Narrative frameworks provide a unique method for understanding how important events and relationships become central to individual identity. Informed by these frameworks, the Centrality of Event Scale (CES; Berntsen & Rubin, 2006) serves as a means to quantify the extent to which a specific event has become central to personal identity. Utilizing the CES, Berntsen and Rubin and colleagues demonstrate the strong link between central traumatic events and psychopathology. Despite this work, however, far less literature explicates the factors that lead to growth and adaptive functioning. In order to address this limitation across the literature, a modified version of Berntsen and Rubin's CES was created in order to assess the importance of close positive social relationships to identity. Data were collected from 255 individuals from undergraduate psychology courses at Southern Illinois University Carbondale. Specifically, it was hypothesized that the component structure of the Centrality of Event Scale modified for social relationships (CESpr) would be commensurate with Berntsen and Rubin's original scale, and it would predict several measures of adaptive functioning. Furthermore, it was hypothesized that positive relational centrality would predict these measures of adaptive functioning, even after controlling for positive event centrality and social support. Congruent with Berntsen and Rubin's original CES, the CESpr yielded a one-component solution, and correlated with several measures of adaptive functioning. Furthermore, after controlling for positive event centrality and social support, positive relational centrality significantly predicted positive affect, resilience, gratitude, and post-traumatic growth. Results of the current study suggest increased personal meaning and relevance attributed to close positive social relationships is indicative of increased adaptive functioning. These findings are consistent with narrative conceptualizations of the self, which suggest that central events and relationships affect the functioning of the individual. Implications and future directions are discussed.

The scholarship that surrounds the relation or comparability of Martin Heidegger’s and Asian thought asks questions of comparability and influence, but the body of literature that has been produced over the last several decades has failed to fully engage Heideggerian and any particular Asian tradition with comparable depth. This work sets out to investigate the ways in which Heidegger’s work and the text of the Zhuangzi, in terms of their responses to the problems that emerge in their respective traditions, offer comparable notions of human nature, authenticity, and the human place in and relation to the universe. Both thinkers find that technology and utility, which are intimately connected with how humans appropriate the world, obstructs how humans are able to relate to the world. Though it becomes apparent in the investigation that Heidegger and the authors of the Zhuangzi offer opposing ideas of the underlying cause of this misappropriation and obstruction, this work uncovers that both traditions offer a vision of how to navigate the world such that we transform with and respond to the world of which we are an inseparable part.

Child maltreatment is a costly social problem that carries with it significant risk of poor outcomes across the lifespan. There is a large body of research on risk and protective factors associated with child maltreatment. However, there is a significant gap in the literature on family functioning after children are reunified with their families. The current study proposed a conceptual model of family functioning based on a socioecological perspective. Hypotheses related to the effects of parenting on well-being were tested using a series of structural equation models. Results indicated modest support for the directional effects of improved parenting on parental well-being and the importance of social support for these families. Overall, this study points to the necessity of continued interaction with families after reunification and the importance of a multi-dimensional perspective. Many mothers continued to struggle with substance use months after reunification, indicating the need for long-term interventions and continued assessment of family well-being. The current study provides data to support changes in public policy and practice which would emphasize continuing long-term service provision. In particular, these families are likely to benefit most from empirically-supported parent training and the development of social support skill-building.

Targeting the ultra poor (TUP) is an integrated, grant-based, anti-poverty intervention in rural Bangladesh. It combines productive asset grants (mainly livestock), confidence building, enterprise training, healthcare, cash and social security support for protecting the ultra poor's consumption, promoting their wealth accumulation and preventing the negative effects of illness. This thesis examines TUP's effects on health (i.e., physical, behavioural, psychological and promotional) and well-being (i.e., food consumption) of ultra poor people. It analyses the impact dynamics (i.e., short-, medium- and long-terms) of health and well-being, food consumption vulnerability to shocks and TUP's differential effects on well-being. The thesis examines these issues constructing a more reliable matched panel from the BRAC's original balanced panel dataset, which is quasi-experimental in nature. The estimates using conditional difference-in-difference (DID) approach with household fixed effects indicate that TUP has had beneficial effects on health and well-being including reduced illness, healthcare sought from modern practitioners, self-reported health improvements, clean water, safer sanitation and improvements in overall wellbeing. However, these health outcomes are not sustained in the long-term (even decay) because of the program design and the lack of household preferences to maintain and invest in health outcomes (e.g. sanitation). In contrast, findings confirm the long-term beneficial effects on well-being. It also suggests the use of BRAC's original sample may lead to a downward bias in TUP's impact assessment on health and well-being as it does not adequately control for the differences in initial conditions among the treatment and control households. Analysis reveals that both health and non-health shocks are prevalent to ultra poor households and are associated with their food consumption vulnerability. However, TUP smooths food consumption through direct and indirect mitigating effects. The results also suggest that being a TUP household improves access to NGOs for shock-induced borrowing. However, food consumption insurance role does come at the cost of production efficiency. Further empirical investigation using the quantile treatment effects (QTE) and the conditional quantile difference-in-difference (QDID) approaches point to a minor differential effect on well-being in the medium- and long-terms. Finally, the QDID approach shows that though TUP works best for the poorest of the ultra poor, it impacts well-being positively from the lower to the upper tail of the food consumption distribution. Therefore, estimation methods used to the matched panel confirm a positive and lasting impact of TUP on food consumption, which supports the extreme poverty-alleviating effects of TUP in rural Bangladesh.

abstract: The relationship between parent and child acculturation gaps and the child's well-being for Asian American families, with the child's perceived family conflict as a potential mediating variable were examined in this study. In addition to linear relationships of acculturation gaps, curvilinear relationships were also examined. The sample consisted of 165 first or second generation Asian Americans, aged between 18 to 22. Results indicated that native culture gap is predictive of participants' self-report of depression, and family conflict did function as a mediator to the relationship between native culture gap and depression. The curvilinear relationship between acculturation gaps and well-being was not supported by the results of the study. Further implications and future directions are discussed. / Dissertation/Thesis / Masters Thesis Counseling Psychology 2015

Although most researchers agree that resilience is defined as the extent to which an individual bounces back and recovers from stress and adversity, the field has not yet settled on the underlying structure of the resilience construct; its lower-order factors remain in dispute and undefined. In this study, five of the most prominent resilience measures (i.e., Ego Resilience, Block & Kremen, 1996; The Resilience Scale, Wagnild & Young, 1993; The Connor-Davidson Resilience Scale, Connor & Davidson, 2003; The Resilience Scale for Adults, Friborg, Hjemdal, Rosenvinge, & Martinussen, 2003; The Brief Resilience Scale, Smith, Dalen, Wiggins, & Tooley, 2008) were administered to two large samples of U.S. adults (N = 396 and 336, respectively). Through a combination of exploratory and confirmatory techniques, seven lower-order resilience factors were identified. Relationships between general resilience, lower-order resilience factors, and correlates were examined. Results reveal that lower-order resilience factors are moderately correlated with one another and are differentially related to outcomes of interest. Follow-up hierarchical regression and relative weights analyses further reveal that general resilience substantially overlaps with Big Five personality measures, but, in many cases, its lower-order factors do not. Consequently, it is recommended moving forward that researchers continue to study the resilience construct, but do so by focusing on lower-order resilience factors, rather than on global measures of the overall resilience construct.

Doctor of Philosophy / Department of Psychology / Clive J. A. Fullagar / Research on occupational well-being, commonly conceptualized as job satisfaction or the opposite of burnout, is criticized for its lack of theoretical basis. Danna and Griffin (1999) point out the need to refine this construct as well as develop measures to assess well-being in the workplace. This study proposed a scale of occupational well-being based on the work of Ryff (1989). Ryff's (1989) model of psychological well-being was designed to address similar concerns plaguing research on general well-being. The scales derived from Ryff's (1989) research are theoretically based on a variety of converging theories of optimal well-being that had previously been ignored. Unfortunately, the support for the psychometric properties of the psychological well-being scale is mixed. Researchers have either been able to produce longer, more reliable scales with a poor factor structure or shorter, less reliable scales with strong factorial validity. The results of this study are consistent with general research on well-being. Of the multiple first order models (with six independent factors) produced, the only acceptable fit was from a scale with 4 item sub-scales. Though acceptable by some, the reliability of these subscales was not as strong as it was for longer versions. The fit of the first order model was then compared to that of a second order model (where the 6 dimensions loaded onto occupational well-being). While both models had an acceptable fit to the data, preference was given to the second order model. While they had similar REMSA values, the PGFI was higher for the second order model; researchers have suggested that PGFI be used to help interpret the REMSA value. In addition, the second order model was cross validated, producing results similar to the original findings. This model was then used to assess the relationship between occupational well-being and the context of work; previously, this has been ignored. Partial support was found for a mediated relationship between psychological climate and occupational well-being. Composite psychological climate scores influenced job satisfaction; this in turn, affected occupational wellbeing. The limitations, contributions, and meaning of the study are then discussed.

Decentralisation has been viewed as one means for promoting citizen well-being by bringing public goods and services closer to local needs. Yet empirical evidence across developing countries shows mixed results. This study aims to examine the association between decentralisation, public services and well-being in decentralised Indonesia. It argues that decentralisation enhances citizen well-being through improved local government capacity better able to deliver public goods and services. With lack of local government capacity and accountability, decentralisation decreases well-being. This study contributes to existing research on decentralisation and well-being in three ways. First, while most studies discuss decentralisation and well-being in a cross-country context, this examines the relationship in a cross-local government context, and specifically within a developing country. Second, while most decentralisation studies focus on objective measures of well-being, this study uses both a subjective measure (i.e. happiness and citizen satisfaction with public services) and an objective measure (i.e. child health and healthcare demand). Third, while most studies use either aggregate or individual analyses to examine the effect of decentralisation on well-being, this study uses multilevel analysis to examine the effect of local government determinants on individual well-being.This study uses unique datasets which combine individual and household level data and local government data. Individual and household level data is taken from the Governance and Decentralisation Survey (GDS) 2006, the Indonesian Family Life Survey (IFLS) 2007, and the Indonesia socio-economic survey (Susenas) 2009. Local government level data comes from the national village census (Podes) 2006-2008, the national election database 2004-2007, the national health database 2009, local development budget and expenditure information 2004-2008, and the consumer prices indices 2004-2009. The main findings show that well-being among Indonesians varies across local governments, and that disparities in both public services and well-being appear between more developed and less developed regions. Well-being is not only associated with individual and household determinants, but also with local government determinants. The results are consistent, namely, that variation in well-being is associated with the capacity of local governments to deliver public goods and services. Citizens report being happier and more satisfied when local governments are able to provide better public goods and services for them (i.e. able to spend more of their budget on providing public services). In contrast, well-being decreases in the face of local corruption and of weak capacity to govern. These findings suggest that improving local government capacity to provide effective policies and good public services is vital to improve citizen well-being in decentralised Indonesia.

Many individuals across the world own dogs for a variety of reasons. For some individuals, dogs can be viewed as providing the most important relationship in their lives. Others may own dogs for protection, companionship, and even health benefits. Some families across the world view their dogs as family members and a vital aspect of the family unit. This study explored the perceived bond between a human and a dog and how this bond influenced the human‟s psychological well-being. Although studies have been conducted on the human-companionate dog bond, empirical research on the perceptions of the bond between a dog and a human and the influence it has on an individual‟s psychological well-being, falls short. Studies on the human-companionate bond have been on the rise internationally, yet studies in this field in the South African context are scarce. This study contributes to psychology‟s broad body of knowledge regarding the human-companionate dog bond and identifies the important influences the bond has on human psychological well-being. The researcher utilized a qualitative research approach. A non-probability purposive sample was employed and semi-structured interviews were conducted with seven participants. Two participants were male and five were female. All participants had developed a bond with their dog and were able to speak English fluently. Interviews were conducted until data saturation was reached. Results demonstrate that having a human-companionate dog bond can enhance an individual's psychological well-being. Themes identified demonstrate that a human-companionate dog bond can enhance physical health, relational well-being, and mental health. This bond also fulfils specific individual needs which enhance psychological well-being. Limitations of the study and recommendations for further research are identified.

This study examines Work Family Conflict including Work Interferes with Family (WIF) conflict, Family Interferes with Work (FIW) conflict, role overload, role interference and the impact of children across various life and career stages. Much of the research in this area focuses on the differences in the way the genders experience Work Family Conflict. Research has shown that various life and career stages can have a marked impact on this type of conflict and this study aims to determine how individuals in the various life and career stages experience this conflict. A correlational research design was used for this study. Using a five point likert scale, participants were asked to score their responses to seventeen items. The instrument was based on Duxbury and Mills Measure of Work Family Conflict (1990) (in Handbook of Quality-of-Life Research: An Ethical Perspective by Sirgy, 2001) with the inclusion of two additional items due to their high face validity. The questionnaire was distributed to human resources managers in organisations, friends, family members and colleagues and friends, family members and colleagues of theirs. Most of the responses were scored using a pencil and paper technique and the remainder was distributed using a Surveymonkey application on social media platforms like Facebook and Linkedin. The overall sample size of respondents was 175. The raw data was entered on an excel spreadsheet and analysed using Statistica version 12 and Microsoft Excel applications with VBA macros developed by a consultant for the Nelson Mandela Metropolitan University Unit for Statistical Consultation. . Statistics such as means, Cronbach alpha’s, relationships between factors, descriptive statistics, MANOVA and Chi-squared tests were used to analyse the data. The results of this study demonstrate the need for organisations to take heed of the various challenges that individuals face in both the workplace and home environment and the different ways in which these are experienced across various life and career stages. This will enable them to design specific interventions to mitigate the effects of Work Family Conflict and improve employee’s level of performance.