<p> High prenatal stress and the stress hormone cortisol have been shown to lead to adverse birth outcomes. Yet, few studies have examined the efficacy of prenatal stress management programs on improving prenatal stress and cortisol outcomes, specifically what factors (i.e., participant comprehension and content fidelity) in implementing these programs might influence whether pregnant women obtain improved stress outcomes. This study demonstrated that participant comprehension (i.e., how well a participant understands program material) and content fidelity (i.e., how well instructors adhere to core program components) were not associated with stress and cortisol outcomes among low-income pregnant women enrolled in a stress management program. Future research should investigate whether program characteristics (e.g., cultural norms of the population, skill-learning, or therapeutic-oriented processes) mediate these implementation factors. By understanding multivariate models of implementation factors and program characteristics, health care practitioners can effectively provide the CBSM program to pregnant women across at-risk communities.</p>

<p> Treatment of addictive processes is one of the specialties of clinical psychology. Practitioners hone their skills to relieve the suffering and ill affects of substance use. This dissertation explored sugar use, as an addictive process, through the lens of emotional regulation, addressing the research question: What is the lived experience of emotional regulation through sugar addiction? The study specifically excluded treatment. </p><p> Review of literature revealed ways to treat, supplement, or kick the sugar habit, examined sugar addiction qualifiers by comparing them to neural correlates of other drug dependencies, and provided recovering food and sugar addicts&rsquo; insights into America&rsquo;s food supply and the harmful deceptions perpetuated by its food industry. The Food Addiction Institute&rsquo;s library maintains over 2,700 peer reviewed articles. </p><p> The study employed a phenomenological research method to look at six co-participants&rsquo; lived experience&mdash;idiographically, to determine what characteristics and themes are unique to each co-participant, and nomothetically, to determine what universally characterizes the whole group. </p><p> Co-participant entry into the study required meeting the thresholds for the Yale Food Addiction Scale, abbreviated version. Interview transcripts provided a rich data base for analysis. Idiographic essential descriptions were used to create a narrative for each co-participant. The nomothetic aggregate used common denominators to create a universal picture of the whole group. </p><p> This study aimed for a greater understanding of the interdependent nature of sugar and emotions. What might a sugar addicted population express that facilitates recovery and emotional regulation? Due to its qualitative approach to data acquisition the research was personal and explored beyond the surface to obtain a unique and individualized story, yet was able to identify a picture common to the whole group. </p><p> The lived experience revealed that envy, deprivation, fear of sugar&rsquo;s control, and lack of support from authority figures contributed to an inability to get enough of comfort foods or to stop overconsumption, and contributed to feelings of guilt, shame, and loss. Co-participants expressed excitement and gratitude that someone was interested in this topic.</p>

<p> Decades of research attest to the psychological benefits of exercise, documenting improved psychological functioning for specific disorders as well as biological systems. Notable trends include reduction of psychological symptoms (e.g., anxiety, depression), increases in self-esteem, facilitation of neurogenesis, enhancement of cognitive functioning, and improvements in stress response. The majority of these studies call for increased utilization of exercise interventions within clinical practice. However, decades of exercise research and the two existing studies on practice habits suggest that exercise continues to be widely underutilized. The data suggest that clinicians believe exercise is beneficial; they report high confidence and rates of utilization in exercise interventions; however, they also report low levels of education in exercise psychology. It was hypothesized that one possible cause for this persistent research-practice gap may be mental health professionals' (MHPs) misperceptions of their own competence, namely the Dunning-Kruger phenomenon. <i>Methods: </i> An original, electronic survey was disseminated to MHPs via email, social media posting, and snowball sampling. Eighty-three clinicians completed the survey, which collected data on beliefs and practice habits; perceptions of confidence and competence; and research knowledge. <i>Results:</i> Findings supported previous observations, documenting high levels of confidence amongst MHPs despite low levels of exercise education. Knowledge of research was poor; data suggest that the Dunning-Kruger phenomenon is a factor in the ongoing research-practice gap within exercise psychology. <i>Conclusions: </i> This is the first study to measure fact-based competence of MHPs and offer an explanation for the longstanding underutilization of exercise. Findings suggest that clinicians may be at risk for overestimating their own abilities in areas that are less familiar. Further research is needed regarding MHPs&rsquo; exercise-related competence in order to elucidate the complex nature of factors examined here.</p><p>

<p> One in four Americans aged 65 years or older is clinically depressed. A growing body of research suggests subclinical depression influences mood, affect, cortisol dysregulation, and autonomic imbalance. Depression is an independent risk factor for cardiovascular disease. Posited to underlie these changes are shifts in sympathovagal balance toward excessive sympathetic arousal and/or decreased vagal inhibitory influences on the heart rate. </p><p> Nine studies suggest a 10-minute fast and variable thinking (FVT) exercise improves mood in nonsymptomatic student populations. This randomized, double-blind, placebo-controlled study investigated pre-to-post FVT effects on mood, perception of thought speed, depression severity, and changes in physiology, that is, heart rate variability (HRV), temperature, and electrodermal response (EDR) in 30 subclinical depressed females aged 50 to 69 as compared to paired controls. </p><p> A paired samples <i>t</i>-test was run to assess mean FVT changes in mood, depression severity, and physiology using the PANAS-X, Zung Self-Rating Depression Scale, HRV, temperature, and EDR, respectively. A linear regression and ANOVA measured within and between group changes in positive mood and perception of thought speed. </p><p> The results showed that fast and variable thinking decreased negative mood (<i>p</i> = .04) and depression severity (<i>p</i> = .02) while maintaining positive mood levels. Perception of thought speed had a very weak mediating effect. Physiologically, %HF (<i>p</i> = .04) and Temperature (<i>p</i> = .002) decreased below baseline post-intervention. Respiration Rate (RSP) did not recover post-intervention. %HF, Temperature, and RSP suggest a possible hypo-parasympathetic response. Relative pre-to-post mean increases in SDNN, RMSSD, pNN50, and HRV Amplitude values in conjunction with EDR recovery suggest resilience and a positive health status. Disparate findings post-intervention may be age and health related. Additional research is needed to determine if the initial sympathetic arousal eventuates in improved health long term. </p><p> This study suggests it is possible to feel less depressed and less negative without feeling subjectively positive. There is sufficient evidence to suggest that fast and variable thinking may be an effective tool for improving mood in subclinical depressed women.</p>

<p> Type I Diabetes (T1D) is one of the most common chronic illnesses in childhood. Supports can play a pivotal role in aiding families affected by chronic illness to cope (Gerhardt, Walders, Rosenthal, &amp; Drotar, 2006; Gavin and Wysocki, 2006); however, when attachment figures become unreliable and unsupportive, it can interrupt child outcomes (Charuvastra &amp; Cloitre, 2008; Feeney, 1999; Mikulincer, Shaver, &amp; Horesh, 2006; VanIjzendoorn, Goldberg, Kroonenberg, &amp; Frenkel, 1992).</p><p> Seven sibling-parent dyads of children affected by T1D were studied using the PedsQL to evaluate Health-Related Quality of Life (HRQoL), the CRIES-13 to evaluate post traumatic stress symptoms, the BASC to evaluate behavioral and emotional functioning, the LEAP to evaluate perception of caregiver availability, the MSPSS to evaluate the parent self-reported level of support, and the BSI to evaluate the parent social-emotional functioning. This pilot studied evaluated whether siblings mirrored past study results (Alonzo, 2000; Droter, 2006; Gerhardt, et al., 2003; Hollidge, 2001; Kenney, 2010; Landolt, et al., 2003; Lombardo, 2005; Newby, 1996; Sharpe &amp; Rossiter, 2002), and then proceeded to evaluate how HbA1c and parent-child factors may have impacted the sibling results.</p><p> This sample did not appear to be impacted by the level of HbA1c control or mirror prior chronic illness study demographics. Further, neither the parent's reported support level nor the siblings' perception of parental availability appeared to impact sibling outcomes. However, there was a significant relationship between sibling CRIES and mother's LEAP scores, as well as a post-hoc analysis relationship between the Child Total PedsQL score/PedsQL Family Impact score and siblings' qualitative indication of felt loss of attention to the T1D child and desire for more sibling support groups. Taken together, this study suggests that parent support variables may not be core to sibling outcomes for the T1D population; however, it is important to remember that significant results may have been masked due to the relative health of this particular sample and the low N, especially given the post-hoc analysis results. Future research on parent-child factors impacting sibling outcomes should occur, as it could generate new treatment protocols to better the lives of families impacted by T1D.</p>