Medicine and Health Commons^™

“Great Job Cleaning Your Plate Today!” Determinants Of Child-Care Providers’ Use Of Controlling Feeding Practices: An Exploratory Examination, Dipti A. Dev, Brent A. Mcbride, Katherine E. Speirs, Kimberly A. Blitch, Natalie A. Williams

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

Background National early childhood obesity prevention policies recommend that child-care providers avoid controlling feeding practices (CFP) (e.g., pressure-to-eat, food as reward, and praising children for cleaning their plates) with children to prevent unhealthy child eating behaviors and childhood obesity. However, evidence suggests that providers frequently use CFP during mealtimes.

Objective Using the Academy of Nutrition and Dietetics (2011) benchmarks for nutrition in child care as a framework, researchers assessed child-care providers’ perspectives regarding their use of mealtime CFP with young children (aged 2 to 5 years).

Design Using a qualitative design, individual, face-to-face, semi-structured interviews were conducted with providers until …

The Relation Between Discrimination, Sense Of Coherence And Health Varies According To Ethnicity; A Study Among Three Distinct Population Groups Living In Israel, Orna Baron-Epel, Vincent Berardi, John Belletierre, Waleed Shalata

Psychology Faculty Articles and Research

Self-reported experiences of discrimination and sense of coherence (SOC) have been found to be associated with health. A face-to-face survey of Long Term Jewish Residents (LTJR), Arabs and former Soviet Union (fSU) immigrants in Israel was performed. Respondents reported their physical and mental health, self-reported experiences of discrimination, SOC and socioeconomic status. Multivariable logistic regressions and bootstrapping path analyses were performed. Discrimination was associated with health after adjusting for all other variables. SOC was also associated with health. SOC did not mediate the strong association between discrimination and health among Israeli LTJR, but was a significant mediator among Arabs and …

Facing Our Demons: Psychiatric Perspectives On Exorcism Rituals, Joel R. Sanford

The Hilltop Review

Belief in possession by malevolent spirits exists in many cultures and religions throughout the world, and such beliefs often serve as explanations for a variety of psychological and emotional afflictions. Traditional remedies in these cases often involve exorcism rituals, which are believed to expel spirits from a person's mind and/or body. Some of the cases commonly attributed to involuntary spirit possession are diagnosed within the psychiatric community as schizophrenia or some sort of dissociative disorder and treated with psychotherapy and/or medicine. For some in the psychiatric community, exorcisms and their use by patients are viewed as problematic due to their …

Science, Symptoms, And Support Groups:Adhd In The American Cultural Context, Kealy D. Fallon

Theses and Dissertations

This thesis is a cultural analysis of the behaviorally- and psychiatrically-defined disorder ADHD, socio-historically contextualizing it in the United States and exploring ethnographically how people affected by it talk about and organize their experience of its symptoms.

Depression And Body Mass Index, Differences By Education: Evidence From A Population-Based Study Of Adult Women In The U.S. Buffalo-Niagara Region, Ashley Wendell Kranjac, Jing Nie, Maurizio Trevisan, Jo L. Freudenheim

Sociology Faculty Articles and Research

The relationship between obesity and depression is well described. However, the evidence linking depression and body mass index (BMI) across the broad range of body size is less consistent. We examined the association between depressive symptoms and BMI in a sample of adult women in the Buffalo-Niagara region between 1997 and 2001. Using logistic regression, we investigated whether increased weight status beyond normal-weight was associated with a higher prevalence of depressive symptoms, and if educational attainment modified the association between obesity and depression. There was a trend for increased weight status to be associated with higher depressive symptoms (obese II/III, …

The Empty Chair Appointment, Jody Long, Ken Sakauye, Khaja Chisty, John Upton

Research, Publications & Creative Work

The objective was to test an intervention to reduce failed rates for psychiatric appointments. We collected data for this study of the characteristics of patients who missed appointments from March 2011 through September 2012. A phone triage assessment intervention was implemented to address chronic first-time failed attendance appointments (N = 78). The main reason for failed appointments was transportation difficulties. The first-time appointment show rate increased after implementing an assessment intervention. Phone assessment intervention was practical and may improve nonattendance for psychiatric appointments. The discussion reflects speculations about causes and possible measures to make services more accessible.

A Culture That Fosters Concussions: Does Increased Education Lead To More Accurate Reporting Of Concussions?, Michael Heptig

PCOM Psychology Dissertations

With over 1.7 million incidents reported annually, concussion has become the most common class of traumatic brain injury (TBI) in the United States (Bazarian, Zhu, Blyth, Borrino, & Zhong, 2012). As staggering a statistic as this may be, many believe it fails to represent the true number of concussions because the non-reporting of symptoms has been commonplace among athletes (Khurana & Kaye, 2012; Williamson & Goodman, 2006). The aim of this study was to determine those factors that influence the reporting of concussion symptoms. Specific variables that were examined include the amount of concussion education provided (determined by requisite amount …

Proximity To Children: A Geospatial Approach To Understanding The Relationship Between Fast Food And Schools, Andrew Atwong

CMC Senior Theses

In a time when Americans are waking up to the health consequences of consuming fast food, researchers have discovered that fast food restaurants seem to be located in greater concentrations near primary or secondary schools. While this phenomenon affects the food environments of some children and carries implications as to their short term and long term health (which has also been well researched), this paper focuses primarily on fast food restaurants that are within walking distance of schools. Using Geographic Information Systems (GIS) to integrate geospatial, business, demographic, and food quality data, I use linear regressions to examine whether and …

Perceptions And Attitudes Of A Sample Of Primary Care Patients Receiving Psychological Care From Their Pcp, Nadine Henzes Gowarty

PCOM Psychology Dissertations

With millions of Americans suffering from a mental health disorder and slightly more than half receiving treatment, the demand for psychological services far outweighs the number of practitioners available to provide direct care. Therefore, the majority of all primary-care visits are based on psychosocial factors; one third of a PCP’s caseloads consist of patients with mental-health problems. Given the fact that PCPs provide comprehensive psychosocial care, it is important to determine the beliefs and perceptions of their patients. Results from this study identified numerous factors that influence the relationship between patients receiving mental health care from their PCP. Specifically, if …

Social Problems, Biomedical Answers? How Causes Of Social Problems Affect Choice Of Solutions, Bianca C. Dreyer

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

With rapid advances in behavioural genetics, scientists are identifying an increasing array of genetic influences on human behaviour. Public misconceptions about the function of genes often lead to the oversimplification of the role of genes in behaviour (Dar-Nimrod & Heine, 2011). To date, no study has systematically investigated whether simply learning about genetic causes of behaviour affects people’s preferred solutions to problematic behaviours. The present research program includes three studies that were designed to examine the psychological effects of exposure to genetic etiology for problematic behaviour, in particular aggression, and investigated how this information influences endorsement of solutions, rating of …

Medication Assisted Treatment And The Three Legged Stool: Medical Providers, Chemical Dependency Professionals, And Clients, Steven Matt Magrath

Antioch University Dissertations & Theses

Opioid dependence has reached epidemic levels in the United States and around the world. With the increased prescribing of opioid pharmaceuticals and the influx of inexpensive heroin, the health care cost to society has topped $72.5 billion annually (Murphy et al., 2016). Opioid overdose deaths have now surpassed motor vehicle deaths and have tripled since 1990. In some age groups opioid overdose is the leading cause of death. This study seeks to analyze the only field that directly treats this primary brain disease: medication assisted treatment for opioid dependence. The three primary participants in this partnership include: (a) doctors and …

Socially Deviant Communities Online: How The Pro-Anorexia Movement Utilizes The Anonymity Provided By The Internet To Thrive, Samantha Thomas

Honors Theses

The creation of the internet has produced an environment in which many communities have been able to develop into strong and thriving societies. A large number of communities that are now predominantly online were unable to exist successfully before the establishment of the internet for a variety of reasons. The internet has made it easier for people from different backgrounds and locations to network, form communities, and share information with one another. Unfortunately the internet has also given harmful underground communities the opportunity to develop and thrive as well. Socially deviant communities, groups that support ideas and behaviors deemed unacceptable …

Association Of Childhood Physical And Sexual Abuse With Intimate Partner Violence, Poor General Health And Depressive Symptoms Among Pregnant Women, Yasmin V. Barrios, Bizu Gelaye, Qiuyue Zhong, Christina Nicolaidis, Marta B. Rondon, Pedro J. Garcia, Pedro A. Mascaro Sanchez, Sixto E. Sanchez, Michelle A. Williams

School of Social Work Faculty Publications and Presentations

Objective

We examined associations of childhood physical and sexual abuse with risk of intimate partner violence (IPV). We also evaluated the extent to which childhood abuse was associated with self-reported general health status and symptoms of antepartum depression in a cohort of pregnant Peruvian women.

Methods

In-person interviews were conducted to collect information regarding history of childhood abuse and IPV from 1,521 women during early pregnancy. Antepartum depressive symptomatology was evaluated using the Patient Health Questionnaire-9. Multivariable logistic regression procedures were used to estimate adjusted odds ratios (aOR) and 95% confidence intervals (95%CI).

Results

Any childhood abuse was associated with …

Uncovering Meanings Of Death, Trauma, And Loss As Experienced By Hospice Bereavement Coordinators: A Phenomenological Study, Rochelle S. Clarke

Department of Family Therapy Dissertations and Applied Clinical Projects

This study examined the experiences of Hospice Bereavement Coordinators (HBCs) and Hospice Chaplains working with grief narratives from patient-family units exhibiting signs of anticipatory or complicated grief. While a significant amount of research has been conducted on Hospice employees, no qualitative studies have examined the interpretation of meaning from employees whose primary role focused on the psychosocial-spiritual aspects of clients exhibiting anticipatory or complicated grief. The researcher identified shared meaning of death, trauma, and loss from six participants in the context of a high stress and high loss environment. This study‘s findings revealed ten central themes: Death is an earthly …

Adhd Versus Ptsd In Preschool-Aged Children: Implications For Misdiagnosis, Klaudette D. Stewart

PCOM Psychology Dissertations

Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) has been one of the most diagnosed disorders in children since it was included in the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders−III (DSM−III) in 1980. The number of children who have been diagnosed since that time has grown significantly, raising concerns about the overwhelming number of young children being diagnosed and prescribed medication. According to the literature, young children are diagnosed at a higher rate by pediatric primary care physicians (PCPs) than clinical child psychologists (CCPs) because they are taken to a PCP’s office by a parent, rather than referred from a school environment, …

A National Scan Of Psychiatric Involuntary Hold Policies, Evan D. Peters

UROP Posters

Psychiatric involuntary holds are initiated when an individual suffering from mental illness is deemed a danger to themselves or others. Each state and the District of Columbia has its own legislation outlining the process for involuntary holds and the assessments that take place during a hold. A variety of individuals, professional and non-professional, can be involved in the process. Each state also sets a time limit during which a person can be held, and specific language that details the behavior of individuals that are eligible for psychiatric involuntary holds. This information was gathered by examining each states' codes involving psychiatric …

Physician Role In Enhancing Patient Communication, Tamanna Sahni

UROP Posters

Communication in the in-patient environment is crucial, and the relationship between a patient and physician enhances patient health and wellness. Patients should feel confident with their abilities to feel comfortable conversing with physicians, which would thus treat symptoms more effectively. This communication has decreased over time, hence patients are often are unable to obtain medical information from their healthcare providers. What is the relationship between psychological factors, such as self-esteem, and quality of patient-physician communication? And can physicians ensure increased patient comfort in the medical environment?

Various factors can affect the patients’ comfort with their physicians, and when addressed, these …

Worlds Of Connection: A Hermeneutic Formulation Of The Interdisciplinary Relational Model Of Care, Susana Lauraine Mccune

Antioch University Dissertations & Theses

Despite a general agreement across health care disciplines that Advanced Care Planning (ACP) and Advanced Directives (ADs) add important elements to a patient's end-of-life care desires, and can inform their loved ones and advocates, help create ease of mind, and enhance quality of care, they continue to remain significantly underused. More than half of Americans transition to chronic and terminal illness without having completed them. The aim of this study was to increase the frequency and enhance the quality of communication about Advance Directives and Advance Care Planning within the clinical relationship. The resulting Interdisciplinary Relational Model of Care (IRMOC) …

Unequally Distributed Psychological Assets: Are There Social Disparities In Optimism, Life Satisfaction, And Positive Affect?, Julia K. Boehm, Ying Chen, David R. Williams, Carol Ryff, Laura D. Kubzansky

Psychology Faculty Articles and Research

Socioeconomic status is associated with health disparities, but underlying psychosocial mechanisms have not been fully identified. Dispositional optimism may be a psychosocial process linking socioeconomic status with health. We hypothesized that lower optimism would be associated with greater social disadvantage and poorer social mobility. We also investigated whether life satisfaction and positive affect showed similar patterns. Participants from the Midlife in the United States study self-reported their optimism, satisfaction, positive affect, and socioeconomic status (gender, race/ethnicity, education, occupational class and prestige, income). Social disparities in optimism were evident. Optimistic individuals tended to be white and highly educated, had an educated …

Practicing Patienthood Online: Social Media, Chronic Illness, And Lay Expertise, Collette Sosnowy

Publications and Research

The use of digital technologies and social media by people with serious illness to find, share, and create health information is much celebrated but rarely critiqued. Proponents laud “Health 2.0” as transforming health care practice and empowering patients. Critics, however, argue that a discourse of developing lay expertise online masks the disciplinary practices of the neoliberal state’s emphasis on individual responsibility. Notably, the perspectives of people who are engaging with social media related to their health and illness are under-represented in this debate. This research examines the experiences and perspectives of women who blog about their lives with Multiple Sclerosis …

Improv To Improve Interprofessional Communication, Team Building, Patient Safety, And Patient Satisfaction, Candace A. Campbell

Doctor of Nursing Practice (DNP) Projects

The purpose of this process improvement project was to implement a test of change within a healthcare team utilizing applied improvisational exercises (AIEs), and to lay the groundwork for more effective inter- and intra-professional communication.

Literature review: AIEs have been shown to facilitate individual participant communication strengths through a process of un-learning certain common behavioral habits, and learning new habits that assist in creating and expanding closed-loop communication. Such un-learning and learning enriches the participant’s awareness of the environment and encourages participant adaptability through positive group interactions.

Method: An all-day AIE seminar/workshop was conducted with members of two healthcare teams …

Assessing Transgender Attitudes Toward Health Care: Can These Attitudes Help Predict Health Outcomes?, Sara M. Shane

PCOM Psychology Dissertations

Research has identified the fact that race/ethnicity, sexual orientation, gender identity, socioeconomic status, education level, geographic location, help seeking behaviors, and experiences of discrimination are associated with health outcomes. In addition, attitudes towards providers can also help determine health outcomes. The transgender community experiences barriers to health care services and therefore their overall health is affected. There is not a sufficient amount of literature that assesses, using standardized measure, the attitudes of the transgender community and their health. The present study will assess the attitudes of the transgender community toward health care (mental and medical health) and, using standardized measures, …

Rural Latino Adolescent Health: Preliminary Examination Of Health Risks And Cultural Correlates, Timothy D. Nelson, Katherine M. Kidwell, Brian E. Armenta, Lisa J. Crockett, Gustavo Carlo, Les B. Whitbeck

Department of Psychology: Faculty Publications

Latino adolescents living in rural settings may be at increased risk of health problems; however, data describing the health status of this population are limited. This study examined 60 rural Latino adolescents and found high rates of health risk, including at-risk/clinical results for hemoglobin A1C (23.3%), high-density lipoprotein cholesterol (55%), systolic blood pressure (21.7%), and overweight/obesity (55%). Time in sedentary behaviors was high and physical activity was limited. Adolescent language use was associated with health risk status, with greater use of English associated with lower risk. Health psychologists could promote improved health by providing health behavior interventions to this underserved …

Making Space For Dying: Portraits Of Living With Dying, Elise Lark

Antioch University Dissertations & Theses

In Making Space for Dying: Portraits of Living with Dying, I describe the everyday lived experience of dying and the care culture within freestanding, community-based, end-of-life residences (CBEOLR) utilizing portraiture and arts-based research. I craft four case studies into “portraits,” based on interviews, on-site visits, up-close observation, and field notes. In the person-centered portraits, I reveal the inner landscape of two terminally ill women, with data represented in poetry. In the place-centered portraits, I “map” the social topography of two CBEOLRs to illustrate how lives and care of the dying are emplaced, from the perspectives of community leaders, …

Reimagining My Body, Center For Public Service

SURGE

I stood there, shoulders slouched, elbows locked, hands glued to the side of the toilet. My body convulsing, I told myself, “this is the last time, just one more time and you’ll get back on track tomorrow.” It wasn’t the last time. I had been forcing myself to purge for months at this point, and each time I hated myself for it.

It was something I couldn’t control. It wasn’t out of a need for attention as so commonly thought, but a pure need to be the unreachable level of thin that I thought would make me beautiful. I was …

Prenatal Development: Annotated Bibliography, Victoria J. Molfese, Amanda Prokasky, Kathleen Moritz Rudasill, Ibrahim H. Acar, Xiaoqing Tu, Kate Sirota, Brian Keiser

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

For decades, researchers have investigated how events in the prenatal period impact women and their infants. These studies, particularly by researchers in the medical, neuroscience, and behavioral science fields, led to discoveries of important information regarding the prenatal events that were strongly associated with mortality (or death) and morbidity (or incidences of injury, pathology and abnormalities/anomalies, and neurobehavioral sequelae) in the neonatal and infancy periods. Among the many common findings from early research studies, two are particularly noteworthy. First, maternal and fetal risk conditions arising in the prenatal period do not do so in isolation. Sameroff and Chandler characterized this …

The Problem With Adhd: Researchers' Constructions And Parents' Accounts, Bora Pajo, David Cohen Dr.

All Faculty and Staff Scholarship

An enduring controversy over the nature of ADHD complicates parents’ decisions regarding children likely to be diagnosed with the condition. Using a fallibilist perspective, this review examines how researchers construe ADHD and acknowledge the controversy. From a systematic literature search of empirical reports using parents of ADHD-diagnosed children as primary informants, 36 reports published between 1996 and 2008 (corresponding to 30 studies) were selected. Data on the studies’ characteristics and methodologies, definitions of ADHD, and extent of the acknowledgment of the ADHD controversy were extracted, as were data on a wide range of parental concerns and experiences. Researchers in 27 …

The Effects Of Emotion And Message Framing On College Binge Drinking, Monica Broughton

Psychology Student Scholarship

The purpose of this study was to find an effective way of portraying binge drinking information to college students, hopefully changing their drinking behavior. A 2(Loss vs. Gain frame) X 2(Anger vs. Fearful prime) X 2(Time 1 vs. Time 2 Alcohol Consumption) was used to assess change in participants' alcohol intake. It was hypothesized that the fearful/loss condition as well as the anger/gain condition would be the most effective in decreasing participants' alcohol consumption.

Medicalization Of Mental Disorders: 1970- To The Present, W. Joseph Wyatt

Psychology Faculty Research

A thirty-five year escalation of emphasis on biological causation has rendered, for many, medications as the treatment of choice for mental disorders. Non-drug treatment may be cast aside, as a result.

The Ticking Of The “Biological Clock”: Worry About Future Fertility In Nulliparous Women, Karen E. Kersting

Theses and Dissertations

Abstract

Title: The Ticking of the “Biological Clock”: Worry about Future Fertility in Nulliparous Women

By: Karen Kersting, M.A., M.S.

A dissertation submitted in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy at Virginia Commonwealth University.

Virginia Commonwealth University, 2013.

Major Director: Kathleen M. Ingram, J.D., Ph.D.

Associate Professor of Psychology

Department of Psychology

Modern women are waiting until later in their lives to have children than women of previous generations, a trend influenced by a number of factors including financial stability, dating norms, and career goals and responsibilities. As women age, their fertility may decline …