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While there currently appears to be no universal definition for Emotional Behavioural Difficulties (EBD) it is often used around the world as a label for children displaying difficult behaviours. One intervention used for children with EBD is residential treatment, which involves “providing a full range of therapeutic, education, recreational and support services given by a professional, interdisciplinary team” (Johansson 2007, pg. 16). To date there is little literature on the effectiveness of residential treatment for children with EBD. This present study aims to further the research by measuring the progress made towards a child’s personal goals while at residential school and if this progress is still evident six months after returning home and entering mainstream schooling. Child and parent feedback on the time spent at residential treatment are examined to see how they viewed the treatment. The participants consisted of 83 children aged seven to thirteen years who had attended the residential school between 2004 and 2009, their parents/caregivers, mainstream teachers and residential treatment staff. Follow up questionnaires given to the parents/caregivers when the child was leaving residential treatment and the child’s leavers report were analysed using a mixed methods approach. The results of this study indicated that the children’s personal goal attainment did not change at a statistically significant level six months after returning home and entering mainstream schooling Findings were consistent across the three age groups analysed (under 8 years 11 months, 9 years -10 years 11 months and over 11 years) as well as across the goal codes. This research suggests the gains the children made towards goal attainment at residential treatment were able to be generalised to their home and mainstream school environment.

The poor outcomes of young people leaving foster care are well documented and demand a focus on placement permanency and interventions that encourage stability (Rubin et al, 2007). The need for better support for foster carers is widely acknowledged (Warman, Pallet & Scott, 2006; Morgan & Baron, 2011). To provide effective support an understanding of foster carers support needs is required. A qualitative approach explored the support needs of foster carers who look after young people perceived to have emotional and behavioural difficulties. Semi- structured interviews were undertaken with 17 foster carers employed by a local authority or an Independent Fostering Agency. A grounded theory methodology within a social constructionist framework was used to develop a new theoretical understanding from the data. A central storyline of ‘keeping your head above water’ emerged and appeared to encapsulate daily struggles and ways of managing. Categories which contributed to this were ‘becoming isolated’ from other professionals, ‘role ambiguity’ regarding the multiple meanings attached to being a foster carer, ‘making sense of emotional and behavioural difficulties’ highlighting a need to understand the children cared for, ‘a focus on behaviours’ illuminating approaches to parenting and ‘unmet emotional needs’ which is a possible consequence of focussing on children’s behaviours. The emergent theory may hold potential for developing psychological formulations, interventions and training programmes for foster carers. Suggestions for future support are put forward based on the new theoretical framework. Applications of the findings to Counselling Psychology are discussed in detail.

Paper 1: An exploratory study of the systems of support to help young males with Social, Emotional and Behavioural Difficulties to remain in post 16 Education Abstract This paper is positioned within a co-operative inquiry interpretative paradigm. This paper is one of two. This study focused on YP with Social, Emotional and Behavioural Difficulties (SEBD) and their views and experiences of the system of support to help them remain in EET. An adapted co-operative inquiry (CI) methodology was employed which emphasised participation This research aimed to address this gap by giving voice to the YP and their views of the education system. Additionally, the views of the YP were sought to deepen our understanding of YP’s needs and level of support they require to remain in EET. The research took place in a unitary authority in the South West of England. The participants in paper one were five male students who had left specialist provision for YP with SEBD following completion of year 11. Ages ranged from 16.5-17 years. Their views were elicited through individual semi-structured interviews which were analysed using a thematic analysis approach (Braun and Clarke 2006). The key finding from paper one was the value YP placed on relationships they formed with practitioners who supported them. For many of the YP Grovehill School (SEBD) was their first positive experience of the education system. The YP making the transition into mainstream EET expressed the view that there was no support in place once they left Grovehill. Additionally, the lack of practitioners in post-16 that knew and understood their needs, coupled with feelings of a lack of belonging and acceptance in their new environment, were identified as particularly challenging. Three out of the five participants became NEET before the end of their second year of post-16 EET. The YP identified the presence of Erica, a learning mentor as the most important source of support. However when the YP were unable to access Erica it was evident that the lack of a wider system of pastoral support presented as a significant challenge for this vulnerable group. Findings from papers one and two were assimilated and the implications for improving future policy and practice were considered in the final section of paper two. Consideration was also given to the role Educational Psychologists (EPs) and how EPs could inform future ways of partnership working to secure positive outcomes for YP with SEBD. Paper Two: An exploration of practitioner’s view of the current system of support for YP with SEBD making the transition into post-16 mainstream education, employment and/or training Abstract The aim of this paper was to explore practitioner’s views and experiences of the system of support in place to meet the need of YP with SEBD making the transition from specialist to mainstream post-16 EET. This small scale study was conducted in a unitary authority in the South West of England. A total of eleven participants took part in the semi structured interviews (six males and five females). The participants were selected to represent the range of provisions offered to YP with SEBD in post-16 EET. Semi-structured interviews were used to elicit their views. A thematic analysis approach to analysis was adopted. Findings were that practitioners identified the importance of cultivating caring relationships, however, a distinction emerged in the FE setting were the focus was on behaving like an adult and conforming to an existing system. Disparities also emerged between settings value and beliefs systems, which appeared to shape the teaching practice and interaction with YP. The lack of support practitioners receive from outside agencies to understand and support YP with SEBD emerged as important factor. Additionally, issues such as the impact of the change of environment from specialist to mainstream EET and school culture emerged as salient features. The dilemma of inclusion versus attainment was found to be a significant challenge for practitioners when trying to meet the needs of the YP. Findings which related specifically to transition identified; across settings there was a lack of a formal transition plan and limited access to resources and funding in post-16 settings. Within FE settings the lack of accessible pastoral support was identified as a key area for development. Finally, all participants identified the need for a clear strategic vision to inform future practice. Systems theory provided a useful conceptual framework to understand the complexity of the interlinked factors which impact on YP access, or lack of access to support to help them remain in EET. Shared themes were identified across the phases of the study which identified that it is not one single factor, but rather a combination of interlinked factors which contribute to YP becoming NEET. The information gathered showed participants across the settings recognised the need for greater partnership working and help for practitioners to help them understand and support YP with SEBD. The study also illuminated the need for better communication between practitioners and the wider system of support. Additionally, the study identified a clear role for EPs in supporting YP and practitioners and implications for EP role are discussed. The study has provided a timely insight into the current system of support for YP with SEBD in light of the move for YP to remain in EET up until the age of 18.

Theory and research supports the implementation of cognitive and behavioural interventions (CBI’s) to address social, emotional and behavioural difficulties (SEBD) in children. The literature argues that schools are an ideal place in which to implement such interventions. As part of a county initiative, school staff were trained and offered follow up support by 2 Educational Psychologists (EPs) around the use of school-based CBI to support children who have SEBD. The 10 participants (from 5 schools) in this research were part of this initiative: they received 4 sessions of training followed by either monthly individual supervision, or group supervision, around their use of CBI. Training and supervision targeted implementation of key CB competences, selected from a competency framework recommended by ‘Improving Access to Psychological Therapies’ (IAPT, 2011). The research explored staff perceptions around the CB competences that they implemented, their methods of implementation and the barriers and facilitators to their implementation. The research used a mixed methodology design. Qualitative data was analysed using thematic analysis and quantitative data was analysed using descriptive statistics. Data was gathered through interviews, supervision sessions, intervention diaries and training evaluations. Exploration of facilitators and barriers to implementation was based on Durlak and DuPre’s (2008) model of intervention implementation. Facilitators/barriers discrete from this model were also identified. Identification and exploration of such factors can assist in ensuring quality implementation of school-based interventions in the future. This study demonstrates how school staff can implement a range of CB competences and through multi-levels of intervention in schools. The potential role of the EP in supporting school staff to implement CBI is also discussed.

Focal epilepsy in childhood is associated with increased risk for developing behavioral, emotional, cognitive and social–adaptive impairments. The present thesis focused on mental health difficulties in paediatric refractory focal epilepsy. It undertook a detailed evaluation of the predictive power of several demographic (gender, age at assessment), clinical (age at onset and duration of epilepsy, seizure frequency), localization (lobe and lateralization of pathology) and cognitive variables (performance in intellectual, memory and academic attainment measures) for mood, conduct, inattention/hyperactivity and peer relationship difficulties, as assessed by parental report. Data from a population of 282 children and adolescents, previously collected for clinical purposes, were examined, using a series of univariate and multivariate analyses. Mental health difficulties were found to be highly prevalent, with peer relationships the most frequently reported area of difficulty, followed by inattention/hyperactivity and emotional difficulties. Different patterns of associations between the variables examined here and individual emotional/behavioural difficulties were revealed, partially confirming and extending previous findings in the literature. Longer duration of epilepsy was found to increase the risk for developing emotional difficulties; male gender and earlier age at onset the risk for conduct difficulties; male gender, earlier age at onset, longer duration and frontal lobe localization the risk for attention/hyperactivity difficulties; and finally longer duration, higher seizure frequency and right hemisphere lateralization the risk for peer difficulties. Lower cognitive functioning was found associated with overall increased mental health difficulties and a lower VIQ was predictive of all types of difficulties. Developing a firm understanding of the risk factors that contribute to mental health comorbidities in focal paediatric epilepsy can help identify and provide assessment and intervention to children who are at higher risk earlier, thus significantly improving quality of life.

This outcome study investigates whether music therapy can improve the emotional well-being of adolescents who are at risk of exclusion or underachievement. Specifically, it addresses music therapy’s impact on students’ self-esteem, anxiety, attitude towards learning, behaviour and relationships with peers. The setting for the research was a mainstream secondary school and its federated special school for students with emotional and behavioural difficulties. Over nineteen months, a mixed methods design was used to observe change in students before and after music therapy. One group received twenty, weekly, individual sessions, and the other formed a wait-list group for comparison and then received the same treatment. At four different times during the project quantitative data were collected from students, teaching staff and school records, and qualitative data from semi-structured interviews with the students before and after their period of intervention. The study found that music therapy made a positive difference. The high level of treatment adherence (95%) of all twenty-two students confirmed music therapy’s appeal to this client group. The majority of teachers (58%) reported improvement in students’ social development and attitude overall, and for some mainstream students (56%) recognition of self-concept increased. The conviction with which students conveyed their positive experiences of music therapy was striking. The study supports the author’s argument for therapeutic support to be made available at secondary schools and promotes a student-centred approach, as exemplified in the thesis. It concludes that music therapy can be effective for youth at risk but requires more participants in subsequent investigations for it to be proved statistically.

This thesis examines interactions between professionals and children who have been identified as having social, emotional, and behavioural difficulties (SEBD). More specifically, this thesis examines video-recorded interactions that take place during the delivery of two interventions: one-to-one pastoral care within a primary school, and group coaching for children with Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD). Using conversation analysis (CA) and discursive psychology (DP) these data were analysed to identify the ways in which professionals package and deliver their support, and manage psychological notions to do with the self, or what I call self-work - moments within the interactions when children are supported to talk about their emotions, feelings, and behaviour in order to help them make sense of the difficulties they are experiencing; and moments within the interaction when children are given the skills and knowledge they need to manage, change, or overcome those difficulties. The main findings from this thesis are that support and self-work are not taken-for-granted outcomes simply achieved because children attend intervention programmes. Instead, support and self-work are packaged and delivered through ordinary conversational practices. Chapter 4 shows how encouraging self-assessment supports a child s agency and participation to construct a more positive version of their self. Chapter 5 respecifies reassurance as an interactional practice to show how it works to prevent the emotional affect of a child s personal troubles becoming internalised and self-imposed. Chapter 6 shows how questions promote the collaborative building of knowledge, and how person references normalise and unpathologise emotions often bound to ADHD constructs. The findings from this thesis demonstrate applicability to both research and practice by offering a unique insight into the interactional environments of pastoral care and coaching. Firstly, by examining the interactional landscapes of these two interventions Chapter 3 provides a rich overview of pastoral care and coaching activities to show how these interventions are accomplished as real life activities. Secondly, by examining the conversational practices through which pastoral care and coaching are delivered this thesis respecifies everyday notions of support and self-work as members situated actions, and in so doing furthers our knowledge and understanding of these somewhat abstract notions. Such findings are valuable because interventions are informed by theoretical guidelines that recommend children experiencing difficulty can be helped if they are supported to understand their difficulties and to develop a more positive sense of self. However, such guidelines offer little in terms of how such recommendations should be put into practice by the professionals working with children. This research uncovers some of the ways in which theoretical recommendations are delivered via interactional practices, to make visible members methods for delivering support and managing self-work . The need for this work to be done is that support and self-work are performed as much through the ways in which professionals deliver their interventions, as it is through the content of those interventions.

This qualitative case study, set within the sociocultural field of education, examined how intervention music lessons over the duration of one school year may have shaped the development of two seven and eight year old children presenting with social, emotional and behavioural difficulties. The students in the context of this research were selected from mainstream classes due to the emotional and behavioural difficulties they had exhibited. Through analysis of field notes, student iPad diaries and formal and informal interviews, an exploration into the impact of active and collaborative music learning and teaching on the social, emotional and behavioural learning of these students took place. The music learning and teaching was based around Eun’s (2010, p.405) socioculturally informed instructional model, which offers eight interrelated principles for instruction, namely that they should be: mediated; discursive; collaborative; responsive; contextualized; activity-orientated; developmental; and integrated. In examining the social and emotional development of these children during the music lessons, the emergent findings suggested that the intervention classes positively benefitted the children’s development in three main thematic areas, namely in personal competence, task competence and social competence. Although both children responded to the intervention music lessons in strikingly different ways, key findings highlighted substantial increases for both children in their self-esteem, possibly due to their success and achievements in music. The second pertinent finding was that the duration of the intervention programme itself was an important factor, with substantial increases being made in their affective development by the late research phase. Overall, this study highlighted the prominence of achievement in student’s affective development and I suggest that utilizing music as a vehicle for accomplishment for children presenting with SEBD, is a potentially powerful and influential resource.

Tyrimo tikslas - nustatyti ryšį tarp tėvų auklėjimo stiliaus ir paauglių emocinių bei elgesio sunkumų. Tyrime dalyvavo 270 (152 merginos ir 118 vaikinų) Šakių „Žiburio“ gimnazijos, Šakių „Varpo“ vidurinės mokyklos ir Lukšių V.Grybo vidurinės mokyklos moksleiviai. Jų amžius – 16 – 17 metų. Paauglių nusikalstamumas, savižudybės, pasitraukimas iš mokyklos ir dar eilė problemų tampriai siejasi su paauglių emociniais ir elgesio sunkumais. Manoma, kad emociniai ir elgesio sunkumai yra susiję su vaiko aplinka, tai yra, tėvų auklėjimo stiliumi. Todėl kyla klausimas, kiek ir koks tėvų auklėjimas padeda paaugliams išvengti ir susitvarkyti su gyvenimo sunkumais. Remiantis literatūros analize, buvo atliktas tyrimas, kurio tikslas atskleisti sąsajas tarp paauglių emocinių ir elgesio sunkumų bei paauglių suvokiamo tėvų auklėjimo stiliaus. Tyrimas atliktas taikant “Jaunimo klausimyną” (YSR 11/18: Youth Self-Report, Achenbach, 1991) ir EMBU klausimyną (EMBU: Egna Minnen Betraffande Uppfostran, Arrindell, 1999; Arrindell et al., 1994). Siekiant nustatyti, kaip tėvų auklėjimo stiliai susiję su paauglių emociniais ir elgesio sunkumais buvo naudota daugialypė tiesinė regresija. Iš daugialypės tiesinės regresinės analizės rezultatų matyti, paaugliams vaikinams, kurie suvokia tėvo ir motinos auklėjimo stilių kaip atstūmimo ir emosinės šilumos bei globos trūkumą yra labiau išreikštas nusišalinimas / depresiškumas bei somatiniai simptomai. Nerimui / depresiškumui įtakos turi paauglių... [toliau žr. visą tekstą] / The aim of the research: define the connection between the style of parental upbringing and emotional and behavioural difficulties of teenagers. 270 students (152 girls and 118 boys) of Šakiai „Žiburys“ gymnasium, Šakiai „Varpas“ and Lukšiai V. Grybas secondary schools participated in the research. Their age rage is 16-17 years. Criminality, suicides, absences from school and a lot of other problems are closely connected with emotional and behavioural difficulties of teenagers. It is thought that emotional and behavioural difficulties are in close relationship with their environment, i.e. the style of parental upbringing. Therefore the question is raised how and what style of parental upbringing helps teenagers to avoid and deal with difficulties in their lives. According to the literature analysis a research was carried out aiming to detect relation between emotional and behavioural difficulties of teenagers and the style of parental upbringing perceived by teenagers. The research was carried out using “Youth Self-Report” (YSR 11/18: Youth Self-Report, Achenbach, 1991) and EMBU questionnaire (EMBU: Egna Minnen Betraffande Uppfostran, Arrindell, 1999; Arrindell et al., 1994). Multiple linear regression was used in order to define how the style of parental upbringing is related to emotional and behavioural difficulties. It can be seen from the result analysis of the multiple linear regression that teenage boys who understand the style of parental upbringing as alienation... [to full text]