Group Counseling Intervention for Solving Problems on the Job

This article reports the effects of a group counseling intervention on the social problem solving by and employment preparation of Grade 9 and Grade 10 students. Mathematics teachers implemented the intervention on problem solving on the job within a unit on mathematics problem solving. The intervention used a cognitive approach to counseling, specifically cognitive strategy instruction with teacher modeling and students' thinking aloud to a partner. Both pretest and posttest scores and analyses of interviews with 4 students showed the success of the intervention. An interview with the peer coach of the teachers highlighted teacher experiences in implementing successful group counseling.     

Utilizing Family Strengths and Resilience: Integrative Family and Systems Treatment with Children and Adolescents with Severe Emotional and Behavioral Problems

Community mental health agencies are consistently challenged to provide realistic and effective home-based family-centered treatment that meets local needs and can realistically fit within available budget and resource capabilities. Integrated Family and Systems Treatment (I-FAST) is developed based on existing evidence-based approaches for working with at-risk children, adolescents, and families and a strengths perspective. I-FAST identified 3 evidence-based, core treatment components and integrated them into a coherent treatment protocol; this is done in a way that builds on and is integrated with mental health agencies' existing expertise in home-based treatment. This is an intervention development study in which we conducted an initial feasibility trial of I-FAST for treating families with children at risk of out-of-home placement. The outcomes of the study provide initial empirical evidence that supports the effectiveness of I-FAST. Findings indicate that there were significant improvements in child behavior, significant increases in parental competency, and significant increases in the level of cohesion and adaptability in these families. All observed changes were significant from pre- to posttreatment with the families able to maintain these positive changes at 6-month follow-up. A more rigorous and robust research design, however, will be needed to establish definitive evidence of the effectiveness of I-FAST.     

On Asking the Right Questions

Despite the vast array of theoretical formulations now available, none is sufficiently well developed. Some of the philosophical questions thrown up by such material are posed. Under the heading of "Discourse," the questions of what constitutes reasonableness and how logical validity is established are raised. Under the heading of "Epistemology," the nature of concept formulation and causality is raised. Under the heading of "Language," the nature of linguistic representation and artificially constructed language or "artificial intelligence" is raised. It is suggested that these and other issues in the philosophy of science require the urgent attention of family therapy theorists.     

Toward a Better Understanding of Psychological Well‐Being in Dementia Caregivers: The Link Between Marital Communication and Depression

To read this article's abstract in both Spanish and Mandarin Chinese, please visit the article's full‐text page on Wiley InterScience ( http://interscience.wiley.com/journal/famp ). Dementia research has frequently documented high rates of caregiver depression and distress in spouses providing care for a partner suffering from dementia. However, the role of marital communication in understanding caregiver distress has not been examined sufficiently. Studies with healthy couples demonstrated an association between marital communication and the partners' psychological well‐being, depressiveness, respectively (e.g., Heene, Buysee, & Van Oost, 2005 ). The current study investigates the relationship between caregiver depression and communication in 37 couples in which the wives care for their partners with dementia. Nonsequential and sequential analyses revealed significant correlations between caregiver depression and marital communication quality. Caregivers whose husbands used more positive communication reported less depression and distress. Additionally, caregiver depression was negatively correlated with rates of positive reciprocal communication indicating dependence between the couples' interaction patterns. This study is one of the first to illustrate the relevance of spousal communication in understanding caregiver distress and depression.