Past research has shown a correlation between first-aid training and the reduction of injuries. This connection has been noted in off-the-job situations in addition to industrial studies. This project is an extension of those past findings with three notable differences: total population training was studied, as the intervention instead of just saturation treatment; attention was given to the effect that the half-life of training had upon injury reduction; and three randomly chosen small groups we're studied to determine short range effects. The theoretical bases from which the study hypothesis was developed originated in the Behavioral Science and Psychology literature. Discussions are developed around the mental structuring of accidental potential situations in the case of a person trained in first-aid principles. Behavior Modification was one of the principles of change that offered a.safer environment through first-aid training. Group contagion provided the setting for development of a safer place to work because of socialization to a "safe attitude." The intervention, American National Red Cross Standard Multimedia First-Aid Course, provided some of the mental developments toward modification of behavior. These were the modeling and rehearsal features of the course. A connection between group deviance and accident "proneness" led to a proposal that avoidance behavior was the resultant of the training.

No description available.

Adults with developmental disabilities that live in large residential settings experience complications due to problem behavior when attending routine medical/dental appointments. This may result in sedation for clients for even the most routine medical/dental appointments. The purpose of this project was to develop a comprehensive staff training program that incorporated best practices to teach direct-support professionals behavior management techniques and best practices for transporting clients to and from routine medical/dental appointments. 4 direct-support professionals at a large residential care facility participated in this project. Multiple probes were conducted utilizing standard role-play exercises to evaluate caregiver acquisition of 16 specific skills related to client information, best practices for client transport, and behavior management. The results indicated that behavior skills training (BST) resulted in caregiver acquisition of all 16 skills during role-play exercises.

This study examined the effectiveness of two procedures, a visual cue and performance posting, to modify the use of sign language by psychiatric technicians. The visual cue was first introduced alone, then paired with performance posting to encourage staff use of sign language with the developmentally disabled children in their charge. Application of the visual cue alone produced little change in staff sign useage. The visual cue plus performance posting condition increased staff use of sign language during mealtimes. Four weeks of follow-up data indicated that the use of sign language remained at a level well above baseline.

Falk's pivotal 1961 study showed that rats would drink excessive amounts of water when exposed to a time based schedule of reinforcement. Since then, schedule-induced drinking or polydipsia, has been demonstrated with several species and with a variety of different behaviors. Rats, the most commonly used animal, have been shown to drink excessive amounts of water under a variety of different time based schedules of reinforcement; exclusively during a free operant procedure. The current study shows that water drinking can be induced during a discrete trial procedure, and instead of using a time-based schedule of reinforcement, this study used a variable-ratio schedule of reinforcement. The results showed that excessive water drinking was induced under these conditions with a canine.

We evaluated the effects of an instructional package on the emergence of novel intraverbals in children diagnosed with autism. Participants were two boys with a diagnosis of autism who had tact and listener repertoires for common objects and events, some intraverbal responses, and showed an ability to learn new intraverbal responses through direct instruction prior to participating in the study. Tact training, listener training, sorting training, and mixed training (listener and tact training) were conducted with each participant, with a probe to test for emergent intraverbals following each training step. If some emergence was seen during a probe following a training step, probes were conducted with the remaining sets to test for emergence in those sets as well. Multiple-exemplar training was conducted following the training steps if all targets within a set did not meet the criterion for emergence during probes. Results showed that for one participant, all four training steps, in addition to multiple-exemplar training, were needed to see emergence in all targets during probes for two sets, with the last two sets requiring only tact training before all targets had emerged during probes. The second participant required only tact training during three sets, with listener training required for one target in one set before all targets in all sets emerged during probes.

A randomized controlled trial study was conducted to test the effectiveness of 16 sessions of the modalities of individual and group child-centered play therapy (CCPT) on improving social-emotional assets, including self-regulation/responsibility, social competence, and empathy. Participants were 56 students in four urban elementary schools in north central Texas, referred by teachers for disruptive or problematic behavior: 10 female and 46 male; ages 5 to 10 years with mean age 7.12; and 21 identifying as Hispanic, 17 as White, 8 as Multiracial, 1 as Asian, and 9 unspecified. Teachers and parents completed the Social and Emotional Assets and Resilience Scale (SEARS; Merrill, 2011) at pre- and post-treatment. With a significance criterion of p< .05, teacher reports provided no statistically significant results. However, parent reports indicated a statistically and practically significant interaction effect with a medium to large effect size, indicating a substantial improvement in children's scores from pre- to post-test attributed to group assignment. Mean differences indicated substantial gains in overall social-emotional assets, according to Total scores, in both individual and group treatment conditions as compared to the waitlist control group. Additionally, both individual and group play therapy was correlated with significant improvement with a large effect for the constructs of self-regulation/responsibility and social competence, with the group condition having a larger effect than the individual condition. Regarding empathy, neither modality resulted in significant improvement, though individual CCPT resulted practically in a large effect. These results indicate CCPT may provide a developmentally appropriate treatment for clinicians working with children in schools and in the community to foster their social and emotional competencies.

A thesis submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy (PhD) in Community Psychology in the Department of Psychology at the University of Zululand, 2004. / The general aim of this study was to determine the effectiveness of the psychological intervention programs in the two schools of industries (SOf's) namely, Mimosadafe and Newcastle Schools of Industries. A third school, Bersig SOI was used for piloting the study and the results were incorporated in the main study findings. Twenty-seven educators, one social worker and one consulting clinical psychologist, and sixty-one learners participated in the study. The major findings of the study were as follows: the psychological intervention programs at SOI's are ineffective; learners are benefiting only partially by being at SOI's. According to educators, learners are benefiting partially because they bunk classes, reconstruction social workers are not supportive, Department of Education is not supportive, no follow up programs for learners post-SOl, emphasis is placed only on structure - not therapeutic programs. Only 15% of educators were found to be adequately trained to teach at SOI. Although psychological intervention programs exist at SOI's, they are not structured and they are only administered on a need-to-basis (reactive rather than proactive/preventive). Intervention strategies used at SOI's are based on individualistic, reactive, traditional mainstream psychology that is based on a disease/medical model. Based on these findings, the current study suggested a change of intervention strategies at these schools into strategies based on community psychological methods of intervention, ft was also suggested that the non-mental health professionals e.g. teachers and house parents should be involved in conducting psychological intervention. To be equal to this challenge these non-professionals should be trained.

Research questions were: 1: Will Drug Injectors Use An Exchange In A StateWhere Syringes Are Legal? 2: Will Drug Injectors Using An Exchange Decrease Risky Behavior? 3: Will Frequent Clients Change Risk Behaviors More Than Infrequent Clients? 4: Will Drug Injectors Using An Exchange Change Risk Behaviors More Than A Comparison Group Not Using An Exchange? 5: Does An Exchange Have An Impact On The Number Of Discarded Syringes On The Streets? 6: Is There A Difference In The Rate Of Spread Of HIV Infection Among Users And Non-Users Of The Exchange. Drug injectors will use needle exchange programs, even in a state where syringes are legal. During the first four years, nearly 2,000 drug injectors made approximately 16,000 visits to the Exchange. Clients of the Exchange reduced risky behavior from intake to six months. Change lasted over time: at twelve months, change in behaviors continued to be significant. Frequent users of the Exchange were better on two variables than infrequent users: they borrowed syringes less, and were less likely to use a syringe and throw it away. Drug injectors using the Exchange were compared to those not using the Exchange, but using a bleach/outreach project. Clients of both projects reduced risky behaviors, with Exchange clients better on two variables: re-using syringes without cleaning, and throwing away used syringes. The two projects attracted different drug injectors, and should be viewed as complementary rather than competing AIDS prevention strategies. The impact of the Exchange on the community was evaluated by the change in the number of discarded syringes found on the streets. The number of syringes found per month decreased from 5.14 before the Exchange opened to 1.9 after it began -- a significant side benefit. The data presented here support the growing evidence that needle exchange programs produce behavioral risk reductions, and that the number of potentially infected syringes in public places can be reduced.

Results of the Youth Center Research Project were almost equally favorable for each other's two schools. The parole-violation rates of the wards released from both institutions dropped from 43% to 31%, a considerable improvement when compared with the two control California Youth Authority schools continuing failure rate of 46%. These figures were for twelve-month parole-exposure periods. But the study’s major hypotheses were not verified. The more mature youths did not do better with TA than with B Mod, and the lower-maturity wards did no better with B Mod. In fact, one classification of higher-maturity wards did a little better with B Mod, and some lower-maturity wards did a little better with B Mod, and lower-maturity wards did better with TA. But all levels did fairly well with either systems, regardless of whether or not the wards declared themselves to be in need of change. Whether those results would endure for more than twelve months were still in question as of this writing. The data were to be evaluated for years to come. In the meantime, an important question not answered in the 1972 report was: were there any interaction effects between the three major aariables: treatment method, maturity level of wards, and treater competence?