An inexpensive CRT terminal controller/computer

An inexpensive CRT terminal controller/computer is described. The board integrates virtually any keyboard and CRT monitor into a work station with firmware-governed intelligence. The system is designed to fill the cost/functionality niche below the Apple microcomputer. It can be configured as a dumb or smart terminal (approximately $100 plus keyboard and CRT monitor), as a self-contained computer that runs ROM-based software such as a small BASIC or an assembler/disassembler fan additional $100 in chips), or as a word processor if aa audio cassette ($50) or dual digital cassettes with controller ($125) are added.     

Disclosure and Self-Advocacy Regarding Disability-Related Needs: Strategies to Maximize Integration in Postsecondary Education

This article reviews issues related to disclosure of disability and disability related needs by students in postsecondary education. The first section familiarizes counselors with research related to disclosure; to benefits and concerns regarding disclosure: and to attitudes that are relevant to the issue of disclosure. The second section provides counseling and systems change strategies to enhance the disclosure and self-advocacy skills of students with disabilities regarding disabilily-related needs.     

Counseling for Dropout Prevention: Applications From Multicultural Counseling

Although high school dropout rates have declined over the past several years, rates remain high for many segments of our population. Most of the attention devoted to dropout prevention counseling has focused on group counseling or programmatic issues, whereas individual counseling has largely been ignored. This article draws on commonalities between multicultural counseling and dropout prevention to produce a general framework for individual counseling with students who have potential to drop out of high school.     

A review of functional assessment use in data-based intervention studies

We reviewed the extent and variety of functional assessment procedures used in behavioral intervention studies. The contents of six research journals dating from 1986 to 1992 were searched for articles describing single-subject intervention studies that targeted problematic social behaviors. Articles meeting this initial criteria were examined to determine if a functional assessment was conducted. If so, the various procedures comprising the functional assessment, types of interventions conducted, and demographic characteristics of study participants were recorded for each study. Results are compared to similar reviews of research dating from 1980–1985. Potential reasons for the paucity of studies incorporating functional assessment procedures are discussed. Finally, directions for future research and applied practice are provided.     

Relationship between the Millon Behavioral Health Inventory and the minnesota multiphasic personality inventory (MMPI) in low-back pain patients

The Millon Behavioral Health Inventory (MBHI) is being used with increasing frequency for the assessment of chronic pain, although there is a relative lack of evidence as to its utility, and prior studies have not examined low back pain. This investigation compared the MBHI to the MMPI in a sample of low-back pain patients and analyzed subgroups of pain patients based upon their MBHI responses. Subjects were 60 patients who had been admitted to outpatient multidisciplinary pain clinics of two Chicago-area hospitals. Patients completed both the MMPI and the MBHI and provided demographic information. Results of correlational analyses indicated strong relationships between the MBHI psychogenic attitude, psychosomatic correlate, and prognostic index scales and the validity scales of the MMPI. The MBHI Pain Treatment Responsivity scale (PP) correlated with 16 of the other 19 MBHI scales. PP did not demonstrate specificity with low back pain patients. The results of both the scale comparisons and the exploratory two-group cluster subgroup analysis support the notion that responses to the MBHI are largely affected by the respondent's tendency to deny psychopathology or to admit emotional distress.     

Using empowerment theory in collaborative partnerships for community health and development

Models of community empowerment help us understand the process of gaining influence over conditions that matter to people who share neighborhoods, workplaces, experiences, or concerns. Such frameworks can help improve collaborative partnerships for community health and development. First, we outline an interactive model of community empowerment that describes reciprocal influences between personal or group factors and environmental factors in an empowerment process. Second, we describe an iterative framework for the process of empowerment in community partnerships that includes collaborative planning, community action, community change, capacity building, and outcomes, and adaptation, renewal, and institutionalization. Third, we outline activities that are used by community leadership and support organizations to facilitate the process of community empowerment. Fourth, we present case stories of collaborative partnerships for prevention of substance abuse among adolescents to illustrate selected enabling activities. We conclude with a discussion of the challenges and opportunities of facilitating empowerment with collaborative partnerships for community health and development. This work was supported by Kansas Health Foundation Grants 9206032B and 9206032A to support and evaluate community partnerships to prevent adolescent substance abuse. Thanks to Tom Wolff for sharing his wisdom about community coalitions so generously, and to Bill Berkowitz and anonymous reviewers for thoughtful comments on an earlier version of this manuscrpt. We also thank our colleagues from the Kansas Health Foundation, Mary K. Campuzano, Steve Coen, and Marni Vliet, and those from collaborating communities, who continue to teach us about ways to enhance community capacities to address local concerns.     

Stimulus equivalence instruction of fraction-decimal relations

Stimulus control technology was applied to the instruction of fraction ratio (e.g., (1/5)) and decimal (e.g., 0.20) relations, with 7 students who demonstrated difficulty in fraction and decimal tasks. The students were trained to match pictorial representations of fractions (B comparison stimuli) to printed counterpart fraction ratios (A sample stimuli), and to match printed decimals (C comparison stimuli) to pictorial representations of counterpart quantities (B sample stimuli). Posttest performance by all participants indicated the emergence of equivalence relations between fractions represented as ratios, decimals, and pictures. Limited generalization of fraction-decimal relations was observed.     

When Manipulation Backfires: The Effects of Time Delay and Requester on the Foot-in-the-Door Technique

We examined the effects of 2 variables on compliance rates within the foot-in-the-door procedure. Participants who agreed to a small request were presented with a larger request either immediately after the first request or 2 days later. The second request was presented either by the same person or by a different requester. Compared to a control group receiving only the large request, participants were more likely to agree to the second request in all experimental conditions except one. When the same requester presented the second request without delay, participants were less likely than the control group to agree to the target request. This latter condition represents a situation in which typical foot-in-the-door procedures can backfire on the requester.     

The Reinvention of Behavioral Health Services in the VA System

The Veterans Health Administration under the direction of Kenneth Kizer, M.D., has faced the challenge of providing high-quality health care while controlling costs. Under Dr. Kizer's direction, VA hospitals are moving toward managed patient centered primary care. Hospital organization, funding, and clinical practices have been changed. Reorganization has meant a variety of possibilities for psychologists employed in the VA system.     

Silence in context: Ethnomethodology and social theory

Ethnomethodologists (or at least many of them) have been reticent about their theoretical sources and methodological principles. It frequently falls to others to make such matters explicit. In this paper I discuss this silence about theory, but rather than entering the breach by specifying a set of implicit assumptions and principles, I suggest that the reticence is consistent with ethnomethodology's distinctive research 'program'. The main part of the paper describes the pedagogical exercises and forms of apprenticeship through which Garfinkel and Sacks aimed to develop ethnomethodology as a practice. These efforts were not entirely successful, partly because ethnomethodological 'practice' required an engagement with other fully-fledged practices. Aside from the difficulties of mastering such practices, it was unclear what an ethnomethodological study would add to, or take from, them. Whether successful or not, ethnomethodological research points to the specificity of discourse and action in any given practice which a general theory is bound to misconstrue. Current disputes about cultural constructivist versions of natural science illustrate the problems that arise when the terms of a general theory are used to describe and evaluate specific domains of practice. The paper concludes by recommending ethnomethodology as a way to dissolve an unbridgeable gap between cultural theories and socially located practices.