An innovative academic seminar model

This paper describes a collaboration between an urban antipoverty agency, Action for Boston Community Development (ABCD), and a private higher education institution, Lesley College. This collaboration is providing a bachelor's degree program for adults associated with human service agencies. The introductory course, which is the focus of this paper, served to validate the students' experiential learning, helped them gain needed skills, and empowered them to make positive changes in both their perceptions and behaviors. Within a remarkable short period, the individuals in this group made significant changes in their lives. The program described can serve as a model in creating nontraditional partnerships to address the needs of underserved adult populations.     

Referring and Reporting Research Participants at Risk: Views from Urban Adolescents

Researching developmental risks of urban youth raises ethical concerns when an investigator discovers a participant is in jeopardy. This study collected data on 147 seventh, ninth, and eleventh graders' views of 3 investigator options: (1) taking no action and maintaining confidentiality, (2) reporting the problem to a concerned parent or adult, and (3) facilitating adolescent self-referrals. Participants judged these options within the context of 5 risk domains: substance abuse, child maltreatment, life-threatening behaviors, delinquency, and shyness. Judgments of reporting options were related to grade and ratings of risk severity, but not to moral reasoning. Confidentiality was viewed favorably for risk behaviors of low perceived severity or for which the consequences of adult discovery might introduce greater risk. Confidentiality was viewed unfavorably and reporting to adults favorably for child maltreatment and threats of suicide. Self-referral was viewed favorably across all grades and risk behaviors. Implications of adolescent perspectives for research ethics are discussed.     

Adolescents' perceptions of their fathers' involvement: Significance to school attitudes

Based on data from 2,722 British adolescents aged 14–18 years, this study explored whether perceived father involvement can be associated with school attitudes even after controlling for perceived mother involvement. Multiple regression analysis showed that both father involvement and mother involvement contributed significantly and independently to positive school attitudes. Furthermore, the association between father involvement and school attitudes was the same for sons and daughters. We did not find evidence to support the notion that being in a non‐intact family weakens the association between perceived father involvement and school attitudes. Finally, there was no evidence suggesting that the impact of perceived father involvement on school attitudes depends on the level of perceived mother involvement. © 2002, Wiley Periodicals, Inc.     

Family Needs, and Self-Efficacy During a Child's Social Support Transition to School

The needs of families of young children with handicaps were examined in relationship to the transition from an early intervention/preschool program to school placements. The results showed that needs became less pronounced during and after a transition compared to the time period during which transition planning occurred, and that the self-efficacy of the parents during and following transitions was positively influenced by social support and the interaction between transition time and social support. The implications of the findings for promoting effective transitions are discussed, especially the importance of identifying and responding to both child- and family-level needs if broad-based social influences are to be assured as a result of transition activities.     

Preterm Children at Early Adolescence and Continuity and Discontinuity in Maternal Responsiveness from Infancy

Patterns in mother-child interaction from infancy to age 12 were investigated in a prospective, longitudinal study of 44 English-speaking mothers and their preterm children. Maternal responsiveness was assessed by home observations during infancy and the Family Interaction Q-Sort at age 12, derived from 2 structured laboratory situations requiring cooperation of mother and child. A cluster of maternal behaviors of critical control toward the toddler was assessed at age 2 years. Children of mothers who were consistently more responsive during both infancy and early adolescence, as well as children whose mothers became more responsive by age 12, achieved higher IQ and arithmetic scores, had more positive self-esteem, and their teachers reported fewer behavioral and emotional problems than children of mothers who were consistently less responsive both during infancy and at age 12. Continuity in parenting behaviors was related to control and criticism beginning in the toddler period and not to degree of responsiveness to the infant.     

The Family Context of Gender Intensification in Early Adolescence

This longitudinal study of 144 young adolescents (ages 9–11 at phase 1) examined the hypothesis that boys and girls would experience increased "gender-differential socialization" across a 1-year period in early adolescence, and that such patterns would be stronger in families in which ( a ) parents maintained a traditional division of labor, and ( b ) there was a younger sibling of the opposite gender. Longitudinal analyses of 3 aspects of family socialization (adolescents' participation in "feminine" and "masculine" household chores; adolescents' involvement in dyadic activities with mothers and fathers; parental monitoring) revealed that gender intensification was apparent for some aspects of family socialization but not others. In addition, when gender intensification was apparent, it generally emerged in some family contexts but not in others. Only dyadic parent-adolescent involvement was characterized by an overall pattern of gender intensification in which girls became increasingly involved with their mothers and boys with their fathers; this pattern was exacerbated in contexts where adolescents had a younger, opposite-sex sibling.     

Recruiting,Funding, and Hiring of Doctoral Students in Physical Education Teacher Education

ABSTRACT

This article examines trends and issues surrounding recruiting, funding, and hiring of doctoral physical education teacher education (D-PETE) students and graduates. Sources for this examination were background data collected by Boyce and her colleagues, the existing literature on these topics, and qualitative data gathered from 30 sport pedagogists during one round-table session at the National Association for Kinesiology in Higher Education (NAKHE) conference in January 2015. All three sources indicated the importance of recruiting and funding of students and hiring of graduates to the future of D-PETE programs. A number of paths were identified which sport pedagogists could follow in order to keep D-PETE programs safe and help them flourish. Unfortunately, agreement as to which of these paths the field should take was often in short supply. In the conclusions section, suggestions for future research of recruiting, funding, and hiring are made with the goal of providing data which could lead to sport pedagogists making more informed decisions regarding the future direction of D-PETE.     

An evaluation of a group CBT programme for children with a diagnosis of autism spectrum disorder in a school age disability service

Research has shown that rates of clinical anxiety levels are higher among young people with an ASD than their typically developing peers. This study conducted an exploratory investigation into the impact of a specifically tailored CBT group programme on anxiety levels in young people with ASD. The 12 week CBT programme was delivered to 12 children with a diagnosis of ASD in a children’s disability team in Ireland. An embedded mixed methods design was utilised and inferences were drawn by collecting and analysing quantitative and qualitative data separately. Findings indicate CBT can be delivered successfully to a group of children with ASD. As is the nature of an embedded design, quantitative findings are reported as supportive evidence for the qualitative findings of this study. The positive preliminary findings suggest a rigorous, large scale evaluation is needed to determine the overall effectiveness of the programme with this population.