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Umaine Office For Diversity And Inclusion_A Time For You! Email, University Of Maine Office For Diversity And Inclusion

Social Justice: Diversity, Equity, & Inclusion

Email from the UMaine Office for Diversity and Inclusion with various details of the Office's work and wrapping up the Fall 2021 Semester.

Perceived & Personal Mental Health Stigma, Katie White, River Jarman, Brenden Jones, Gabrielle Archambault

Fall Student Research Symposium 2021

An exploration of stigmatizing beliefs held by college students, as well as the students' experiences with stigma and discrimination in relation to their own reported mental health problems. The Day's Mental Illness Stigma Scale and the Mental Health Stigma Scale were used to measure varying aspects of stigmatizing beliefs including treatability, relationship disruption, hygiene, anxiety, visibility, recovery, professional efficacy, discrimination, disclosure, and positive outcomes.

Gender & Social Support In Young Adults, Sierra Howe, Amy Jensen, Kaitlin Welsh, Jalena Warner

Fall Student Research Symposium 2021

The effect of social support on mental health outcomes is important in understanding how best to address mental health issues in the general population. Young adulthood is a time of extreme stress and change which can often be a trigger for mental illness to occur. Previous research indicates gender as a major determinant for mental health outcomes, especially when exploring help-seeking behaviors. While women are more likely to seek support for mental illness, men are much more likely to self-medicate rather than seek help. Trans and gender diverse individuals were much less likely to receive social support for mental illness, …

Coping Strategies In Utah State Students With Depression, Mekenzie Orton, Emma Wirtz, Lauren Ambuehl

Fall Student Research Symposium 2021

In this study, a Sociology student research group looked at previous and ongoing coping strategies of college students at Utah State University. Previous research indicates that college students suffer from depression and use copious coping strategies to deal with this debilitating mental illness. They may be positive or negative in nature. Previous research is dated, and new material should be conducted to continue the education on coping strategies students use to deal with depression. This paper will outline the steps taken, research done, and an overall analysis of data of Utah State University students and their coping strategies for depression. …

Peer-Led Building Resilience And Enhancing Social-Emotional Skills Program, Danielle K. Enrico

Department of Occupational Therapy Entry-Level Capstone Projects

The purpose of the Capstone experience was to develop and implement a five-week peer-led building resilience and social-emotional skills training program at a public high school. This program addressed high school students' knowledge, skills, and attitudes regarding resources, social-emotional skills, and resilience. A questionnaire was administered pre and post-program to measure effectiveness. The results indicated an increase in scores, demonstrating a clearer understanding in all three areas.

Gender Identity And Mental Health Among Undergraduate Students In The United States, Mckenzie Mcnamara

All Theses

This study explores the relationship between gender identity, challenges experienced by students, psychological distress, and suicide behavior for undergraduate students in the United States of America. The quantitative analysis utilizing the American College Health Association’s National College Health Assessment from Fall 2019, Spring 2020 and Fall 2020. The sample consisted of 78,296 undergraduate participants of which 65.9% identified as female, 30.5% identified as male, and 3.6% identified as non-binary students. The statistical analysis consisted of a multiple regression model controlling for variables of institution type. The major finding of this study is that non-binary undergraduate students had greater psychological distress …

Right Against Self-Incrimination: Revealing The Mental Health History Of Justice-Involved Youth, Sesha Kethineni, Colette B. Harris

Contemporary Issues in Juvenile Justice

In the last two decades, the juvenile justice system has focused on the early identification of youth mental health to provide timely assessment and needed treatment. However, there are potential risks in divulging youth mental health status because the information is often made available to juvenile courts and probation departments. Many state statutes allow such information to be used in the admission of guilt, adjudication, and dispositional phases. The study reviewed state and federal statutes related to protections against self-incrimination of youth at eight different stages of the juvenile justice system. A systematic content analysis of secondary sources and legislative …

Ethnic Disparities In Mental Health Among Asian Americans: Evidence From A National Sample, Fang Gong, Jun Xu

Journal of Health Disparities Research and Practice

Asian Americans have become the fastest-growing racial group in the United States, yet their health profiles are still under-explored. In particular, the existing research on Asian American mental health has not devoted adequate attention to the enormous ethnic heterogeneity of the group. Grounded upon theoretical frameworks of the tri-racial system and a contextual approach, we examined ethnic disparities in Asian American mental health using data from the National Latino and Asian American Study (NLAAS). We focused on ethnic membership, immigration-related factors, socioeconomic status, and social support as the main correlates of multiple outcomes, including self-rated mental health, psychological distress, and …

Equine Assisted Therapy For Veterans, Nicole M. Krum

IPS/BAS 495 Undergraduate Capstone Projects

Equine-assisted activities and therapy have been proven to be highly effective in assisting veterans with mental health conditions. This project aimed to provide information and resources about these services to Treasure Valley veterans. In order to do this, an in-person open-house was hosted, to connect veterans to equine therapy. By completing this project, it can be asserted that there is a general lack of accessible and affordable services.

National Suicide Prevention Month: Acknowledging The Mental Health Crisis In Maine, Emma Vannorsdall

Social Justice: Diversity, Equity, & Inclusion

Each year, approximately 47,500 people die by suicide in the United States. It is the tenth leading cause of death in the U.S. and the second leading cause for those aged 10-34. Maine falls 20% above the national average and has the highest suicide rate in New England. On average, approximately 227 people in Maine die by suicide each year. These statistics alone are concerning, but the implications of the COVID-19 pandemic threaten to further exacerbate the mental health crisis in our state.

"It's Like Being Pulled In Two Directions": Experiences Of Transgender Latter-Day Saints, Morgan Monet

Theses and Dissertations

This study qualitatively examined the experiences of transgender individuals who also identify as active members of the Church of Jesus Christ of Latter-day Saints (N=10). Researchers took an interpretive phenomenological approach to elicit factors which allow trans Mormon folks to hold their apparently conflicting religious and gender identities simultaneously (and the consequences of doing so). Overall, we aimed to answer the broad question, “what is it like to be transgender and Mormon?” Following a process of semi-structured interviews, transcription, and coding, the broad categories which seemed to connect many elements of the trans/Mormon experience were 1) a sense of being …

Throwing Pebbles While Waiting: An Autoethnographic Exploration Of Mental Health And Colonialism, Kelly Limes Taylor, Rita Sørly, Bengt Karlsson

The Qualitative Report

In this article, three scholars jointly investigate questions of Western colonization and mental health. While their areas of interest and experience vary, the authors discuss oppression as a common thread connecting their ideas about mental health and its medicalization. In line with Toyosaki et al. (2009), the researchers did a community autoethnography, performing written dialogue as a dynamic research method. Using a sequential model, Kelly Limes Taylor wrote about her experience, passed it on to Rita Sørly and Bengt Karlsson. Karlsson added his story to the previous writing, and he passed it on to Sørly for further addition of stories. …

Campus Mental Health Service Use Among Female Survivors Of Sexual Violence: An Interpretative Phenomenological Analysis, Hannah Coffman

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Description: Despite the increase in resources to address the alarming rates of collegiate sexual violence (SV), survivors consistently do not disclose or seek mental health treatment from campus supports (Halstead et al., 2017). The purpose of this study was to understand the lived experiences of women who survived SV during college.

Method: Seven women who experienced SV during college completed a series of two semi-structured interviews using a HIPAA-compliant, web-conferencing software (Seidman, 2013). The interviews were transcribed verbatim and analyzed using an interpretative phenomenological analysis (IPA) framework (IPA; Smith, 2004; Smith et al., 2009). A six-step data analysis procedure identified …

Design For Living

DePaul Magazine

With health care increasingly moving online, DePaul has emerged as a leader in cutting-edge digital technology leveraged for the greater good. From harnessing design as a vehicle for social change to creating an app to help close racial inequity gaps in care, 21st-century advances with an eye toward Vincentian values are unfolding every day at DePaul thanks to the inventiveness and ingenuity of its faculty, staff and students.

The Survey Measurement Of Sexual Orientation: Configurations Of Sexual Identity And Attraction And Associations With Mental Health, Dana Garbarski

Sociology: Faculty Publications and Other Works

Purpose:

This study aimed to examine how configurations of sexual identity and attraction are associated with mental health outcomes.

Methods:

Data came from the 2015, 2016, and 2017 waves of the National Survey on Drug Use and Health, one of the few nationally representative surveys to ask about sexual attraction. Sexual identity and attraction were combined into groups that are coincident (heterosexual-opposite gender attraction, gay/lesbian-same gender attraction, or bisexual-any multiple gender attraction) or branched (heterosexual-any same gender attraction, gay/lesbian-any opposite gender attraction, bisexual-only same or opposite gender attraction). The association between these configurations and various measures of mental health and …

Assessing The Health Effects Of Police Violence On Black Communities In America: A Literature Review, Darian Hannig

Intuition: The BYU Undergraduate Journal of Psychology

Police-related mortality rates are disproportionately higher among Black populations than among any other racial group in the United States. While official data on non-fatal encounters with police is lacking, current evidence suggests these encounters are more common among Black individuals and often result in signs of immediate psychological and physical damage, as well as triggering long-lasting physiological stress responses and psychological trauma among these individuals and their communities. The aim of this literature review is to assess if police interactions are associated with poor mental and physical health outcomes among Black Americans. Using scholarly electronic databases, 13 articles were analyzed …

Community Art For Rebuilding College Communities Following The Covid-19 Pandemic: A Literature Review, Amber Haney

Expressive Therapies Capstone Theses

This paper is an examination of arts-based community engagement projects as a way to creatively engage, support, and endorse healing in college communities. This paper was written with consideration for potential long-term impacts on college students, individually and collectively, as a result of the COVID-19 pandemic. Throughout this paper, college student mental health trends in the United States are addressed and existing community engagement projects that center around community, healing, and resilience are examined. This paper argues that art therapy practices that are meant to advance societal healing can occur outside of the traditional, clinical individual or group therapy session …

The Effects Of Racial Discrimination On Black, Indigenous, And People Of Color (Bipoc) Students’ Mental Health, Alana M. Hall Ms.

Honors College Theses

Racial discrimination and its relationship with mental health outcomes in BIPOC students, specifically psychological distress, the focus of this study. This was deemed important because these students may have responded by using certain coping strategies that could be harmful to their mental health and overall health, in the long term. It is already known that racism has been a problem in the world, but has morphed over the years to that of subtle, and often more harmful, forms of racism (e.g. microaggressions). The goal of this study was to examine the discriminatory experiences of BIPOC students at a predominantly white …

The Anatomy Of Inceldom: An Analysis Of Incels Through The Lens Of Gender, Jacob Scheuerman

Themis: Research Journal of Justice Studies and Forensic Science

This literature review examines the phenomena of Inceldom through the prism of hegemonic masculinity, concluding that the identity of an Incel derives from toxic masculine norms and attitudes from fringe online social movements. Incels are contradictory in that they both conform to and reject hegemonic masculinity. They conform in their aspiration to acquire goals that align with what is typically thought of as masculine—such as assertiveness or sexual dominance—while believing they are unable to do so because of their inadequacies. The dissociation between conformity and rejection leads them to adopt a defeatist worldview by not living up to the masculine …

Mental Health Support And Advocacy For Undergraduate Bgsu Students In Wood County, Oh, Robert Lince

Honors Projects

In the midst of the COVID-19 pandemic, mental health has been a topic receiving significant focus on college campuses across the United States. Thus, it is important for all undergraduate college students to understand the available organizations and facilities that will provide the most quality and effective mental health care. With BGSU undergraduates already facing academic and social pressures, in addition to the financial and other hardships brought on by the pandemic, it is imperative that students are aware of resources both on campus and in the local community so that their needs can be met appropriately and in a …

Cultural Bereavement And Resilience In Refugee Resettlement: A Photovoice Study With Yazidi Women In The Midwest United States, Julie A. Tippens, Kaitlin Roselius, Irene Padasas, Gulie Khalaf, Kara Kohel, Elizabeth Mollard, Izdihar (Vianne) Sheikh

Department of Child, Youth, and Family Studies: Faculty Publications

This study explored how ethnic Yazidi refugee women overcome adversity to promote psychosocial health and well-being within the context of U.S. resettlement. Nine Yazidi women participated in two small photovoice groups, each group lasting eight sessions (16 sessions total). Women discussed premigration and resettlement challenges, cultural strengths and resources, and strategies to overcome adversity. Yazidi women identified trauma and perceived loss of culture as primary stressors. Participants’ resilience processes included using naan (as sustenance and symbol) to survive and thrive as well as by preserving an ethnoreligious identity. Findings suggest that women’s health priorities and resilience-promoting strategies center on fostering …

The State Of The Asylum: Assessing Institutional Legitimacy Through An Examination Of Its Clientele, Peter Dranow

Honors Theses

While mental asylums have long been a point of intrigue and folklore in Western culture, they have also been the subject of bitter debate in academic and medical circles. Brought to the forefront of sociology with Erving Goffman’s benchmark work, Asylums; Essays on the Social Situation of Mental Patients and Other Inmates (1961), the question of whether mental institutions in America were–and are–fundamentally curative or custodial institutions has yielded a dualistic interpretation of the past, present, and future. Whereas the psychiatrist and liberal historian might characterize America’s failed asylums as externalities of progress and, in some cases, poor policy, social …

Criminal Mental Health, Tabitha Oliver

Senior Honors Theses

The purpose of this thesis is to assess and address the prevalence of mental health issues among incarcerated individuals in America. There are multiple internal and external contributing factors to the disproportionately high numbers of mentally ill inmates. Comparing the United States prison system with other countries such as Norway allows for possible paths to improving the mental health crisis that we are currently experiencing. This thesis looks at the principles and practices used in Norway's prisons as well as how they affect inmate's mental health. By comparing Norway's prison policies and design, this thesis will suggest changes in staff …

"I Thought That We Could Nurture The Nature Out Of Our Son": Making Meaning Of Parenting In The Narratives Of Parents Of Children In Residential Treatment, Jared V. Worwood

Theses and Dissertations

This study implements relational dialectics theory to explore the meaning of parenting from the perspective of parents who had enrolled a child in a residential treatment program. Contrapuntal analysis of six interviews revealed two discourses competing to make meaning of parenting. The Discourse of Demanding Parenting Ideals (DDPI) consisted of two themes: relentless sacrifice and complete responsibility, whereas themes of boundary-setting and acceptance compose the Discourse of Realistic Best Effort (DRBE). Discursive interplay between these discourses occurred in the forms of diachronic separation, synchronic interplay, and discursive transformation to make meaning of parenting and hold theoretical and practical implications.

Adverse Childhood Experiences, Psychological Distress, And Fathering Behaviors, Kevin Shafer, Scott D. Easton

Faculty Publications

Objective

This study examines the relationship between adverse childhood experiences (ACEs), internalized and externalized psychological distress, and six measures of parenting behavior among fathers in the United States.

Background

Prior research on ACEs and parenting has focused almost exclusively on mothers, specific types of childhood adversity, and the intergenerational transmission of abuse, neglect, and other traumatic experiences. This study extends the literature by considering ACEs in fathers, using a multidimensional measure of ACEs, and multiple measures of positive and negative fathering behavior.

Method

Using the ecological model of father involvement, this study is based on a national sample of more …

Unmet Needs Are Associated With Increased Stress And Poor Physical And Mental Health In Early Adulthood, Colleen Heflin, Katie Green, Ying Huang, Asiya Validova

Population Health Research Brief Series

Material hardship, such as not being able to pay bills, negatively affects both physical and mental health. This research brief examines how different types of material hardship (difficulty paying for food, bills, and health care) are associated with self-rated health, depression, sleep problems, and suicidal thoughts among U.S. young adults (ages 24-32).

Police Killings Of Unarmed Black Americans: A Reassessment Of Community Mental Health Spillover Effects, Justin Nix, M. James Lozada

Criminology and Criminal Justice Faculty Publications

We reevaluate the claim from Bor et al. (2018) that “police killings of unarmed black Americans have effects on mental health among black American adults in the general population” (p. 302). The Mapping Police Violence data used by the authors includes 91 incidents involving black decedents who were either (1) not killed by police officers in the line of duty or (2) armed when killed. These incidents should have been removed or recoded prior to analysis. Correctly recoding these incidents decreased in magnitude all of the reported coefficients, and, more importantly, eliminated the reported statistically significant effect of exposure to …

Impact Of The Covid-19 Shutdown On Mental Health In Appalachia By Working Status, Erin N. Haynes, Timothy J. Hilbert, Susan C. Westneat, Kate Leger, Katie Keynton, Heather M. Bush

Journal of Appalachian Health

Introduction: To slow the spread of COVID-19 in the United States, businesses shutdown in Spring 2020. Research has indicated the impact on frontline workers, yet little is known about the impact on those who were not working outside the home or switched to working remotely.

Purpose: The purpose of this report is to identify the financial and healthcare issues and mental health impact of the COVID-19 shutdown on Appalachians by worker categories.

Methods: An online survey was administered from May 8 – June 6, 2020 to a convenience sample of previous research participants and shared through social …

Correlates Of Depression Among Black Girls Exposed To Violence, Dexter R. Voisin

Faculty Scholarship

Depression rates for youth remanded to juvenile detention is double that of the general population and Black girls are especially vulnerable. A dearth of literature analyzes the factors that are correlated with depression among system-involved Black girls, ages 12–17 years old. We utilized personal agency to examine the relationship between risk factors (i.e., abuse history, and fear of condom negotiation) and protective factors (i.e., condom self-efficacy, and perceived social support) that might correlate with depression among Black girls exposed to violence. Findings indicate that fear of condom negotiation, abuse history and low condom self-efficacy are correlated with depressive symptomology while …

Student Teachers With Mental Health Conditions Share Barriers To Success: A Case Study, Michael Houdyshell, Diane Kratt, Jackie Greene

The Qualitative Report

Universities are trying to address student mental health needs through counseling centers and other outreach initiatives. However, do individual colleges know how to address the mental health concerns of their own students? Three faculty members in the College of Education at a university located in the southern United States posed two questions to find out what it is like for student teachers to live with a mental health condition, and what would support academic performance in the College. Seventeen undergraduate students who self-reported as having a mental health condition and were completing their senior year as student teachers volunteered to …