Trauma is multidimensional and affects people directly as well as those of future generations. There is a profound absence in the literature of the community traumas experienced by the Chamorro people of Guam. The Chamorros are the indigenous people of Guam and have endured a history of near annihilation and subjugation by the Spanish (1521-1898), subsequent colonization by the American government (1898-present) and invasion and occupation by the Japanese military during World War II. Additional trauma has been experienced as a result of the Vietnam War. The challenge for counselors and therapists is to provide effective and culturally responsive counseling to their Chamorro clients. This qualitative study explored the impact of historic events on the Chamorro people through in-depth interviews with nine participants who have had extensive experience working with Chamorro clients. It also explored culturally responsive treatment strategies that may be helpful for those unfamiliar with this population. The findings highlighted cultural strengths as well as cultural barriers to treatment. Therefore, services provided to this population may be facilitated by an understanding of the history, culture, values, and beliefs of the Chamorro people of Guam. The study identifies a paradox of cultural adaptability. On the one hand, the culture's richness and vitality has enabled many of the people not only to survive but to thrive, in spite of a long history of traumatic experiences. On the other hand, it also presents a population in need of mental health services due to the stressors of cultural adjustment (e.g. loss of land and way of life, loss of language, identity confusion and substance abuse) and some of the same institutions and traditions that also serve as a source of strength. This study has implications for the training, research, and practice in the helping field. It includes suggestions for the treatment of trauma, community trauma, and intergenerational transmission of community trauma as well as assessment issues.

The area of parenting assessment lacks an inexpensive, comprehensive, psychometrically sound, and easy-to-use instrument that has been validated on an ethnically diverse group of parents. The area of parent training, in particular, lacks an instrument with these properties that also measures the parenting behaviors that are often the targets of such interventions. The Parent Behavior Scale (PBS), a parent self-report questionnaire, was evaluated with an ethnically diverse sample of 114 parents and their 4- and 5-year-old children. Thirty-eight percent of these parents self-reported as Hispanic, 26% as African American, and 36% as European American. The scale demonstrated adequate internal consistency and test-retest reliability. Scores on the PBS were significantly related to several measures of parenting. PBS scores were, in general, not strongly related to measures of child behavior problems. Four factors of parenting behavior were identified: They were (1) angry vs. warm, (2) permissive/frustrated vs. firm/calm, (3) powerless vs. purposeful, and (4) disengaged vs. active parenting. The PBS should help researchers evaluate the efficacy of behavioral parent-training interventions for child behavior problems, and this instrument should help clinicians who use such interventions to track their clients' progress.

Using extrafamilial child sexual abuse (CSA) as an example of family trauma, the author interviewed 62 parents of sexually abused boys on multiple occasions to analyze the organization of gender, race, and class in parental coping processes. Despite access to alternative interpretations of CSA that challenge conventional notions of gender, parents in this study typically relied on traditional themes to make meaning of the CSA experience. The author organized the data analytically around gender strategies and found that parents used race- and class-specific gender strategies in the aftermath of trauma. Most important, mother-blame is theorized as a form gender reaffirmation. The author uses the term gender reaffirmation to illustrate the way social actors recuperate after a situation has been interpreted as detrimental, challenging, or stressful to heteronormative gender relations. Mother-blaming accounts encouraged race and class enactments of gender that had negative consequences for women and helped secure men's cultural power.

Race, one of the most salient qualities by which people determine their social interactions, is a dynamic social construction shaped by racism in which Whites benefit by increased access to social power. Racial identity is defined as one's conscious and unconscious affiliation with one's racial group membership. Theoretical models identify racial identity development to proceed according to three aspects (1) one's sense of self as a member of a racial group, (2) one's attitudes and beliefs about other racial groups, and (3) one's understanding of racism. This study uses these aspects as guides for three research questions, namely (1) "How do traditional-age White college students describe themselves in terms of their White identity?" (2) "How do traditional-age White college students demonstrate and/or describe their attitudes and beliefs about other racial groups?" and (3) "How do traditional-age White college students define and describe racism?" This study includes quantitative and qualitative methods. Data was elicited in two processes. Forty traditional-aged White college students completed a Personal Information sheet, the Conceptualization of Racism Test and the Experience Recall protocol. A subset of ten students participated in in-depth interviews. Twelve variables were identified for a correlation analysis. While there is not a correlation among the variables, patterns related to the two developmental models were identified. Seven theme clusters were identified and include: (1) Definitions of race, ethnicity and self-ascription by race and ethnicity, (2) Recognition of differential treatment based on own racial identity, (3) Characteristics of being White, (4) General beliefs about other racial groups, (5) Identification of external influence, degree of internal agency, stereotypes and feelings, (6) Anecdotes of racial interactions involved in racism, and (7) Perspectives on racism. A developmental analysis using cognitive conceptualization of racism skills and self-knowledge skills illustrates developmental differences in the ways in which the students negotiate each theme cluster. The developmental differences are presented in three composite portraits reflective of the developmental differences in the students' understanding of White identity. These portraits are used to provide answers to the research questions.

Drawing upon gender- and life-course perspectives, this study addresses a number of conceptual gaps in our understanding of linkages between gender-role ideology, depression, and marital quality across the transition to parenthood. It employs a unique sample of 120 working-class, full-time dual-earner heterosexual couples to (a) explore linkages between marital partners' ideology and their depression, love, and conflict while accounting for the inherent dependence in partners' data; (b) examine effects of spousal concordance/discordance in ideology; and (c) compare the performance of a global gender ideology measure (GRI) versus a measure specific to economic provision roles within a family (PR). Couples were interviewed antenatally (third trimester of pregnancy) and postpartum (six months and one year after their baby's birth). In general, new mothers' greater egalitarianism was found to be associated with women's lower depression and lower marital conflict, whereas new fathers' greater egalitarianism was associated with more marital love. The influence of egalitarianism on men's reported conflict level depended upon the proportion of family income he made. When differences between relationship partners' global gender ideology or provider role views were used to predict outcomes, a different pattern of findings emerged. Women who held more egalitarian provider role views than their male partner reported more love and less relationship conflict than women who held more traditional provider role views than their partner. Men who were more egalitarian than their partner or who held more egalitarian provider role views than her reported lower depression than men who were more traditional than their partner. Findings argue for the importance of considering gender ideology on the dyadic level in addition to the individual level. The two different gender ideology measures (GRI and PR) were generally found to have similar effect sizes, with respective strengths in different contexts. The discussion highlights the need for future research to consider domestic work roles in concert with paid labor roles when conducting family research, as these two concepts are inextricably linked.

The study takes a grounded theoretical approach to the study of conflicted communication among adolescent youth in an inner city middle school. Ethnographic field methods were utilized over an eighteen month period in an inner city middle school and the surrounding neighborhoods. Conflicted communication is concerned with the use of patterned forms and content of conflict behaviors to both maintain and transform the youths' social world. It arises out of the social construction of adolescence, the institutional and community settings and familial practices. Three questions are posed: What are the patterned forms and content of adolescent conflicted communication? How does the school, community, and family make an impact on conflicted communication? What does the enactment of conflicted communication reveal about the social world of adolescent youth? Audiotapes of mediation sessions between youth, interviews with youth, school personnel, community members and families, as well as field notes comprise the primary data sources. Analyses of these data necessarily cross traditional boundaries to explore these research questions. Descriptive analyses reveal the presence of overarching patterned processes and particular repeated content in conflict situations. An interpretive analysis of 'face,' an often-mentioned symbolic theme, reveals the importance of taking the symbolic dimension into account in order to understand the hidden values inherent in conflicted communication practices. Lastly, a critical analysis examines the interplay between conflicted communication practices and the influence of the inner city institution and neighborhoods on such practices. Framing these three analyses is a meta-theoretical proposition regarding the social world of adolescent youth which suggests that adolescent youth engage in conflicted communication because it provides the means to re-organize social groupings, to experiment with displays and exercise of power, and to test the strength of socio-familial alliances. The study concludes with the suggestion that conflict resolution/mediation programs in schools consider the socio-cultural dimensions and functions of conflict in the lives of adolescents. Rather than striving to eliminate institutional conflict, school personnel need to encourage critical reflection about conflicted communication and help youth identify junctures within conflict situations where less destructive actions might be chosen.

This longitudinal study examined the experience of caregiving among a nationally-representative sample of 10,537 middle-aged adults participating in Wave 1 and Wave 2 of the Health and Retirement Study. Individuals were classified as parent caregivers, child caregivers, and multiple (parent and child) caregivers. The low incidence of multiple caregiving found among these middle-aged adults questions the validity of the phenomenon described as the "sandwich generation." Females comprised the majority of the parent, child, and multiple caregiving groups. Contrary to expectations, Black and Latina caregivers were not more likely than whites to hold parent and multiple caregiving roles. A high frequency of caregiving role losses and a low frequency of caregiving role assumptions occurred between Wave 1 and Wave 2. Most notable was the finding that 41% of multiple caregivers and 70% of parent caregivers in Wave 1 became noncaregivers in Wave 2. In addition, only.4% and 6.5% of women assumed multiple care and parent care, respectively. These findings suggest that the experience of caregiving during the middle-generation years is of short duration and likely to decrease over time. No support was found for the "caregiving pile up effect" (Doress-Worters, 1994) among those holding multiple caregiving roles. Rather, female caregivers experienced a decrease in well-being regardless of their caregiving role transitions, while caregivers who gained or maintained caregiving reported better physical health than those who lost caregiving. In addition, caregivers' well-being did not differ from that of noncaregivers, with the exception of ADLs (better for caregivers). Ethnicity was found to play an important and complex role in predicting transitions in caregiving and well-being. As hypothesized, being a Black or Latina caregiver who lost parent care predicted worse well-being. With regards to the maintenance or assumption of child care, however, being a minority woman accounted for worse well-being. The negative consequences of child caregiving for Latinas is especially intriguing given their greater likelihood to maintain child care. There was some support for the notion that minorities' traditional family values in support of caregiving predict better well-being for women maintaining child care or for multiple caregivers.

This exploratory study looks at Chinese-Caucasian interracially married parents' experience of raising their children. The goal is to characterize these parents' stances toward their children's ethnic identity. A semi-structured, clinical interview was developed for the study in order to gather information about the respondent's family and individual histories, as well as their childrearing practices and beliefs. The sample consisted of 29 interracially married parents who had at least one child older than nine years old. Eight intraracially married Chinese parents were also interviewed for comparison purposes. The interview data was subjected to a content analysis which generated the following six-dimensional conceptual framework of ethnic identity: (1) Group Identification; (2)Ethnic Continuity; (3) Physical Characteristics; (4) Objective Culture; (5) Subjective Culture; (6) Sociopolitical Consciousness. It was found that parents did not feel that their children's ethnic identity was the focus of a great deal of concern. Parents also emphasized that it had rarely been a source of psychological or social difficulty for their children. The ethnic identity of the Chinese parent was stressed far more than the ethnic identity of the Caucasian parent. Surprisingly, parents expressed very little concern about their children's racial marginality or the issue of racial continuity. On a conscious level, parents were more strongly committed to "group identification" and "objective culture." In actual practice, however, their commitment in these areas carried a great deal of ambivalence. On an unconscious level, parents were most likely to pass down "subjective culture." This was the one area of regular cultural conflict in these families, particularly around expectations about family roles. These parents' greatest concern revolved around their children losing their Chinese culture. However, parents were generally unsuccessful when they tried to actively guide their children in an ethnic direction. Parents stressed that their children's most durable ethnic commitments developed largely independently of their own efforts to influence, emphasizing that their own personal ethnic involvements (modelling) seemed to have the most impact. The study concludes by offering some integrative comments about the nature of ethnic identity and the forces that propel it across generations. An important area of future research would be to talk with these parents' biracial children about their ethnic identities.

As a discipline virtually unknown thirty years ago, family therapy has expanded in a rapid manner. However, surprisingly little scientific attention has been given to the process of supervision and training. Supervision remains mainly a matter of intuition and individual experience. This dissertation attempts to understand the supervisory process by examining how experienced supervisors make intervention decisions during live supervision. The subjects of study are three experienced family therapy supervisors who train students in agency settings. Theoretical and empirical literature pertaining to live supervision is reviewed. Included is literature that describes the context of family therapy supervision, literature which defines the cognitive maps used by supervisors, and descriptive accounts of training programs for supervisors. Two conceptual models are reviewed, Schon's (1983) theory of "reflection-in-action." and Gorman's (1988) model of the context of family therapy supervision, which was developed to guide the present inquiry. The moment-of-intervention, defined as the point during live supervision when the supervisor communicates with the trainee in order to affect the session's activity, is the unit of analysis providing a window into the supervisory process. A total of 24 moments-of-intervention (8 per supervisor) were observed. Video tapes of these interventions were transcribed and rated based on a typology consisting of eight different dimensions. All three supervisors tended to make interventions that were direct, specific, supervisor-initiated, and immediate. A subsample of 12 moments-of-intervention (4 per supervisor) was chosen for further study. Interviews with each of the supervisors revealed important influences in decision-making were the expectations of the employing agency and the pervasive influence of the supervisor's training-of-origin. Next in importance was the supervisor's family-of-origin and immediate collegial group. Least influential was awareness of the expectations of the larger profession. The results are valuable because they offer a description of the supervisory process grounded in systematic observation of actual interventions. The results confirm a number of theoretical expectations, highlight some elements of the supervisory process that were not incorporated in either theoretical model, and suggest directions for future research.

This dissertation describes an experimental project to devise forums for “civil” public discussion. It is an analysis of the project in terms of the Coordinated Management of Meaning theory, and discusses implications for the de-escalation of tension and the management of conflicts where passions are unusually strong and the positions taken by disputants are particularly intractable. There has been an interesting effort to improve the quality of public discourse at the University of Massachusetts, Amherst. The usual form of educational discussion is the ‘debate’ and true to form, the administration called for debates to be held in order to allow informed and civil discussants to educate the student body on the issues surrounding events in the Middle East during the mid-eighties. But a turning point was made when The Kaleidoscope Project was announced as “not a debate,” but as “an experimental forum for the non-adversarial public discussion of intractable disputes: to ‘discuss the undiscussible’.” Through the late eighties and into the early nineties, Kaleidoscope forums were held and the format refined. Subsequently, “people of good will” on the campus have attempted to increase the opportunities for students and faculty to engage in non-adversarial forums, increasingly citing a perceived need for dialogue. “Dialogue” has become the watchword for educational and mediated conversations. The subject of this study is The Black/Jewish/Other Video Exchange Project which allowed self-identifying student members of three groups, “Blacks”, “Jews”, and “Others”, to use videotaped interviews to “enter a dialogue” or—as the BJO Committee referred to it, to have a “distanced conversation”. The dissertation holds the premise that different forms of communication construct different ways of being human, and thus the communication process constructs the specific forms and outcomes of conflicts in human systems. I hypothesize that interventions designed to produce dialogue rather than debate or dispute are rooted in differences in cultural constructions of “conflict” and “dialogue” and that the way people communicate rather than what they think contributes more significantly to the form of the conflict. Successful conflict management is a matter of second order change; the success or failure of peacemaking interventions depends upon the maintenance or the collapse of the interventive control of contextual reconstruction. The dissertation provides a conversation analysis of the videotapes from the BJO Video Exchange Project in order to advance a deeper understanding of cross-cultural “dialogue” and the characteristics of “transformative discourse.”