Revising the Communication Mediation Model for a New Political Communication Ecology

A long tradition of research focuses on conversation as a key catalyst for community integration and a focal mediator of media influence on participation. Changes in media systems, political environments, and electoral campaigning demand that these influences, and the communication mediation model, be revised to account for the growing convergence of media and conversation, heightened partisan polarization, and deepening social contentiousness in media politics. We propose a revised communication mediation model that continues to emphasize the centrality of face‐to‐face and online talk in democratic life, while considering how mediational and self‐reflective processes that encourage civic engagement and campaign participation might also erode institutional legitimacy, foster distrust and partisan divergence, disrupting democratic functioning as a consequence of a new communication ecology.     

Comparing Alliance in Two Cognitive-Behavioural Therapies for Adolescents With ADHD Using a Randomized Controlled Trial

Alliance is defined as the client-therapist bond and their ability to collaborate on therapeutic activities. Treatment for adolescents with ADHD is rarely studied in terms of alliance. In this study, two cognitive-behavioral treatments (CBT; one structured treatment aimed at planning skills and one less-structured solution-focused treatment, both delivered in the style of Motivational Interviewing) were compared with regard to alliance and alliance-outcome association. The influence of therapist competence on this alliance-outcome association was also evaluated. The alliance between 69 adolescents diagnosed with ADHD and their therapists was measured early in treatment, using the Therapy Process Observational Coding System for Child Psychotherapy–Alliance scale. Observer-rated therapist competence was measured using the Motivational Interviewing Treatment Integrity scale (version 3.1.1.). Outcome variables were the adolescents’ reduction in planning problems and ADHD symptoms. The alliance, and, more specifically, collaboration on therapeutic activities, was significantly higher for the more structured CBT (p = .04; moderate effect size). Alliance was not related to outcome in the more structured CBT, while the alliance was positively related to the reduction in planning problems in the less structured CBT. Finally, alliance was a significant mediator between therapist competence and treatment outcome for the less-structured CBT. The clarity and structure of CBT may help facilitate alliance formation for adolescents with ADHD who often have difficulty implementing structure themselves. Therapists may need to invest more in alliance formation in less structured CBT as the alliance affects outcome. Moreover, enhancing therapist competence in less structured CBT may help improve outcomes in less structured CBT, as therapist competence may impact outcome through alliance.     

How effective is workplace counselling? A review of the research literature

The provision of counselling for work‐related problems has expanded in recent years, as organisations have recognised the value of this approach to staff support. However, there has been relatively little research into the outcomes of workplace counselling, and no systematic reviews have been conducted into the effectiveness of counselling in this setting. This paper presents the results of a preliminary review of evidence in this area. 34 studies of the effectiveness of workplace counselling were identified, of which 16 were sufficiently well designed to be considered as comprising reliable findings. The results of these studies suggest that, in general, workplace counselling is effective for clients for a wide variety of type and severity of presenting problems, employed across a range of different organisational contexts. The paper includes discussion of methodological issues associated with this research, recommendations for further research, and implications for practice.     

An administratively created reality: Some problems with the use of self‐report questionnaire measures of adjustment in counselling/psychotherapy outcome research

Outcome research in counselling and psychotherapy has come to rely heavily on the use of self‐report questionnaire measures of anxiety, depression and general symptomatology. The validity of these measures in the context of psychotherapy research has, in general, been taken for granted. This paper proposes that, despite the success of self‐report questionnaires in personality research and personnel selection, there are significant problems involved in the use of these methods in research into therapeutic change. Specifically, three areas of difficulty are reviewed. First, questionnaires are completed in a social setting that itself changes as a result of therapy. Second, the experience of psychotherapy changes the way that clients make sense of questionnaire items (the ‘response shift’ phenomenon). Third, the conceptualisation of the person implicit in questionnaire design is not compatible with the conceptualisation of persons espoused by most contemporary therapeutic approaches. It is argued that the continuing popularity of self‐report questionnaires can be understood in terms of Kurt Danziger's model of the social construction of psychological knowledge.