A purposive study conducted among mature adults aged 55 and older in Northeast Tennessee examined variants of volunteerism as well as volunteer needs of agencies and organizations and what percent of volunteers in those agencies fall within the specified age group. Mature volunteers in the region match profiles of other studies -- predominantly white, married, homeowners, who are protestant, females with educational levels beyond high school, and who have income levels above the regional average. Findings show that most volunteers attend religious services at least once each week but found no association between gender and informal volunteerism, between health and volunteerism, or that rural volunteers are more likely to participate in informal volunteer activities. Results were analyzed using the chi-square test of statistical significance.

abstract: Rapidly growing research on mothers’ perinatal depression, has demonstrated significant links among mothers’ depressive symptoms during pregnancy and the first year postpartum, their parenting, and multiple aspects of children’s development. This prospective longitudinal study contributes to research on mothers’ perinatal depression by examining the mechanisms by which maternal perinatal depression is associated with children’s adjustment early in development in a sample of 204 Mexican-origin adolescent mothers (Mage at Wave 1 = 16.80, SD = 1.0) and their children (58% boys). I expected that adolescent mothers’ negative parenting behaviors would mediate the associations between mothers’ perinatal depressive symptoms and three child outcomes: internalizing symptoms, externalizing behaviors, and cognitive ability. I further hypothesized that mothers’ perceived social support from their family would modify the extent to which mothers’ perinatal depressive symptoms negatively impact their parenting behaviors and their children’s developmental outcomes. Mothers reported on their own depressive symptoms, their perceived social support from their family and their children’s internalizing and externalizing problems; negative parenting was assessed using observational methods; and children’s cognitive ability was assessed using standardized developmental assessments. In this sample, adolescent mothers’ negative parenting behaviors did not significantly mediate the relations between mothers’ perinatal depression and children’s developmental outcomes. Further, perceived social support did not significantly buffer the effects of mothers’ perinatal depression on mothers’ negative parenting or children’s developmental outcomes. However, in line with hypotheses, results indicated that mothers’ prenatal depression had a wider impact on children’s adjustment outcomes than mothers’ postpartum depression, which appeared more specific to children’s internalizing problems. Discussion focuses on implications for intervention addressing adolescent mothers’ perinatal depression, as well as the need to continue to explore protective factors that have the potential to disrupt the negative intergenerational transmission of risks. / Dissertation/Thesis / Doctoral Dissertation Family and Human Development 2019

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No description available.

Students learning English at school and another language at home comprise a rapidly growing segment of U.S. student populations. Language learners can benefit from using technology, but do not always use it advantageously (Katz & Gonzalez, 2016). Many studies address technology’s scholastic use, but few investigate how bilinguals use digital technology at home (Hinostroza, Matamala, Labbé, Claro, & Cabello, 2015), or what it means to them (Toboso-Martin, 2013). This qualitative multiple-case study focuses on the intersection between bilinguals, intergenerational learning, and digital technology. Specifically, it studies how bilingual, Hispanic family members interact around information and communication technology (ICT), and their attitudes toward ICT. Language patterns emerged during paired ICT use. Data were gathered from six Hispanic, bilingual families in the Midwestern U.S. through interviews, observation, and tasks where intergenerational pairs were asked to teach each other about ICT. This study adds to the literature on bilingualism, digital literacy, sociocultural theory, and intergenerational learning. Findings included parental ICT policies of vigilance, access, and trust. Findings support arguments that the digital divide persists as digital literacy. ICT both impeded and promoted intergenerational learning. Findings shed light on bilinguals’ contextualized linguistic needs, and echoed Vygotsky’s writings on gesture, internalized speech, and serial thought processing. English dominated as the language of ICT, but participants used Spanish and English to contextualize problems and negotiate meaning. Findings affirmed factors affecting the quality of ICT use. The author argues that Grosjean’s Complementarity Principle can be applied to digital literacy. Implications for parents, teachers, and researchers are given. Key words: bilingualism, families, intergenerational learning, information and communication technology (ICT), digital technology, digital literacy, home language practices, sociocultural theory, translanguaging

The need for mental health service is increasing in American Indian/Alaska Native (AI/AN) communities. While research has examined the availability, access, and effectiveness of provided services to the AI/AN, very little is known about the influence of the attitude and perceptions of both clinicians and clients in their therapeutic relationship in the treatment process. Using the frameworks of liberation, oppression, and trauma theory, this qualitative phenomenological study explored mental health service delivery and utilization issues within an AI/AN community. Data were collected through semistructured interviews with 14 clinician and client participants. The data were sorted into themes and subthemes and analyzed using the NVivo 11 computer software. Intergenerational struggle represented the primary theme and other subthemes such as assimilation, acculturation, and communication were among some of the secondary themes gathered from the data. Analysis of the themes provided greater insights into the dynamics of the participant's lived experience in various organizational structures within the larger community as well as a better understanding of mental health service delivery and utilization in maintaining sobriety in their daily struggles. The results indicated that intergenerational struggle along with other environmental factors were the chief causes of their cyclical journey through the penal and other systems; thus reducing their ability in maintaining longer sobriety and in improving their mental health. The implications for positive social change in this study include the reduction of stigma associated with these health issues through the education of the community and in training clinicians in factor-specific issues impacting life altering critical events in AI/AN struggles.

While many prevention and intervention strategies have been applied towards indigenous Pacific Island communities, these populations continue to observe upward trends in health disparities and documented shortfalls in the literature of culturally competent and sensitive practices. The purpose of this phenomenological study was to gain more understanding and insight of these communities through the conceptualizations of historical trauma (HT) and posttraumatic growth (PTG) theories. The central research question for this study examined how indigenous Pacific Island 3rd-generation adults described and perceived their experiences of intergenerational HT and potential growth. This study utilized a purposeful and criterion sample of 10 indigenous Pacific Island adults, between 18-32 years old, who participated in a project over 10 years ago. In the project, indigenous elders used the cultural tradition of oral storytelling, shared accounts of HT onto school aged children. Data were collected through semistructured interviews and qualitatively coded and analyzed using a modified thematic approach. Key findings indicated intergenerational HT effects as it related to participants' thoughts and feelings with concurrent positive experiences of increased values and engagement. The results also indicated PTG changes in appreciation of life, relating with others, personal strengths, new interests, and spiritual growth. Positive social change is implicated through the empirical evidence to inform researchers, policymakers, educators, and practitioners for further action, studies, and application of the culturally competent and sensitive strategy of shared familial oral traditions of storytelling as a means of preserving a community's history, found to increase PTG and reduce health disparities.

Individuals in certified nursing facilities (CNF) often experience social isolation and have limited opportunities to exercise. Bingocize®, an evidence-based healthpromotion program, is a combination of exercise and Bingo and provides opportunities for CNF resident interaction. Limited tools are available to quantify social engagement displayed by nursing home residents. Research suggests that intergenerational programming can positively affect social engagement. The present pilot study focused on the implementation of the Fun and Social Engagement (FUSE) evaluation to measure social engagement displayed by nursing home residents during Bingocize® sessions. The FUSE combined observation and self-report measures to yield a total social engagement score. Social engagement data were collected during Bingocize® sessions with university students interacting with residents and without student presence. Participants (M age = 82) included 35 residents from certified nursing facilities in Kentucky that receive funding from the Civil Money Penalty grant by Centers for Medicare and Medicaid Services. The purpose of this study was to determine if participants display increased positive social engagement during Bingocize® sessions when students are present versus when they are not, as well as if there is a difference between the participants’ self-report measure of engagement versus the observational report. Data were collected across four Bingocize® sessions, two with intergenerational programming and two without. Paired t-tests were conducted to determine overall participant engagement scores with and without student presence. Because of absenteeism, only two of the comparisons had a sufficient number of participants to analyze the effect of student presence. Comparing scores of the same residents, FUSE scores were higher in sessions with students present versus when students were not (p < .05). A two-sample t-test revealed that residents who reported happiness had higher observational scores than those who reported they were not happy. The results of this pilot study are tentative due to limited number of participants at some of the sessions. Future studies are needed to determine reliability of the FUSE. Nevertheless, this study suggests that the FUSE is a feasible tool for measuring fun and social engagement during Bingocize® and that university students have a positive effect on resident social engagement.

When examining the process of the intergenerational transmission of trauma for the experiences of first, second, and third generation Holocaust survivors, there exists both overlapping similarities and unique differences. Understanding the trends that underlie this process is of crucial importance when researching the cultural changes in communication and openness across generations that have occurred over time. In particular, minimal prior research has been conducted regarding the unique perspectives of third generation survivors. It is important to highlight that the third generation offers a unique perspective as the youngest participants of studies on post-Holocaust trauma, given that minimal prior research has been conducted on this young demographic. This study aims to fill in sizable gaps in the literature, comprehensively analyzing similarities and differences through the narrative-telling of three living generations of Holocaust survivors. Based on an extensive review of literature, this study poses interview questions adequately suiting each of the three generations and their respective experiences. Based on the results of the power analysis, a minimum of 966 Holocaust survivors from all three generations need to be studied in order to achieve a powerful effect size. For the purpose of this study, data is analyzed using thematic analysis, a coding method that converts qualitative data into quantitative data and identifies patterns of meaning across a dataset (Padgett, 2008). The research findings yielded from this study further the inquiry in literature on Holocaust survivorship, as well as introducing research questions of the intergenerational transmission of trauma.

Aging-friendliness work uses a model of eight core domains to assess and achieve communities in which people are more equipped to age well, and remain in their community as they age. These domains are broken into the built environment (i.e., Housing, Transportation) and the social environment (i.e., Communication, Social Inclusion, Employment). This dissertation is centered on the efforts to make communities more aging-friendly, and focuses specifically on the Livable Lexington initiative. This dissertation utilized an exploratory study of a pre- and posttest evaluative design to pilot intergenerational discussion groups as a potential intervention. Intergenerational discussion groups were developed with the goal of changing community members’ perceptions of how aging-friendly their community is, and were a way of operationalizing Rawlsian concepts such as the Veil of Ignorance and Wide Reflective Equilibrium, with the end goal of Intergenerational Equity. The three outcome variables in the study were perceptions of 1) ability to age in place, with regard to domains, 2) overall aging-friendliness, and 3) ability to engage and participate in community activities (such as decision making). Recruited from an initial aging-friendly needs assessment developed by AARP, the intergenerational discussion groups (n = 40) exposed participants to an environment that allowed them to lead discussion around what would make their assigned core domains (i.e, housing, transportation, social inclusion, communication, employment, etc.) more aging-friendly. Participants in the discussion groups perceived a greater ability to age in place, with respect to the social environment (p < .001), as well as a greater ability to engage and participate in community activities (p < .001). Additionally, participants perceived their community as more aging-friendly after the intervention (p < .001). The participants, however, did not perceive a greater ability to age in place, with regard to the built environment (p < .001). Throughout the discussion, the results are tied back into the literature and theory, and reasons for the adverse result in the built environment are also discussed (while more time is often necessary to notice changes in the built environment). Implications for this research, as well as future recommendations are discussed, as well.