Psychology Commons^™

Assessing A Punching Bag Feedback Performance Device, Neil Deochand

Dissertations

Physical exercise has been integrated into treatment efforts in reversing the number of overweight and obese individuals. Furthermore, exercise extends mortality, enhances general quality of life, and it is a protective health factor for preventing the progression some mental health disorders. Electronic athletic training equipment easily allows monitoring of real-time physical activity, and enables tracking of progress made toward individualized performance goals. There are limitations to only using visual feedback (e.g., visual depictions of heart rate, speed, distance traveled, or calories burned etc.) to track and improve exercise and athletic performance, especially for some sports, such as boxing. This issue …

The Lived Experience Of Individuals With Chronic Back And Neck Pain, Depression, And/Or Anxiety, Tara L. Palmeri

Dissertations

More than 1.5 billion people worldwide suffer from chronic pain (CP). People who experience chronic pain are 20 to 40% more likely to meet criteria for an anxiety disorder, and three to four times more likely to be clinically depressed than their pain-free counterparts. The relationship between CP and mental health has been studied quantitatively; however, few researchers have investigated co-morbid CP and mental health through a phenomenological lens. The subjective nature of the relationship is not comprehensively addressed within the literature.

This qualitative phenomenological study explored (a) how individuals with chronic back and/or neck pain (CBNP) experience, understand, and …

Understanding Factors Related To Negative Mental Health Outcomes Following Childhood Unintentional Injuries, Jennifer T. Kuhn

Dissertations

Unintentional injuries are the leading cause of death for children ages 0-19 and account for 9.2 million emergency room visits in the United States each year (Borse et al., 2008). Research shows that approximately 20% of children meet criteria for PTSD following an unintentional injury (Ostrowski et al., 2011). There are several factors that may contribute to the development of PTSD including caregivers’ posttraumatic stress symptoms after the injury event. Research has not explained the association between caregivers’ PTSD and children’s risk for PTSD symptoms, but it is possible that caregivers with PTSD may be modeling anxious behaviors to their …

Increasing Caregiver Supervision Of Young Children: Teaching Scanning, Predicting Behavior, And Modifying For Safety, Natalie Truba

Dissertations

Unintentional injuries account for a significant number of child deaths and visits to the emergency department. Although increased supervision is routinely shown to be an effective method of preventing unintentional childhood injuries, few interventions systemically teach caregivers behavioral skills to supervise their children appropriately. The present study utilized a multiple baseline design to pilot test an intervention designed to increase caregiver supervision and decrease unintentional childhood injuries by training caregivers how to provide appropriate levels of supervision for their young children (ages 6 to 36 months). Specifically, caregivers were taught in the present study include: (1) scanning the environment (for …

Piloting A Screening Tool For Eating And Eating-Related Behavior, Michael N. Reynolds

Dissertations

Obesity is a common medical condition associated with negative health and social outcomes. Obesity has a primary malleable behavioral cause, eating more calories than are metabolized. While metabolic rate is malleable with exercise, eating can more quickly add calories than exercising can subtract them. In the past, behavioral weight-loss treatment studies relied on multi-component package interventions that have shown reliable patterns of participant weight-loss during treatment and weight-regain in follow-up. Those findings could be conceptualized as an ABA withdrawal design, eating behavior returns to baseline after the prosthetic contingencies of the treatment study are withdrawn. We must develop ways to …

Family Communication Motivating Athletics Over Generations: A Mixed Method Expansion Of Self-Determination Theory, Elizabeth Hanson Smith

Dissertations

Mixed methods were utilized to test the communication within a model of self-determination (Deci & Ryan, 1985) in a multi-generational sports framework in order to argue for an update to self-determination theory (SDT) that includes a communication element. Fourteen qualitative research questions were posed to examine how communication functioned to move tennis players, golfers, and runners from the initial family influence in participating, to integrating family values to the extent that participants modeled athletic values to offspring and community members. Three hypotheses correlating the variables of self-efficacy, autonomy-controlling and autonomy-supportive family communication supported the argument that communication functioned to develop …

Coping, Hardiness, And Parental Stress In Parents Of Children Diagnosed With Cancer, Kathryn Lynch Bigalke

Dissertations

Previous research has demonstrated a significant increase in stress for parents with a child in active cancer treatment. As the number of children diagnosed with cancer continues to rise, there has been a call to identify factors that may contribute to positive outcomes in these families (e.g., Sloper, 2000; Streisand, Kazak, & Tercyak, 2003). Certain effective coping strategies, particularly related to more problem-focused forms of coping and hardiness, appear to be negatively related to parental stress. However, little is known about how these strategies may impact parental stress in families of children in active cancer treatment. The current study assessed …

Evaluating Sexual Assault Prevention Training Programs For College Women, Eliza S. Mcmanus

Dissertations

Sexual victimization is a frequent and concerning problem for college women. It is estimated that college women are three times more likely to experience sexual assault than women in the general population. Additionally, women with a history of unwanted sexual experiences are at greater risk for future sexual victimization than women without such histories. For these reasons, the examination of college-based sexual assault prevention programs is important given the high rates of unwanted sexual experiences and subsequent negative mental health consequences. Furthermore, the lack of effective skills-based sexual assault prevention programs on college campuses is an important issue to address. …

An Analysis Of The Impact Of Emotional Literacy Instruction On At-Risk Students, Shannon H. Garcia

Dissertations

This study examined the impact of social-emotional literacy instruction for at-risk adolescents ages 13 to 18 at the high school level. Of particular interest is the impact of social-emotional literacy instruction on at-risk youth Grades 9-12 in secondary high schools’ 8-week-long social-emotional literacy class through Project AWARE, particularly in the areas of suspension, expulsion, attendance, connectivity, attitude toward school, resiliency, and relational aggression rates; the data were analyzed using archival data and teacher interview. Project AWARE, the social-emotional literacy intervention examined in this study, educates and provides mentorship for at-risk students, while also providing a group educational component on relationships …

Increasing Positive Interactions Between Staff And Individuals With Disabilities: The Impact Of Training On Acquisition And Maintenance, Kimberly Anne Martell

Dissertations

The primary purpose of the present study was to evaluate the use of direct training to increase the rate of positive interactions between direct care staff (DCS) and individuals with developmental disabilities who reside in intermediate care facilities. Specifically, this study evaluated whether real-time prompts delivered via a one-way radio would result in immediate and sustained increases in rates of DCS positive interactions. Additionally, this study evaluated the link between increased rates of DCS positive interactions and concomitant decreases in residents’ challenging behaviors. A multiple baseline design across participants was implemented to assess DCS rates of positive and negative interactions. …

Does Psychopathy Predict Future Risky Sexual Behavior?, Jessica Jade Fulton

Dissertations

Risky sexual behavior (RSB), such as having sex with an unknown partner, is associated with a variety of negative consequences including sexually transmitted diseases and unplanned pregnancy. Previous research (e.g., Fulton, Marcus, & Payne, 2010) suggests that psychopathic personality traits as assessed by the Psychopathic Personality Inventory (Lilienfeld & Andrews, 1996) are associated with RSB. Self-Centered Impulsivity (SCI), which is characterized by impulsivity, irresponsibility, and reckless behavior, was positively associated with RSB among men and women. In contrast, Fearless Dominance (FD), which is characterized by fearlessness, manipulativeness, and social dominance, was positively associated with RSB among men but not women. …

The Influence Of A Personal Practice Of Meditation On One’S Therapeutic Practice, William W. Fitzgerald

Dissertations

The focus of this study was to examine counseling professionals’ personal experience with meditation and how it influences their clinical work, including the formation of a therapeutic relationship. Using phenomenological methods, data were gathered from 10 psychotherapists and then analyzed.

There has been a great deal of effort devoted to investigating what contributes to positive counseling outcome for clients. One constant in the therapeutic process is the person of the therapist. While the person of the therapist is frequently mentioned in the literature, much less attention has been given to the examination of personal development paths of the therapist. Little …

Short-Term Nicotine Abstinence And Decision Making, Gabriel D. Searcy

Dissertations

Research has shown that acute drug administration may affect impulsivity (i.e., choice for small, immediate rewards over large, delayed rewards) on laboratory delay-discounting tasks. Few studies have investigated how drug abstinence affects impulsivity. Investigating how drug abstinence affects impulsivity may be relevant to preventing relapse. Two previous studies have investigated the effects of short-term nicotine abstinence on impulsivity using delay-discounting tasks. The results were mixed, one study suggested that choices became more impulsive (i.e., delayed money was devalued) under nicotine deprivation. One goal of the present research was to further investigate how nicotine deprivation affects delay-discounting for money rewards. In …

Examination Of Anxiety And Substance Use Symptoms In Trauma Exposed Versus Environmentally Stressed College Students, Theresa M. Souza

Dissertations

Anxiety is a common problem among the college population, which rarely occurs in isolation. Oftentimes, an individual abuses substances in an attempt to eliminate the short term affect of these conditions. Post Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD), is the most persistent and severe type of anxiety disorder. It has been a long-standing belief within the psychological community that in order for PTSD to develop, the individual must first experience a traumatic event which meets certain criteria and must evidence a definable emotional response during the event. A recent study found PTSD in individuals who had not experienced the type of trauma …

Exploring The Experiences Of Living With A Controversial Illness In Patients With Fibromyalgia, Samantha L. Wheeler

Dissertations

Fibromyalgia is an illness of great controversy estimated to affect approximately 4% of the US population. There are no widely accepted etiological causes or clear physiological explanations of fibromyalgia. Only a few research studies have addressed the concept of illness uncertainty in patients with fibromyalgia. There are no current studies that examine how fibromyalgia patients experience, perceive, and understand their illness in terms of having a syndrome with an unknown etiology.

This qualitative study, using phenomenological methods, explored the concept of unknown etiology as one factor in illness uncertainty. Ten participants, diagnosed with fibromyalgia from 2-15 years were interviewed. The …

Effects Of Yellow Rectangular Rapid-Flashing Beacons And Novel Lane Markings On Motorists’ Yielding, Speed, And Headway At Multilane Uncontrolled Crosswalks, Jimmy Wayne Shurbutt

Dissertations

Several methods have been examined to increase motorists’ yielding to pedestrians and the distance at which they yield on multilane crosswalks at uncontrolled locations with relatively high average daily traffic (ADT). A series of 5 experiments were conducted to evaluate the efficacy of rectangular rapid-flashing beacons (RRFBs) as effective pedestrian crossing aides. The first experiment found that the RRFBs produced a significant increase in yielding behavior at all 26 sites located in 3 cities in the United States. Data collected over a 2-year follow-up period at 22 of these sites plus 14-month follow-up at an additional 4 sites documented the …

A Psychometric Investigation Of The Young Adult Social Behavior Scale (Yasb), Michelle Rene Augustin

Dissertations

Aggressive behavior is a serious public health concern that has resulted in several problems in contemporary society. Despite a considerable body of literature on human aggression, both popular and scientific, a focus on overt physical aggression has obscured other forms of aggression. As a result, considerably less is known about other, more subtle forms of aggression, such as relational aggression. Moreover, research on relational aggression, particularly among older adolescents and adults, has been hindered by the lack of psychometrically sound measures. Research in this area would be enhanced by the availability of such a measure, facilitating comparison of data across …

The Relationship And Effects Of Mindfulness On Comfort, Work Satisfaction, And Burnout Among Nurses Who Provide Direct Patient Care, Pamela Lichtenberg Heard

Dissertations

This study proposed to examine the problem of burnout in the nursing profession and ways to ameliorate burnout. Many burnout studies in the past focused on the problem and possible solutions that managers and/or hospital administrators could incorporate into their organization. The focus of this study is to evaluate ways that nurses can decrease their own propensity to burnout through the use of mindfulness. Therefore, this study examined burnout in a non-traditional manner. It is not assumed that others must assist nurses with decreasing their levels of burnout. Mindfulness is a means by which nurses can empower themselves to combat …

An Evaluation Of A Sexual Assault Education Program, Angela P. Hatcher

Dissertations

Sexually aggressive behavior, especially on college campuses, is an issue of major concern. Previous research has found that 54% of college women report being sexually victimized (Koss, Gidycz, & Wisniewski, 1987). Given the scope of this problem, effective prevention strategies are necessary. Sexual assault prevention programs have included those targeting a mixed gender audience as well as gender specific programs. Research examining the effectiveness of these programs, at both post-intervention and follow-up, have provided mixed results.

The goal of the current study was to examine the effectiveness of a video-based sexual assault education program in decreasing rape myths, increasing victim …

Posttraumatic Spiritual Growth: A Phenomenological Study Of Cancer Survivors, Ryan Myles Denney

Dissertations

A small but growing body of research has sought to investigate the specific role of religion and spirituality in posttraumatic growth. Recently investigations have begun to focus on spiritual growth following trauma, specifically that of cancer patients and survivors. The purpose of this qualitative study was to investigate how having cancer effects the spiritual growth of cancer survivors across a multidimensional conceptualization of spirituality (Hill 2005; Tsang & McCullough, 2003). The researcher investigated the lived experience of thirteen cancer survivors with posttraumatic spiritual growth using a phenomenological method of data analysis. Participants reported experiencing spiritual growth across the following domains …

The Comparative Efficacy Of Dosed, Enhanced Dosed, Prolonged Exposure, And Mindfulness In The Reduction Of Anxiety, Sophie Rubin

Dissertations

Exposure-based treatments have proven effective in treating a range of fears and phobias and can be accounted for by mechanisms described in behavioral theory. Enhanced dosed and dosed-only exposure are promising new behavioral approaches for treating fears and phobias. Fifty participants with speech anxiety were randomly assigned to a prolonged exposure condition (PE), a dosed-only exposure condition (DE), a positively enhanced dosed exposure condition (PDE), a negatively-supplemented dosed exposure condition (NDE), or a mindfulness enhanced dosed exposure condition (MDE). End of session results for all of the enhanced groups resulted in significantly lower subjective ratings of discomfort than the non-enhanced …

Acceptability Of Interventions To Staff In Long-Term Care Settings For Older Adults: Comparing Ratings And Hierarchical Selection, Jonathan C. Baker

Dissertations

Older adults and their caregivers generally prefer behavioral interventions over medications in treatment acceptability studies (Osterkamp, Mathews, Burgio, & Hardin, 1997). However, previous acceptability studies have primarily examined ratings, which did not force the responder to select between treatment options. Additionally, recent advances in behavioral treatment technologies (Carr & LeBlanc, 2003) and pharmacotherapy (Schneider, 1999) warrant revisiting treatment acceptability for older adults. The present investigation examined treatment acceptability of behavioral, pharmacological, and sensory interventions using a treatment acceptability rating scale, treatment selections, and direct report of treatments used in a six-month window. Fifty-six staff from nursing homes in the Mid-West …

The Role Of Expectations As Determinants Of Satisfaction In An Outpatient Care Setting, Jan Strohmeyer Brien

Dissertations

Understanding patient satisfaction is a central theme in today's healthcare landscape. The role of patient expectations and its impact on patient satisfaction has not been well understood in the context of a viable theoretical model. Thibault and Kelly's Theory of Interpersonal Relations and constructs of expectations in relationships are used to develop a framework for identifying the main factors driving both expectations and satisfaction. Measures are developed for comparison level of current outcomes compared to expectations (CL), comparison level of alternatives to care (CLalt), investment in selecting a physician, and prior satisfaction. Participants included a random sample of 500 primary …

Religious Orientation And Religious Coping In Adolescents With And Without A Chronic Illness, Jacqueline Beine Brown

Dissertations

Religion plays an important role in most people's lives and can greatly affect how individuals cope and interpret stressful situations. However, very little is known about how adolescents incorporate religion into their lives (e.g., is it central or peripheral to their lives, do they utilize religious coping). Furthermore, given the additional stressors experienced by adolescents who have a chronic illness, it is likely their religious orientations and religious coping strategies are different from their healthy peers. Thus, the present study was designed to examine the constructs in both typically developing and chronically ill adolescents. Additional constructs of hope, general coping, …

Unwanted Sexual Experiences: Preliminary Development And Validation Of A Behavioral Analog Measure For Risk Perception, Response Appraisal, And Response, Robin M. Carter-Visscher

Dissertations

Based on research findings indicating that sexual victimization is a prevalent problem on college campuses and has significant consequences for victims, researchers have examined the effectiveness of sexual assault education programs on reducing incidents of sexual victimization and have found programs to be unsuccessful. Other researchers have begun to investigate behavioral factors associated with risk for sexual victimization in order to better understand mechanisms of sexual victimization and revictimization before developing and implementing interventions. One hypothesis that has received increased attention in recent years is that women with a sexual victimization history may have deficient risk perception and effective responding …

Health Anxiety And Cognition: Chronic Awareness Of Health Concerns Or Situational Activation Of Latent Dysfunctional Assumptions About Illness?, Desmon Craig Mitchell

Dissertations

Rationale: This study investigated if health anxious individuals have chronically aroused illness-related concerns or if these concerns remain latent, only to be activated when first primed by illness-related stimuli. To test these alternatives this study examined whether participants, with varying levels of health anxiety, differed as to their (a) performance on an emotional Stroop task that included health-related words, (b) memory tasks (free recall and recognition tasks), and (c) the participants' dream content, after either being exposed, or not exposed, to an illness-related trigger. Hypotheses: If illness concerns are chronically activated in health anxious individuals, then participants will perform worse …

Mindfulness In Childbirth: An Investigation Of The Effects Of Mindfulness Training On Maternal Satisfaction With Childbirth And Obstetric Outcomes, Brenda L. Bratton

Dissertations

This study investigated the effects of mindfulness training on obstetric outcomes and maternal satisfaction with childbirth. We were interested in whether mindfulness training was more effective than a control group receiving psychoeducation on stress reduction. The goal of the intervention group was to increase participants' moment-to-moment awareness of thoughts, feelings, and body sensations during childbirth so that they would respond to these experiences rather than react to them in an automatic manner. These strategies were hypothesized to help a laboring woman minimize fear or anxiety associated with pain and complications and be more adaptive to whatever circumstances arose. Repeated measures …

Future Psychologists' Perceptions Of Managed Care, Michele Renae Boyer Blood

Dissertations

This study was designed to examine future psychologists' perceptions of managed care, as well as their managed care related training and work experience. Data for this project were gathered electronically via a specially designed website. Participants were 119 future psychologists completing predoctoral internships in university counseling centers (n = 61) and hospitals (n = 58). Variables examined included predoctoral interns' attitudes towards managed care and their perceptions of the importance of knowledge in three critical domains relevant to service provision in the contemporary marketplace (i.e., general reimbursement, risk management, misdiagnosis). One measure, the Demographic and Practice Information Form (DAPIF), was …

An Investigation Of Relationship Characteristics, Exercise And Physical Activity, Couple And Life Satisfaction, Mark W. St. Martin

Dissertations

Exercise has been shown to be positively related to many different variables including sexual satisfaction, mental health, and physical health. These variables, in turn, have been linked to increased life satisfaction and couple satisfaction. The primary purpose of this study was to examine the relationships between exercise and couple satisfaction as well as exercise and life satisfaction. A secondary purpose was to replicate previous findings on the relationships between communication, love, sexual satisfaction, self-esteem, and physical health and couple satisfaction.

A total of 229 undergraduate and graduate students from a large Midwestern university in the United States participated in this …

The Effects Of Acute Nicotine Abstinence On Vigilance And Verbal Memory In Non-Diagnosed Smokers, David W. Ayer

Dissertations

Research has shown a differential prevalence of smoking in the schizophrenic population compared to other psychiatric and non-diagnosed populations. The three most commonly investigated reasons for this differential prevalence in schizophrenics are: the self-medication hypothesis, side effects hypothesis, and sociological hypothesis. The self-medication hypothesis which proposes that schizophrenics smoke at a higher rate to ameliorate cognitive deficits is the most substantiated by the research. Of current interest is the possible role of nicotine in improving performance on vigilance and verbal memory, the two areas shown to be most related to impaired social functioning in schizophrenics. It is difficult to make …