The low graduation rate of degree-seeking students at public community colleges is an important crisis facing communities across the United States. College satisfaction and withdrawal cognitions in students have been identified as key factors in college persistence by researchers. However, a review of the literature revealed no study in which a college-persistence intervention based on the personalization principle theory or using tailored messages has been conducted. The purpose of this study was to test the effectiveness of a college-persistence intervention, based on the personalization principle theory and Mashburn's theory, for students at a community college. This study used between-groups experimental research design and employed a nonprobability convenience sample comprising 108 college students at a regionally accredited public community college in the United States. Random assignment to 1 of 3 groups, including 2 experimental groups and 1 no-message control group, was conducted. The 2 experimental groups were the personalization-based tailored instructional messages and generalized instructional messages groups. A one-way MANOVA indicated that there was no significant difference in the college satisfaction and withdrawal cognitions of students in the experimental and control groups. A chi-square test of independence also indicated that there was no significant association between intervention type (personalization-based tailored instructional message, generalized instructional message, and no-message control) and college persistence. This study provides educators with a basis for social change with the debut of a prototype intervention that may be replicated and extended in future research to help students earn a college degree.

Proficiency in language arts and communication skills is essential to success in the global workforce. Most states assess students in language arts literacy (LAL) through standardized tests that assess a student's ability to read, interpret literature, and write expressively. Although educational reformers strive to improve the foundations that prepare students in literacy, reforms have not fully incorporated the theory of emotional intelligence (EI), which explains a student's ability to use, understand, perceive, and manage their emotions in order to think critically, make decisions, and solve problems. Although it is not known whether EI directly correlates to literacy, emotional skills are an integral part of literacy, linguistics, and overall cognition. The purpose of this quantitative study was to determine whether a correlation existed between EIQ (measured by the Mayer, Salovey, and Caruso Emotional Intelligence Test), and LAL (measured by the High School Proficiency Assessment) in literacy, for secondary students. The multiple regression model included 2 control variables: gender and grade point average. The findings of the primary analysis demonstrated positive correlations between EIQ and LAL scores. Upon further analysis, the relationship between EIQ and LAL remained positively significant in the regression model. Emotional intelligence, and associated improved literacy skills, may positively influence social change by helping secondary students to develop a broader repertoire of skills necessary for communication and problem solving later in life.

Lymphangioleiomyomatosis (LAM) is a rare lung disease recognized by abnormal growth of smooth muscle cells proliferating in lungs parenchyma, developing benign tumors, migrating to the other organs, and ultimately leading to respiratory failure and death. Despite existing literature mainly on clinical aspects of LAM, there is a gap of literature in regards to the knowledge, attitude, and lifestyle practices (KAPs) of LAM patients and their effects on their quality of life. The purpose of this quantitative study was to investigate the KAPs of the sporadic LAM patients as measured by the Bristol Chronic Obstructive Pulmonary Disease Knowledge Questionnaire, Beliefs and Behavior Questionnaire, Determinants of Lifestyle Behavior Questionnaire; these KAPs were then analyzed for their relationship to quality of life reports as measured by the St George’s Quality of Life Questionnaire. Transtheoretical model (TTM) was used to describe the relationship among the variables. The data were collected through online survey questionnaires from 143 sporadic LAM patients registered at the LAM Foundation. Pearson’s correlations and linear regression were used to analyze the data. The results of the analysis showed that there was a significant positive relationship between attitude, lifestyle practices, and quality of life and a negative relationship between knowledge and quality of life. The outcome achieved by this study and its implication on social change identifies the need to initiate more study-specific KAPs within LAM populations, including individuals with tuberous sclerosis complex LAM. The results could also encourage the LAM community as well as other stakeholders to implement programs, workshops, and interventions that could promote and enhance quality of life.

My passion as a student at the Claremont Colleges is to help children with Autism Spectrum Disorder grow and learn as normal children and to help prepare them for life outside the Autism Center at Claremont McKenna College. In my thesis project, I am exploring the concept of silhouettes through photography and my perceptions of the stories told to me by the children I teach. Esthetically, I am inspired by Kara Walker’s installation of large cutout silhouettes but I am using different mediums to accomplish my project: Artistically, I am inspired by the detailed descriptions of the obsessive stories and information provided to me by the children at the Autism Center. Primarily, I will be using photographs that I have taken of the children and creating silhouetted images of them through Photoshop. Afterwards, I will paint my perceptions of the detailed and creative descriptions of the different information relayed to me by each individual child. Secondary, there will be some life size black cutouts, on black paper, of different imagined scenarios with the children. In the spring, I see this as an installation with many separate pieces that contain different sizes, depth, and simplicity.

Stress has been widely shown to directly influence people’s emotional and behavioral processing as well as their underlying biological systems. This project examined physiological and behavioral responses as indicators of stress and coping in the context of a psychosocial stressor in a controlled laboratory setting. We examined the association between indicators of behavioral coping and underlying physiological reactivity within participants while experiencing stress. Participants included 68 emerging adults. Physiological measures include autonomic biomarkers (e.g., heart-rate, skin conductance) at rest and during the stressor while behavioral indicators that were coded include acute verbal and non-verbal actions exhibited by participants during the stressor. Results supported the efficacy of a modified social stressor at eliciting stress responding in participants. In addition, behavioral coping was found to be associated with autonomic responding to the stressor. Exploring these associations has important implications for understanding the interaction between biological and behavioral responding to stress.

Objetivos: O objetivo principal deste trabalho foi avaliar a contribuição do conhecimento, da religiosidade, do medo, da qualidade de vida, dos grupos de referência e de variáveis sociodemográficas e comportamentais na prática da doação de sangue em uma amostra representativa da população de usuários de atenção primária à saúde do município de Ribeirão Preto, São Paulo. Como objetivos específicos, propôs-se uma versão em português da Blood or Injection Fear Scale e desenvolveu-se um instrumento para a avaliação do conhecimento sobre a doação de sangue na população brasileira denominado Blood Donation Knowledge Questionnaire (BDK-Brazil). As propriedades métricas desses instrumentos também foram avaliadas. Métodos: Tratou-se de estudo transversal com amostragem aleatória estratificada. As 41 unidades básicas de saúde do município foram agrupadas em 12 estratos, de acordo com a área geográfica e o Índice Paulista de Vulnerabilidade Social (IPVS). O tamanho amostral calculado para o estudo foi de 1,054 entrevistas. Os participantes responderam perguntas sobre a prática da doação de, conhecimento sobre a doação, religiosidade, medo, qualidade de vida e variáveis sociodemográficas e comportamentais. Para responder ao objetivo principal do estudo os dados foram incluídos em um modelo de equações estruturais e a prática da doação foi considerada a variável dependente (construto central). O modelo estrutural foi avaliado por meio de matriz de correlações policóricas. O ajuste do modelo foi analisado considerando-se os índices de qualidade do ajustamento e a significância dos caminhos causais (?), avaliados pelos testes z, considerando um nível de significância de 5%. Resultados: a doação de sangue foi mais frequente no sexo masculino e entre indivíduos maior nível socioeconômico e educacional. Entre os que nunca doaram sangue, maiores frequências de participantes do sexo feminino, mais jovens, de menor nível socioeconômico, solteiros e sem religião foram detectadas. No modelo estrutural, as variáveis medo, conhecimento e as variáveis sociodemogáficas idade, sexo, nível econômico e educacional foram significativas. Conclusão: Os8 resultados do nosso estudo sugerem associação da prática da doação de sangue com o medo de sangue, injeções e reações vasovagais, com o conhecimento e com variáveis sociodemogáficas como sexo, idade, nível econômico e escolaridade. O medo foi considerado uma barreira relevante para a decisão de doar sangue, bem como a falta de conhecimento sobre o processo da doação. Além disso, há evidências que entre os usuários de atenção primária à saúde, o grupo menos propenso a doar sangue é formado pelas mulheres, os mais jovens e com menor nível socioeconômico e educacional / Objectives: The main objective of this study was to evaluate the contribution of knowledge, religiosity, fear, quality of life, blood donation of peers and sociodemographic and behavioral variables in the practice of blood donation in a representative sample of the population of primary healthcare users in the city of Ribeirão Preto, São Paulo. As specific objectives, a Portuguese version of the Blood or Injection Fear Scale (BIFS) was proposed and an instrument for the evaluation of knowledge about blood donation in the Brazilian population denominated Blood Donation Knowledge Questionnaire (BDK-Brazil) was developed. The metric properties of these instruments were also evaluated. Methods: This was a crosssectional study with randomized stratified sampling. The 41 healthcare facilities of the municipality were grouped into 12 strata, according to the geographic area and the Paulista Social Vulnerability Index. The sample size calculated for the study was 1,054 interviews. Participants answered questions about the blood donation practice, knowledge about donation, religiosity, fear, quality of life and sociodemographic and behavioral variables. To address the main objective of the study the data were included in a structural equation model and the blood donation practice was considered the dependent variable (central construct). The structural model was evaluated through polychoric correlation matrix. The fit of the model was analyzed considering the goodness of fit indices and the significance of the causal paths (?), evaluated by the z-tests, considering a level of significance of 5%. Results: Blood donation was more frequent in males and among individuals with higher socioeconomic and educational level. Among those who never donated blood, higher frequencies of female participants, younger, lower socioeconomic level, single and non-religious were detected. In the structural model, the variables fear, knowledge and sociodemographic variables age, sex, socioeeconomic and educational level were significant. Conclusion: The results of our study suggest the association of the blood donation practice with fear of blood, injections and vasovagal reactions, knowledge and10 sociodemographic variables such as gender, age, socioeconomic and educational level. Fear was considered a relevant barrier to the decision to donate blood as well as lack of knowledge about the donation process. In addition, there is evidence that women, the youngers participants and those with lower socioeconomic and educational level are less likely to donate blood among primary healthcare users.

Objetivos: O objetivo principal deste trabalho foi avaliar a contribuição do conhecimento, da religiosidade, do medo, da qualidade de vida, dos grupos de referência e de variáveis sociodemográficas e comportamentais na prática da doação de sangue em uma amostra representativa da população de usuários de atenção primária à saúde do município de Ribeirão Preto, São Paulo. Como objetivos específicos, propôs-se uma versão em português da Blood or Injection Fear Scale e desenvolveu-se um instrumento para a avaliação do conhecimento sobre a doação de sangue na população brasileira denominado Blood Donation Knowledge Questionnaire (BDK-Brazil). As propriedades métricas desses instrumentos também foram avaliadas. Métodos: Tratou-se de estudo transversal com amostragem aleatória estratificada. As 41 unidades básicas de saúde do município foram agrupadas em 12 estratos, de acordo com a área geográfica e o Índice Paulista de Vulnerabilidade Social (IPVS). O tamanho amostral calculado para o estudo foi de 1,054 entrevistas. Os participantes responderam perguntas sobre a prática da doação de, conhecimento sobre a doação, religiosidade, medo, qualidade de vida e variáveis sociodemográficas e comportamentais. Para responder ao objetivo principal do estudo os dados foram incluídos em um modelo de equações estruturais e a prática da doação foi considerada a variável dependente (construto central). O modelo estrutural foi avaliado por meio de matriz de correlações policóricas. O ajuste do modelo foi analisado considerando-se os índices de qualidade do ajustamento e a significância dos caminhos causais (?), avaliados pelos testes z, considerando um nível de significância de 5%. Resultados: a doação de sangue foi mais frequente no sexo masculino e entre indivíduos maior nível socioeconômico e educacional. Entre os que nunca doaram sangue, maiores frequências de participantes do sexo feminino, mais jovens, de menor nível socioeconômico, solteiros e sem religião foram detectadas. No modelo estrutural, as variáveis medo, conhecimento e as variáveis sociodemogáficas idade, sexo, nível econômico e educacional foram significativas. Conclusão: Os8 resultados do nosso estudo sugerem associação da prática da doação de sangue com o medo de sangue, injeções e reações vasovagais, com o conhecimento e com variáveis sociodemogáficas como sexo, idade, nível econômico e escolaridade. O medo foi considerado uma barreira relevante para a decisão de doar sangue, bem como a falta de conhecimento sobre o processo da doação. Além disso, há evidências que entre os usuários de atenção primária à saúde, o grupo menos propenso a doar sangue é formado pelas mulheres, os mais jovens e com menor nível socioeconômico e educacional / Objectives: The main objective of this study was to evaluate the contribution of knowledge, religiosity, fear, quality of life, blood donation of peers and sociodemographic and behavioral variables in the practice of blood donation in a representative sample of the population of primary healthcare users in the city of Ribeirão Preto, São Paulo. As specific objectives, a Portuguese version of the Blood or Injection Fear Scale (BIFS) was proposed and an instrument for the evaluation of knowledge about blood donation in the Brazilian population denominated Blood Donation Knowledge Questionnaire (BDK-Brazil) was developed. The metric properties of these instruments were also evaluated. Methods: This was a crosssectional study with randomized stratified sampling. The 41 healthcare facilities of the municipality were grouped into 12 strata, according to the geographic area and the Paulista Social Vulnerability Index. The sample size calculated for the study was 1,054 interviews. Participants answered questions about the blood donation practice, knowledge about donation, religiosity, fear, quality of life and sociodemographic and behavioral variables. To address the main objective of the study the data were included in a structural equation model and the blood donation practice was considered the dependent variable (central construct). The structural model was evaluated through polychoric correlation matrix. The fit of the model was analyzed considering the goodness of fit indices and the significance of the causal paths (?), evaluated by the z-tests, considering a level of significance of 5%. Results: Blood donation was more frequent in males and among individuals with higher socioeconomic and educational level. Among those who never donated blood, higher frequencies of female participants, younger, lower socioeconomic level, single and non-religious were detected. In the structural model, the variables fear, knowledge and sociodemographic variables age, sex, socioeeconomic and educational level were significant. Conclusion: The results of our study suggest the association of the blood donation practice with fear of blood, injections and vasovagal reactions, knowledge and10 sociodemographic variables such as gender, age, socioeconomic and educational level. Fear was considered a relevant barrier to the decision to donate blood as well as lack of knowledge about the donation process. In addition, there is evidence that women, the youngers participants and those with lower socioeconomic and educational level are less likely to donate blood among primary healthcare users.

Relatively few studies have investigated the relationship between early childhood attentional control and later cognitive outcomes, especially language development. The current study is an investigation of the relationship between the executive functioning (EF) component of attentional control and language ability in the second year of life. More specifically, the predictive nature of two aspects of attentional control, attentional focus and resistance to distraction, was be the primary focus of the proposed study. Although it was expected that children both high in attentional focus and resistance to distraction would have significantly superior language development than infants with lower attentional capacities, analyses indicated associations between the postural deviation component of resistance to distraction and language. Attentional focus was also related to infant language ability. Avenues for future research regarding early childhood attentional control, resistance to distraction, and language ability are discussed.

Recent research shows that 7.7% of individuals who use indoor tanning beds do so in private homes,1 but little is known about this group. This study evaluated the tanning practices, reasons for tanning, and association with tanning addiction of adults who use tanning beds in private residences.

The objective of this study was to compare the accuracy of self-reported skin cancer risk outcome measures proposed as standards by prevention experts to aggregated estimates of behavior from weekly diaries. Weekly electronic diaries of ultraviolet radiation (UVR) behaviors, initially validated by comparison with daily electronic diaries, were used to assess the accuracy of commonly used end-of-summer self-reported measures among 250 adults. Results revealed low biases, and good correspondence between simple open-ended self-reported estimates of days outside, hours outside, sunbathing days and hours, and days outside when not protected by either sunscreen, long-sleeved shirts, hats, or shade. Rating scale measures commonly used in the current literature and those recently recommended as standards by a workshop of experts showed evidence of being non-interval and lacking precision for more frequent behavior (e.g., >1 h sun exposure daily). These data indicated that open-ended frequency self-reports of skin cancer risk behaviors that follow procedures designed to increase accuracy were reliable over a summer-long period.