Loyd S. Wright

Correlates of drinking and drug use by higher education faculty and staff: implications for prevention.

The prevalence and frequency of drug and alcohol abuse among higher education faculty and staff is not known. Higher education is a cultural environment which, on the one hand, is stressful and, on the other, permits a high degree of autonomy. This relationship of stress and autonomy is predicted to produce drug and alcohol abuse. Information is gathered by anonymous, self-report questionnaires, on the frequency and prevalence of faculty and staff drug and alcohol use at a regional university. Responses show alcohol and drug use within the last year and month among four higher education occupational groups: faculty, administrators, clerical staff, and physical plant/custodial staff. While stress was found to be weakly correlated with some drug use in the last month, depression was consistently correlated with drug use and moderately correlated with suicidal thoughts and tendencies, as well as job dissatisfaction. Drug and alcohol abuse is a factor in behavioral problems that affect faculty/staff and can be addressed through Employee Assistance Programs.

Family interventions and adolescent resiliency: The Southwest Texas State High-Risk Youth Program

The emergence of social ecology as an orienting perspective in prevention has reinforced attention to the family as a critical influence on adolescent risk and protection. The Southwest Texas High-Risk Youth Program (SWTHRY) addressed the neglect of family as a prevention focus by providing in-home sessions for high-risk families that sought to strengthen family cohesion and adaptability, and thereby promote adolescent resiliency. Based on pre- and post-program administration of carefully constructed measures, the evaluation demonstrates increased family cohesion and strengthened adolescent family bonding among participants. However, participants reported less increase in family adaptability, and adolescent family members showed no statistically significant gain over pre-program scores in dimensions of resiliency other than family bonding, nor in family interaction, family supervision, or ATOD attitudes. Family bonding, the area in which there was significant change in adolescents, was not highly correlated with ATOD use. The study supports the need for comprehensive programming to strengthen adolescent resiliency, and provides further evidence that prevention interventions targeted on affective purposes (e.g., self-esteem, family cohesion) will have limited effects.

Correlates of Reported Drug Abuse Problems among College Undergraduates.

Among 619 students enrolled in freshmen level psychology classes at Southwest Texas State University 13.5 per cent of the males and 4.2 per cent of the females reported that they perceived themselves to have drug abuse problems. Male drug abuse problems were significantly related to perceived maternal emotional problems, parental rejection and angry parents, conflicts with parents, reported physical abuse by a parent, suicidal thoughts, delinquency and feelings of being bored, unappreciated, unrecognized, dependent, unstable and dissatisfied. Female drug abuse problems were significantly related to perceived parental emotional problems, maternal drinking problems, parental depression, parental anger and parental rejection, poor relationship with father, reported physical abuse by a parent, conflicts with and between parents, unhappy childhood, delinquency and feelings of being shaky, bored, unrecognized, troubled, unstable, dissatisfied and unhealthy.

Perceptions of Parents and Self Among College Students Reporting Learning Disabilities

Abstract Of 1773 college students who completed self‐administered questionnaires, 80 indicated they had been diagnosed as having a learning disability (LD). Those students were then compared on measures of self concept and recalled family stress, and reported personal problems with those who indicated no LD. It was found that the LD participants, in comparison with their non‐LD peers, tended to view themselves and their parents more negatively, recall more family stress during childhood and adolescence and report more drug abuse problems, delinquency and suicidal thoughts.

A Norm Changing Approach to Drug Prevention.

This article describes the implementation of an innovative curriculum called Drugs-At-Work (DAW), which was evaluated in three phases. In phase-one, data collected after the third year of the study suggested that the curriculum had a significant impact on the fifth-grade participants, who in turn influenced their sixth-grade classmates the following year. In comparison to their sixth-grade baseline counterparts, the DAW participants and their classmates were significantly less likely to have used tobacco, alcohol or other illicit drugs (ATOD) and less likely to know other elementary students who did so. In phase-two, data were examined on a year-by-year basis using a modified A-B-A design. These data revealed a drop from baseline in ATOD use during the intervention years and a return-to-baseline after the program ended. In phase-three, comparisons were made among participants in the Combined Baseline Group, the Combined DAW Group and the Transition Group (those exposed to DAW but not surveyed until a year after the grant closed). These analyses revealed that the DAW significantly reduced ATOD use for the total sample and for the Mexican-American, the Anglo, and the African-American students examined separately.

Relaxation/Covert Rehearsal for Problematic Children: A Pilot Study

Hyperactivity has been associated with overactivity, distractability, short attention span, low frustration tolerance, impulsivity, aggressiveness, academic underachievement, and low self-esteem (Weiss & Hechtman, 1979). Prevalence estimates range from 4 to 20% for regular classroom children (Johnson, Kenney, & Davis, 1976), and from 35 to 80% for special education children (Safer & Allen, 1976). Weiss and co-workers (1979) cite evidence that these children tend to have continuing problems as adolescents and adults. Other children have problems associated with this diagnosis to a lesser degree but enough to interfere with their optimal development and with classroom instruction.

Three Types of Conduct-Problem Boys in an Educational Setting.

ABSTRACT Third grade boys identified as being disruptive to on‐going classroom activities were grouped according to their teachers ratings of their behaviour characteristics as unco‐operative (Type I), easily flustered (Type II), and unco‐operative and easily flustered (Type III). No significant differences in performance existed between types on individually administered tests of perception and psycholinguistic abilities. On group administered tests of academic achievement and intelligence, the uncooperative boys did significantly better than the other two types. It was also determined that the easily flustered boys did substantially better on individually administered measures of IQ. than they did on group administered measures. These findings suggest that teachers should avoid using group tests to evaluate disruptive boys they perceive as being easily flustered.