Help-seeking has been studied for over 20 years, but much is yet to be known
about what variables influence parental help-seeking. In the present studies, participants
were recruited from Texas, Mississippi, and Louisiana. Study 1, included 260 caregivers
recruited from local school districts and a church. Using confirmatory factor analysis,
results supported the hypothesized 3-factor structure of the Parental Attitudes Toward
Psychological Services Inventory (PATPSI) and internal consistency ranged from
moderate to high.
Study 2 conducted subsequent analyses on the data from Study 1. Correlation
analyses supported the relationships among parental attitudes, stigma, and help-seeking.
Secondly, parents with previous use of child mental health services reported more
positive attitudes and less stigma than parents with no previous use. Thirdly, no
significant gender differences were found, but there was a trend toward parents reporting
higher intentions for boys than girls. Additionally, African Americans reported less positive attitudes and more stigma than the other ethnic groups. Finally, moderation
analyses suggested that attitudes are more likely to influence help-seeking for European
Americans but not for African Americans, and stigma appeared to influence helpseeking
for Hispanic Americans but not for European Americans; no moderation effects
were found for child gender. Finally, analyses indicated that only stigma and attitudes
were significant independent predictors of help-seeking.
Study 3 was a sub-sample from Study 1 (N = 118) who completed additional
measures. The purpose was to replicate findings from Study 2 and examine test-retest
reliability of the PATPSI. Test-retest reliability for the PATPSI was low in this sample.
Overall, results were consistent with Study 2. Results indicated that parents with previous service use reported higher externalizing symptoms (not internalizing) than
those with no previous use. Inconsistent with Study 2, Asian Americans reported less
positive attitudes, and African Americans reported less stigma than European Americans
and Asian Americans. Additionally, stigma tolerance was found to have a stronger
influence on European Americans likelihood of future service use than for African
Americans. Furthermore, the interaction between problem type and gender was not a
significant predictor of likelihood of future use. Finally, only previous service use and
attitudes (not stigma) were independent predictors of likelihood of future use.
Implications for future research and practice are discussed.
| Identifer | oai:union.ndltd.org:tamu.edu/oai:repository.tamu.edu:1969.1/ETD-TAMU-2009-12-7298 |
| Date | 2009 December 1900 |
| Creators | Turner, Erlanger A. |
| Contributors | Heffer, Robert W., Jensen Doss, Amanda |
| Source Sets | Texas A and M University |
| Language | en_US |
| Detected Language | English |
| Type | Book, Thesis, Electronic Dissertation, text |
| Format | application/pdf |
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