Research has shown that adult attachment mediates the relationship between child sexual abuse and mental health functioning in adulthood. However, there is great variability across these projects as to the operational definition of attachment. Hence, the primary goal of this project was to clarify the literature by providing a comprehensive definition of attachment which would allow for the translation of research findings into a treatment application for child sexual abuse. The second goal of this project was to update the child sexual abuse and attachment research bases by providing a complete definition of mental health outcome. That is, rather than defining mental health solely as the absence of psychopathology, it was defined both as the absence of psychopathology and the presence of psychological wellbeing. From these goals it was hypothesized that child sexual abuse would be positively related to adult psychopathology and negatively related to adult psychological wellbeing. The relationships were expected to be mediated by both adult attachment anxiety and attachment avoidance. To test the hypotheses a total of 421 men and women undergraduate students were sampled and completed numerous questionnaires. The analyses revealed a significant positive relationship between child sexual abuse and adult psychopathology and this relationship was found to be completely mediated by adult attachment anxiety and partially mediated by attachment avoidance. Contrary to prediction, the inverse relationship found between child sexual abuse and psychological wellbeing was not statistically significant. Unfortunately, all supportive findings had to be nullified because the size of the relationship between child sexual abuse and psychopathology was exceptionally small and post-hoc corrections were unable to increase the size of the effect. A considerable investigation was undertaken to identify potential sources of this apparent error and the relationships between the attachment and complete mental health variables were explored further. The most impressive finding of the exploratory analyses was that nearly one quarter of the variation of complete mental health was accounted for by adult attachment. Taken together, although this project did not unfold as predicted, it did partially satisfy its secondary goal and hence it remains an interesting and viable contribution to the literature.

Research has shown that adult attachment mediates the relationship between child sexual abuse and mental health functioning in adulthood. However, there is great variability across these projects as to the operational definition of attachment. Hence, the primary goal of this project was to clarify the literature by providing a comprehensive definition of attachment which would allow for the translation of research findings into a treatment application for child sexual abuse. The second goal of this project was to update the child sexual abuse and attachment research bases by providing a complete definition of mental health outcome. That is, rather than defining mental health solely as the absence of psychopathology, it was defined both as the absence of psychopathology and the presence of psychological wellbeing. From these goals it was hypothesized that child sexual abuse would be positively related to adult psychopathology and negatively related to adult psychological wellbeing. The relationships were expected to be mediated by both adult attachment anxiety and attachment avoidance. To test the hypotheses a total of 421 men and women undergraduate students were sampled and completed numerous questionnaires. The analyses revealed a significant positive relationship between child sexual abuse and adult psychopathology and this relationship was found to be completely mediated by adult attachment anxiety and partially mediated by attachment avoidance. Contrary to prediction, the inverse relationship found between child sexual abuse and psychological wellbeing was not statistically significant. Unfortunately, all supportive findings had to be nullified because the size of the relationship between child sexual abuse and psychopathology was exceptionally small and post-hoc corrections were unable to increase the size of the effect. A considerable investigation was undertaken to identify potential sources of this apparent error and the relationships between the attachment and complete mental health variables were explored further. The most impressive finding of the exploratory analyses was that nearly one quarter of the variation of complete mental health was accounted for by adult attachment. Taken together, although this project did not unfold as predicted, it did partially satisfy its secondary goal and hence it remains an interesting and viable contribution to the literature.

Examinations of stress in relation to adolescent mental health have not often utilized a comprehensive definition of psychological functioning. Recent literature has found support for the importance of examining optimal psychological functioning as the presence of high life satisfaction in addition to low psychopathology (Antamarian, Huebner, Hills, & Valois, 2011; Suldo & Shaffer, 2008). Most research on stress has focused on either major stressful events or chronic environmental stressors; further research is needed on the psychological model of stress, which conceptualizes stress as involving both environmental events and one's cognitive appraisals of the stressor. The current longitudinal study determined how multiple types of stress (accumulation of stressful life events, chronic stressors in social relationships, global perceived stress level) are associated with mental health (i.e., psychopathology and life satisfaction) over a one year period. Additionally, this study explored whether perceptions of social support from various sources (i.e., parents, classmates, teachers) act as a protective factor in the relationship between stress and later mental health outcomes. Data collection for Time 1 occurred in the Fall 2010, and was part of a larger on-going research project involving 500 students from grade 9 - 11. Time 2 data collection occurred during the Fall of 2011 and included 425 of those students, now in grades 10-12. Analyses included multiple regression to examine both the overall contribution of stress on mental health outcomes (life satisfaction, internalizing psychopathology, externalizing psychopathology) as well as the unique contributions of various types of stress. Additional regression analyses explored whether social support from various sources acts as a buffer for students that experience stress from later increases in psychopathology or declines in life satisfaction. Results revealed that the combination of Time 1 mental health variables and all forms of initial stress accounted for the most amount of variance (45%) in Time 2 internalizing problems and the least amount of variance in Time 2 externalizing problems (13%). In all cases, the largest predictor of Time 2 mental health was initial levels of mental health. The only stressor that appeared as a unique predictor of Time 2 mental health was stress in the student-teacher relationship, which accounted for a significant amount of variance in Time 2 externalizing problems. Further regression analyses found that parent and peer support were critical in predicting later mental health (i.e., exerted main effects). These analyses identified trends in the data in which parent and teacher support acted as buffers in the relationships between some forms of stress and later mental health. Implications for school psychologists and future directions for research are discussed.

This research project explores whether the delivery of positive psychology interventions in the workplace through an employee assistance program (EAP) can improve employees’ authentic happiness/flourishing as well as decrease symptoms of depression. A small convenience sample of 13 Manitoba public school educators accessing employee assistance were recruited for a quasi-experimental research design. Nine participants were randomly assigned to the experimental group and the remaining participants assigned to the control. Experimental group members participated in a six session psychoeducational, experiential, and process-oriented positive psychotherapy group that met once a week over six weeks. Experimental group participants’ scores on the authentic happiness/flourishing measure increased by a statistically significant 9% and depression scores decreased by a statistically significant 45% from pre-intervention to one month post-intervention. The study’s findings therefore provide promising confirmation that positive psychology interventions delivered through EAPs can make a meaningful difference as both secondary prevention and primary enhancement strategies in the workplace.

This research project explores whether the delivery of positive psychology interventions in the workplace through an employee assistance program (EAP) can improve employees’ authentic happiness/flourishing as well as decrease symptoms of depression. A small convenience sample of 13 Manitoba public school educators accessing employee assistance were recruited for a quasi-experimental research design. Nine participants were randomly assigned to the experimental group and the remaining participants assigned to the control. Experimental group members participated in a six session psychoeducational, experiential, and process-oriented positive psychotherapy group that met once a week over six weeks. Experimental group participants’ scores on the authentic happiness/flourishing measure increased by a statistically significant 9% and depression scores decreased by a statistically significant 45% from pre-intervention to one month post-intervention. The study’s findings therefore provide promising confirmation that positive psychology interventions delivered through EAPs can make a meaningful difference as both secondary prevention and primary enhancement strategies in the workplace.