The purpose of this study was to investigate, through semi-structured interviews and focus groups, how self-identified creative, high school adolescents perceived their experiences with creativity and its influence on their lives in order to (1) increase the available information on adolescent creativity with the contribution of the adolescent viewpoint and (2) begin to assess what relationships might exist between the creative functioning of adolescents and their social-personal processes, especially the developmental task of identity formation. All of the data, results, and conclusions of this study were based on the adolescents perspective: What did they think and/or feel about the nature of their own creativity? Was creativity important to them? What influenced their creativity? How did significant others respond to their creativity? Did their experiences with creativity relate to their developing sense of self, and if so, how did they characterize that connection? Qualitative research techniques were used to investigate 195 self-reports and the responses of nine interviewed adolescents (4 females/5 males, ethnically diverse, selected from the self-reports) who answered questions about their creativity. Information came from three perspectives: (1) 195 written reflections on personal creativity, (2) nine adolescent viewpoints revealed to an adult in two semi-structured interviews, including information from a biographical questionnaire and creativity measurements, (3) and the same adolescent viewpoint revealed to peers in two focus group discussions. One substantial finding was that the theme of the self and creativity recurred across all data sources--self-reports, interviews, focus groups--and response categories. Another was the 100% response rate describing creativity as increasing the interviewed adolescents' enjoyment and connection to life, nature and themselves. Specifically, they cited motivation, self-esteem, increased productivity, handling difficult emotions (anger, frustration, loneliness, etc.), an alternative to drug use, as processes which were positively affected by their creativity. Such personal testimony holds clues for educational and intervention strategies that could influence at-risk adolescents suffering from hopelessness, drugs, and early pregnancies. If creativity is valuable to adolescents by virtue of its life enhancing effects, then what preventatives might programs design to support and encourage the creative self in at-risk individuals?

The purpose of this study is to explore relationships between narrative arts and healing, as experienced by various "narrative practitioners"--those who tell/write/act out/teach/witness/appreciate stories and story-telling in their roles as psychotherapists, teachers, writers, actors, story-tellers, and oral historians. In-depth interviews with six practitioners who are in a position to comment on their multiple narrative roles (those who are both writers and therapists, for instance) shed light on meanings of story-telling in different contexts. Answers to questions about the history of participants' multiple narrative roles, their present narrative practices, and their meaning-making have contributed to a different understanding of conventional distinctions drawn between psychotherapy and the narrative arts. Participants have had a chance to respond to the researcher's reflections on their experiences (based on initial interviews) in the form of a group discussion, and also to comment on the effects of the research on their thinking. Initial questions focused on relationships between narrative and therapeutic processes: Did participants equate the two or distinguish between them? What distinctions did they draw? Is the application of the theme of "narrative" (or story) particularly useful in healing? Is the application of the theme of "therapy" particularly useful in the narrative arts? Participants' responses to the research process shifted the focus of the study from one realm of "worldmaking" to another. The first realm is an understanding of "worldmaking" as the creation and re-creation of knowledge and "truth" through story-telling: the world consists of the stories that we tell about it; there is no such thing as a single "true" description, theory, belief, model, or cause; each of these can as easily be described as "the nearest amenable illuminating lie," or one of many truths. The second realm is an understanding of "worldmaking" as community-building and social action. This involves bringing stories out of the private realm into the public eye and ear, in the form of publishing, performance, ritual, or ceremony. Through it, practitioners find ways to see and work beyond the confines of the legal/medical model for healing, to do work that is at once an artform, a kind of healing, and social action. Their interventions take place not just at an individual or family level, but at a cultural level. They are comfortable with political--as well as psycho-analysis. They are able to take what might be called an ethical-poetic stance. They assume not only that we make the world by telling stories about it, but that people in community can re-make the world together.

Childhood sexual abuse (CSA) occurs in up to 9.9 % of the general population. Clinical implications of CSA are lasting and warrant treatment utilizing suitable approaches. Although the developmental psychopathology model encourages clinicians to evaluate disorders in the context of risk/protective factors, cultural issues and development, there is a gap in current research regarding the utilization of developmental theory among clinicians working with this population. Therefore, the purpose of this study was to examine consistent patterns in treatment practices employed by therapists with CSA patients. The primary research question in this study was to determine how closely therapists' actual treatment practice with CSA females paralleled the developmental psychopathology model. The study utilized a grounded theory approach to generate a model of practice drawn from structured interviews with 20 therapists recruited through a snowballing sample. A sequence of open, axial and selective coding of these data revealed three themes including empowerment, consistency and support. Results indicate most participants were trained in developmental theory and, developed model based skills over time while intuitively utilizing this model and that progressing clients had therapists that utilized this model. Recommendations include required undergraduate training in this model. This information will contribute to the existing literature on developmental theory and, can enhance social change initiatives through increased reliance on therapist intuition which in turn can produce patient care more aligned with developmental needs. In addition this information can be used for the development of effective model based interventions and preventions so as to decrease CSA's harmful societal impact.

Recent estimates indicate that 1 in 100 children in the United States is diagnosed on the autism spectrum. Although research has demonstrated the bidirectional nature of parentchild relations, the effect of child autism symptom severity on parent-child interaction and overall relationships has not yet been explored. This study examined the impact of child symptom severity in children ages 4-15 years, as measured by the Autism Diagnostic Observation Schedule (ADOS), on parent-child interaction, as measured by the Dyadic Coding Scale (DCS), and parent-child relationships, as measured by the Parent Child Relationship Inventory (PCRI). The bidirectional model of socialization informs the study, as it recognizes the mutual impact that parents and children have on one another in the context of parent-child relations. The sample included 25 parent-child dyads, each consisting of a child diagnosed on the autism spectrum and his/her primary parent. Relationships between autism symptom severity, parent-child interaction, and parent-child relationships were explored using multivariate regression analysis. Significant inverse relationships were found between autism symptom severity and parent-child interaction, but no relationship was found between symptom severity and parent-child relationship. Understanding the negative influence of autism symptom severity on parent-child interaction and the lack of impact on overall relationship allows for more effective treatment planning and monitoring of progress over time. Efforts to improve interactions and relationships for these children will lead to significant social change by increasing the effectiveness of treatment programs, enriching family relationships, and improving outcomes across the lifespan.

Foster and adopted children with special needs have high rates of placement instability. This has been associated with their increased risk of having special needs, particularly reactive attachment disorder which results from severe disruptions in early relationships. Child welfare agencies report inadequate knowledge of specific placement predictors and assessment measures, although research has shown that placement duration is partly a function of successful parent-child match. Using Bowlby's attachment theory as the theoretical framework, this quantitative study examined the contributions of foster and adoptive parents' own attachment characteristics, the child's type of special need, and the child's age at the time of placement in predicting placement duration. A convenience sample of 108 foster and adoptive parents completed three self-report instruments: the Parental Bonding Instrument measuring parental care and protection, the Relationship Scales Questionnaire measuring avoidance and anxiety related to relationships, and a researcher-created demographic questionnaire. Multiple regression analysis was used to examine whether parental attachment characteristics, age at placement and type of special need affect the dependent variable of placement duration. The overall model significantly predicted child placement duration in foster or adoptive homes. Reactive attachment disorder status and the child's age at the time of placement contributed significantly to the prediction model. Implications for social change include the expeditious termination of parental rights, and the need for early, well-matched permanent placement, facilitated by child welfare agency use of objective attachment measures.

This dissertation examines social comparison tendencies in young women during eating disorder (ED) recovery. Study one drew on a photo-elicitation method (“PhotoVoice”) and semi-structured interviews to examine this relation. Thirty U.S. women, ages 18-35, in self-defined recovery from disordered eating, used photography to capture personally-meaningful social and cultural influences on their recovery. Participants then shared these photographs with the research team and described them in detail. Photographs and interviews were examined for social comparisons using thematic analysis, and two broad categories emerged: recovery-promoting and recovery-hindering comparisons. The presence of both “upward” and “downward” comparisons that both support and hinder recovery suggests that social comparisons during the recovery process are more nuanced than previously known. Study two drew from this qualitative data to revise and validate an existing measure of food and body comparisons for women in ED recovery. Women from across the U.S. (n = 183) completed measures of body, eating, and exercise social comparison general comparison orientation, and body dissatisfaction and disordered eating in one online session. After removing four items based on prior research and theory, the revised model fit the data well. Results suggest that body, eating, and exercise social comparisons continue to correlate with body dissatisfaction and disordered eating during recovery, but there are nuances in the content of the comparisons. Study three used this revised measure of social comparison to examine how the interrelations among thin ideal internalization, social comparison, and disordered eating outcomes vary throughout the disorder and recovery processes. An additional 78 women with an active ED, and 178 healthy-control women completed the above-mentioned measures, along with a measure of thin-ideal internalization. Multi-group path analysis showed that the relations among these constructs change between disordered eating and recovery. Study four drew from the same interviews explored in study one, returning to the interviews and photographs to highlight the key areas of potential change for clinicians and policymakers. Participant responses clustered into six themes: healthcare practice and access, health insurance reform, education, objectification of the female body, and mental health stigma. Direct suggestions and implications are discussed.

Purpose: The aim of this study was to determine differences in effectiveness and rate of skill acquisition between a recently developed and empirically validated instructional sequence, Motor and Vocal Imitation Assessment (MVIA), and a commonly used instructional sequence in a curriculum guide, Verbal Behavior Milestones Assessment and Placement Program (VB-MAPP). Methods: Children with ASD were randomly assigned to two treatment groups to determine difference in imitation performance. The treatment group followed the instructional sequence proposed in the MVIA. The comparison group followed the instructional sequence proposed in the VB-MAPP. Initial levels of imitation were assessed via the MVIA. The intervention consisted of discrete trial training (DTT). A trained therapist presented a fixed number of stimuli in massed trial format. Prompted and unprompted imitative responses were reinforced using edibles. A most-to-least with a progressive time delay prompting strategy was used to help the learner engage in the target response. Results: Participants in the MVIA treatment group had significantly more skill acquisition than participants in the VB-MAPP comparison group. Participants in the MVIA treatment group also acquired these skills more efficiently, spent less time on skills that never reached mastery and demonstrated higher levels of responding. Additionally, pre-treatment imitation was found to predict autism severity and expressive language. Conclusions: These results indicate that the MVIA protocol provides an appropriate sequence ordered from simple to complex for selecting targets for intervention. These findings suggest that organizing and sequencing skills in increasing difficulty, as with the MVIA protocol, leads to more appropriate target selection. Targeting skills that are appropriate for the child’s current skill level, in turn leads to more effective and efficient intervention. Results also replicate previous findings that demonstrate that imitation performance plays a critical role in other areas of development.

Despite plentiful research on the physical, psychological, and emotional demands on adult child caregivers, there are few studies that highlight developmental issues in the adult child/dependent parent dyad. This study was designed to highlight the dependency factor in this dyad, thus addressing the gap in the literature. With family systems theory, attachment theory, and role conceptualizations constituting the bases for the study, research questions addressed how adult child caregivers experience parental dependency and how dependency affects the caregiving/care-receiving dynamic. Ten volunteer participants were interviewed, and the results were analyzed using a variation of the van Kaam method of data analysis in which themes emerged from qualitative phenomenological data. Results of this study revealed 6 main themes; in descending order of the number of participants endorsing each, the themes were as follows: caregivers did not receive enough help from family/friends (n = 10), caregiving evolved on its own (n = 8), expectations changed (n = 8), roles changed (n = 8), dementia caused changes (n = 7), and new relationship provided benefits (n = 5). The first 2 themes indicated the ways in which adult child caregivers experience parental dependency. The remaining 4 themes illuminated participant-reported changes following the addition of dependency to the adult child/parent dynamic. Findings from this study can influence social change by promoting appropriate support interventions that support the physical and mental health of the caregiver population.

<p>To assess how the plasticity of the face processing system changes with age, we trained 8-year-olds, 10-year-olds, and adults to differentiate 10 chimpanzee faces at the individual level for 3 days by having them watch a child-friendly training video. Their improvement from baseline was compared to that of age- and gender-matched controls who completed the pre- and post-tests, but did not complete training. Improvement did not vary across age: 8-year-olds, 10-year-olds, and adults all showed similar improvement in accuracy at discriminating the 10 chimpanzee faces on which they were trained. This improvement resulted in the reduction of the own-species bias after training. However, the benefits of training did not generalize to novel exemplars. In addition, participants from both the training and control groups showed a practice effect: their accuracy at discriminating both chimpanzee and human faces improved from pre- to post-test. Taken together, these results demonstrate that the face processing system is somewhat plastic between 8 years of age and adulthood and suggest that this plasticity remains stable throughout this period of development.</p> / Master of Science (MSc)

<p> Choosing specific implementational details is one of the most important aspects of creating and evaluating a model. In order to properly model cognitive processes, choices for these details must be made based on empirical research. Unfortunately, modelers are often forced to make decisions in the absence of relevant data. My work investigates the effects of these decisions. Looking at infant speech segmentation, I incorporate empirical research into model choices regarding model input, inference, and evaluation. First, I use experimental results to argue for syllables as a basic unit for early segmentation and show that the segmentation task is less difficult than previously thought. I then explore the role of various inference algorithms, each of which produces testable predictions. Lastly, I argue that standard methods of model evaluation make unrealistic assumptions about the goal of learning. Evaluating models in terms of their ability to support additional learning tasks shows that gold standard performance alone is an insufficient metric for measuring segmentation quality. In each of these three instances, I treat model design decisions as free parameters whose impact must be evaluated. By following this approach, future researchers can better gauge the success or failure of cognitive models. </p>