In 1950 Bossard and Boll published their pioneering work on family rituals entitled Ritual in Family Living. Since then, numerous researchers have examined family rituals using various research designs. This study was done in the tradition of Bossard and Boll by closely examining the personal written accounts of 493 college-age students from a western university. Comparisons were made between the current sample and the sample of Bossard and Boll. Numerous changes in family rituals were identified. Christmas was found to be the most discussed ritual, but Christmas Eve rituals were more often discussed than Christmas Day rituals. The importance of family rituals from the perspective of respondents was discussed as well as the meaning behind them.

The purpose of this study was to determine the effect of ideological perspective-taking training on female identity development. The primary hypothesis of the study was that those subjects engaged in the training sessions would show advancement in identity development that exceeded that of normal adolescent development. Ninety-eight subjects were pretested for the study. Attrition due to elimination during prescreening and failure to complete the training phase of the study left 50 subjects. Participants were assigned to a treatment group, an engaged control group, or a maturational control group. Both the treatment and engaged control groups participated in two sessions a week for a 4-week period. Posttesting was completed during the final week of the study. One-way analysis of variance and a repeated measures analysis of variance were computed on the pretest and posttest scores. There were no significant advances in ideological identity for those participating in the training program. Validity and reliability of the dependent measures are assessed and discussed. Implications for future research are presented.

The purpose of this study was to determine if there was an association between current level of conflict between divorced parents and their attendance or nonattendance at the divorce education pilot program. A telephone interview was used to examine current level of postdivorce conflict. The first portion of the telephone interview used questions that were taken from the Family of Origin Scale (FOS). Questions were selected as they related to various stages of divorce. The second portion of the questionnaire obtained sociodemographic data. as well as information regarding relitigation. The telephone interview was administered to 160 individuals who participated in the divorce education pilot program and to 59 individuals who did not participate. Hypothesis one stated that attendance at the divorce education program will not be associated with the current level of postdivorce conflict. This hypothesis was rejected as a statistically significant association between postdivorce conflict and class attendance was demonstrated. Both males and females in the nonattendance group had higher mean conflict scores than the attendance group. Also, females in both groups had higher mean conflict scores than their male counterparts. Hypothesis two stated that attendance at the divorce education program will not be associated with the number of custody and visitation legal issues since the initial custody arrangement. Hypothesis two was also rejected as attendance at the divorce education class was found to be weakly associated with whether a subject will return to court or not. A demographic summary for subjects returning to court was also created. The need for continued research on postdivorce conflict was addressed. The theoretical implications of the study were highlighted. as well as other recommendations concerning the role of marriage and family therapists who work with families experiencing divorce.

This study explored the use of rituals in substance abuse counseling. Data were obtained from a total of 25 mental health workers in the substance abuse field from the northern region of Utah. Four research questions were asked about rituals and their use in substance abuse counseling: (I) Are addictions therapists using rituals? (2) How did therapists determine when to use rituals? (3) What types of rituals do they use? and (4) How do therapists assess ritual effectiveness? Results indicated that about three fourths of the mental health workers questioned were using rituals in their treatment protocol with substance abuse clients. The most common methods used for determining when to implement rituals into treatment were (a) clients were emotionally stuck, (b) client's cognitive ability, and (c) therapist's perception. The findings also suggested that therapists presented means of assessing the effectiveness of the rituals they implemented, but the data also supported past literature findings that showed little empirical means of assessment.

No description available.

No description available.

This study explored the use of rituals in substance abuse counseling. Data were obtained from a total of 25 mental health workers in the substance abuse field from the northern region of Utah. Four research questions were asked about rituals and their use in substance abuse counseling: (I) Are addictions therapists using rituals? (2) How did therapists determine when to use rituals? (3) What types of rituals do they use? and (4) How do therapists assess ritual effectiveness? Results indicated that about three fourths of the mental health workers questioned were using rituals in their treatment protocol with substance abuse clients. The most common methods used for determining when to implement rituals into treatment were (a) clients were emotionally stuck, (b) client's cognitive ability, and (c) therapist's perception. The findings also suggested that therapists presented means of assessing the effectiveness of the rituals they implemented, but the data also supported past literature findings that showed little empirical means of assessment.

The problem which was investigated in this study was the influence of a child development laboratory experience and the child's discriminatory abilities on the developmental level of children's art productions. Forty-eight children, three and four years of age, of whom 24 had no prior experience, and 24 others had completed approximately six months as participants in a child development laboratory, were included in the study. All children were given a discrimination task to establish their individual levels of discriminatory abilities. Each child painted four pictures, two with easel paint and two with crayons. Each painting was analyzed to determine art content and level of development. The findings indicated that discrimination ability does not appear to be an influential factor on the developmental level of children 's art creations among children of this age. Children demonstrated more advanced art stages when using crayons than when painting with tempra at the easel. Experience in the Child Development Laboratory exerted its strongest influence on the child's production of learned art forms, alphabet letters and numerals. It was concluded that art experiences for three and four year old children tend to be motoric and exploratory responses to the various media in use by them. However, experience is also a factor in the development of children's art, in that the child's use of learned art forms is influenced by an enriched learning environment.

No description available.

Alzheimer’s disease (AD) is the most commonly occurring form of dementia that affects African Americans at 2 to 3 times higher rate than other ethnic or racial groups in the United States. As the number of older African Americans with AD grows rapidly so will the need for daily supports; therefore, informal caregivers, such as an adult offspring, often assume the role of filial caregiver. Focusing on the unique patterns of caregiving among African Americans, this generic qualitative study may help explain the adult offspring’s perspective on sibling relationships as they function in the role of primary filial caregiver. Equity theory was the conceptual framework used to explore sibling relationships among African American adult filial caregivers. A purposeful sampling in conjunction with snowballing was used to recruit participants who provided filial caregiving to a home-bound parent with AD. For this generic qualitative study, 10 participants responded to 12 open-ended interview questions related to their sibling relationships and filial caregiving. After collecting and transcribing the data, I used a thematic analysis approach, resulting in the following 5 emergent themes: (a) perception of equity, (b) continuing a close sibling relationship, (c) strategies of communication and collaborative decision-making, (d) varying siblings supports, and (e) attitudes towards caregiving and siblings. The results from this study may enhance culturally sensitive or responsive interventions/strategies and family-centered programs supporting African American adult filial caregivers and their siblings as they navigate the demands of elder care, thereby informing perceptions of fairness related to caregiving responsibilities.