Thesis (M.S.)--University of Michigan, 2002. / eContent provider-neutral record in process. Description based on print version record. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 32-36).

Thesis (M.S.)--University of Michigan, 2006. / eContent provider-neutral record in process. Description based on print version record. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 35-41).

Thesis (M.S.)--University of Michigan, 1991.

Thesis (M.S.)--University of Michigan, 2006. / eContent provider-neutral record in process. Description based on print version record. Includes bibliographical references (leaves 35-41).

The problem with which this investigation is concerned is that of determining whether utilizing self-help groups for remedial mathematics students would improve their course completion rates, achievement, and attitudes toward learning mathematics. The methods of determining the success/failure of self-help groups in this study were the Z-test from inferences concerning two proportions, the t-test from inferences concerning the difference between two independent means, and the t-test from inferences concerning the difference between two dependent means. The participants of the study were chosen from the students enrolled in "daytime" mathematics classes at Tarrant County Junior College - Northeast Campus, Hurst, Texas. The experiment was conducted over two semesters and the data combined for statistical analysis. There were one hundred four students involved in the study. Fifty-two students comprised each of the experimental and control classes. The term self-help group was utilized to describe a small group of two-to-fifteen people who engaged in discussion of responsibility, standards, confession, lay leadership, and action. The students did not study mathematics in self-help group sessions. The group meetings dealt with anxieties, attitudes, and commitment that may be associated with mathematics in general. To investigate the hypotheses of this study, data was collected to calculate the percentage completion rates, the means of the final exams taken by students, and the differences of the Semantic Differential scores given to students in the experimental class at the beginning and the end of the semester. This data was utilized for statistical analysis to determine if the experiment was successful. The report concludes that self-help groups did not significantly improve course completion rates, achievement, or attitudes of students toward learning mathematics. Forty-four per cent of the students that completed the experimental class participated in self-help groups.

Hong, Liu. / Thesis (M.Phil.)--Chinese University of Hong Kong, 2008. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 232-244). / Abstracts in English and Chinese. / Chapter Chapter One: --- Introduction --- p.1 / Chapter 1.1 --- Research background --- p.1 / Chapter 1.1.1 --- Self-help as a social phenomenon in Western and Chinese societies --- p.1 / Chapter 1.1.2 --- Impacts of self-help groups --- p.4 / Chapter 1.1.3 --- An issue demanding attention: maintenance and development of self-help groups --- p.7 / Chapter 1.2 --- Research objectives --- p.9 / Chapter 1.3 --- Initial guiding questions --- p.10 / Chapter Chapter Two: --- Sketching a Conceptual Framework --- p.12 / Chapter 2.1 --- Literature Review --- p.12 / Chapter 2.1.1 --- Group maintenance and development --- p.12 / Chapter 2.1.2 --- Dynamics of self-help groups --- p.27 / Chapter 2.1.3 --- External forces influencing self-help groups --- p.32 / Chapter 2.2 --- Conceptual framework --- p.40 / Chapter 2.2.1 --- Theory-use in current study --- p.40 / Chapter 2.2.2 --- Conceptual framework --- p.41 / Chapter 2.3 --- Refining the research questions --- p.42 / Chapter 2.4 --- Definitions of key terms in the research question --- p.45 / Chapter 2.4.1 --- Self-help groups --- p.45 / Chapter 2.4.2 --- Maintenance and development --- p.45 / Chapter 2.4.3 --- Social workers --- p.46 / Chapter Chapter Three: --- Research Design and Implementation --- p.48 / Chapter 3.1 --- Research design --- p.48 / Chapter 3.1.1 --- Philosophical consideration --- p.48 / Chapter 3.1.2 --- Methodological justification --- p.50 / Chapter 3.2 --- Case study design --- p.52 / Chapter 3.2.1 --- Overall design: embedded contrasting multiple-case (two cases) study --- p.52 / Chapter 3.2.2 --- "Unit of analysis, subunit of analysis and context of case" --- p.54 / Chapter 3.3 --- Case selection --- p.55 / Chapter 3.4 --- Implementation --- p.57 / Chapter 3.4.1 --- General process of implementation --- p.57 / Chapter 3.4.2 --- Data collection --- p.58 / Chapter 3.4.3 --- Data analysis --- p.61 / Chapter 3.4.4 --- Quality of study --- p.65 / Chapter 3.5 --- Ethical consideration --- p.68 / Chapter Chapter Four: --- Case A: Within-Case Data Display and Analysis --- p.70 / Chapter 4.1 --- Chronicle of Case A --- p.70 / Chapter 4.1.1 --- Pre-formalized stage: before SCMC Parents Group --- p.72 / Chapter 4.1.2 --- Formalized stage: SCMC Parents Group --- p.74 / Chapter 4.2 --- Difficulties encountered by the group on the factors contributing to the maintenance and development in Case A --- p.81 / Chapter 4.2.1 --- Leadership --- p.82 / Chapter 4.2.2 --- Membership --- p.89 / Chapter 4.2.3 --- Practical difficulties: logistics and finance --- p.96 / Chapter 4.2.4 --- Professional Involvement --- p.101 / Chapter 4.2.5 --- Affiliation --- p.105 / Chapter 4.2.6 --- Legitimacy --- p.115 / Chapter 4.3 --- Responding to research question 1: what are the difficulties? --- p.124 / Chapter 4.3.1 --- Difficulty on leadership: indistinct leadership structure --- p.124 / Chapter 4.3.2 --- Difficulty on membership: shortage of new core members --- p.125 / Chapter 4.3.3 --- Difficulty on practical issue: tight finance --- p.126 / Chapter 4.3.4 --- Difficulty on affiliation: reserved support from the hospital --- p.126 / Chapter 4.3.5 --- Difficulty on legitimacy: unachieved out-hospital legitimacy --- p.127 / Chapter 4.4 --- "Responding to research question 2 & 3: how are the difficulties mutually linked, and linked with the maintenance and development of the groups?" --- p.129 / Chapter 4.5 --- Role of social work profession --- p.134 / Chapter 4.5.1 --- Social work practice in SCMC --- p.134 / Chapter 4.5.2 --- Involvement of social workers in the parents group --- p.136 / Chapter 4.5.3 --- Expectations from the medical staff --- p.138 / Chapter 4.5.4 --- Social workers or administrators? --- p.139 / Chapter Chapter Five: --- Case B: Within-Case Data Display and Analysis --- p.142 / Chapter 5.1 --- Chronicle of case B --- p.142 / Chapter 5.1.1 --- Before establishment --- p.143 / Chapter 5.1.2 --- After ICCCPO Shanghai conference --- p.144 / Chapter 5.2 --- Difficulties encountered by the group on the factors contributing to the maintenance and development in Case B --- p.150 / Chapter 5.2.1 --- Leadership --- p.150 / Chapter 5.2.2 --- Membership --- p.159 / Chapter 5.2.3 --- Practical issues: logistics and finance --- p.165 / Chapter 5.2.4 --- Professional involvement --- p.172 / Chapter 5.2.5 --- Affiliation --- p.174 / Chapter 5.2.6 --- Legitimacy --- p.179 / Chapter 5.3 --- Responding to research question 1: what are the difficulties? --- p.187 / Chapter 5.4 --- "Responding to research question 2 & 3: how are the difficulties mutually linked, and linked with the maintenance and development of the groups?" --- p.191 / Chapter Chapter Six: --- Case Synthesis --- p.196 / Chapter 6.1 --- Comparing the two cases --- p.196 / Chapter 6.1.1 --- Commonalities --- p.196 / Chapter 6.1.2 --- Differences --- p.198 / Chapter 6.2 --- Controlled comparison --- p.198 / Chapter 6.2.1 --- Controlling the factors --- p.198 / Chapter 6.2.2 --- Making comparison --- p.199 / Chapter 6.2.3 --- Results of comparison --- p.203 / Chapter 6.3 --- Uncontrolled comparisons --- p.204 / Chapter 6.3.1 --- "Affiliation, host organizations, and Finance" --- p.205 / Chapter 6.3.2 --- Affiliation and Out-hospital Legitimacy --- p.209 / Chapter 6.3.3 --- Out-hospital Legitimacy and Finance --- p.210 / Chapter Chapter Seven: --- "Conclusions, Discussions，Implications，and Limitations" --- p.211 / Chapter 7.1 --- Conclusions --- p.211 / Chapter 7.2 --- Discussions --- p.213 / Chapter 7.2.1 --- Members and leader in the self-help groups: “free-riders´ح and “bum-out´ح --- p.213 / Chapter 7.2.2 --- Group legitimacy and affiliation in the Chinese context --- p.216 / Chapter 7.2.3 --- Professional involvement: medical staff and social workers --- p.219 / Chapter 7.3 --- Implications --- p.223 / Chapter 7.3.1 --- Implications for social work practice --- p.223 / Chapter 7.3.2 --- Implications for social work education --- p.225 / Chapter 7.3.3 --- Implications for social policy --- p.226 / Chapter 7.3.4 --- Implications for future research --- p.229 / Chapter 7.4 --- Limitations --- p.230 / Reference --- p.232

Objective(s). An increasing demand exists for psychological interventions to increase recovery from depression and anxiety in people with long-term physical health conditions (LTCs). Guided self-help (GSH) may meet this need, however, there is limited evidence of GSH’s appropriateness for people with LTCs. Design. A mixed-methods study using qualitative interviews with people with stroke and Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease (COPD), and a quantitative survey of professionals who support guided self-help, explored opinions about whether self-help is appropriate, and whether suggested adaptations varied across LTCs. Results. Opinions varied about the appropriateness of standard self-help and adaptations required. Illness beliefs may help explain differences between the two LTCs and individual interviewees. The majority of professionals surveyed felt competent supporting people with LTCs, and reported having access to appropriate self-help material. Conclusions. Recommendations for improving the appropriateness of contents of guided self-help for people with LTCs are provided. Supporting professionals need relevant knowledge and skills to integrate information about the LTC into the intervention, and offer flexible, personalised delivery to support participation.

Objectives. To examine the clinical effectiveness of guided self-help (GSH) for anxiety and depression in routine clinical practice, and the role of self-efficacy, therapeutic alliance and socio-economic status in influencing that effectiveness. Design. A within-subjects repeated measures design in which participants served as their own controls by completing questionnaires across a control period prior to GSH intervention, then again at post-intervention and 3- and 6-month follow-up. Methods. GSH participants completed outcome measures for mental health (HADS) and work/social functioning (WSAS). Factors explored by regression as possible predictors of effectiveness were self-efficacy, therapeutic alliance and socioeconomic status. Results. Sixty people completed GSH, with analyses indicating effectiveness of GSH in significantly improving mental health and social functioning at post-treatment and 3-month follow-up, but not at 6-month follow-up. Effectiveness was also indicated under intent-to-treat conditions (n = 97) with medium effect sizes (≈ 0.6) for each outcome measure at post-treatment. Improvement in mental health was predicted by lower self-efficacy and greater therapeutic alliance. Completers of the intervention had significantly higher socio-economic status than non-completers. Conclusions. The current study has suggested effectiveness of GSH in routine clinical practice across different primary care services at post-treatment, but with less evidence of this at follow-up. Effectiveness has been highlighted to be influenced by self-efficacy and therapeutic alliance, suggesting the importance of considering non-specific factors when patients access GSH in primary care. This study underlines the need for further research exploring longer-term clinical effectiveness and examining for whom GSH works in order to constructively inform future evidence-based practice.

Stress and depression are popular and powerful terms within the mental health field. Although the relation between the two terms has been discussed and investigated in lay and scientific discourse, less is known about how this relation is constructed online. Individuals wanting to learn more about these topics are increasingly turning online using a search engine as an initial quick method of obtaining mental health information. The present research examines the stress and depression discourse found on self-help websites using a social constructionist epistemological framework and the methodological approach of discourse analysis. In the first manuscript, I specifically examined how stress was constructed in the causal ontology of depression in six different websites. The analysis demonstrated that many possible relations between the two terms were included. This finding suggests that, in the online context, ensuring that website users find themselves represented in the text is of maximal importance. In the second manuscript, I examined how the stress and depression terms themselves were constructed. This analysis suggests that the stress discourse often borrowed from depression discourse, constructing the two terms in similar ways. This parallel construction involved defining both terms as mental illnesses, with corresponding symptoms and clinical presentations that required treatment. The degree of overlap between the two terms suggests that engaging the website user was more important than the specific label used to label the distress in the online context. I examine the contrast between the general, fluid, and elastic constructions of the mental health terms found online with the ever-evolving need for increased precision and demarcation of mental health conditions within the fields of psychiatry and psychology.

No description available.