social meetings. Teachers will be asked about child’s behavior at school and performance in studies. Procedures a. Describe your interview procedures (when, where, and how).   If you are doing a longitudinal study, you need to describe this for each assessment period. Assessment period of 4 months Three different questionnaires will be prepared for each group, children, parents and teachers. Interviews will be conducted at school in the afternoon for children and evening for teachers after they are free from class teaching. Are you compensating your participants? If so, how much? If you are doing a longitudinal study, you need to describe this for each time period. Gifts will be distributed among children after they take survey and give true information. For each survey gifts will be presented. If you are doing a longitudinal study, you need to describe how you will track your participants between assessment periods. Each participants contact number will be taken on first consent of participating in the study. Each participant will be provided with one telephone and mobile number of the research for easy contact and communication.

Comfort Theory Essay

In my nursing practice with long term care residents, I frequently care for dying residents. Instead of simply providing these patients with medication to ease the pain, I wanted to learn about ways to enhance the comfort of the dying patient and assist their beloved family throughout the difficult process. This desire led me to undertake a concept analysis of comfort. Through my research at the end of life, I discovered Katharine Kolcaba’s theory of comfort. I found her theory to be usefully in describing the concept of comfort care and decided to further analyze her theory and portray its use in the nursing practice. Katharine Kolcaba was born on December 8, 1944 in Cleveland, Ohio. In 1965, she graduated from St. Luke’s Hospital School of Nursing and started her nursing career. Even at that time, Katharine had interests in the developing of nursing profession. Particularly, she strived to understand how to implicate nursing in gerontology correctly. Early years of her career were the time of establishment and development of Kolcaba as a theorist. She studied a great number of early theory works and began to apply this knowledge at her work place. In 1997, she had her next achievements such as earning of Ph.D. in nursing, and receiving of a Certificate of Authority as a Clinical Nursing Specialist. This year Katharine also received the Marie Haug Student Award for being excellent student in Aging Studies. This award was from her native Case Western Reserve University. Kolcaba’s specialist field consisted of comfort studies, nursing theory, and nursing research. Nevertheless, the special place in that list took gerontology and the end of life. From that time, she especially concentrated on research and development in gerontology. The next professional level was the teaching. In 1987, Katharine Kolcaba started Bachelor’s program of Nursing, which specialized on gerontology. It was a starting point of developing her concepts of nursing. At that time,† she developed her propositions about comfort with specific attention on end-of-life and palliative care with focus on gerontology as an emerging specialty in nursing† (Nursing Theories, 2012). As a result, Katharine published Comfort Theory and Practice: a Vision for Holistic Health Care and Research in 1999. She continued teaching in  University and developed her theory. In 2003, the publishing of the Comfort Theory and Practice: A vision for Holistic Health Care became a great result of the hard work. In the same year, Midwest Nursing Research Society rewarded Katharine Kolcaba with the Advancement of Science Award for her work End of Life and Palliative Care Nursing. Then, she took part in co-writing of article published in Anesthesia Nursing. In 2005 she received Second Place Award in the Best Practice Category by the American Society. According to Kolcaba (2003): Katharine Kolcaba first b egan â€Å"theorizing about the outcome of comfort† (Kolcaba, 2003) while working on a dementia unit as a head nurse and pursuing her Master’s of Science in Nursing at Case Western Reserve University. She further yet continued her research while pursuing her doctoral degree which she ended up completing in 1997. Her interest was sparked by her understanding that comfort was a necessary component for optimum function in the patients she cared for on the dementia unit. With the patients being largely non-verbal, the nurses were required to interpret the patient’s actions to determine what may be causing discomfort in a patient, thus leading to disruptive behaviors. From this assessment it was possible to implement care plans to treat underlying issues or enhance patient comfort leading to improved patient care. Her work produced numerous articles and a book describing the theory of comfort, its assumptions, the major concepts and their relationships, techniques for measuring comfort in a variety of environments, and discussions for the theory’s application in nursing practice. An overview of this will be presented. First, it is important to understand what comfort is i n Kolcaba’s terms. Historically, Florence Nightingale spoke of comfort when she stated that â€Å"it must never be lost sight of what observation is for. It is not for the sake of piling up miscellaneous information or curious facts, but for the sake of saving life and increasing health and comfort† (Peterson & Bredow, 2004). Comfort is also referred to by many major nursing theorists including Orlando, Roy, Watson, Henderson, Paterson, and Zderad, but no one sought to understand the nature of comfort itself. Kolcaba undertook this effort when she performed her analysis of the concept of comfort. In her analysis, Kolcaba described two dimensions. â€Å"The first dimension of comfort consists of three states, called relief, ease and transcendence† (Kolcaba, 1994). â€Å"The second dimension of comfort is the contexts in which comfort can occur†¦which are  derived from the nursing literature about holism† (Kolcaba, 1994). The definitions of the three states of comfort are presented next. Kolcaba derived her three states of comfort from other nursing theorists. Orlando originally spoke of relief stating that â €Å"nursing actions should be designed to meet the physical and mental needs of patients and it focuses on how the nurse deciphers what the patient’s needs are† (Kolcaba, 1991). Ultimately, Kolcaba defined relief as â€Å"when the patient is capable or if comfort provides respite from the stress and anguish of disease, debilitation or injury.† The second state of comfort, ease, is defined as â€Å"an enduring stated of peaceful contentment. Henderson originally spoke of the concept of ease when she stated that â€Å"only after a discomfort is relieved can the patient proceed to recovery† (Kolcaba, 1991). Finally, of renewal or transcendence, Kolcaba wrote that it â€Å"implies enhanced powers, strengthened motivation, and positive attitudes and outlooks for meeting the life challenges normal for that person† or â€Å"the state in which one rises above problems or pain† (Kolcaba, 1991). This was developed from Paterson and Zderads’s statement that â€Å"comfort is the state in which the patient is free to be and become controlling and planning one’s own destiny.† After gaining understanding of the three states of comfort, it is necessary to discuss the four contexts in within which they occur. The four concepts are physical, psychospiritual, environmental, and sociocultural. The first context comfort can occur in is physical. Kolcaba defined the physical context as â€Å"pertaining to bodily sensations.† The phsycopspiritual context was defined as â€Å"pertaining to the internal awareness of self, including esteem, concept, sexuality and meaning in one’s life; it can also encompass one’s relationship to a higher order or being.† The third context, sociocultural was defined as â€Å"pertaining to the external background of human experience; encompasses light, noise, ambience, color, temperature and natural versus synthetic elements.† While most would think of comfort as a strictly physical experience with only one possible outcome, Kolcaba believed it was important to stress that comfort encompassed a variety of states and contexts that were necessary to consider when ensuring the best patient outcomes. To best depict the relationship between them, she developed a grid in her taxonomic structure of comfort that helped t o further define her ideas. A discussion of the major concepts in the theory is presented next. There are seven major concepts presented by Kolcaba in her theory of comfort. These concepts are health care needs, nursing interventions, intervening variables, patient comfort, health-seeking behaviors, institutional integrity and institutional outcomes. She defines health care needs as â€Å"needs that arise for patients in stressful health care situations (Kolcaba, 2001). Intervening variables are those things â€Å"that will affect the outcomes† and she describes patient comfort as â€Å"the immediate state of being strengthened by having needs met.† Health seeking behaviors are defined as â€Å"patient actions of which they may or may not be aware and which may or may not be observed that are predictor or indicators of improved health† (Kolcaba, 2001). Institutional integrity is defined as â€Å"the quality or state of health care organizations† (Kolcaba, 2003). Finally, she described institutional outcomes as â€Å"decreased lengths of stay, successful discharges, and improved public relations when patients and families are happy with their health care† (Kolcaba, 2001), which for hospital administrators is the ultimate goal when comfort is a key nursing consideration. With the key concepts identified and defined, their relationship to one another needs to be understood. Kolcaba clearly described the relationship between her major concepts when she stated her positions in theory of comfort: Nurses identify patients’ comfort needs that have not been met by existing support systems. Nurses design interventions to address those needs. Intervening variables are taken into account in designing interventions and mutually agreeing on reasonable immediate and/or subsequent health-seeking behavior outcomes. If enhanced comfort in achieved, patients are strengthened to engage in health-seeking behaviors. When patients engage in health seeking behaviors as a result of being strengthened by comforting actions, nurses and patients are more satisfied with their health care. When patients are satisfied with their health care in a specific situation, that institution retains its integrity. The last relationship, not defined explicitly by Kolcaba, is that institutional outcomes are direct result of understanding and addressing a patients comfort needs. Finally, before an analysis of the theory of comfort can be completed, it is necessary to understand the major assumptions made by Kolcaba when developing her theory. According to Kolcaba, those assumptions underpinning her theory of comfort are as follows. Human beings have holistic responses to complex stimuli. Comfort is a desirable holistic outcome that is germane to the discipline of nursing. Human beings strive to meet, or have to meet, their basic comfort needs; it is an active endeavor. Institutional integrity has a normative and descriptive component that is based on a patient-oriented value system. The theory of comfort is referred to as a middle range theory. Whall compares middle range theories with grand theories and states that middle range theories â€Å"contain fewer concepts and relationships, are adaptable to a wide range of practice and experience, can be built from many sources, and are concrete enough to be tested† (Kolcaba, 2001). Given this description, the theory of comfort can be readily identified as a middle range theory. With regard to the concepts presented by Kolcaba, they are clearly defined and the relationship between them are easily understood. The concepts are generalized and measurable through the development of numerous measurement tools designed fo r specific environments. The theory itself had been applied in a number of different environments including hospice, perioperative, radiation therapy and general care areas. Questionnaires to test the theory of comfort have been developed for each of these areas and successfully tested and employed. The scope of the theory is narrow and stands at a low level of abstraction. Most importantly, the theory is readily applicable to the nursing discipline and provide a clear framework relevant to meeting patient’s needs during a stressful life event. It allows the nurse to define, with input from the patient, what their needs are within the four contexts, to address those needs with nursing interventions, to evaluate the success or failure of those interventions and to continue in a cyclic manner until the patient achieves a state of comfort. In essence, the framework provides a process model for nursing that is specific to comfort and precise. It is easy for a nurse to use and understand and can be applied in many environments. In evaluating and analyzing the theory of comfort, numerous research possibilities come to mind. Given my specific interest in end of life care, it is important to understand that the nurse is focused not only on the comfort of the patient but also on that of the families and caregivers of the dying patient. While one would think of health-seeking  behaviors to be focused on cure or rehabilitation, they can also be used to aid in a more peaceful or comfortable death. Therefore, a study that evaluated the level of comfort experienced by the patient and family members with and without direct care provided by the family members could be undertaken. The study would seek to determine whether less medical intervention is required to ensure patient comfort during the dying process if there is increased family involvement in care. This nurse would hypothesize that, in measuring patient comfort, less medical intervention would be required to maintain an acceptable level of comfort in death if family members have greater involvement in providing care. Conversely, another possible study could involve family member comfort and ask if family members have an increased level of comfort with greater involvement in patient care during the period proceeding death. The sample population for both studies would by dying patients and their family members. To measure family member comfort, data could be collected utilizing a likert-scale questionnaire. To measure patient comfort, and questionnaire could be developed for those patients that are able to verbalize or the nurse could be given a list of objective signs and symptoms of comfort to evaluate in order to determine patient comfort. Kolcaba’s work has led to a universal theory applicable to all areas of nursing. She has captured the quintessential essence of nursing in a simple and structured framework. Use of her framework in practice can lead to improved patient experiences in one of the most important outcomes of nursing practice, patient comfort. References Kolcaba, Katharine (2001). Evolution of the mid range theory of comfort for outcomes research. Nursing Outlook, 49(2), 86-92 Kolcaba, Katharine (1991B). An analysis of the concept of comfort. Journal of Advanced Nursing, 16, 1301-1310 Kolcaba, Katharine (1991A). A taxonomic structure for the concept of comfort. Journal of Nursing Scholarship, 23(4), 237-240 Kolcaba, Katherine (1994). A theory of holistic comfort for nursing. Journal of Advance Nursing, 19, 1178-1184 Kolcaba, Katherine (2003). Comfort theory and practice: A Vision for Holistic Health Care and Research. New York: Springer Publishing Company, Inc. Peterson, S.J., & Bredow, T.S. (2004). Comfort. In Middle Ranger Theories: Application to Nursing Research (pp. 255-273). Philadelphia: Lippincott Williams & Wilkins

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