The subject of this two year Master's thesis in Library and Information Science is the information practices of illiterate immigrants in everyday life. The purpose is to examine how immigrants seek, identify, understand and value information sources and information, and how the practices have changed with their arrival in Sweden. It furthermore focuses on the barriers that illiterate immigrants meet in accessing and understanding information. It moreover investigates the strategies they use to overcome them. For this purpose twelve qualitative research interviews were carried out, with illiterate immigrants as well as with service providers. The theoretical concepts of the essay is information practices, which means that the information process is within a context, and information poverty, that people in different context do not have adequate and equal access to information and information sources. Using McKenzie's model of information practices, the essay concludes that illiterate immigrants are active in their information process, especially when they interact with information. The most commonly used information practice is to seek out and ask for help in their social network. They use service providers to explain written information. In addition to actively seeking out people to help them, they use a variety of information practices. They use Internet on their smartphones. Some of them use a translator app to translate letters and communicate with others. They use Facebook and watch TV. They also use other visual sources. Their information practices function as strategies to cope with barriers connected to illiteracy. They utilize their social network that possesses writing and reading skills to help them read and explain. Other strategies are to use numbers and to learn things by heart. Although the illiterate immigrants use a variety of practices and strategies, they still do not get adequate and equal access to information and therefore can be called information poor. Their social network is a resource, but it can also be a limitation. They risk lacking information about intangible things. But they do not, opposed to Chatman's theory, keep their needs concealed. One participant differed from the others in this aspect, since he expressed an unwillingness to ask. He was also troubled by his illiteracy. He perceived himself as being more limited because of it. The interpretation of this is that he lives in a more literate world than the other participants. Therefore is he able to realize what he lacks. It is important to give illiterate immigrants adequate and equal information. This essay thus suggests that institutions seek to adapt their information services to the practices and strategies that the group acquires and uses.

In this study, an Implicit Association Test (IAT) was created to measure individuals attitudes towards seeking psychological help. The IAT was administered prior to the Beliefs About Psychological Services scale (BAPS; Ægisdóttir & Gerstein, 2009) to examine the relationship between the implicit and explicit measures of attitudes toward seeking psychological help. It was theorized that the implicit measure would be less affected by social desirability and unconscious attitudes than the explicit measure. Standardizing revealed that IAT scores reflected less belief in the expertness of psychology professionals than did BAPS scores. However, participants reported greater intent to seek psychological help on the BAPS compared to the IAT. BAPS scores reflected higher stigma towards psychological services compared to the IAT. Correlations between the implicit and explicit measure were moderate for stigma and perceived expertness of psychology professionals but low for intent to seek psychological help. / Department of Counseling Psychology and Guidance Services

The purpose of this study was to identify factors that may affect counseling psychology doctoral students' tendencies to seek professional psychological help for their personal problems. The study had the following specific goals: (a) to identify psychology students' reasons for seeking professional help, (b) to identify psychology students' reasons for hesitating to seek professional help, (c) to determine the incidence of personal distress among psychology students, (d) to determine the incidence of professional psychological help seeking, and (e) to begin to examine the impact that training environments have on the development of psychologists' attitudes toward seeking personal psychotherapy.The population of this study was doctoral students in APA-approved programs in Counseling Psychology during their internship phase of training. The sample consisted of 178 pre-doctoral interns. Students were mailed a survey developed by the researcher. The survey instrument consisted of questions about psychological problems experienced and the extent to which students had sought or would seek help for these problems. The survey also addressed students' perceptions about whether or not personal help seeking was advocated in their training programs and extent to which the topic of personal psychotherapy was included in their graduate curriculum.Data were analyzed using a combination of qualitative and quantitative procedures. Grounded theory analysis techniques, frequency distributions and multiple regression analyses were utilized.The study reveals that the decision to seek help is a complex one. While most students had sought or would be willing to seek help in the future, many would hesitate to do so. Conclusions drawn are that psychologists (in training) may prefer to turn to professional help as a last resort, and that there are barriers that prevent trainees from obtaining psychological services including finances, availability of therapists, and concerns about confidentiality. Trainees who have had positive experiences with therapy or who value it for personal or professional growth are more likely to seek help. Trainees who perceive that help seeking is normative among their peers are also more likely to seek help. The topic of "psychologists' seeking help for themselves" is not consistently addressed as a part of counseling psychologists' formal training. / Department of Counseling Psychology and Guidance Services

There is a significant gap between the numbers of college students who experience a diagnosable psychological problem and those who seek psychological treatment for these problems. One explanation for this gap may be that many college students may be unaware of free mental health services available at the university counseling center on campus. Thus, use of these resources is not a viable option. These concerns were addressed in the current study via a posttest-only experimental design by creating a video in line with the Theory of Planned Behavior (TPB; Ajzen, 1985; 1991) and assessing its effects on college students attitudes towards psychological help seeking (PHS), subjective norms associated with PHS, perceived behavioral control over PHS, and PHS intentions. Mixed support was found for the video’s impact on TPB variables in a PHS context. In addition, the utility of the TPB model for explaining PHS in college students was examined. Based on model fit statistics the TPB adequately explained PHS in college students, but only after modifications were made to the measurement model. / Department of Counseling Psychology and Guidance Services

The relationships among counseling expectations, attitudes toward seeking psychological help, psychological distress, and intention to seek counseling have only been examined in one previous study (Vogel, Wester, Wei, & Boysen, 2005). The primary purpose of the current study was to replicate and address the limitations of the Vogel et al. (2005) study. First, a mediation analysis of attitudes on the relationship of expectations and intention to seek therapy was performed. Next, path analyses were used to test a model of the relationship among counseling expectations, attitudes toward seeking psychological help, psychological distress, and the intent to seek counseling, for men and women separately. In the hypothesized model, two separate paths were predicted to impact intentions to seek psychological help. First, three distinct expectations about counseling (personal commitment, facilitative conditions, and counselor expertise) were expected to influence attitudes toward seeking psychological help, which in turn, predicted intention to seek counseling. Second, psychological distress was expected to relate to the intent to seek therapy. Because the hypothesized model for both genders did not fit the data, exploratory path analyses were completed. In the final path model for men, additional paths from the expectancy factors personal commitment and counselor expertise to intent to seek therapy resulted in a well-fitting model. For women, an additional path between psychological distress and attitudes improved the model significantly. Impact of these findings for research and practice are discussed. / Department of Counseling Psychology and Guidance Services

This study was designed to explore the relationship between attitudes toward help seeking, the ethnicity of the psychological help provider, and the level of cultural mistrust toward Jews. A sample of 102 Israeli Arab undergraduate students from Haifa, Israel, participated in this study. It was hypothesized that attitudes toward help seeking, as measured by Attitudes Toward Seeking Professional Psychological Help-Short Form (ATSPPH-S) and the Beliefs About Psychological Services (BAPS), will be related to the ethnicity of the psychological help provider and to the level of cultural mistrust toward Jews. A 2 x 2 between subjects multivariate analysis of variance (MANOVA) was employed. No significant relationship was found between attitudes toward help seeking, the ethnicity of the psychological help provider, and the level of cultural mistrust toward Jews. However, ANOVAs revealed that Freshmen had more favorable attitudes toward seeking professional psychological help as measured by ATSPPH-S than fourth and fifth year students and that sophomores had more favorable attitudes toward seeking psychological help as measured by BAPS than fourth and fifth year students. The results of the logistic regression indicated that Muslim and Christian participants are three times more likely to choose an Arab help provider than Druze participants. Further, the probability of choosing an Arab psychological help provider increased significantly as the participant’s level of cultural mistrust, in the domains of Politics and Law and Interpersonal Relations increased. On the other hand, the probability of choosing an Arab psychological help provider decreased significantly when participants had previous psychological help, and when their level of cultural mistrust increased in the domain of Business and Work. Results indicated strong significant correlations between attitudes toward help seeking and variables such as father’s highest level of education, previous psychological help, age, and year in school. Significant correlations between beliefs about psychological help and year in school and gender were found. The level of cultural mistrust correlated significantly with religion, ethnicity of psychological help provider, previous psychological help, age, and gender. Limitations and implications for future research and practice are presented. / Department of Counseling Psychology and Guidance Services

Thesis (M.A.)--Miami University, Dept. of Psychology, 2007. / Title from first page of PDF document. Includes bibliographical references (p. 33-40).

Thesis (Ph.D.)--Ohio University, August, 2009. / Title from PDF t.p. Includes bibliographical references.

Thesis (Ph. D.)--University of North Texas, Dec., 2009. / Title from title page display. Includes bibliographical references.

Thesis (M.S.W.)--University of Hong Kong, 1994. / Includes bibliographical references (leaves 104-111).