Clinical Psychology Commons^™

Sexual Satisfaction And Functioning In Women With Histories Of Sexual Victimization, Kerri Anne Guadagni

Theses and Dissertations

The present study evaluated the relationship between a history of sexual abuse and adult sexual satisfaction and functioning. This included examining psychological symptomology, revictimization, and the degree of sexual functioning and sexual satisfaction of women who reported childhood, adolescent, and/or adult sexual traumas. This study contributes to the limited research on the sexual functioning of women with childhood sexual trauma histories. Sexual satisfaction and sexual functioning were found to be related, yet separate areas in which women with sexual abuse histories may experience difficulties. There was evidence of an association between psychological distress and trauma history in that the presence …

Tobacco And E-Cigarette Use In Youth With Autism Spectrum Disorders, Nicole R. Higgins

Theses and Dissertations

While there has been an extensive amount of research on tobacco use in children and adolescents, very little has been conducted in children with developmental delays, particularly Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD). Similarly, research examining newer methods of nicotine use, such as electronic nicotine delivery systems (ENDS; ecigarettes) has not yet been conducted in this population. It has previously been assumed that characteristics commonly observed in youngsters with ASDs serve as protective factors for the initiation of tobacco and ENDS use; however, no studies have identified the variables that contribute to a youngster’s intention to smoke/use ENDS in this vulnerable population. …

Pediatric Sleep Education In Primary Care: Parental Receipt, Compliance And Children’S Sleep Problems, Jenna Patricia Mullarkey

Theses and Dissertations

Sleep is important for children, as inadequate sleep can result in a number of poor outcomes in terms of cognitive, psychosocial, and somatic functioning. The American Academy of Pediatrics (AAP) has recommended that all pediatric providers educate parents about the necessary sleep duration for optimal functioning and healthy sleep hygiene practices for their children. The present study sought to examine the proportion of parents who receive pediatric sleep education from their child’s providers, the rates of compliance with these recommendations, and the effects that receiving this information has on frequency and severity of the child’s sleep problems. This cross-sectional study …

Self-Reported Malingering: Prevalence, Strategies, And Decision Making, Bethany Linn Hall Wellman

Theses and Dissertations

Objective: Malingering is intentional fabrication or exaggeration of physical or mental symptoms for the purpose of gaining an external incentive, whether it be for a reward or a gain of some sort or avoidance of an unwanted outcome (Gorman, 1982). Understanding malingering behaviors for accurate identification is of vital importance due to both the economic burden on health care corporations, workers compensation and disability services when malingering goes unidentified, as well as the harm caused to individuals with genuine symptoms falsely suspected of malingering. Greater understanding of malingering practices to help improve resources for correct identification is an area within …

The Utility Of Neuropsychological Measures On The Differential Diagnosis Of Adhd-Inattentive Type Versus Anxiety In A Pediatric Outpatient Behavioral Health Population, Emily Stapleton

Graduate School of Professional Psychology: Doctoral Papers and Masters Projects

This study examined the differences in inattention and executive function between a group of children diagnosed with ADHD and a group diagnosed with anxiety disorders to establish differential profiles for these two disorders. This study evaluated the differences among children with ADHD and anxiety disorders, using parent-report and performance-based measures of inattention and anxiety. A retrospective chart review was completed for a total of 58 patients who met the criteria for an anxiety disorder or for ADHD-C and ADHD-I at the completion of the neuropsychological assessment. Analyses compared the ADHD group and the Anxiety group on select scales and subscales …

Labeling Sexual Assault Perceptions Associated With Ptsd Symptom Severity, Shania Cole

Murray State Theses and Dissertations

Many agree that sexual assault is a common problem among females, but there is less agreement regarding how to label individuals who experience sexual assault. Most research has examined the connotations associated with the labels, most of which has associated “victim” with negative connotations and “survivor” with positive adjectives. Few studies empirically examine how individuals of sexual assault respond to these labels and how the labels relate to outcomes in these individuals’ lives. Unfortunately, individuals who have experienced an unwanted sexual encounter are at higher risk for developing posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD). Understanding how these individuals label themselves, and how …

If You Think It You Can Achieve It: The Relationship Between Goal Specificity And Magical Thinking, Brianna Jones

Murray State Theses and Dissertations

Previous research has found a connection between the type of goals that individuals set and psychopathology, specifically depression (Dickson & Moberly, 2013). Magical thinking is the belief that a person’s thoughts are connected to their actions or to future outcomes (Markle, 2010). Magical thinking has been found to be a primary feature in many psychological disorders such as obsessive-compulsive disorder (Shihata et al., 2014). The present study is the first of the literature to examine the relationships between goal setting and magical thinking as well as magical thinking and various psychological disorders such as depression. The current study examined the …

Social Networking Sites And Physical Activity: The Role Of Framed Health Messages, Cassie Gonzalez

Murray State Theses and Dissertations

Cardiovascular disease, cancer, and diabetes are the current leading causes of death in the United States, where most of these diseases are caused by a few specific risk behaviors including tobacco use, poor nutrition, and lack of physical activity (Rutledge, Lane, Merlo, & Elmi, 2018). Healthcare professional are being encouraged to educate patients and the community about the risks associated with health behaviors and lifestyle choices. I explore aspect of these health messages in the context of gain- vs loss-framed messages presented through two social networking sites, Twitter and Instagram, on subsequent health behavior changes. Whereas existing literature have explored …

Flexibility In The Brain And Muscles: Examining Psychological Flexibility, Athletic Identity, And Stigma Within Sport Culture, Brighton Claire Hollingsworth

Murray State Theses and Dissertations

Abstract

Interventions designed to increase psychological flexibility have been shown to reduce mental health stigma, and such interventions have shown to be effective in athletic populations. The current study assessed the relationship between athletic identity and mental health stigma while also observing the moderating effects of psychological flexibility within that relationship. An exploratory analysis was also conducted to observe the moderating effect of psychological flexibility on the relationship between athletic identity and barriers to care. Participants (N = 176) from online sport-themed communities completed measures to assess mental health stigma, barriers to care, athletic identity, current symptoms of distress, …

The Impact Of Gender Normed Scoring Of The Brief Symptom Inventory On Trans* Individuals, Ashley Megan Bieze Wilson

Murray State Theses and Dissertations

The purpose of this research was to investigate the significance of the choice of gender normed scoring on the Brief Symptom Inventory (BSI) (Derogatis, 1993) when assessing cisgender and trans* or gender non-conforming individuals. This study compared two groups, cisgender and trans* individuals, on male and female gender normed scoring for the BSI. Each participant’s responses on the BSI were scored using both male and female norms and the number of clinically significant elevations (T-score ≥ 63) was counted. Results indicated that regardless of gender identity or sex-assigned-at-birth (SAAB), a higher mean number of elevations was found when using male …

The Effects Of Parental Engagement In Early Childhood On Academic Achievement In Adolescence, Alex Velez

Murray State Theses and Dissertations

Parental involvement and engagement have been used interchangeably in research regarding the academic outcomes of children. The current study assessed parental engagement and its relationship to academic achievement in adolescence. Specifically, the study looked at parental engagement with children aged 3 and its effects on academic achievement at age 15 in 1-parent and 2-parent homes. Exploratory analyses were also conducted to examine the effect of ethnicity on the relationship between parental engagement and academic achievement. Data were taken from participants (N = 3350) who were a part of the Fragile Families and Child Wellbeing study, a longitudinal dataset. Findings showed …

Healing From Heterosexism Through Expressive Writing, Kathleen M. Collins

Graduate Masters Theses

Simply by existing within our society, LGBTQ people encounter widespread exposure to heterosexist attitudes, behaviors, and policies on a daily basis that ignore, invalidate, or outright discriminate against them. This marginalization contributes to myriad psychological consequences such as depression, suicidality, anxiety, and substance abuse. Despite the fact that LGBTQ people experience mental health issues and some subsequently seek treatment, few interventions exist that specifically address LGBTQ minority stressors; those that do exist tend to treat mental health consequences of societal heterosexism, rather than offering ways to heal from heterosexist experiences directly. In the current study, I explored the ability of …

Individual’S Self Awareness Of Mental Illness: The Effects On Implicit Bias, Microaggressions, And Racial Discrimination, Sarah Zoubaa

Student Theses

The purpose of the current study is to understand the factors that impact how persons experiencing subclinical psychological symptoms or an undiagnosed but clinically significant psychological problem perceive individuals who been diagnosed with mental illness. Previous literature has investigated the experiences of discrimination among those with mental health problems, but not their attitudes and behavior towards individuals among their in-group. It was hypothesized that individuals with an emerging mental health problem will have higher rates of implicit bias and perpetrate more microaggressions towards those with a mental illness in order to remove themselves from a group that is associated with …

Health Equity Through Spatial Justice: A Critical Phenomenology Of Urban Trail Makers, Arvin Simon

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Research has increasingly demonstrated that race, class and place are powerful predictors of health and social justice. This study was conducted to identify the lived experiences of individuals who were hired and trained as part of a green job program that created trails within a city park in Pittsburgh’s Mount Washington Community. This program has historically hired individuals who were formerly incarcerated, many of whom identify as African American. We explored the personal and social experiences of working in nature to better appreciate the intersections of race, class and environment in an urban community. This current study is based on …

The Inheritance Of This Moment: An Exploration Of Temporality, Subjectivity, And Liberation In Non-Dual Contemplative Practice And Psychotherapy, Jeremy Axelrad

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation considers the meaning of “present-moment awareness” and its role in psychological healing and transformation. The current conversation around mindfulness, a secularized practice with roots in Buddhist contemplative traditions, has largely unfolded within a dualistic framework in which subject and object are separate from one another as well as from a discrete entity called a moment. While widely appreciated for its capacity to foster well-being and insight, mindfulness as construed above remains disconnected from Buddhist psychology’s non-dualistic view of experience, which radically challenges our ordinary understandings of subjectivity and temporality. In the current project, I sought to explore this …

Measuring Teen Dating Violence Perpetration: A Comparison Of Cumulative And Single Assessment Procedures, Alison Krauss, Ernest N. Jouriles, David Rosenfield, Renee Mcdonald

Psychology Theses and Dissertations

Teen dating violence (TDV) is a widespread and harmful public health concern. The measurement of TDV has undergone some debate, with some researchers suggesting current measurement methods are suboptimal. The current study evaluates the use of cumulative assessments, a measurement method used previously in research on mental health and TDV victimization, to measure TDV perpetration. We hypothesized prevalence of frequency estimates of TDV perpetration would be higher when measured with cumulative assessments compared to a single report. Additionally, we hypothesized TDV perpetration measured cumulatively would more strongly relate to criterion variables than TDV perpetration measured with a single report. A …

The Influence Of Opponent Strategy And Psychopathic Traits On Point Gains And Cooperation In The Iterated Prisoner’S Dilemma, Mary Baggio

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

The Prisoner’s Dilemma game is a paradigm used to model and measure social cooperation. Uncooperative behavior may be one manifestation of the unstable interpersonal functioning in psychopathy. I investigated the effect of opponent strategy as well as psychopathic traits of fearless dominance (FD) and impulsive antisociality (IA) on cooperation rates and total and competitive point gains in a sample of 177 undergraduates playing long, finitely iterated Prisoner’s Dilemma games against computerized opponents who varied in their interpersonal styles from very harsh to very lenient. I analyzed rates of cooperation during each game, participants’ total points gained, and the difference in …

Screen Time, Sleep, And Mental Health: An Investigation Of Electronics Use And Sleep Habits, Robert Nicks

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Internet addiction (IA) is classified as a compulsive-impulsive behavior disorder involving excessive use of the internet, withdrawal, tolerance, and negative repercussions (Block, 2007). Internet usage is becoming more widespread across all industrialized people, and younger people are using the internet more and more as it becomes more ubiquitous (Rideout, Foehr, & Roberts, 2010). The purpose of the current study is to investigate internet usage habits, sleep disturbance, and IA as it appeared in a national United States sample, and a sample seeking clinical psychological help in the Southwestern United States. The results of the current study suggested that IA predicted …

Development Of The Emotional Verbal Learning Test - Spanish (Evlt-S), Davor Nicolas Zink

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Emotional disturbances are common features of clinical disorders and are often present in individuals who have neurodevelopmental or acquired brain disorders. The Hispanic population is the largest and fastest growing ethnic minority group in the United States (U.S.) and by 2050 is projected to be the largest. However, few instruments are available to evaluate emotional functioning in individuals who speak Spanish. Fewer still are available to assess cognitive disturbances resulting from brain dysfunction that impact emotion processing. Normal processing of emotion is critical for social functioning. In recent years it has become apparent that cognitive abilities specialized to process social …

Identifying Youth At Risk For Problematic Absenteeism Using Nonparametric Modeling: The Impact Of Youth Psychopathology And Family Environment Risk Factors, Mirae Fornander

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

The best cutoff to differentiate problematic school absenteeism from nonproblematic school absenteeism has yet to be identified in the literature (Lyon & Cotler, 2007). Contemporary classification systems, including Multi-Tiered Systems of Support (MTSS), depend upon cutoffs to clearly define the various tiers (Jimerson, Burns, & VanDerHeyden, 2016). The current study aimed to inform the MTSS approach while also contributing to early identification, assessment, and intervention methods for those youth and families at the highest risk of problematic school absenteeism and its negative consequences. The current study identified subgroups of youth at the highest risk of problematic absenteeism, defined as equal …