The present study aimed to expand on previous research that explains when affect can influence subsequent judgments in an incongruent way. It also investigated a context where a negative emotion may have been maintained in order to achieve a subsequent goal. Participants in a guilt, shame, and control condition visualized past events. Those in the guilt and shame condition wrote about a time when they committed a moral transgression and were instructed to write an apology letter to a person they hurt. They then rated themselves on a number of interpersonal traits as a way to measure self-enhancement. I hypothesized that those in the guilt condition would self-enhance on interpersonal traits as a result of feeling guilt, which is a repair-focused emotion that has been shown to benefit interpersonal relationships. I also hypothesized that participants in the guilt condition would express a desire to maintain their feelings of guilt as a strategy to help them write an apology letter. The present findings do not support my hypotheses.

Epidemiological data suggest that alcohol use and related problems have increased among college women. The current study examined psychosocial predictors of risk drinking in a sample of college women (N=360), whether race moderated this relationship. Potential predictors included: daily smoker; premenstrual syndrome (PMS) symptom severity; age at first alcohol use, negative affect, parental history of alcohol problems and minority status. Analyses found that somatic PMS symptom severity score, age of first alcohol use, daily smoking, age of first alcohol use and non-minority status were related. Findings suggest that minority group membership was associated with low risk drinking, while somatic PMS severity scores were associated with high-risk alcohol use among White women. While further research is needed, current study findings suggest that screening college women for somatic symptoms of PMS and alcohol use may identify women at greater risk of developing alcohol use disorders.

The rapid spread of interest and experimental work in early experience has led to confused and contradictory claims. This thesis reviews the literature to assess these claims and investigates certain hypotheses. Experiments were designed to test (1) the effects of neonatal stimulation, (2) the effects of pre v post-weaning environments, and (3) the effects of handling in the golden hamster. This experimental animal was used to determine cross-species applicability of infantile stimulation theory. Experimental work consisted of submitting litters to early "burrow" or laboratory environments preweaning, and to laboratory or free-enriched environments post weaning. Other litters were subjected to various handling schedules - days 1-21, days 5-21 and "non-handled" controls in order to understand the contradictory results reported. Dependent variables included, physiologically, growth observation, brain and adrenal weight analysis, and plasma cortisol assay; and, behaviourally, open-field behaviour, response to novel objects and discrimination learning ability: all variables typically used in this field. The data were subjected to analysis of variance. Results show early stimulation in the golden hamster to have none of the "beneficial" effects found in the rat; rather it leads to increased emotionality, neophobia, impaired learning and poor physical development. These effects cannot solely be attributed to impaired hypothalamic maturation nor alteration in maternal care, as demonstrated by the handling conditions. Both early "burrow" environments and later free-enriched experience effect clear adaptation in the subjects with decreased emotionality, faster reactivity and good learning ability; the early environment affected physiological changes within the animal, whilst the enrichment produced its effect via experiential factors. Wider usage of species, taking into account their known natural history, and a more ethological experimental approach appears necessary to gain a true understanding of mediators and their consequences in this field. No extrapolation to higher organisms is valid at this stage.

The long and short term effects of brief handling of laboratory rats between birth and weaning have so far been shown to be mainly physiological in nature. Recent evidence indicates, however, that investigatory behaviour in adult animals may also be affected. The area of exploratory behaviour is receiving increasing attention, but there have been comparatively few studies relating this to early experience. Following a brief review of each topic, a series of studies is therefore reported in which the behaviour of handled and non-handled rats is compared in a variety of experimental situations. These range from situations giving considerable opportunity for locomotor investigation to others in which responses to specific aspects of the environment can be observed. In addition, the behaviour of males and females is compared and responses to each situation recorded over a number of trials. Results from these experiments indicate that a variety of tests can distinguish behaviourally between handled and non-handled animals, but that the locomotor measures were least satisfactory in this respect and also revealed fewer interactions between the variables of Handling, Sex and Trials, although females had higher locomotor scores than males. However, handledanimals tended to approach novel objects more rapidly and to spend more time investigating them than did non-handled; they also scored higher on tests of home cage emergence. Statistical interactions in these situations were frequently found, indicating the complexity of the effects of early handling. In addition, differences between the groups tended to persist over repeated trials. It is concluded that early handling is capable of producing effects upon subsequent investigatory behaviour, either in addition to or in place of the lower-level processes of emotionality and locomotor activity.

This study examined the relationship among social workers who were engaged in traditional social work practice and non-traditional social work practice. One hundred and forty two (142) survey participants were selected for the study utilizing non­ probability convenience sampling. The survey participants were composed of members of the Georgia Chapter of National Association of Social Workers who were either currently working or retired from the field of social work. The survey questionnaire was developed for the purpose of exclusive use of this study and employed the four point Likert Scale. The findings of the study revealed that regardless of the practice settings social workers showed little distinction in their adherence to social work mission, values, foundational knowledge and use of social work skill sets. The findings also indicated that social workers were accepting (85.8%) of non-traditional social work settings despite 65.7% of participants identifying themselves as traditional social workers in the study

The major focus of my dissertation will be the use of benchmarking and best practices as a guide for program and curriculum development in social work. The case study method of research, with an emphasis on the development of the Addiction Studies Program at the University of Arkansas at Pine Bluff, provided the focal point for this research. A critical part of this problem; Program development is an ongoing necessity in social work. In order to meet the ever changing needs of our society, effective programs need to be developed. Yet, social workers often do not have the expertise or time to research even the nuts and bolts of each program they wish to develop. Hence, a method is needed to help them develop reliable and effective programs without requiring them to undergo extensive research and experimentation to determine the most effective programs to implement. One method to guide development of new programs is benchmarking which can be briefly defined as a continuous learning process that can lead to a discovery of best practices, which can be used to improve quality within an organization (Hafner, 2004; Kristensen, 2003). It was hypothesized that benchmarking best practices can result in effective social work program development and implementation

The objective of this study was to establish the presence of a relationship between stress factors and the incidence of child abuse. The study was secondary analysis of descriptive statistics provided by the Georgia Department of Human Resources and the u.s. Department of Commerce. The sample consisted of seven-hundred, fifty identified Black perpetrators of child abuse and it was drawn from Fulton and DeKalb counties, State of Georgia. The null hypothesis presented in this study was that poverty was the best predictor of child abuse in Black families. The null hypothesis was rejected based on the fact that over 50% of the sample population was identified as being poor according to the national poverty line, which made poverty a negligible factor . The factors that are significant predictors of child abuse in Fulton and DeKalb counties, State of Georgia, in ranked order, are: l) marital status and 2) education. The study was designed to determine if there was a relationship between the incidence of child abuse in Black families and stress factors.

The purpose of this comparative/descriptive study was to examine the level of stress and degree of life satisfaction among women with HIV/AIDS and non HIV – positive women of African American descent. The dependent variables were measured through the use of two scales: Index of Clinical Stress (ICS) and the Satisfaction with Life Scale (SWLS). A sample of thirty (30) African American women agreed to participate in the study. Fifteen of the women were HIV-positive. Simple descriptive statistics and t-tests were used to analyze the data. The results indicate that although there was no statistical difference found in the level of stress between women with HIV/AIDS and non HIV-positive women, the non HIV-positive group showed a higher stress score than the HIV-positive group. There was, however, a statistical significant difference in the degree of life satisfaction between the two groups indicating that the HIV-positive women were more satisfied with their lives than the non HIV-positive women.

This quantitative cross-sectional research study examined the relationship between anxiety and sleeping habits among African American undergraduate college students living on campus at a private southeastern university in the U.S, The study also determined if there are statistically significant differences between undergraduate freshmen and sophomores as it pertains to levels of anxiety and sleeping habits. Participants consisted of fifty-five freshmen and sophomore males and females at a private southeastern university, who currently live on campus. Results of the Pearson's correlations determined that the there is a statistically significant correlation between levels of anxiety and sleeping habits among African American college students living on campus. Results of the independent-! test determined that there is no statistically significant difference between freshmen and sophomores in regard to levels of anxiety and sleeping habits.

This study examined the impact incarceration poses on the family's mental health status. The study was conducted using cross-sectional design. The sample, which was selected using convenience sampling method, included 30 participants who are over 18 years old and identified as having an incarcerated family member. The current study sought to determine two things: (1) if family members had higher levels of discontentment or mental distress due to their loved one's incarceration and (2) the impact of the loved one's sentence length on the family member's mental health status. Results indicated that levels of mental distress were higher in nieces and/or nephews than their levels of discontentment. Results also revealed the longer the sentence length, the higher the levels of discontentment and mental distress of their family member. Furthermore, limitations and implication will be presented.