Many researchers have pointed out the difficulties teachers face with managing student oppositional behaviour in the classroom. Most pre-service teacher education programs emphasize the curriculum content and the planning of lessons to the exclusion of specialized training in classroom management approaches. This oversight has led to inadequate classroom management skills in many teachers and can result in low teacher self-efficacy and high rates of stress and burnout. Many commonly employed strategies used by teachers to manage problem behaviour focus on reductive consequences that can have a range of negative side effects. Other strategies may be proactive and effective, but are often too complicated and impractical for regular use. In this paper we propose a “keystone” approach to classroom management that may be more efficient and effective for teachers to use in the classroom. With this approach, teachers focus on a circumscribed set of specific classroom skills that have the potential to produce widespread improvement in child outcomes. Empirical support for this approach is discussed.

This study examined parent-adolescent conflict and the attributions for conflict. Adolescent participants (29 ADHD; 22 Comparison) aged 13-17 and their mothers and fathers completed questionnaires. Adolescents with ADHD have conflicts over more issues with their parents according to self and parent report. Adolescents who believed that the conflict occurred in many contexts and that their parents were responsible for that conflict reported that they had conflict over more issues. Attributions were not predictive of conflict according to mother report. ADHD status moderated attributions in predicting father reported conflict. Among fathers who believed that conflicts were their son or daughter’s responsibility, fathers of youth with ADHD were less likely to report more issues involving conflicts than fathers of youth without ADHD. Conversely, among fathers who believed conflict was pervasive across contexts and time, having a son or daughter with ADHD was associated with more issues involving conflict.

The present study examined the frequency and risk factors associated with experiencing victimization by peers and bullying others in adolescents with Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD). Sixty-four males and females (ages 13-18) and their parents and teachers completed standardized questionnaires. Adolescents with ADHD were more likely to report increased levels having experienced victimization by peers and participation in bullying others. Parent reports of victimization by peers and bullying others did not differ between adolescents with and without ADHD. Among adolescents with ADHD, those who had experienced victimization by peers perceived lower levels of social support and had increased levels of parent-reported peer relation difficulties. Bullying others was not associated with perceptions of social support or parent-reported peer relation problems. Individual factors such as internalizing problems and oppositionality were not significantly associated with experiencing victimization by peers or bullying others. Implications for future research and clinical assessment are discussed.

Research supports rehabilitative programming addressing youths’ risk to reoffend, criminogenic needs and responsivity factors with the goal of reducing reoffending. However, the Risk-Need-Responsivity (RNR) framework takes a ‘gender neutral’ approach that critics assert overlooks the unique needs of females. It remains largely unknown whether matching treatment to RNR needs is as effective for female youth as it has been shown to be for male youth. Comparative analyses of 39 male and 37 female justice system-involved youth indicate that across RNR categories, females and males were similar in quality and quantity of needs, and had them met through probation services at a similar rate. However, while the RNR assessment tool predicted risk for recidivism equally well, the matching of services to RNR needs appears to be far more potent in reducing recidivism for boys than girls, suggesting a moderating effect of sex on the relationship between RNR matched treatment and re-offending.

The purpose of this study was to document the perspectives and experiences of five Indigenous Elders on the potential for Indigenous and Western healing paradigms and practices to be integrated in mental health service delivery for Indigenous peoples. Semi-structured qualitative interviews were held with each participant, and a narrative analysis was used to generate research themes and findings. Results indicated that all five Elders perceived a potential for Indigenous and Western approaches and practitioners to work collaboratively together in the future, and Elders reported varying levels of experience with integrated healthcare delivery. However, all five Elders identified numerous issues requiring attention and steps to be taken prior to integrated practice taking place. These included the need to reclaim Indigenous knowledge, an acceptance and respect for Indigenous knowledge and practices by the Western healthcare system, and the need for increased and formalized education related to Indigenous knowledge and healing approaches.

Although childhood maltreatment has been established as a risk factor for the development of problematic gambling, there are significant omissions in the literature regarding the investigation of mediating mechanisms underlying this etiological relationship. The purpose of the current study was to examine altered self-capacities (i.e., relationship difficulties, identity disturbances, and affect dysregulation) and gambling motives as mediating mechanisms underlying the link between childhood maltreatment and gambling, in a sample of emerging adults recruited from the community. It was hypothesized that childhood maltreatment would lead to impairments in the aforementioned self-capacities, which would subsequently predict greater endorsement of gambling motives. In turn, gambling motives were hypothesized to predict increased gambling frequency and gambling problems. The results revealed a pattern wherein altered self-capacities mediated the relationship between childhood maltreatment and gambling motives. However, gambling motives were not observed to mediate the relationship between altered self-capacities and gambling frequency or gambling problems.

Impaired social interaction is one of the hallmarks of autism spectrum disorders (ASDs). Emotional faces are arguably the most critical visual emotional stimuli and the ability to perceive, recognize, and interpret emotions is central to social interaction and communication as well as healthy development. There is however, a paucity of studies devoted to neural and cognitive mechanisms underlying emotional face processing in adolescents with ASD. Through an implicit emotional face processing task completed in the MEG, we examined spatiotemporal differences in neural activation during angry and happy emotional face processing. Results suggest atypical frontal involvement in ASD adolescents during angry and happy face processing. In particular, orbitofrontal activation in participants with ASD was found to be delayed but greater in amplitude, relative to controls.

Temporal lobe epilepsy (TLE) is a common form of intractable epilepsy that can be treated with surgical resection of the epileptogenic medial temporal lobe tissue, specifically the hippocampus. This resection can lead to a variable degree of memory deficit and considerable research has been directed at identifying predictors of these deficits. This thesis explores the relationship between structural predictors and functional predictors in TLE. I looked at fMRI activation asymmetry produced by a scene encoding task as well as volume asymmetry ratios within the hippocampus and the relationship of these predictors to memory performance in patients with TLE. Mediation analysis was performed according to Baron and Kenny (1986) and showed that fMRI activation asymmetry mediated the relationship between volume asymmetry and memory asymmetry in patients with TLE. This suggests that activation asymmetry may be a preferred variable for assessing functional adequacy in the medial temporal region.

Preliminary novel research findings indicate that a subset of individuals with moderate to severe traumatic brain injury show bilateral hippocampal atrophy progressing beyond the acute stage post-injury. The present study proposes a novel, integrated model of neuroprotection against subacute hippocampal atrophy (i.e., atrophy occurring beyond the initial 3 months post-injury) via environmental enrichment, drawing on theoretical models and research findings from the fields of environmental enrichment, brain and cognitive reserve, and neuroplastic models of functional recovery from brain injury. Objectives: (a) to examine the relationship between environmental enrichment factors and subacute hippocampal atrophy and (b) to examine the relationship between subacute hippocampal atrophy and return to productivity. Design: Retrospective observational within-subjects. Participants: Patients (N=21) with moderate to severe TBI. Measures: Primary predictors: Self-report ratings of environmental enrichment factors (i.e., hours of cognitive, physical, and social activities, meditation/prayer, and therapy). Primary outcome: hippocampal volume change between 5 months and 24+ months post-injury based on initial and follow-up MRI scans; Brain Injury Community Rehabilitation Outcome Scales-39 (BICRO-39). Results: Generalized environmental enrichment (i.e., an aggregate of cognitive, physical, and social activity) was significantly negatively correlated with subacute bilateral hippocampal atrophy (p<.05). Cognitive activity was the environmental enrichment element that accounted for the greatest degree of variance (32%) in subacute bilateral hippocampal atrophy (p<.01). Frequency of meditation/prayer was significantly negatively correlated with right hippocampal subacute atrophy (<.05) after controlling for socioeconomic status and generalized environmental enrichment. Level of education and pre-injury occupational attainment did not correlate with subacute hippocampal atrophy. Conclusion: Findings suggest that a fixed degree of neural reserve at the time of brain injury may not confer neuroprotection against structural pathology in the manner suggested by the present study’s proposed model of neuroprotection via environmental enrichment. Instead, findings suggest that in order for environmental enrichment to positively modulate susceptibility to subacute hippocampal atrophy post-TBI, environmental enrichment exposure must occur during the subacute phase post-injury rather than prior to injury.

Despite the high prevalence of father-perpetrated maltreatment, relatively little empirical attention has been given to men who abuse and neglect their children (Dubowitz, 2006, 2009; Haskett, Marziano, & Dover, 1996). To further our understanding, the current dissertation explored father-child relational dynamics that underlie risk for child maltreatment. In the first study, data from a sample of 121 maltreating fathers were used to discern differential patterns of parenting dynamics using both theoretical and statistical approaches to classification. It was hypothesized that fathers would show problems predominantly in one of five areas: emotional unavailability; negative attribution, harshness, and rejection; developmentally inappropriate interaction; poor psychological boundaries; and exposure of a child to hostile inter-parental relations. Contrary to expectation, little support was obtained for the predominant problem hypothesis. Although methodological limitations may play a role, results indicated that men were more clearly differentiated by the degree of severity evidenced across their problematic parent-child interactions, than by differences in the specific pattern of problems they experienced. An interesting finding from Study 1 was that increasingly severe relational problems were associated with a misprioritization of parent and child needs. Study 2 further explored this dynamic by revising and re-evaluating a self-report measure of men’s ability to balance needs in the father-child relationship. Data from two samples (93 community fathers and 85 maltreating fathers) provided mixed results: Support was obtained for the internal consistency and construct validity of the image-emotional needs subscale of the measure; however, minimal support was obtained for the personal needs subscale. Furthermore, in contrast to expectation, discriminant validity was not obtained for either subscale, as maltreating fathers reported a better ability to balance needs on both scales than fathers drawn from a community sample. Social desirability was one of several factors deemed to play a key role in this finding. Each study’s contribution to the field is reviewed, along with discussion of limitations and future directions.