Relationship Systems Outside the Therapy Room| A Grounded Theory on Seasoned MFT Doctoral Graduates Utilizing Their Systemic Training in Human Service Team-based Organizations

Thesis (Ed.D.)--Indiana University, Dept. of Educational Leadership of the School of Education, 2007. / Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 69-01, Section: A, page: 0041. Adviser: Ronald E. Barnes. Title from dissertation home page (viewed Sept. 24, 2008).

Thesis (Ph.D.)--Indiana University, Dept. of Psychological and Brain Sciences and Cognitive Science, 2009. / Title from PDF t.p. (viewed on Feb. 5, 2010). Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 70-04, Section: B, page: 2590. Adviser: John E. Bates.

Thesis (Ph.D.)--Indiana University, Dept. of Counseling and Educational Psychology, 2009. / Title from PDF t.p. (viewed on Feb. 10, 2010). Source: Dissertation Abstracts International, Volume: 70-06, Section: A, page: . Adviser: Ann Dopkins Stright.

<p> Maternal influence has been identified as a crucial factor in identifying and predicting if a child will be obese and can influence children's future comorbidities if they are obese. There is a dearth of research focused literature on the mothers' perspectives in caring for a child with obesity. The purpose of this grounded theory study (Glaser &amp; Strauss (1967)) was to identify a process of mothering an obese child. Data were collected through semi-structured interviews with 12 mothers. The transcripts of the interviews were coded, and coded data were then categorized and further analyzed to conceptualize a process. Three final phases, <i>realizing</i>, <i>limiting and eliminating</i>, and <i>doing something</i>, each with subcategories, explained the process of mothering an obese child. <i> Limiting and Eliminating</i> emerged as the core variable for this process. That is, mothers primarily used limiting and eliminating foods for their child, a strategy well known today to be ineffective for weight loss in children. Moreover, the mothers were not aware of many of the contemporary strategies for obesity intervention for children. This study's findings will inform health care professionals who work in both prevention and intervention settings with mothers of obese children and those at risk for developing obesity.</p>

<p> Infancy and toddlerhood is an important time for the development of emotion regulation, with interactions between parents and children critical to these processes. Negative parenting behaviors can have a deleterious impact on this development; however, for infants and toddlers in child care, the classroom environment, including teacher-child interactions, provides an important setting for emotional development and may serve as a protective factor when parenting risk at home is high. The aim of the three papers presented in this dissertation was to explore the potential for child care to act as a protective factor for infants and toddlers experiencing different dimensions of parenting risk that threaten emotion regulation development: minimal sensitivity and support, harsh and intrusive behaviors, and physical abuse and neglect. Results confirmed the negative impact of unsupportive, harsh, and intrusive parenting behaviors on emotion regulation, but child care was either insignificant in mitigating these effects or operated as a buffer for certain children only. Additionally, a review of the extant literature suggested that understanding the optimal caregiving experiences in child care that meet the unique regulatory needs of maltreated infants and toddlers is limited. Collectively, implications of these findings include the need to ensure measurement validity when assessing children&rsquo;s experiences within child care, the importance of considering the interactive nature of child, parent, and child care factors, and the pressing need for more research regarding child care teachers&rsquo; roles in facilitating emotional experiences in the classroom that meet the unique regulatory needs infants and toddlers facing risk at home.</p>

<p>Throughout American history, parental involvement has been a ?hot topic? in American education. Parents have great influence on their children?s schooling. Chinese immigrants are one of the largest populations in the United States, which introduces new challenges for American teachers. Along with the increasing numbers of Chinese in the United States, many American teachers have limited knowledge and resources to help them. Using Joyce Epstein?s six types of parental involvement and Grolnick and Slowiaczek?s three dimensions of parental involvement as a theoretical framework, this study investigated 10 Chinese immigrant parents in northwest America. The purpose of this study was to explore how Chinese immigrant parents? heritage, culture, and beliefs affect their understanding of American education. In addition, this study explored the factors that affect Chinese immigrant parents? participation in their children?s cognitive development.

<p> In the United States, approximately 400,000 children reside in foster care, and most have been exposed to caregiver abuse, neglect, or abandonment. A majority of foster children suffer the effects of damaging circumstances including poverty, violence, inferior health care, and substandard housing. Consequently, young foster youth frequently struggle to accomplish developmental tasks such as establishing secure attachment relationships, cultivating pre-academic skills, and acquiring social-emotional competence. The purpose of this research was to determine the impact of Peace4Kids, a nonprofit community-based organization, on young foster youths&rsquo; social-emotional development and pre-academic skills. Data collected from parents, teachers, and administrators during semi-structured interviews documented children&rsquo;s experiences as they attended the organization&rsquo;s Saturday Core Program. Participants noted that as foster children participated in a variety of curricular and co-curricular experiences at Peace4Kids, their social, emotional, and academic development were positively impacted. Parents, teachers, and administrators reported that the organization&rsquo;s culture of consistency, trust, and accountability promoted secure attachment relationships among foster youth, staff members, and peers at the Saturday Core Program. Participants iterated that secure relationships provided a foundation for foster children to subsequently acquire social and emotional capacities, including persistence, conflict resolution, self-regulation, and autonomy. As youth in foster care developed social-emotional competencies, pre-academic skills such as literacy and numeracy emerged. This study&rsquo;s findings indicate that a comprehensive approach is necessary to address the unique needs of foster children who have experienced prior trauma. Additionally, this research study contributes to a growing body of work that explores the role of attachment relationships in group and organizational settings.</p>

<p> This dissertation focused on understanding the perceptions built around autism in the Turkish context through an inquiry of lived experiences of individuals who have close contact with individuals on the autism spectrum. The nature of the experiences of two main groups of the participants, a group of experts working with individuals with autism and the parents of children who are on the spectrum, is explored employing an interpretive phenomenological analysis, which is a method of qualitative inquiry. The perceptions of participants show divergences and similarities regarding the nature of autism, the intervention, and the role of the family as well as regarding issues about diagnosis, collaboration, and conflict among experts and between all participant groups. For all groups of participants, the variation in the manifestations of autism symptomology and the overall severity level emerged as one crucial factor shaping the perceptions around the condition. The understandings of the majority of the participants seems to be informed by a theoretical basis that is mainly built around behavior control and behavior modification. The emphasis on behavior modification, in turn, shapes the education practices, which is considered to be the sole intervention for autism by all participants, leading to efforts to eliminate unwanted behaviors rather than seeking the possible underlying factors that trigger them. The focus on behaviors also leads to a particular understanding of what constitutes a successful outcome of therapy in which the evaluation of functional use of skills acquired during intervention can be overlooked. </p><p> The informational inaccessibility and the knowledge inequality that currently exists in Turkey appears as one major implication of this investigation. This is indicative of the need for greater collaboration on the part of the professionals as well as a service delivery system that is oriented to providing parents and experts working with children on the ASD spectrum with the most recent data-based knowledge.</p>

<p> There has been a rash of divorce among Nigerian Igbo immigrants. This was unheard of several years ago in a community whose culture frowned upon divorce. While some have examined factors affecting divorce, this study investigates those couples who remained married in the whirlwind of the divorce around them. </p><p> This phenomenological study reports the lived experience of nine Nigerian Igbo immigrant couples who live in the Houston area metropolis and who have been married for 20 years or more. Data from two clergymen who also live in the Houston metropolitan area and who have ministerial duties for the Nigerian Igbo community were utilized. Interviews were audiotaped and transcribed. Giorgi&rsquo;s psychological phenomenological method (1985) was used to analyze data. </p><p> The analysis of the data from participating couples yielded the following 15 essential structures: successful navigation of problems related to extended family, understanding that every marriage is unique with no comparison, mutual trust and understanding, appreciation of the marriage experience, communication, living within ones means, ability to be flexible and dynamic, team work, eliminating interference from others, infidelity, involvement in spiritual and religious activities, seeing marriage as a learning process, finances, raising of children , and acculturation issues. Participating clergy identified these six structures: ability to forgive and to tolerate, preference to go to the priest or religious leader, awareness of unacceptability of divorce, effective management of issues surrounding sex, being constantly aware of the love element in marriage, and managing the over inflated image of a cozy life in the US. </p><p> This study&rsquo;s finding did not differ greatly from other studies on long-term marriages. The results support the conclusion that there may be cross cultural similarity in structural factors fostering marriage longevity. The results did, however, indicate some uniqueness germane to the acculturation of this immigrant population in the areas of extended family, upbringing of children, gender roles, and male patriarchal hegemony. This underscores the need for counselors to consider cultural context when looking at marriage longevity. The Nigerian couples in this study also acknowledged that the above listed structures may have either a positive or negative impact on marriage stability.</p>