Digital Commons Network^™

Resilency And Fatherless Households, Joshua Ellis-Kennedy, Crystal Angelica Orellana

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

Fatherlessness is a complex and prevailing issue in society associated with many vulnerabilities and unfavorable outcomes. This study seeks to describe and identify the contributing factors to resilience among individuals who were raised in fatherless homes. Findings from this research would contribute to the body of knowledge that focuses on promoting resiliency and would specifically provide insight on contributing factors to resiliency that can help mitigate the negative consequences of fatherless homes.

Overtime Worked And Its Effect On Burnout, Illness, And Health Outcomes, Haoqiu Zhang

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

Professional employees at work deal with stressors such as extensive workload and coursework, prolonged work and class schedules, overtime, and performance concerns from their supervisors and managers. The length of time working, the pressure one has in one's work life, and the amount of overtime can be a predictor of burnout (Brown & Pranger, 1992), and employees being burnt out can result in numerous issues in people’s health. Working overtime, as a stressor, is very common in the workplace and has continuously increased among employees (Hetrick, 2000). The primary purpose of this study was to explore the effect of overtime …

Asian Discrimination: In The Field Of Social Work, Sunghay Cho

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

This research explored how anti-Asian rhetoric influences the work experiences and lives of Asian American (A.A.) social workers. This is a qualitive, exploratory study that used a non-probability, convenience sample, and snowball technique for sampling, and interviews with participants via Zoom who identified as Asian American and who had completed their master’s degree in social work. It was found that different types of anti-Asian rhetoric influence Asian American social workers’ own expectations of themselves, their mindset, creates fear, and even sets limitations. It was also found that immigration status/generation (first/second generation) has an influence on their experiences as well. This …

The Perceived Quality Of Social Work Education And Internship In Preparation For Career, Precilla Martinez, Jennifer Ruvalcaba

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

This study aims to analyze whether California State University of San Bernardino students in the two social work programs, the Title IV-E program and the generalist social work program, perceive a difference in social work career preparation in education and internship. The literature on social work education and training suggests that preparation for career is an important component for students of any specialization.

This quantitative study used a self-administered, anonymous survey created by the researchers to assess social work students’ perceptions of their career preparation. Participants were recruited from the California State University, San Bernardino School of Social Work from …

Exploring The Effects Of Substance Use Disorder Alcohol Use Disorder Treatment Service Barriers, Erica Vanderhyde

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

This project will focus on Substance Use Disorder/Alcohol Use Disorder (SUD/AUD) treatment service barriers in the rural desert communities of Yucca Valley, Joshua Tree, and Twentynine Palms, CA.

This project follows the concepts of the positivist paradigm. Because of this, the author primarily collected quantitative information. The author gathered data through snowball and convenience sampling utilizing local personal social connections and posting her questionnaire on Facebook. Study participants entered their answers into a self-administered questionnaire on Qualtrics. After completing data collection utilizing Qualtrics, the author examined the frequency analysis of the demographic statistics and key variables by exporting the data …

Experiences Of Latina Student Mothers In The Transfer Pipeline: An Interpretive Phenomonological Analysis, Aurora Vilchis

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

Characteristics of who today’s college student is has drastically changed over the years with more students over age 25, may have dependents, employed full-time, attending school part time and likely a parent. These students are known as post-traditional students who make up 85% of undergraduates nationwide. The purpose of this phenomenological study was to understand the experiences of Latina students, who are mothers, and have successfully transferred from a community college designated as a Hispanic Serving Institution (HSI) to a four-year public higher education institution also designated as an HSI. Data was collected from eleven participants who shared their experiences …

Proficiency Of Social Workers In Teaching Mindfulness-Based Practices And Techniques, Vanessa Morales

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

This study explored the self-rated proficiency of social workers in teaching mindfulness-based practices as part of treatment. It paid special attention to what they feel is the benefit to incorporating mindfulness-based practices (MBPs) into treatment and as their own personal practice. Participant responses of what has helped to develop their perceived expertise are highlighted. The literature on mindfulness reveals that mindfulness-based interventions have been effective at decreasing psychological distress caused by mental illness. MBPs help individuals dealing with anxiety, depression, and post-traumatic stress disorder to gain a sense of control when it comes to their mental health.

The study employed …

Barriers Among Men Seeking Mental Health Services, Karen Barone

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

ABSTRACT

The purpose of the research study is to gather information regarding the opinions, ideas, thoughts, and attitudes of men regarding mental health and mental health seeking behaviors. Insight into these areas will be obtained in order to acquire sufficient information to further contribute to more positive outcomes for males in regard to mental health. Information gathered may contribute to more effective clinical work with men and engage men in healthier attitudes towards mental health.

The underutilization of services is disproportionately reflective of men not adequately being served, either by their own actions, or the actions of providers.

Significance of …

Social Worker Student’S Anxiety, And Alcohol Consumption During The Covid-19 Pandemic, David Adler

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

The COVID-19 pandemic has been extremely impactful on a vast majority of the population, either from losing a possible loved one, or the pandemonium that arose in its wake. The purpose of this study is to better understand how much of an impact the COVID-19 pandemic has had on social worker students’ mental health, specifically, how it has affected their levels of stress, anxiety, and levels of alcohol consumption. This study is significant because the pandemic has had a substantial impact on the mental health of so many individuals, and it is important to research just how large these effects …

Social Workers And Client Resistance Behaviors, Elizabeth Sandoval, Kelly Martinez

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

The study aimed at exploring the extent that social workers feel competent and confident to respond to client resistance behavior. A quantitative technique using a survey questionnaire, including a standardized scale adapted by the researchers, was used to gather information regarding social workers' level of preparedness to respond to client resistance behaviors. Data was collected using Qualtrics from 137 participants, and 116 were analyzed (21 contained incomplete data). Data was analyzed utilizing SPSS. The results of two Independent Samples T-tests indicated that there is a significant difference between social workers who have less than 6.47 years of experience and those …

The Impacts Of Exposure To Domestic Violence In Childhood That Leads To Experiencing Violence In Future Intimate Partner Relationships, Araceli Rodriguez, Ceirra L. Venzor

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

This qualitative study was designed to explore a person’s experiences of both exposure to domestic violence in childhood and domestic violence in their current relationships. Considering that domestic violence impacts the social wellbeing of an individual, it is important to understand the factors that contribute to a person’s decision to leave the relationship, especially the factors that made it difficult to leave and the services that were accessible to the person.

To explore the aforementioned factors, this study examined interviews of eight female survivors of domestic violence that were receiving services through a domestic violence agency. The student researchers utilized …

Barriers To Mental Health Supports And Resources Experienced By Online Graduate Social Work Students, Joseph B. Camacho

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

The focus of this qualitative exploratory study was to examine barriers online graduate social work (MSW) students encountered in obtaining mental health services. To obtain relevant data, the researcher interviewed online MSW students at a public university in southern California. This project employed bottom-up data analysis techniques by using open and axial coding to categorize and synthesize varied participant experiences. Relationships between axial codes were identified and analysis provided a window into the student experience for these online graduate social work students.

This study uncovered a phenomenon that this author calls the participants’ “student experience” as they pursue their online …

Barriers To The Use Of Palliative And Hospice Care Among The Latino Population, Diana Ramirez

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

Patients suffering from irreversible and terminal illnesses may benefit from the services provided by Palliative and Hospice Care to control any symptom burden and assist in navigating complex medical decisions. Many patients may express hesitation in accepting and enrolling to this service due to misconceptions. Language barriers may add an additional layer of complexity. This study explored the challenges Palliative Care providers encounter when introducing concept of hospice to Spanish-speaking patients their families for the first time. This study implemented qualitative research methods by using semi-structured one-on-one interviews. Ten members of an In-patient Palliative Care Team at a University Hospital …

Lessons Learned About Services Delivery To Victims Of Domestic Violence During Covid 19 Mandatory Physical Distancing Orders, Veronica Perez

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

The COVID-19 pandemic and resulting social distancing guidelines have dramatically limited or excluded in-person services to domestic violence (DV) victims. Service providers have shifted to providing services to DV victims through telehealth as part of the COVID-19 physical restriction orders. This shift in services from in-person to telehealth has impacted the DV victims accessing services and has impacted the service delivery by the service providers. This study aimed to understand the lessons learned about service delivery to victims of domestic violence during the COVID-19 mandatory physical distancing and stay-home orders. This qualitative study used interviews via Zoom to collect data. …

Which Generation Is Having Safe Sex? Millennial Or Gen-Z, Rachel Silver

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

ABSTRACT

This research study aims to examine the sex practices of Millennials vs. Gen Z's. There are many concerns and questions about the long-term effects of hook-up culture for modern youth. In the last few years, there has been a rise in STDs and a decrease in teenage pregnancy. This quantitative research intends to find out where are education gaps are and the most significant motivators for young people to use protection and contraceptives through a list of questions in a survey. The goal is to understand better the similarities and differences between Millenials and Gen-Z's safe sex education and …

Combating Domestic Violence: Understanding Military Ipv And The Available Military And Civilian Ipv Interventions, Taylor Coutts

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

Intimate relationships within the U.S. military community face domestic violence perpetration at rates three times higher than the civilian population. Currently, both military and civilian agencies work to combat this domestic violence in military relationships. However, delivery of service and intervention techniques are not universal among these providers, and because of this, gaps have been identified. This research, comprised of the nine 45-minute interviews of military agency and civilian non-profit service providers, highlighted four major themes impacting the prevention and intervention of domestic violence in military populations including prevention limitations, conflicting approaches to the truth in a case, lack of …

The Importance Of Self-Care Among Hospice Social Workers, Lillianna Gomez, Divina Perez

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

Social workers in general face daily challenges, but social workers in the field of hospice face unique daily stressors. The purpose of this study was to investigate what self-care methods hospice social workers use to combat burnout and compassion fatigue. One hundred hospice social workers were surveyed. Researchers used two scales to measure participants’ current self-care methods and their current quality of life. Researchers used two tailed Pearson test to analyze relationships between self-care and burnout as well as self-care and compassion satisfaction. Researchers also utilized various SPSS tests to analyze the relationship between demographics and self-care method. Participants reported …

Career Outcomes For Formerly Incarcerated College Graduates, Roberta Fox, Jesse Rodriguez

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

The California State University (CSU) Project Rebound is a reentry program that provides educational, social, financial, and case management to formerly incarcerated college students (FICS) with the goal of helping them become successful post-incarceration and post-graduation. However, there is a penury of research on how Project Rebound actually helped FICS create pro-social bonds and develop career preparation competencies. This exploratory study is an attempt to fill this gap in the literature by looking at the outcomes of formerly incarcerated college graduates who participated in a CSU-sponsored reentry program. In this qualitative study, semi-structured interviews were conducted with 13 alumni of …

Improving Parenting For Families With Involvment In The Child Welfare System: Perspectives Of Social Workers And Parents In Southern California, Laura Velazquez

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

ABSTRACT

Child neglection has been a concerning topic in today's society. Therefore, parent classes have been implemented as a method of prevention services. Through evidence-based interventions and the effective outcomes programs parenting classes have stopped incidents of child neglect and abuse by providing parents with the knowledge, education, and skills to prevent this from occurring. This research was qualitative, and the data collected allowed the researcher to discover the outcomes of how parent education can prevent child neglect. This study had 15 participants, 8 parents, and 7 social workers (N = 15). The findings from this research both from a …

Effectiveness Of Services In Foster Care From The Foster Parents' Perspective, Christina Marie Landeros, Cherish Justine Watson-Nunez

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to gain a better understanding of foster parent perceptions of the services their foster youth were receiving. This study aimed to gather information based on how effective foster parents felt these services were in the hopes that this information can lead to better service provisions. This study conducted a secondary analysis of qualitative interviews of fifteen foster parents with foster children enrolled in Hesperia Unified School District.

Qualitative data analysis revealed themes and subthemes in positive and negative experiences associated County versus school service referrals, as well as social worker communication with foster families. …

Caregiver And Social Worker Perceptions Of The Impacts Of Covid-19 On Child Welfare Visitation, Christopher Enhelder, Christina Ortiz

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

The COVID-19 pandemic took the world by surprise and adversely impacted service delivery in both the public and the private sector. This qualitative study asked two significant questions: 1) What are child welfare caregivers’ perceptions of the impact of COVID--19 on child welfare visitation across the United States? How did child welfare caregivers’ cope with child welfare visitation during the COVID-19 pandemic across the United States? A sample of five child welfare professionals who conducted visitations during the pandemic were interviewed (N = 5). Thematic analysis yielded the following five major themes: 1) COVID-19 took the visitation sector by surprise; …

Utilization Of Telemental Health By Mental Health Professionals During Covid-19, Zayne Boudreauxramirez

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

It has been established that certain barriers and benefits affect a mental health professional’s attitude towards using telemental health. The purpose of this study was to examine a possible relationship between mental health professional’s discipline, theoretical orientation, and treatment approach with their attitudes towards telemental health utilization. This study collected data from 117 mental health professionals from California. A principal component analysis uncovered four factors with attitudes towards telemental health: confidence with telemental health, concerns about telemental health, peer influence, and professional support & behavioral intent. This study showed significant relationships between discipline, theoretical orientation, and treatment approach with confidence …

Social Workers’ Perceptions In Working With Children With Medical Complexities, Elia Galicia, Rosa Espinoza

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

ABSTRACT

This research study reviewed some of the challenges that foster care children with medical complexities encounter. The number of children with medical complexities in the foster care system has significantly increased in the last few years. However, little is known about the perceptions of social workers who have worked or will work with this specific population during their careers. This research explored social workers’ knowledge about care and the designed protocols in working with foster children with medical complexities. Variables including social workers’ classification, education level, degree’s background, experience, and completion of training were considered in this study. This …

Immigration And Social Work: A Content Analysis Of Schools In Liberal States, Yenicka Avila, Stephanie Ibarra

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

The social work profession vows to defend society’s most vulnerable populations, including undocumented immigrants. Yet, how immigration is perceived in social work education and the extent to which social works schools are integrated this concept in their mission statements and/or social media pages remain understudied in the existing literature. This study is a mixed-methods content analysis of 133 social work schools accredited (or in the process of accreditation) by the Council of Social Work Education (N = 133). It was hypothesized that the proportion of social work schools that overtly/covertly mentioned immigration in their mission statements and Facebook pages will …

A Need For Support Services Among Hispanic First-Generation College Students, Evelyn Arellano, Jessica Cazares Armenta

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

Hispanics are the largest minority group in the United States, yet the retention and graduation rates among Hispanics continue to remain low. This study examined some of the barriers and social challenges that Hispanic First-Generation College Students experience. The main objectives addressed low retention rates, low graduation rates, discussed unique cultural issues, and looked at the most prevalent challenges that this population endures while trying to successfully achieve higher education.

A qualitative approach was utilized to gather data. A total of ten participants were recruited and placed in two focus groups. These focus groups were conducted virtually due to national …

Improved Sensor-Based Human Activity Recognition Via Hybrid Convolutional And Recurrent Neural Networks, Sonia Perez-Gamboa

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

Non-intrusive sensor-based human activity recognition is utilized in a spectrum of applications including fitness tracking devices, gaming, health care monitoring, and smartphone applications. Deep learning models such as convolutional neural networks (CNNs) and long short-term memory (LSTMs) recurrent neural networks provide a way to achieve human activity recognition accurately and effectively. This project designed and explored a variety of multi-layer hybrid deep learning architectures which aimed to improve human activity recognition performance by integrating local features and was scale invariant with dependencies of activities. We achieved a 94.7% activity recognition rate on the University of California, Irvine public domain dataset …

Utilization Of Mental Health Services And Culture: A Qualitative Study Of Monolingual Spanish Speaking Parents In The Inland Empire, Valeria Armentilla Cecena

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

Mental health services in the United States have been underutilized despite the fact that millions of Americans suffer from mental health issues. Previous research has largely ignored the views of Hispanics in the Inland Empire. This qualitative study fills this gap in the literature by exploring the underutilization of mental health services among monolingual Spanish-speaking parents in the Inland Empire. This study consisted of 30 participants (N = 30) with whom semi-structured interview were conducted. 12 themes emerged from the analysis of the data. These themes vary from one another and reflect (a) understanding of mental health, (b) stigma, (c) …

The Underdiagnosis Of Adhd In Black Females, Kiana Clerkley

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

Background

Historically, Black women have continued to face discriminatory practices within the various branches of healthcare in America, including mental health.

Objectives

The aim of this study was to explore the reasons for and factors contributing to the underdiagnosis of Attention Deficit- Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) among Black females.

Methods

This study was conducted using both quantitative and qualitative methods by use of collecting self-report scales and conducting individual interviews. Eight Black women were recruited by posting fliers on social media accounts that served as ADHD support groups among women. I collected data with the results of the self-report scale and …

Covid-19 Pandemic, Social Class, And Online Instruction Survivability: A Qualitative Study Of Low-Income Families With Children In The K-12 Education System, Antonio Leanos

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

This qualitative study highlights the problems that distance learning has had towards low- income families who had children in K-12 system enrolled in distance learning during Covid-19. Major themes that were presented were separation of being a teacher/parent, technical issues, social interactions, communication, and patience. Parents expressed their survivability with their children enrolled in distance learning during Covid-19 and shared their positive and negative experiences with the schools their children attended. The K-12 Education System in the United States uses a one-size-fits-all instructional approach that does not distinguish between low- income students and their middle-to-high income counterparts. Based on the …

Measuring Competency In Social Work: Lgbtqia Populations, Desirae Nicole Aguirre, Samantha Raquel Stephens

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

The study conducted interviews to measure the level of competency social workers have assisting members of the lesbian, gay, bisexual, transgender, queer and/or questioning, intersex, and asexual community (LGBTQIA+) using a qualitative exploratory research design. Data was collected from nine social workers from the United States of America. Key findings indicated the participants generally did not feel competent to work with this community, particularly transgender persons. Training at work, through school, or learned on their own about serving LGBTQIA+ clients were generally limited in scope. Lastly, findings on what the participants thought the specialized needs of the transgender population were …