Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

Following In Their Footsteps: The Risks Of The Intergenerational Cycle Of Incarceration Among Inmates And Their Children, Megan Harris

All Theses

The purpose of this thesis was to test the proposition that parents who are currently incarcerated are at high risk for having children who are also incarcerated. Furthermore, several risk factors, commonly found in homes with previously or currently incarcerated members, were identified and analyzed to predict the odds of an incarcerated parent also having an incarcerated child.
The current study found that the majority of the demographic variables were significant predictors of child incarceration. Furthermore, only a few risk factors were found to be significant predictors of an inmate's child being incarcerated: an inmate having two or more prior …

Filial Responsibility As A Moderator Of Witnessing Domestic Violence And Behavioral Outcomes In Latino Children, Dhakirah Amelia Hamin

Psychology Theses

Children’s perceptions of the fairness of their filial responsibility was examined as a moderator between witnessing domestic violence and behavioral outcomes in children. Hierarchical Multiple Regressions revealed that children’s perceptions of the fairness of their family responsibility influenced the relation between the psychological violence in the household and child reports of internalizing behavior problems. Specifically, higher levels of psychological violence predicted higher levels of internalizing only under perceptions of unfair filial responsibility. In addition, increased levels of reported psychological violence in the household significantly predicted increased levels of mother-reported externalizing problems. Descriptive analyses revealed that for 12 of the 27 …

Comparison Of High And Low Distraction For Pediatric Procedural Pain, Crystal Marie Stack Lim

Psychology Theses

Distraction is an effective pain management intervention and children’s coping styles are important to consider when designing interventions. The purpose of this study was to examine two movie distractions in children 3 to 11 years old receiving venipunctures and to evaluate the relations between the effectiveness of the interventions and coping styles. Results revealed no interaction and no main effects of condition or coping style. However, coping on caregiver-report of child pain approached significance. T-tests revealed significant differences between approach and avoidance coping styles, with children with an approach coping style experiencing significantly less pain compared to children with an …

New Perspectives On The Relationship Between Emotion Decoding And Social Acceptance In School-Age Children, Eri Suzuki

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

The relationship between children's emotion decoding ability and their social acceptance was examined, with a major focus on potential nonlinear components. Based on the display rules literature, the prediction was tested that social acceptance and emotion decoding skills can be best described as an inverted U-shaped function. Children in kindergarten through fifth grade (113 girls and 123 boys) completed measures of postural and facial decoding accuracy (FACES and TALK) and their social acceptance was assessed using child and teacher reports (SPPC or PSPC). The results showed only a statistically significant quadratic relationship for girls and a statistically significant linear relationship …

Fathers' Perceptions Of Relationships With Young Adolescent Children: Implications For Family Therapy, Tyler D. Patrick

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

This study used family systems theory as a lens to examine fathers' relationships with young adolescent children as it relates to the areas of time spent together, communication between generations, and paternal satisfaction in raising an early adolescent child. Similarities and differences of scores on the Parent Success Indicator were examined for 191 Caucasian American (n=110) and African American (n=81) fathers of 10- to 14-year-old-children. Results showed that increased amounts of time that fathers report spending with children was significantly associated with paternal satisfaction, communication between generations, fathers' use of time, parental frustration, and parental teaching. …

Predicting School Placement Outcomes Of Children With Disabilities Who Was Once Enrolled In Early Intervention, Mark Stanley Jesinoski

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

From longitudinal data from 223 children with disabilities in Utah, variables collected at entry into Part C early intervention and Part B early childhood special education services were used to differentiate between children and to predict placement outcomes in elementary school. Scores on the Battelle Developmental Inventory, Vineland Adaptive Behavior Scale, Parenting Stress Index, Social Skills Rating System, number of hours mothers worked outside the home, and fathers ' education in years were differentiated between children who exited from and children who remained in special education. These same scores were also used to predict whether children would remain in or …

Writing A Children‟S Book, Andrea Fabiano

Creativity and Change Leadership Graduate Student Master's Projects

This project contains the components and procedures for writing a children‟s book, as the first in its series. The story is of a child at a birthday party who puts on a baseball cap. He then morphs into a pitcher of a baseball team on the brink of getting into the playoffs. This project has the timeline and the steps that it took to get to the end result, which was the first draft of the first book in the series. The series has a central theme. In each book, a child will put on a hat, and then transform …

Breaking Down The Wall: An Examination Of Mental Health Service Utilization In African American And Caucasian Parents, Idia O. Binitie

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This study investigated the influence of parents' gender, race, and psychopathology on barriers and attitudes to mental health utilization for themselves and for their children. It was hypothesized that mothers and Caucasian¹ parents would have more positive attitudes and would perceive fewer barriers to mental health services than fathers and African American² parents. A total of 194 African American and Caucasian parents were recruited from the community to participate in this study. Parents completed measures on barriers and attitudes toward treatment for themselves and their children, utilization of mental health services for themselves and their children, and their own current …

Bibliotherapy: School Psychologists' Report Of Use And Efficacy, Marci A. Olsen

Theses and Dissertations

This study focused on the use of bibliotherapy by school psychologists. A survey was created and distributed to 119 registered and licensed school psychologists in Utah to obtain information on this topic. Forty-one percent returned a completed survey. Results indicated that bibliotherapy is used by 82% of the participants in the study, and 31 of 34 (91%) use bibliotherapy with children grades K-6. Topics most used with bibliotherapy included self-esteem, bullying, divorce, anxiety, and grief. Efficacy varied depending on the topic of bibliotherapy. However, school psychologists regarded bibliotherapy across all topics to be very effective to effective.

The Personal Impact On Female Therapists From Working With Sexually-Abused Children, Kinsey Drouet Pistorius

Theses and Dissertations

Although previous research has established that therapists who work with sexually-abused children experience symptoms of vicarious trauma, few studies have addressed the process by which the therapist is affected. In order to understand therapists' personal experiences and how working with sexually-abused children impacts them in their personal lives, the researcher interviewed therapists who were currently working with this specific population. Data analysis was completed by using ethnographic research methods and three major themes emerged during the interviews. The first theme included the "job characteristics" inherent in working with sexually-abused children. This theme refers to how the therapists entered the field …

Verbal Learning And Memory Abilities In Children With Brain Tumors: The Role Of The Third Ventricle Region, Jackie L. Micklewright

Psychology Theses

The third ventricle region houses several neuroanatomical structures that are primary components of the human memory system, and provides pathways through which these brain regions communicate with critical regions of the frontal and medial temporal lobes. Archival data was obtained for 42 children with cerebellar or third ventricle tumors, and was examined for tumor and treatment related confounds. Children with third ventricle tumors were hypothesized to exhibit; 1) better performance on a measure of auditory attention, 2) greater impairment in learning across trials, 3) greater memory loss over a 20-minute delay, and 4) greater impairment across delayed memory tests than …

Children's Coping With Peer Rejection Experiences: The Regulating Role Of Emotion, Kimberly L. Goodman

Theses and Dissertations

The primary purpose of this investigation was to examine the role of emotions as predictors of children's coping responses to peer rejection experiences. This study also explored how children's emotional experience and coping behaviors were related to gender, peer socialization (i.e., receiving prosocial acts by peers and previous victimization experiences), and indices of psychopathology. Children ages 7-12 (N=53) completed questionnaires to assess emotional and coping responses to hypothetical peer rejection scenarios, symptoms of depression and anxiety, and peer experiences. Overall, findings suggested that emotion-related factors (emotion states and more stable "emotional tendencies" such as psychological symptoms) and social context (i.e., …

The Impact Of No Child Left Behind On Charter School Legislation And Practices - Policy Implications, Joice Eaddy Conyers

Theses and Dissertations

The charter school movement is considered one of the fastest growing education reform efforts in the United States today, serving over 1 million children nationwide. The demand to improve the quality of education in the United States has been paramount over the last twenty years.In December 2001, Congress approved a reauthorization of the Elementary and Secondary Education Act (ESEA) and renamed it the No Child Left Behind Act of 2001 (NCLB), P.L. 107-ll0, H.R. 1. Although ESEA was enacted in 1964 by President Lyndon Johnson to supplement state and local efforts to provide all children with high-quality education, NCLB has …

The Relationship Between Parenting Stress And Family Cohesion In Non-Abusing Parents Of Sexually Traumatized Children, Danielle Marie Bronk

Seton Hall University Dissertations and Theses (ETDs)

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Eliciting Facial Expressions In Children With And Without Down Syndrome, Orietta Coz

Master's Theses

This study investigated facial expressions of children between the ages of 10 and 15 years with Down Syndrome (experimental group) and compared them to typically developing children (control group). Elicitation of facial expressions was carried out through showings of video clips. Trained observers were used to code expressions of happiness, anger, and disgust from video recordings that were made of the children’s reactions while they watched the video clips.

I hypothesized that Down Syndrome children will not differ from typically developing children in the frequency of elicited happy expressions. However, I expected them to differ in the frequency of elicited …

The Discursive Practices Of Chemical Discipline, Roger L. Pippin

LSU Master's Theses

This project examines the history of science and its relationship to the popular, or lay, audience, a problem of rhetorical inquiry since Aristotle. This project also explores the implications of the emerging trend in lay literature on Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) to transform the causal mechanism underlying ADHD so that it is isomorphic in structure and parallel in content to the most contemporary and fetishized sciences of the human body. In other words, how ADHD was once a problem of brain chemistry, and is now a problem of genetics is not simply a matter of scientific practice on the …

Evaluation Of The Effectiveness Of A Body Mass Index-For-Age Percentile Health Report In Raising Parent Awareness Of Their Child's Weight Status, Anantha Padmaja Lakkakula

LSU Master's Theses

Overweight in children has become a major health concern. Research suggests that many parents may not be aware of their child’s actual weight status. The objectives of this study were to test the effectiveness of a body mass index (BMI)-for–age percentile report in raising parent awareness of their child’s weight status. Eighteen public elementary schools in southeast Louisiana were pair matched and divided into nine intervention and nine control schools. Children in the intervention and the control schools were divided into two groups 1) healthy weight (BMI ≥ 5th to <85th percentile) and 2) at risk and overweight (BMI ≥ 85th percentile). Forty children were randomly selected from each of the two weight groups from the intervention and the control schools. Parents of children in the intervention group received a BMI-for-age percentile health report along with a short questionnaire. Parents of children in control schools received the questionnaire only. Parents in the intervention group have 4.7 times more accurate perception about their child’s weight compared to the control group (OR: 4.7, 95% of CI: 0.89-24.86, p=0.00 ). After receiving the report, more parents of at risk or overweight children were concerned and only fewer parents of healthy weight children were anxious about their child’ weight. When parents were compared based on their child’s weight regardless whether they got the report, parents of at risk or overweight children were more than five times less likely to perceive the correct weight classification of their child (OR: 1.8, 95% of CI: 0.05-0.62, p=0.00) and less concerned about their child’s weight (OR: 0.98, 95% of CI: 0.32-2.93, p=0.00) when compared to parents of healthy weight children. All parents were willing to help their child follow healthy behaviors regard less of the report and their child’s weight status. A BMI-for-age percentile report appears to be an effective way to increase parent awareness and concern regarding their child’s weight status. With increased awareness, parents may be more likely to encourage their children to achieve a healthy weight.

The Predictive Relationship Of Inhibitory Control, Emotion Regulation, Moral Emotions, And Life Stressors On Behavior Problems In School-Aged Children Of Incarcerated Mothers, Geraldine M. Lotze

Theses and Dissertations

Children whose mothers go to prison are at high risk for poor outcomes of many kinds,including externalizing behaviors, internalizing disorders, school dropout, and eventual criminal activity. Inhibitory control, moral emotions, emotion regulation, and stressful life events were examined as predictors of externalizing and internalizing behaviors in children of incarcerated mothers. Participants were 50 children age 6 to 12 years (M = 9.77 y, SD = 1.54) with mothers currently in prison who attended a faith-based recreational summer camp. Inhibitory control was not impaired in these children, showing that their brains were functioning appropriately in this area of executive functioning. Inhibitory …