Evaluation of family therapy trainees: acquisition of cognitive and therapeutic behavior skills

In this study, which describes the evaluation of a structural family therapy training program, we developed an evaluation procedure that can be used with other similar training programs. Trainees were evaluated before and after training as to their improvement in cognitive, case-planning and in-therapy intervention skills. Results suggest a progression of skill learning, beginning with cognitive understanding, followed by case planning, and then intervention skills. Though trainees made significant progress in cognitive and planning skills, this was not the case with intervention skills. Trainees' self-evaluations were similar to their results on other measures.     

Psychological skills and mindfulness training effects on the psychological wellbeing of undergraduate music students: An exploratory study

This study explored the efficacy of psychological skills and mindfulness training intervention on the psychological wellbeing of undergraduate music students. Participants were undergraduate music students (n = 36) from the Department of Music at a South African university, 21 of whom were elected to take the psychological skills and mindfulness training intervention. Data on their self-reported psychological wellbeing, psychological skills, mindfulness and performance anxiety levels were collected pre-and post-intervention. The analysis applied non-parametric procedures to determine changes in students’ psychological wellbeing after the seven-week intervention programme. Findings suggest improvements in psychological wellbeing, psychological skills, mindfulness and performance anxiety with training. Psychological skills and mindfulness training may have benefits to the psychological wellbeing of music students.     

Problem-solving training to help workers increase positive affect,job satisfaction,and life satisfaction

The purpose of this study was to determine the effectiveness of brief problem-solving training for improving adjustment in individuals who have low control over their work environment. The 118 participants were flight attendants who were randomly assigned to an intervention or control group. The results indicated that when compared to the control group, those who received the problem-solving skills training reported at postintervention more problem-solving skills, more problem-solving self-efficacy, greater positive affect, higher job satisfaction, and higher life satisfaction. To assess whether improvements were due to experimenter demand, participants completed a measure of openness, which the intervention was not expected to affect. No difference in groups occurred for openness. The results provide evidence that problem-solving training can help improve adjustment in individuals working in low-control environments.     

Effect of an auditory training program on reading, phoneme awareness, and language

This investigation examined the effect of an auditory training program, Fast ForWord-Language, with 26 children ages 7 to 10 years. As two subgroups based on reading ability, all children received 6 wk. of intervention. Thresholds for three conditions of backward masking were obtained pre- and postintervention, and 6 mo. afterward. Immediately following the intervention period, backward masking thresholds improved for all backward masking conditions. Participants also showed increases in language skills and in phoneme awareness but not in reading skills. Six months after intervention, there were improvements in thresholds for backward masking but no improvements in language or reading skills for either group. This study calls into question the efficacy of an intensive auditory training program to improve reading skills.     

Bridging the Gap: Connecting Resident Assistants and Suicidal Residents Through Gatekeeper Training

One hundred sixty‐two resident assistants (RA s) at a large southeastern university were randomly assigned to attend either a specialized 1‐hr training program in suicide prevention (intervention group) or a stress and time management skills training program (control group). The results failed to show the suicide prevention training program had any impact on RA intervention behaviors, resident help‐seeking behaviors, or RA perceptions of resident distress and suicidality 4 months following training. Results are interpreted and discussed in relation to strengthening suicide prevention training programs on college campuses.     

Working memory and early numeracy training in preschool children

Many factors influence children’s performance in mathematical achievement, including both domain-specific and domain-general factors. This study aimed to verify and compare the effects of two types of training on early numerical skills. One type of training focused on the enhancement of working memory, a domain-general precursor, while the other focused on the enhancement of early numeracy, a domain-specific precursor. The participants were 48 five-year-old preschool children. Both the working memory and early numeracy training programs were implemented for 5 weeks. The results showed that the early numeracy intervention specifically improved early numeracy abilities in preschool children, whereas working memory intervention improved not only working memory abilities but also early numeracy abilities. These findings stress the importance of performing activities designed to train working memory abilities, in addition to activities aimed to enhance more specific skills, in the early prevention of learning difficulties during preschool years.     

Effectiveness of a Parent Training Program for Improving Children’s Social Behavior

We tested the efficacy of a social skills training program for the parents of school-aged children experiencing socio-emotional problems. Participating families (N = 42) were randomly assigned to one of three conditions: parent social skills training; parent plus parallel child social skills training; or no-treatment control. The two treatment groups did not differ on any of the outcome measures. Treatment was associated with improvements in parent and child social skills knowledge, parent social problem solving, and child emotional functioning. In follow-up analyses examining mechanisms of change, parental attendance and change in child social skills knowledge predicted response to treatment. Overall, our results highlight the utility of engaging parents as primary participants in the treatment of children’s socio-emotional problems and suggest methods for maximizing the impact of such an intervention.     

Behavioral skills workshop for staff and supervisor in a community residence for developmentally handicapped adults

A behavioral skills workshop for counselors and a supervisor in a community group home was developed and evaluated. The workshop included group skills training, individual supervised in vivo practice, and supervisor training. Supervisor training taught behavioral staff management skills that were delivered in a multiple baseline design across subjects. Positive changes in staff behavior occurred for each group only after supervisor intervention. Significant positive changes occurred by the end of the workshop and were maintained at follow-up for staff self-evaluations of expertise and confidence to resolve problems, severity of client problems, and behavioral observations of positive client behaviors.     

A comparison of skill-building and desensitization strategies for intervention with aggressive children

Social skills training and desensitization interventions were conducted with 41 institutionalized aggressive children aged 7–13. Subjects were randomly assigned after blocking by aggression and cooperative play to either of the treatments. Dependent measures were direct observations of playground play and teacher ratings. Subjects in the social skills program mastered the basic cognitive skills presented to them. Observational data indicated that both groups experienced marked reduction in aggressive behavior and increases in cooperative play. The social skills training intervention engendered incremental improvement in aggression in comparison to the desensitization condition. However, none of the behavioral changes evident in the observations were reflected in teacher ratings.     

A proximal change experiment testing two communication exercises with intimate partner violent men

This study tests the immediate impact of two interventions for intimate partner violent (IPV) men in affecting behavioral and emotional change during arguments with their partners. Couples with an abusive male partner (N = 100) discussed an area of conflict twice, interrupted by a brief intervention. Men were randomly assigned to receive (a) an editing-out-the-negative skills training, (b) an accepting influence skills training, or (c) a time-out. IPV men in both skills-training conditions showed greater decreases in aggressive feelings than IPV men in the time-out condition based on their self-report and observed affective behavior. Women also reported feeling less aggressive when their husbands were assigned to one of the skills-training conditions as compared to the control (time-out) condition. Results suggest that IPV men can learn to adopt new communication skills and that they do appear to have a positive impact on the emotional tone of their arguments. Clinically, communication skills training may be a useful addition to battering intervention programs, although these skills may need to be taught to both men and women involved in violent relationships.     

FUNCTIONAL COMMUNICATION TRAINING USING ASSISTIVE DEVICES: RECRUITING NATURAL COMMUNITIES OF REINFORCEMENT

We evaluated the effectiveness of functional communication training (FCT) as an intervention for the problem behavior exhibited by 5 students with severe disabilities both in school and in the community. Following an assessment of the function of their problem behavior, the students were taught to use assistive communication devices in school to request the objects and activities that presumably were maintaining their behavior. Multiple baseline data collected across the students indicated that not only did the students use their devices successfully, but the intervention also reduced their problem behavior. In addition, data from community settings showed generalization to untrained community members. These results replicate other successful efforts to use FCT with individuals having limited communication skills, and demonstrate the value of teaching skills to recruit natural communities of reinforcement in order to generalize intervention effects to meaningful nontraining environments.     

Skills Training for Spouses of Patients with Alzheimer's Disease: Outcomes of an Intervention Study

The effects of a 12-week intervention on a patient-focused skills training group and a caregiver-focused skills training group were compared with those on a control group that received comparable attention, but no training. Intervention effects were monitored at the completion of the treatment phase and at 3- and 6-months postintervention. Treatment implementation was documented in a comprehensive fashion to ensure replicability. Both training groups acquired skills that enabled them to improve targeted behaviors (patient problem behaviors and caregiver mood, respectively). Weaker effects were found for more distal outcomes, such as depression, perceived stress, caregiver strain, and self-efficacy.     

Can SMART Training Really Increase Intelligence? A Replication Study

A burgeoning research stream supports the efficacy of a novel behavior-analytic intervention, known as SMART training, in raising general intelligence by training a set of crucial cognitive skills, referred to as relational skills. A sample of Irish secondary school students (n?=?26) was divided into two IQ matched groups, with the experimental group receiving 12 weeks of SMART training delivered in bi-weekly 45-min sessions. WASI IQ assessments were administered at baseline and follow-up to all participants by blind testers. For each of the three WASI IQ indices and the four IQ subtests, significant follow-up rises were found for the experimental group only. Analyses of variance indicated a significant effect of training on Verbal IQ, Matrix Reasoning and Vocabulary scores. Results lend further support for the efficacy of the SMART training program in enhancing intellectual skills.     

Evaluation of a social problem-solving skills program for third- and fourth-grade students

The effects of a social problem-solving (SPS) training program for entire classrooms of third- and fourth-grade children were examined in two studies. In the first study, experimental children showed significantly greater improvement in knowledge and performance of SPS skills than control children. However, both positive and negative effects of the intervention (varying by classroom) were found on measures of behavioral adjustment, self-efficacy, and peer acceptance at a 6-month follow-up. The second study compared two different intervention strategies: (a) SPS training with teacher-student dialoguing, peer pairing, and self-monitoring, and (b) SPS training with dialoguing only. It was found that children in both the experimental and control groups improved significantly in performance of SPS skills but no differences between the groups were found for changes in behavioral adjustment, self-efficacy, and peer acceptance. The limitations of cognitively mediated interventions for young children were discussed.     

Effects of training in visual discrimination after one year: visual analysis of volleyball skills.

Although the effects of specialized training in visual analysis of skills are well documented, whether the effects are lasting is not. The purpose of the present study was to analyze the effect a visual skills training program in volleyball had on participants one year after the completion of a training intervention. Subjects received either traditional performance instruction supplemented with visual training or traditional performance instruction in volleyball only. All subjects remaining in the teacher education program from a previous study were given a visual test on diagnosing errors in three different volleyball skills (the forearm pass, the overhead pass, and the overhead serve). Subjects exposed to visual training remained significantly better at diagnosing errors for the three volleyball skills one year later as compared to those subjects who had not received visual training.     

动觉监督早期介入对动作技能形成的影响

通过人工动作技能项目和典型职业操作技能项目的训练活动,研究了动觉监督早期介入对动作技能形成的影响,结果表明早期进行动觉监督训练可以更为充分、有效地发挥动觉监督的作用,提高动作技能形成的成绩和效率。据此讨论了“视觉为主转化为动觉为主”监督机制观点的局限性,认为自觉的职业操作技能训练活动无须遵循这一结论;提出了含有动觉训练的职业操作技能训练模式。     

The Effects of Cognitive Restructuring and Decision-Making Training on Career Indecision

The authors designed a cognitive restructuring intervention for individuals having difficulty with career decision making and compared the intervention to a decision skills intervention and a no-treatment control. The cognitive restructuring intervention was more effective than were both decision-making training and the control condition in reducing anxiety about career decision making and in encouraging vocational exploratory behavior. Cognitive restructuring clients also reported more use of the skills they had learned, were more satisfied with the decisions they made, and found the treatment program more useful in making career decisions than did clients in the other two groups.     

Control-group study of an intervention training program for youth suicide prevention

Few studies have examined whether training can improve competency in intervening with suicidal youths. In this study we attempted to verify the effectiveness of such a training program on helper competency. Forty-three helpers who received the training were compared with 28 helpers who did not. Participants who received the training improved in knowledge, attitudes, and intervention skills following the training, compared with the control group across measures. Their gains were maintained at 6-month follow-up. In this sample, implementation of a one-time training program improved helpers' competencies in youth suicide intervention.     

A Cognitive-Skills Model for Counselor Training and Supervision

This article describes a model for training counselors in cognitive skills that can be used to supplement any systematic training approach to behavioral skills. The four phases of the training model are designed to teach counselor trainees cognitive skills and self-instructional strategies related to (a) attending to and seeking information, (b) forming hypotheses and conceptual models, and (c) intervention planning and self-instruction. Instructional techniques and exercises are described for each training phase.