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A preventative intervention program was administered to a non-clinical population deemed at risk for the development of eating disorders. Two-hundred and three women from a large southwestern state university who belonged to four campus sororities participated in the intervention. Members of the two sorority houses served as the control group while members of the other two houses served as the experimental group during the eight-week intervention. The intervention consisted of five workshops involving risk factors identified with anorexia nervosa and bulimia nervosa. The intervention included workshops on basic information on eating disorders, exercise, stress management, nutrition, self-esteem, and body image. Compared to the control group, the experimental group displayed significantly lower scores on the Ineffectiveness sub-scale and the Bulimia sub-scale of the Eating Disorder Inventory. The present study demonstrated that a population highly susceptible to disordered eating, was open to and positively affected by, an intervention procedure.

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The present exploratory study focused on international graduate students who might experience some difficulties with major life transitions and studying in a different culture. The purpose of this study was to examine the relationship between personal assertiveness and social support satisfaction among international graduate students. The researcher hypothesized that assertive international graduate students would report higher levels of seeking out and marshalling social support. Thus, they would more likely be satisfied with their perceived social support. The present study also examined several demographic variables such as ethnicity, sex, TOEFL scores, GPA, and length of stay in the U.S., as possible factors affecting their assertiveness and perceived social support satisfaction. The major findings indicated that assertiveness did not always augment social support satisfaction in the current sample. However, the results of the study demonstrated the effects of ethnicity and several other variables in predicting the levels of assertiveness and perceived social support satisfaction among international graduate students. The study also suggested several implications for future research regarding the relationship between interpersonal variables and perceived social support satisfaction. / Department of Psychological Science

The purpose of the present study was to examine the influence of cultural factors, such as self-construal, and social beliefs, on coping for U.S. and Chinese college students. Data from 325 U.S. and 321 Chinese college students were used for the analyses. It was found that independent self-construal, beliefs in reward for application and social complexity predicted task-oriented coping and self-regulation for both the U.S. and Chinese students. It was also found that beliefs in both fate control and social cynicism were associated with avoidance and emotion-focused coping in both groups. These two patterns of relationships were also observed across gender in each sample. Differences were also noted between the two countries. For the U.S. students, independent self-construal and interdependent self-construal contributed equally to task-oriented coping and self regulation, whereas for the Chinese students, only independent self-construal predicted these coping strategies. Moreover, religiosity was associated with emotion-focused coping and self regulation for the Chinese participants, while this pattern was not found in the U.S. student sample. The results of this study support the transactional model of coping. Consistent with previous findings, significant associations were found between three of the cultural variables (independent self-construal, beliefs in social complexity, and reward in application) and taskoriented coping. In contrast to prior research, the current study indicates that both independent and interdependent self-construal predicted task-oriented coping for the U.S. students. This contradicts Lam and Zane’s (2004) findings which suggested that these two dimensions of selfconstrual affect coping differently. Moreover, the current study found associations in the U.S. sample between self-construal, social beliefs, and coping dimensions which were originally identified in Chinese populations (i.e., self-regulation and help seeking). Similarly, the current research illuminated relationships in the Chinese sample between self-construal, social beliefs, and coping dimensions which were originally identified in the West (i.e., task-oriented and emotion-oriented coping). These findings suggest that current conceptualizations of coping in the West and China may not fully capture important aspects of coping in these two cultures. These results were discussed in relation to past findings in the literature, as well as the cultural contexts of the U.S. and China. / Department of Counseling Psychology and Guidance Services

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This study explored the use of child-centered play therapy (CCPT) as a culturally responsive intervention and a prevention treatment method for the psychosocial well-being of Japanese children in the United States. In light of the demand for the evidence-based therapeutic treatment for children as well as the need to conduct multicultural research without ignoring within-group differences, this study was composed of two research methodologies; quantitative research design and individual analysis. Single-group repeated measures ANOVA was utilized for the group analysis and linear regression was employed for individual analysis in addition to qualitative data obtained through parent feedback and the researcher's observation of play therapy sessions. The participating children received a total of eight CCPT sessions. The impact of CCPT was measured by a decrease in a child's behavioral problems perceived by a parent measured by scores of the Internalizing Problems, Externalizing Problems and Total Problems on the Child Behavioral Checklist and a reduction of parent-child relationship stress manifested in the Child Domain, Parent Domain and Total Stress Score of the Parenting Stress Index. Data from a total of the four assessment points; the baseline, pretest, second assessment, and third assessment, was gathered for use in the analysis. A total of 16 children were recruited from the Japanese School of Dallas for participation in this study. However, some children did not complete the entire set of 8 play therapy sessions, and as a consequence, neither were all assessments completed by their parents. Therefore, data from 10 children, age ranging from 4 to 9, were utilized for the statistical analysis. The results of the analysis did not reveal any statistical significance. However, large and medium effect sizes were obtained on all the six aforementioned subscales during the treatment period. Individual analysis provided further information on possible environmental, developmental, and cultural factors that are considered influential issues on the change of individual scores.

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