Les interventions préventives en santé mentale du jeune enfant vues par leurs bénéficiaires : l’exemple du projet CAPEDP

ObjectiveHome-visiting programs have become one of the most popular early childhood interventions, though their impact on parents and children remain uncertain. Outcomes measures often rely on experimental quantitative design and little space is offered for the voices of those served by these interventions. This paper presents the results of a qualitative protocol performed by the research team with participants in the CAPEDP project which took place in France from 2005 to 2011.MethodAll 184 women who had accepted at least one home visit in the CAPEDP programme were contacted and invited to participate. Individual and group interviews were conducted with the first 16 who accepted to participate. The semi-structured interview schedule addressed their overall appreciation of the project, their initial concerns, the quality of their relationship with their home visiting psychologist, positive and negative aspects of the intervention and any recommendations they might have for future interventions. Interviews were recorded, transcribed and anonymised. An inductive categorical thematic analysis was performed by the research team.ResultsParticipants expressed overall satisfaction with the CAPEDP intervention, underlining the quality of the relationships with the home visitors, usefulness of parental guidance, the fact that the intervention could be adapted to suit their own personal agenda, routine and needs, the importance of learning how to accept help and give help to others. Less positive aspects included the fact that the home visitors were not mothers themselves and that they lacked technical experience, the difficulty ending the relationship at the end of the 27-month project, insufficient integration of fathers, the difficult and time-consuming evaluation protocol and the lack of interaction with other parents during the intervention.ConclusionAlthough mothers who accepted to participate in the qualitative interview schedule may have had a more positive overall experience of the CAPEDP project than those who declined to participate, participants’ points of view provide potentially useful indications for adapting future home-visiting programs to the French context.     

Error adaptation in mental arithmetic

Until now, error and conflict adaptation have been studied extensively using simple laboratory tasks. A common finding is that responses slow down after errors. According to the conflict monitoring theory, performance should also improve after an error. However, this is usually not observed. In this study, we investigated whether the characteristics of the experimental paradigms normally used could explain this absence. More precisely, these paradigms have in common that behavioural adaptation has little room to be expressed. We therefore studied error and conflict adaptation effects in a task that encounters the richness of everyday life's behavioural adaptation—namely, mental arithmetic, where multiple solution strategies are available. In accordance with our hypothesis, we observed that posterror accuracy increases after errors in mental arithmetic. No support for conflict adaptation in mental arithmetic was found. Implications for current theories of conflict and error monitoring are discussed.     

Organizational Identification and Perceived Intra-School Conflict Among Secondary Special Education and General Education Teachers

The relationships between the organizational variables-teacher assignment (general education or special education) and primary organizational identification (teachers' individual schools or respective district-level departments) and perceived organizational conflict were investigated. Four-hundred and fifty-four high school teachers—382 general education and 72 special education—responded to a three-part questionnaire. Both general education and special education teachers identified with both the school and the district-level departments to a greater than neutral level; the general education teachers identified more with their local schools than their district-level departments and the special education teachers identified equally with both their local school and the district-level department. Significant correlations between teacher organizational identification and perceived conflict were found for both groups of teachers—as the identification increased, the perception of conflict decreased. No significant differences were found in comparisons of general education and special education teachers on the identification or perceived conflict variables. Conclusions, with alternative causative factors, and recommendations for enhancing relationships between general educators and special educators are provided.     

Axis I anxiety and mental health disorders among stuttering adolescents

PurposeThe purpose of this study was to evaluate anxiety and psychological functioning among adolescents seeking speech therapy for stuttering using a structured, diagnostic interview and psychological questionnaires. This study also sought to determine whether any differences in psychological status were evident between younger and older adolescents.MethodParticipants were 37 stuttering adolescents seeking stuttering treatment. We administered the Computerized Voice Version of the Diagnostic Interview Schedule for Children, and five psychometric tests. Participants were classified into younger (12–14 years; n = 20) and older adolescents (15–17 years; n = 17).ResultsThirty-eight percent of participants attained at least one diagnosis of a mental disorder, according to the diagnostic criteria of the Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders, Fourth Edition (DSM-IV; APA, 2000), with the majority of these diagnoses involving anxiety. This figure is double current estimates for general adolescent populations, and is consistent with our finding of moderate and moderate–severe quality of life impairment. Although many of the scores on psychological measures fell within the normal range, older adolescents (15–17 years) reported significantly higher anxiety, depression, reactions to stuttering, and emotional/behavioral problems, than younger adolescents (12–14 years). There was scant evidence that self-reported stuttering severity is correlated with mental health issues. There are good reasons to believe these results are conservative because many participants gave socially desirable responses about their mental health status.DiscussionThese results reveal a need for large-scale, statistically powerful assessments of anxiety and other mental disorders among stuttering adolescents with reference to control populations.Educational Objectives: The reader will be able to: (a) explain the clinical importance of assessing for mental health with stuttering adolescents, (b) state the superior method for adolescent mental health assessment and (c) state a major issue with determining the genuineness of stuttering adolescent responses to psychological assessment.     

Was William James a Patient at McLean Hospital for the Mentally Ill?

Rumors that William James was a patient at McLean Asylum near Boston have persisted for several decades. I focus on the reasons why the question has been so difficult to answer in any definitive way; assess the evidence presented in support of the rumors; note that two different periods in James’s life (late twenties and early sixties) have been judged the most likely; and explore the diagnostic question as well: If he was in fact a patient, for what was he being treated? I also discuss evidence that his younger brother Robertson was a patient at McLean and consider the bearing of this evidence on the question of whether William James was a patient at McLean and on the diagnostic issue.     

Surviving the 2015 Mount Everest disaster: A phenomenological exploration into lived experience and the role of mental toughness

ObjectivesThe 2015 Nepal earthquake and subsequent avalanche at Mount Everest Base Camp is the deadliest mountaineering disaster to date. This study is novel in exploring the lived experiences of survivors and the role of mental toughness in their psychological responses to the disaster.DesignPhenomenological study.MethodTen mountaineers, who were on expeditions during the earthquake, participated in phenomenological interviews. Data were analysed inductively and thematically, while strategies to enhance trustworthiness were also employed.ResultsSeven dimensions emerged from the data, which captured climbers' psychological responses to the disaster, ranging from the moments the earthquake hit to reflections on the disaster after returning home. Contrasting emotional responses were described, and suggested to depend on experience and mental toughness. Negative emotional and behavioural responses were reported in the aftermath. Some climbers reported post-traumatic stress, but also a strong desire to return to Mount Everest and continue mountaineering.ConclusionsThese findings provide detailed insights into the lived experiences of climbers who survived the 2015 Nepal earthquake and Base Camp avalanche. Findings also shed light on the role of mental toughness in coping with and responding to a major natural disaster.     

Representation over time: the effects of temporal distance on similarity

Similarity is central in human cognition, playing a role in a wide range of cognitive processes. In three studies, we demonstrate that subjective similarity may change as a function of temporal distance, with some events seeming more similar when considered in the near future, while others increase in similarity as temporal distance increases. Given the ubiquity of inter-temporal thought, and the fundamental role of similarity, these results have important implications for cognition in general.     

Emotional competence in children with autism: Diagnostic criteria and empirical evidence

The diagnostic criteria of autism spectrum disorders (ASD) include emotional impairments. However, scientific evidence for these impairments is varied and subtle. In this contribution, recent empirical studies that examined the emotional competence in children and adolescents with ASD are reviewed. Four aspects of emotional competence that are important to children’s daily social functioning (expression, perception, responding, and understanding) are discussed, differentiating between mentally retarded and normally intelligent children and adolescents with and without ASD in natural and structured contexts. On various accounts, the emotional impairments of children with ASD that are found in scientific studies provide a more differentiated view on the impairments suggested by the diagnostic literature. Consistent empirical findings and gaps in the field are discussed. Theoretical and clinical recommendations for assessment procedures are suggested.     

Active school travel is associated with fewer suicide attempts among adolescents from low-and middle-income countries

Background/Objective: This study explored the association between active school travel (AST) and suicide attempts among adolescents in low- and middle-income countries (LMICs). Method: We used the data from the Global School-based Health Survey, including 127,097 adolescents aged 13-17 years from 34 LMICs. A self-reported survey was used to collect data on AST and suicide attempts as well as some variables. Multivariable logistic regression was performed to assess the association between AST and suicide attempts. A meta-analysis with random effects was undertaken to identify the difference in the association between AST and suicide attempts. Results: Across all the adolescents, the prevalence of AST was 37% and the prevalence of suicide attempts was 11.60%. Adolescents who engaged in AST were less likely to have suicide attempts irrespective of gender. The country-wise analysis indicated a large inconsistency in the association between AST and suicide attempt across the countries. Conclusions: AST would appear to be a protective factor for reducing suicide attempts among adolescents. However, the association between AST and suicide attempts varied greatly across the countries. Future studies should confirm the association between AST and suicide attempts.     

Relationship of religiosity to mental health literacy,stigma, social distance,and occupational restrictiveness in Ningxia Province,China

Little research has assessed the relationship between religiosity and mental health awareness in low- and middle-income countries. This study identified a representative sample of 2,425 community-dwelling adults in Ningxia, China and administered the Duke University Religion Index, the Mental Health Knowledge Questionnaire, the Mental Health Attitude Questionnaire, the Social Distance – Personal Questionnaire and the Social Restrictiveness – Occupational Questionnaire. Religious affiliation per se was not associated with mental health literacy or attitudes, but higher levels of religiosity were associated with better awareness of mental health issues and less social distance and occupational restrictiveness of those with mental health conditions. However, these relationships were substantially different in Hui ethnicity respondents (85% of whom were practicing Islam) and Han ethnicity respondents (15% of whom practiced Buddhism, Taoism or Confucianism).