Research has found that parents may feel isolated from their children's schools due to their own problematic educational experiences or their lack of understanding their children's school experiences. Current literature explores stakeholders' perceptions of school counselors but lacks specific context from a parental perspective. Validating parents' perceptions of and experiences with school counselors enhances students' academic success by providing insight about what motivates parents to invest in their children's schools and how school counselors influence parental involvement. Utilizing key concepts related to the importance of parental involvement for student success, this qualitative study focused on the experiences and perceptions of parents regarding their children's high school counselors. Criterion and snowball sampling was used to recruit 8 parents from 5 different high schools across the Midwestern United States. Interview data were analyzed through clustering and horizontalization processes, revealing 4 specific themes: student benefits, in which school counselors directly supported students; parents feeling empowered, in which school counselors validated concerns and empowered parents; school counselor providing interpersonal environment, where students believed school counselors cared about them as individuals and strove for their success; and informed school counselor, where school counselors capitalized on their expertise and professional experience for the direct benefit of students. These emerging themes strengthen existing research and provide current and future school counselors with insight into building and maintaining collaborative relationships with parents, including advocacy efforts to increase student success.

This study examined student teachers' explicit and implicit perceptions of ADHD and the relationship between perceptions of ADHD and social desirability. In addition, the relationship between a current measure of implicit perceptions of ADHD and one that was adapted for this study was also investigated. Findings indicate that student teachers view a student portrayed as exhibiting symptoms consistent with ADHD more negatively than a "normal" child in terms of their self-reported first impressions of the child as well as their predictions for the child's future success. Participants' perceptions, as measured by two implicit measures, however, were mixed, with results from one measure indicative of neutral attitudes toward ADHD, while results from another measure were suggestive of an implicit attitude bias against ADHD behaviors. Overall, social desirability did not appear to be meaningfully associated with student teachers' implicit or explicit perceptions of ADHD. The key findings seem to indicate that student teachers generally exhibit more negative perceptions of stereotypical ADHD behaviors than "normal" behaviors. Two measures of student teachers' implicit perceptions of ADHD were not significantly related.

The purpose of this study was to investigate social science doctoral students' perceptions and attitudes toward different characteristics of written feedback and written feedback providers for their academic writing. Moreover, it aimed to provide an explanatory model to describe the relationships between these perceptions and attitudes, students' revision decisions, and other potentially relevant factors in their written feedback practices. The investigation was informed by two theoretical frameworks: principles of instructional design and conditions of learning, and situated learning and communities of practice. The study used a mixed methods approach in which qualitative data collection and analysis was followed by quantitative data collection and analysis. The main purpose of the qualitative phase was to develop a background to build a questionnaire to be used in the quantitative phase. The qualitative data were collected through interviews with 15 participants. Grounded theory data analysis methods were adapted in the qualitative analysis of the data. The quantitative data were collected through a questionnaire with 276 participants in two large mountain west public universities. Descriptive and multivariate correlational data analyses were employed for the analysis of the quantitative data. The results of this study provided descriptive information on doctoral students' preferences for different types of written feedback and their perceptions and attitudes toward different characteristics of written feedback providers. Moreover, the structural equation modeling (SEM) analysis results showed that that there are several factors in the feedback practices of the doctoral students that have significant influences on some other factors in these feedback practices. An eight-factor model was developed constituting the following factors: (a) attitudes toward critical/negative written feedback, (b) motivations for academic writing, (c) perceptions of opportunities to write academic papers with faculty members in the department, (d) attitudes toward asking and searching for written feedback for academic papers, (e) attitudes toward feedback providers' willingness and time to give feedback when asking for written feedback, (f) attitudes toward feedback providers' personality when asking for written feedback, (g) revision decisions considering the external issues while examining the written feedback, and (h) revision decisions considering the written feedback characteristics and the need for the revisions while examining the written feedback.

My research examines the importance of a particular form of cross-group brokerage in social networks wherein a person represents a bridge between his or her group and people belonging to a different group. Prior research on network brokerage and leadership emergence has failed to distinguish between brokerage in general and the kind of boundary-spanning between groups that is the focus of my research. Moreover, what we currently know about social network brokerage and leadership emergence comes either from highly abstracted laboratory-based work, or it comes research in relatively traditional work organizations with clear formal structures. It is unclear whether prior research from traditional organizational settings can be applied to nontraditional organizations in the so-called “creative industries,” which are the focus of my research. The core hypotheses my research examines are: (1) Do individuals whose friendship networks help them bridge between groups emerge as leaders in the eyes of others? And (2) Are people who are socially perceptive and socially skilled better at leveraging such boundary-spanning positions to win nominations of leadership from others? Data from the study come from interview and survey data from four different musical orchestras based in Korea.

Behavioral and academic outcomes differ for students by race, ability, and gender within the K-12 public education system. Moreover, striking gaps exist at the intersection of race, ability, and gender, despite the similarity in severity and frequency of behavior between groups. Few studies, however, have examined the educational mechanisms that contribute to these gaps. Despite this, the scientific literature? shows that when educators have high expectations, students are more likely to be successful academically and behaviorally. Therefore, this study examines the inverse of this relationship by recognizing that biases likely influence behavior and academic student outcomes through expectancy bias for certain groups of students. The present study utilizes an intersectional framework of disability studies and critical race theory (DisCrit) to examine preservice educator expectations of behavior and academic outcomes of a hypothetical student at the intersection of student race, ability, and gender using a factorial vignette experimental design. Analyses consisted of factorial multivariate analyses of main and interaction effects including covariates for social desirability, tolerance, severity, and demographic characteristics. Results indicated significant and meaningful differences in expectations of behavior and academic experiences by race and ability. However, interaction effects were not detected. Implications and limitations of this study are discussed.

In order to create more efficient, useful alcohol treatment and intervention methods tailored specifically for the older population, it is important to understand the reasons that older adults perceive that they consume alcohol. For this reason, this study explored older adults’ perceptions regarding why they use alcohol. Older adults, age 60 and older, were surveyed through questionnaires completed at senior community centers within San Bernardino County. This was a mixed method design that used qualitative and quantitative analysis for the purpose of exploring the most frequently reported reasons for why older adults use alcohol. The main finding of the study is that older adults in the sample most frequently reported using alcohol for “having fun and celebration” and for “social reasons.” However, it is important to note that older adults reported a variety of motivations for using alcohol. Further research is suggested to determine correlations between demographics, alcohol use patterns, and older adults’ perceptions of why they use alcohol.

This study utilized a quantitative survey design in order to explore the perceptions and preparedness of Master of Social Work (MSW) students in regards to substance using clients. The study was exploratory and the data that was collected focused on the perceptions, attitudes, and level of preparedness of forty MSW students. The study used a self-report survey that included demographic questions in order to identify factors such as age, gender, ethnicity, cohort placement, current year in the program, formal training, and declared specialization. This study found that the perceptions and attitudes of MSW students were mixed and varied across the board. Results indicated that formal training contributed to level of preparedness and that a large majority of the sample felt that taking a substance use course would contribute to preparedness. The study also found that the majority of the sample felt that their MSW program did not contribute to preparedness. The study recommends that future studies on perceptions and preparedness of MSW students collect data from more than one MSW program and include qualitative interviews in order to gain a better understanding of MSW students’ perceptions.

This research project aims to explore the perceptions of professional service needs from county social workers and parents seeking reunification at Walden Family Services in San Bernardino. This research study gathers the professional perspective and personal opinions of social workers that work closely with parents who are attempting to reunify with their children and the perspective of parents going through the process of attempting to reunify. This research project explores the positive and negative themes that were found from the feedback given from social workers and parents. The following study provides important insight into areas that can be improved from social workers and parents working together. The findings can help social workers understand the perspectives of parents going through the reunification process and provide insight into the barriers that might be hindering them from being successful. The findings can be of assistance to social workers working with parents in the social welfare system as they may assist in prioritizing attention to drop-out rates of services, poverty, social work expectation towards parents and the quality of social workers in general. Vise-versa, these findings can be a help to parents understand the viewpoints of social workers and their expectations social workers have on them. Ultimately, the research aims to provide insights on barriers that are impeding social workers and parents from working together effectively and working as a team. The following study is an exploratory research project that explores the discrepancies in perspectives from these two different groups. This qualitative study utilizes face to face interviews with open-ended questions as the tool to collect data from participants. The two central themes that emerged during the study were the emphasis both groups placed on the importance of communication and recognition of systemic barriers that prevent parents and social workers to be successful. Based on the qualitative responses of the eight participants in this study, the researcher has concluded that there is a discrepancy between perception of professional service needs from social workers and parents.

Over the past few decades, there has been an increase in literature on social work practice with the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender (LGBT) community, with a strong focus on the LGB portion of the community. Due to the lack of literature in social work practice with the transgender population, this study was designed to assess bachelor and master levels social workers’ knowledge, attitudes and preparedness for working with the transgender community. This study is significant to the field of social work as it evaluates if students can provide comprehensive services to transgender clients. The study uses a quantitative survey design utilizing an adapted version of the Lesbian, Gay, Bisexual, and Transgender Assessment Scale (LGBTAS). The data were analyzed by differentiating the two types of social work students to evaluate the differences in preparedness levels by asking about participants’ phobias, attitudes, and cultural competence. As there has been minimal literature on the social work practice with the transgender population, the implications of this study will present the support for a transgender-inclusive approach to social work practice. Study findings suggest that when compared to one another, bachelor level students feel more prepared to advocate on behalf of transgender clients than do master level students. Furthermore, master level students felt their social work programs were not providing culturally competent coursework and field placements that prepared them to work with transgender clients, while bachelor level students did feel prepared.

The primary purpose of this study was to observe the dynamics between sexual harassment (SH), social identity theory, and justice perceptions. Furthermore, participants’ past experience with SH may have created conspiracy mentalities to explain outgroup members (e.g., males) behavior towards women. From a social identity perspective, women who strongly identify with being female should be more prone to view lower justice perceptions when a male investigator denies an SH claim, but equally high levels of justice perceptions when male or female investigators confirm SH and when a female investigator denies SH. Four scenarios were created where female participants (N = 283) were randomly assigned to one of four scenarios: Scenario 1 involved a female investigator who confirmed an SH claim; Scenario 2 involved a female investigator who denied an SH claim; Scenario 3 involved a male investigator who confirmed an SH claim; and Scenario 4 involved a male investigator who denied an SH claim. Regression analyses revealed that social identity (i.e., gender identity) had no predictive value regarding justice perceptions, but that the decision of the investigators influenced justice perceptions. Furthermore, an ANOVA was utilized and discovered significant mean differences between the four scenarios, suggesting that there were differences when the investigator confirmed SH (both male and female) or denied SH (both male and female), but there was no significant interaction. Participants had low justice perceptions when SH was denied and higher justice perceptions when SH was confirmed. Practical and theoretical implications are discussed, as well as directions for future research.