It is crucial for counselors to be aware of their own attitudes and beliefs and to prevent them from influencing the counseling process. The prevalence of obesity is growing and biases against obese people are becoming more apparent. Counselors must become aware of the potential weight bias and what factors influence it. The purpose of the current study was to examine whether counselors- in-training hold negative attitudes toward obese clients and whether the career status of the client affects these perceptions. Seventy-six students in graduate level counseling programs at Arizona State University were randomly assigned one of four vignettes describing either an obese bookkeeper, a normal weight bookkeeper, an obese executive, or a normal weight executive. Negative attitudes were measured using two scales; one evaluating perceived personal characteristics of the client and one evaluating the perceived work efficacy. Results indicated that counselors-in-training perceived the client with more negative characteristics when the client was described as obese rather than normal weight, and also when she was described as having a low status job compared to a high status job. The perceived work efficacy of the presented client was not affected by the client’s weight or job status. It is important for students in counseling programs to receive training regarding weight biases and job status biases.

Never married parents (NMPs) are a burgeoning population within the Family Court system. However, there is no empirical research on these parents' separation process, though the neighboring literature purports that NMPs are more at risk for negative child wellbeing outcomes than their divorcing counterparts. This study investigated child behavior problems in high conflict litigating never married families by assessing four salient issues collectively termed chaotic environment: economic strain, lack of social support for the parents, parental repartnering, and family relocation, which included parent changing residence and child changing schools. They were then compared to divorcing parents. It was hypothesized that NMPs would experience higher levels of chaotic environment, and subsequent increases in child behavior problems than divorcing parents, but that the relationship for NMPs and divorcing parents would be the same with each of the chaotic environment variables. This study found the contrary. NMPs only had significantly higher mean scores on lack of social support for fathers and marital status did not predict child behavior problems. Both economic strain and child changing schools predicted child behavior problems for both mothers and fathers. Two interaction effects with mothers were found, indicating that the more a never married mothers repartnered and/or changed her residence, the more behavior problems her child had, while divorcing mothers experiencing the converse effect.

The present study examined whether a history of childhood sexual abuse would be related to attachment to mother, to father, and to friends, mattering to parents and to friends, and coping behaviors. In addition, whether use of force, duration of abuse, and severity of abuse were related to perceived negative impact of childhood sexual abuse was examined. Gender differences among survivors were also investigated. Specifically, from the initial sample of 258 young adults, 186 who met the age requirement were included in the tests of the hypotheses. All participants were between the ages of 18 and 25. Compared to those with no history of childhood sexual abuse (n = 109), survivors (n = 77) reported lower attachment to father and less mattering to parents. There were no differences in attachment and mattering to friends or in emotion-focused and problem-focused coping. When gender differences were examined among survivors, females reported greater use of problem-focused coping and perceiving their childhood sexual abuse experiences as more negative than did the male survivors. There were no differences among male and female survivors of childhood sexual abuse on emotion-focused coping. Force and severity, but not duration, were linked to more negative perceptions of the childhood sexual abuse. Attachment to mother emerged as a key variable in that attachment to mother was positively related to attachment to friends, mattering to friends, and the use of problem-focused coping. Stronger attachment to mother and attachment to father, but not a history of childhood sexual abuse, were related to more perceived mattering to parents. These results highlight the importance of attachment to caregivers in developing peer attachment and a sense of mattering to friends, problem-focused coping skills, and perceiving childhood sexual abuse as having a less negative impact on their lives. Clinical and research implications and suggestions for future directions are discussed.

Adolescence is a tumultuous time, and for those with risk factors, it can be even more difficult. This study examined the relationships among intrinsic and extrinsic protective factors such as high self-esteem, high self-efficacy, mattering to others, positive sense of identity, and healthy peer relationships in female adolescents. Additionally, the current study assessed the impact of a positive youth development intervention designed for this particular population. The potential sample consisted of adolescent girls who were students at an alternative high school in the Southwestern region of the United States. Of the 25 girls at the school, 12 participated in the study and completed pre-test instruments measuring self-esteem, self-efficacy, mattering to friends and parents, identity distress, and relational aggression. The instruments were administered before and after a positive youth development intervention of which 10 of the 12 participants attended. The intervention, Girls Circle, consisted of activities designed to foster self-acceptance, identity formation, healthy friendships, and goal setting in adolescent girls. While the study's intervention did not result in significant changes over time, several important findings emerged. Self-esteem was positively related to both mattering to friends and mattering to parents. Likewise, a negative correlation was found between relational aggression and mattering to parents. Girls who felt they were more important to friends and family had higher self esteem and were less likely to engage in covert aggression tactics such as spreading rumors and maliciously excluding peers from their social groups. These results support the literature and highlight the important interconnection of social relationships and subjective well-being. Teachers, counselors, social workers, and other helping professionals who work with adolescents need to understand these relationships and use this understanding to design and implement interventions that will best serve at-risk girls, such as those in this study.

Although women of color have increased their presence in the workplace, many obstacles restricting career opportunities still exist. It is important that mental health professionals contribute in providing interventions to increase career opportunities for women of color. The purpose of this research is to add to the repertoire of interventions by studying the irrational career beliefs of Black women. This research utilizes the Believe It! program, an online career development program that focuses on altering irrational/maladaptive career beliefs that can prevent young females from pursuing career opportunities. An early study of Believe It! found it to be effective for Caucasian females, however the effects for minority females were less clear. The current study re-examined the effectiveness of Believe It! for minorities by altering the appearance of the animated character within the program. It was hypothesized that young African American women interacting with African American animated agents would display greater rationality in terms of career beliefs compared to young African American women interacting with Caucasian animated agents. Forty-four African American girls between the ages of eleven to fifteen were pre-tested with a battery of assessment devices addressing the irrationality of the girls' career beliefs. The measures included the Career Myths Scale, the Career Beliefs Inventory, the Occupational Sex-role Questionnaire, and the Believe It! measure. Four to eight days later, participants engaged in the online Believe It! Program; they were randomly assigned to either a matched condition (viewing the program with an African American animated agent) or a mismatched condition (viewing the program with a Caucasian animated agent). After completion of the intervention, participants were post-tested with the same assessment battery. MANCOVA and ANCOVA analyses showed that participants in the matched condition consistently benefitted from the matched intervention. Implications for this research are discussed.

The purpose of this study was to evaluate whether five select scales of the MMPI-A (F, Scale 2, A-dep, A-lse, and A-aln) are predictive of a diagnosis of a major depressive episode according to the current DSM-IV-TR criteria. Participants were 90 girls and 58 boys in a clinical psychiatric setting. The study examined two separate hypotheses across the five scales. The first set of hypotheses tested whether a significant T-score on each of the five scales would predict a diagnosis of a major depressive episode in clinical adolescents. The second set of hypotheses attempted to step away from the constraints of diagnostic and statistical cut-off criteria and evaluated the ability of discrete T-scores of the MMPI-A in predicting the number of symptoms of a major depressive episode in clinical adolescents. Results indicated that none of the five scales were predictive of a diagnosis of a major depressive disorder in clinical adolescents. All but one scale (Scale 2) was significant in its ability to predict the number of depressive symptoms in clinical adolescents. Implications of this study include the need for a better diagnostic criteria for adolescent depression as well as re-evaluating the cut-off criteria of scales on the MMPI-A. Directions for future research are also discussed.