Bridging Science to Practice: Achieving Prevention Program Implementation Fidelity in the Community Youth Development Study

This paper describes the development, application, and results of an implementation monitoring component of the Communities That Care (CTC) prevention framework used in the Community Youth Development Study (CYDS) to ensure high-fidelity prevention program implementation. This system was created based on research that community-based implementation of evidence-based prevention programs often includes adaptations in program design, content, or manner of delivery (Gottfredson and Gottfredson, Journal of research in crime and delinquency, 39, 3-35, 2002; Hallfors and Godette, Health Education Research, 17, 461-470, 2002; Wandersman and Florin, American Psychologist, 58, 441-448, 2003). A lack of fidelity to the implementation standards delineated by program designers is one indicator of a gap between prevention science and practice which can lessen the likelihood that communities will realize the positive participant effects demonstrated in research trials. By using the CTC model to select and monitor the quality of prevention activities, the 12 CYDS communities replicated 13 prevention programs with high rates of adherence to the programs' core components and in accordance with dosage requirements regarding the number, length, and frequency of sessions. This success indicates the potential of the CTC program implementation monitoring system to enhance community Prevention Delivery Systems (Wandersman et al. American Journal of Community Psychology, this issue) and improve the likelihood of desired participant changes.     

Pathways from infant exposure to marital conflict to parent–toddler role reversal

We know that exposure to marital conflict places infants at risk, but we know less about processes. One process may be role reversal, when a distressed parent looks to the child to meet unmet needs for comfort, intimacy, or companionship. A parent in marital conflict may be particularly prone to role reversal, which in turn adversely affects child development. The current study examined pathways from infants' exposure to marital conflict at 12 months to role reversal at 24 months. We sampled low–middle socioeconomic status (SES) families with their first child (N = 128). Independent observers assessed marital conflict (in a problem‐solving task) and role reversal (in a story‐telling task). We found that each parent's conflict behavior predicted the other parent's role reversal. In a direct pathway, mother's conflict behavior towards father led directly to father's role reversal with the child. In an indirect pathway, father's conflict behavior towards mother led to his withdrawal from her, which in turn led to mother's role reversal with the child. Clinical implications are discussed within a developmental psychopathology framework in terms of preventive interventions to offset the deleterious effect of marital conflict and role reversal on child development.     

Regulatory Fit and Persuasion: Basic Principles and Remaining Questions

How can researchers and practitioners use regulatory fit theory to increase the effectiveness of their attempts to change attitudes and behavior? In this article, we extract from the literature a set of basic processes by which fit can influence persuasion and describe different methods for inducing fit. Regulatory fit can influence persuasion by: (i) making message recipients feel right during message reception; (ii) increasing recipients’ strength of engagement with the message, which contributes to processing fluency; and (iii) influencing elaboration likelihood. Integral methods induce fit within the persuasion situation (as with framing of message arguments, source delivery style, and decision means), whereas incidental methods induce fit independent of the persuasion situation. We discuss common difficulties researchers may encounter with these techniques, and clarify existing confusions about regulatory fit and regulatory focus theory. Throughout, we highlight important questions that must be addressed to attain a complete understanding of regulatory fit.     

Introduction to the Special Section: Advances in psychological prevention and treatment interventions to promote children's mental health

This paper introduces the Special Section on Advances in Psychological Prevention and Treatment Interventions to Promote Children's Mental Health. The three articles in the Special Section provide perspectives on the adaptation, evaluation, and implementation of evidence‐based psychological interventions for children in countries in Northern and Eastern Europe, and Latin America. The articles highlight disparate methodologies for the examination of intervention data, including addressing causal inference in the absence of availability of true experiment data (i.e., randomised controlled trial data), randomised trial data from a school‐based prevention programme, and predictors of change in an evidence‐based treatment programme. Together, the articles highlight the movement of evidence‐based practices into routine care settings and emerging strategies for settings in which randomised trial data are not yet available. They demonstrate the contribution of psychological research to the advancement of practices for improving children's mental health.     

Efficacy and social support as predictors of parenting stress among families in poverty

Using a sample of low‐income mothers enrolled in Early Head Start (n = 65), this study tested the hypothesis that parenting stress is affected by social support and self‐efficacy, in addition to family risk status and family income. Specifically, it was proposed that social support and self‐efficacy are psychological resources that are associated with lower parenting stress levels, and would moderate the impact of family income on parenting stress. A significant proportion of variance in parenting stress was explained by self‐efficacy, family risk, and the interaction of self‐efficacy and family income; family income alone was not a significant predictor of parenting stress levels. Mothers higher in self‐efficacy had lower levels of parenting stress, and income was less associated with parenting stress levels for mothers high in self‐efficacy. Social support was not associated with lower parenting stress levels, nor did social support moderate the effect of income on parenting stress. Family risk was also a strong and reliable predictor of parenting stress, suggesting that family circumstances are perhaps better predictors of parenting stress levels than income alone. These findings suggest that parenting stress among low‐income parents should be viewed as a function of psychological, as well as financial, resources.     

‘It all boils down to respect doesn't it?’: Enacting a sense of community in a deprived inner‐city area

Audio recordings of meetings of two community groups in a deprived inner‐city area were analysed, using discursive psychological and conversation analytic techniques to explore situated enactments of ‘community’. Participants situated themselves as members of a geographical community, of an ‘imagined’ community and of other constitutive communities. A sense of community was enacted through five interactional strategies: Affirming moral codes, ‘defending’ other members, distinguishing insiders from outsiders, enacting empowerment and challenging institutions. Participants regularly employed emotional displays and affirmed moral positions, both to constitute ‘community’ and to take action in it. In so doing they worked up social capital and positioned community concerns in ways more reflective of their own situated values than of criminal law or government policy. Copyright © 2011 John Wiley & Sons, Ltd.     

On-again/off-again dating relationships: what keeps partners coming back?

Building on research comparing on-again/off-again (on-off) relationships to other dating relationships, the current study focused on a unique feature of these relationships-renewals. A sample of 274 participants who had experienced an on-off relationship completed a survey about why they renewed their relationships, characteristics of their breakups and renewals, and what stressors and benefits they experienced. These characteristics were used to predict the occurrence of renewals, separately as well as in multivariate analyses. In addition to lingering feelings being a predominant reason for renewals, findings suggested uncertainty about what the preceding breakup indicated, not having dated others after breakups, and feeling the on-off nature improved the relationship were all related to an increased chance of renewals. Mutual initiations of breakups, as well as reporting uncertainty about the general nature of the relationship, were also related to a decreased chance of renewals.     

Direct and indirect relationships among posttraumatic stress disorder,depression, hostility,anger, and verbal and physical aggression in returning veterans

Hostility, anger, and aggression are conceptually related but unique constructs found to occur more often among veterans with posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD) than among civilians or veterans without PTSD. However, the pathways between PTSD, depression, hostility, anger, and aggression have not been comprehensively characterized. Therefore, drawing on a sample of returning Operation Enduring Freedom/Operation Iraqi Freedom combat veterans ( N = 175; 95% male; mean age 30 years), this study sought to examine the direct and indirect relationships among PTSD, depression, hostility, anger, and four types of aggression: verbal, and physical toward self, others, and objects. Functional modeling of direct effects was done using multiple least-squares regression and bootstrapped mediation analyses were carried out to test indirect effects. Results indicate that PTSD is not the overall direct contributor to different forms of aggression, supporting the mediating role of depression and trait anger. Depression symptoms explain part of the relationships between PTSD and verbal aggression, physical aggression toward objects, and physical aggression toward self and trait anger explains part of the relationships between PTSD and verbal aggression, physical aggression toward objects, and physical aggression toward others. Our findings support the importance of assessing for anger, depression, and different types of aggression among veterans presenting for PTSD treatment to develop individualized treatment plans that may benefit from early incorporation of interventions.     

Objectification in Heterosexual Romantic Relationships: Examining Relationship Satisfaction of Female Objectification Recipients and Male Objectifying Perpetrators

Sex Roles - Sexual objectification is one of most the common manifestations of discrimination against women in Western societies; however, few studies have examined objectification in the context...