Indiana University-Purdue University Indianapolis (IUPUI) / The research base regarding the effectiveness of systems of care for children with serious emotional disturbances is limited. The incremental development of systems of care in Indiana provides an opportunity to compare the outcomes of children served in these child and family wraparound teams with the outcomes of a matched sample of children receiving usual public mental health services. Functional assessment data from a state database was examined using logistic regression models. The level of development of wraparound services was used as a fidelity measure.

Students who are removed from their regular classrooms for treatment in special education classrooms commonly exhibit positive behavior gains in those settings. Typically, however, the gains do not generalize and maintain when the students are returned to their regular classrooms. The present study initially provided six Behaviorally/Emotionally Handicapped elementary school students with a short-term resource room treatment to bring their behavior under the control of a combination of procedures emphasizing self-evaluation. Once acceptable levels of appropriate behavior were maintained with only minimal external reinforcement and students accurately self-evaluated their own work and behavior, generalization and maintenance of behavior gains were sought in subjects' regular classrooms. A multiple baseline across pairs of subjects design was used to examine individual subjects' behavior throughout the study. Analysis of the results of the study indicated that once self-evaluation procedures were extended into subjects' regular classrooms, subjects transferred and maintained high levels of appropriate classroom behavior in those settings. For four of the six subjects, all extratraining components were faded from use. Only two subjects required a modified form of the original intervention to maintain behavior gains in their regular classrooms.

There has been a recent trend towards increasing accountability of mental health care providers through the use of treatment outcome measures, in order to reduce spending and improve patient care. This qualitative study utilized focus groups to elicit input regarding the need and possible content involved in creating an improved outcome measure specifically designed for severe emotionally disturbed (SED) children and adolescents. We conducted 60-90 minute focus groups with each of the following three separate constituent groups who are regularly involved in the care of SED youth at the Utah State Hospital (USH), including a) hospital clinical staff, b) affiliated education staff, and c) parents/primary caregivers; as well as clinical staff at a community mental health youth outpatient clinic, the Wasatch Mental Health (WMH) Youth Outpatient Program. While the groups agreed that a new unified system of tracking outcomes could be beneficial as an aid in improving outcomes, their greater concern is about a lack of communication between disciplines and between levels of care. Six broad domains were divided between two sections of Internal versus External Locus of Control (Internal: Behavior, Social/Emotional, Academic/Cognitive, and Strength-Based Assessment; External: Collaboration among Care Providers and Family) and 23 subdomains were generated based on themes identified from the focus groups' responses. We also compared these domains and subdomains to ones previously generated by a USH pilot study and found some overarching similarities, but also some notable differences and both should be considered in any future outcome measure created. However, the most prevalent theme we found was a desire for an increase in collaboration and communication between constituencies and throughout levels of care, which is vitally important to improve care and long-term outcomes of SED youth.

Det här projektet berör människor som är engagerade i kreativt hantverk i sin hemmiljö, och de särskilda utmaningar de står inför. Arbetet har genomförts i enlighet med designprocess. Med en grund i enkätstudier, personliga intervjuer och observationer har en djupare förståelse för användargruppens situation och behov kunnat skapas. Genom sätta i målgruppens perspektiv i fokus har en iterativ process av generering och utvärdering kunnat genomföras och återkopplastill användare för att kunna säkerhetsställa arbetets riktning. Designarbetet har resulterat ett förslag på en produkt som är ämnad att underlätta kombinationen av levnadsmiljö med den miljö som gynnar användarens kreativa skapande.  Den resulterande lösningen erbjuder en möjlighet att kunna förvara redskap och annat material,överblickbart i anpassad ordning inom en armlängds avstånd. Samtidigt är det enkelt att gömma innehållet och flytta undan möbeln när ytan behövs till andra delar av vardagen. Anpassningsbarhet och flexibilitet har varit grundläggande krav för att användaren både skall få maximal nytta och kunna fortsätta använda produkten även när hens behov ändras. Detta är mycket viktigt för att kunna göra en produkts livscykel ekologiskt försvarbar. Konstruktionen är skapad för att ge produkten en bra potential att kunna vidareutvecklas för en effektiv och klimatvänlig produktion.

The purpose of this study was to examine whether removing disruptive students to a behavior support office (BSO) is an effective intervention in reducing disruptive behaviors in a school exclusively serving students diagnosed with emotional disturbance. The study also examined the effect of the BSO on academic success and school attendance. Staff attitudes toward the BSO were also examined. Finally, demographic categories were evaluated. Archival data from two school years were collected. There were 35 students during the 2007-2008 school year when the BSO was in effect, and 65 students during the 2008-2009 school year when the BSO was not in effect. There was also an evaluation of the 23 students who were present during both years. It was hypothesized that use of the behavior support office would reduce the number and intensity of behavior incidents, and ultimately, reduce the amount of time spent out of class due to those behaviors. The data, however, demonstrated that students exhibited more behavior incidents and spent more time out of the classroom due to those behaviors with the BSO in place. It is believed that this increase was most likely due to the reinforcement of escape motivated behaviors. These behaviors in the BSO were, however, of a lower intensity. This researcher further hypothesized that students would demonstrate higher grade point averages and higher rates of attendance with the behavior support office in place. There was no significant difference in GPA or attendance. School staff were administered the Intervention Rating Profile - 15 to examine levels of staff acceptance for the behavior support office. Teaching staff had the highest level of acceptance for the BSO, while administrators had a lower level of acceptance, and behavior staff had the lowest level of acceptance. The higher level of teaching staff acceptance did not appear to impact the success of the intervention. Finally, demographic information was evaluated. There were no significant effects for age or gender. However, African American students demonstrated a significantly greater decrease than Caucasian students in time out of the classroom due to behavior incidents after the Behavior Support Office was discontinued. / School Psychology

This qualitative study examines how art interventions are aligned and integrated with emotionally focused therapy (EFT; Johnson, 2020) in the treatment of relational distress with couples. EFT is a brief humanistic evidence-based treatment, grounded in attachment theory, with experiential and systemic approaches to intervention that engage underlying emotion to create more secure bonds. Notably scant literature exists blending art-based and verbal approaches in EFT, despite the importance of verbal imagery in EFT intervention and the experiential nature of expressive therapies. In this study, NVivo qualitative data analysis software facilitated thematic analysis of semi-structured interviews with five clinicians who integrate the two approaches. Theory-driven analysis with skills of the Emotion-Focused Therapy-Therapist Fidelity Scale (EFT-TFS; Denton et al., 2009) examined alignment and divergence from the EFT model. Patterns in the data revealed a conceptual framework for integrating art interventions with EFT that prioritized fidelity to the EFT model. This framework provides structure and language to describe art interventions in a granular way at the session level, with considerations for the progression of treatment through the steps and stages of EFT in the context of considerations for the therapeutic alliance. This framework has wide applications in clinical practice, teaching, and empirical inquiry integrating art interventions with EFT.

Since this is a survey to determine the current practices and procedures of counseling in residential treatment centers for emotionally disturbed children, the problem of this study may be stated as follows: (1) to review related literature in the field of counseling and guidance in order to determine the best educational thought as to what constitutes a good counseling program; (2) by means of a survey in the form of a questionnaire, to determine what is actually being done in counseling work in established residential treatment centers for disturbed children; (3) to determine, from information received, good counseling work practices for treating emotionally disturbed children.

A number of authors have suggested recently that the behavioral characteristics and self-perceptions of learning disabled and emotionally disturbed children are so similar as to negate the fruitfulness of trying to differentiate between these two groups. These characteristics are quite similar for the two special education groups when they have been compared independently of each other to regular education students. In order to provide support for these prior studies, the self-concepts and locus of control of 36 learning disabled, emotionally disturbed, and regular education students were compared. A significant difference was found between the LD and RE students in terms of self-concept only. No significant differences were noted between the ED and RE students. These results are discussed in relation to the somewhat conflicting results of prior studies with implications for future research.

Thesis (M. A. (Psychology)) --University of Limpopo, 2017. / This study endeavours to identify and describe the stress experiences of South African Police Personnel (SAPS) in a specific municipal area. The components of stress and related coping mechanisms are of particular interest in policing as much research indicates that officers suffer from stress related illnesses. The research was thus undertaken to determine what type of stressors affect police officers in the Greater Tzaneen Municipal Area, Limpopo Province, and what type of coping strategies they use. A quantitative approach utilising a cross sectional survey design was used for the investigation. Stratified random sampling was used to draw the sample of SAPS officers from the different police stations in Greater Tzaneen Municipal Area. Data was collected by means of questionnaires namely the Police Stress Inventory (PSI) and the Coping Inventory (COPE). Ethical considerations, as required by the University of Limpopo, were followed. Results included the fact that of the top ten stressors five were organisational stressors. This finding suggests that the South African Police Services in this area must provide interventions that reduce the effects of work related stressors. They should also recruit more female officers as the gender disparity is a notable one. Results suggest that no matter what age, religion, language, gender, marital status and rank, all respondents are alike in terms of the use of Avoidant Coping strategies. These are used to some degree however; the majority of respondents use Problem Focused Coping strategies together with Emotionally Focused Coping strategies. This suggests that the sample was able to handle negative stressors in a positive manner. It was concluded that a police force that reflects the general demographic of the area is more likely to provide a community driven workforce

Universities are an ideal environment to assist students in the development of their leadership skills in a safe and supportive environment. The development of emotional intelligence (EI) has become an important aspect of student leadership development. The purpose of the study was to examine the emotionally intelligent leadership (EIL) scores of students working in a collegiate recreation setting and to examine their perceptions of their own EI and EIL. An exploratory, sequential, mixed-methods approach was used to explore the EIL scores of students employed in collegiate recreation departments at seven university sites. EIL was the theoretical framework used in this study (Shankman et al., 2015). The findings of this study showed no statistically significant difference in mean scores of EIL between students working in formal and informal leadership positions or between genders. Themes that emerged from the participant’s perceptions of their own EI and EIL were communication, confidence, perceived leadership ability, and teamwork. Understanding how students perceive their own EI and EIL can assist practitioners in the creation and development of intentional training and development programs.