Family Centred Brief Solution-focused Therapy with Chronic Schizophrenia: a Pilot Study

The purpose of the study was to pilot a family centred brief solution-focused therapy model (BSFT) with families and clients diagnosed with schizophrenia. A control group of clients and their families received traditional outpatient therapy, while an experimental group of clients and their families were treated with a BSFT model. All participants were pre-tested and then post-tested with the Family Environment Scale after five therapy sessions over a ten-week period. Significant differences between the groups were found on expressiveness, active-recreational orientation, moral-religious emphasis and family incongruence. The participation of families and clients with schizophrenia in family centred brief solution-focused therapy produced encouraging results and demonstrated the need for expanded studies using BSFT with other chronically mentally ill clients and their families.     

Positive Leader Behaviors and Workplace Incivility: the Mediating Role of Perceived Norms for Respect

Scholars have called for research on the antecedents of mistreatment in organizations such as workplace incivility, as well as the theoretical mechanisms that explain their linkage. To address this call, the present study draws upon social information processing and social cognitive theories to investigate the relationship between positive leader behaviors—those associated with charismatic leadership and ethical leadership—and workers’ experiences of workplace incivility through their perceptions of norms for respect. Relationships were separately examined in two field studies using multi-source data (employees and coworkers in study 1, employees and supervisors in study 2). Results suggest that charismatic leadership (study 1) and ethical leadership (study 2) are negatively related to employee experiences of workplace incivility through employee perceptions of norms for respect. Norms for respect appear to operate as a mediating mechanism through which positive forms of leadership may negatively relate to workplace incivility. The paper concludes with a discussion of implications for organizations regarding leader behaviors that foster norms for respect and curb uncivil behaviors at work.     

The Relationship Between Treatment Acceptability and Youth Outcome in Group CBT for Youth with ASD and Anxiety

Anxiety is one of the most common co-occurring diagnoses in youth with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Cognitive behavior therapy (CBT) is an evidence-based treatment that has been tailored for youth with ASD and anxiety and has shown good efficacy in reducing youth anxiety immediately after treatment. One area that has not been widely studied is acceptability of CBT for anxiety in this population. Acceptability includes beliefs about the potential helpfulness and satisfaction with a given treatment and may be important in understanding treatment outcomes. This study focuses on parent, youth, and clinician acceptability of a well-researched CBT program, Facing Your Fears, for youth with ASD and anxiety. Data was collected as part of a larger multi-site study that compared three different instructional conditions for clinicians learning the intervention. Results indicated that parents rated acceptability as higher for the overall treatment compared to youth. Further, youth and parents rated exposure related sessions as more acceptable than psychoeducation, and higher exposure acceptability ratings were predictive of lower youth anxiety levels post-treatment. Clinicians who received ongoing consultation rated treatment acceptability lower than clinicians in the other training conditions. While some clinicians may be hesitant to implement exposure techniques with this population, findings suggest that it is the technique that parents and youth rated as the most acceptable. Results are discussed in terms of treatment and research implications for youth with ASD and their families.     

Training Community Clergy in Serious Illness: Balancing Faith and Medicine

Community-based clergy are highly engaged in helping seriously ill patients address spiritual concerns at the end of life (EOL). While they desire EOL training, no data exist in guiding how to conceptualize a clergy-training program. The objective of this study was used to identify best practices in an EOL training program for community clergy. As part of the National Clergy Project on End-of-Life Care, the project conducted key informant interviews and focus groups with active clergy in five US states (California, Illinois, Massachusetts, New York, and Texas). A diverse purposive sample of 35 active clergy representing pre-identified racial, educational, theological, and denominational categories hypothesized to be associated with more intensive utilization of medical care at the EOL. We assessed suggested curriculum structure and content for clergy EOL training through interviews and focus groups for the purpose of qualitative analysis. Thematic analysis identified key themes around curriculum structure, curriculum content, and issues of tension. Curriculum structure included ideas for targeting clergy as well as lay congregational leaders and found that clergy were open to combining resources from both religious and health-based institutions. Curriculum content included clergy desires for educational topics such as increasing their medical literacy and reviewing pastoral counseling approaches. Finally, clergy identified challenging barriers to EOL training needing to be openly discussed, including difficulties in collaborating with medical teams, surrounding issues of trust, the role of miracles, and caution of prognostication. Future EOL training is desired and needed for community-based clergy. In partnering together, religious–medical training programs should consider curricula sensitive toward structure, desired content, and perceived clergy tensions.     

Comorbid interpretation and expectancy bias in social anxiety and alcohol use

Background: In two studies, the present research examined whether being high in both social anxiety and alcohol use disorder symptoms is associated with a comorbid interpretation and expectancy bias that reflects their bidirectional relationship.

Design: Cross-sectional, quantitative surveys.

Methods: Measures of social anxiety and alcohol use disorder symptoms, as well as an interpretation and expectancy bias task assessing biases for social anxiety, drinking, and comorbid social anxiety and drinking.

Results: In Study 1 (N?=?447), individuals high (vs. low) in social anxiety had stronger social threat bias and individuals high (vs. low) in alcohol use disorder symptoms had stronger drinking bias. Those high in both social anxiety and alcohol use disorder symptoms endorsed interpretations and expectancies linking social interaction with alcohol use. Comorbid bias predicted membership into the high social anxiety/drinking group, even after taking into account single-disorder biases. In Study 2 (N?=?325), alcohol use disorder symptoms predicted drinking bias and social anxiety symptoms predicted social anxiety bias. Alcohol use disorder symptoms, social anxiety symptoms, and their interaction predicted comorbid interpretation and expectancy bias.

Conclusion: Results indicate unique cognitive vulnerability markers for persons with comorbid social anxiety and alcohol use disorder symptoms, which may improve detection and treatment of this serious comorbidity.