Margo A. Jackson

Predictors of distress in women being treated for infertility

Many studies cite infertility as highly stressful, yet womens responses to infertility are quite variable. Lazarus and Folkmans cognitive phenomenological theory of stress, coping, and appraisal may explain this variability. Gender role identity, career role salience, and societal pressure for motherhood are variables hypothesised to affect a womans cognitive appraisal of infertility, thus influencing distress level. Female participants (N = 119) were recruited through the NYU Fertility Clinic and Resolve, a support organisation for individuals faced with infertility. Participants completed questionnaires assessing gender characteristics, career role salience, social pressure for motherhood, cognitive appraisal, and distress. Many respondents (42%) reported clinically significant levels of distress. A path analysis assessed the effects of gender‐role identity, career role salience, social pressure for motherhood, and cognitive appraisal on distress. The model accounted for 32% of the variance in distress. Women experiencing social pressure for motherhood viewed infertility as more stressful, women identifying with more positively valued instrumental gender role traits reported less distress, and women who endorsed more negatively valued instrumental gender role traits and cognitively appraised infertility as stressful reported greater distress.

Are Success Learning Experiences and Self-Efficacy Beliefs Associated with Occupational Interests and Aspirations of At-Risk Urban Youth?.

To help increase access to educational and occupational options for a growing yet underrepresented population of low-income, culturally diverse, urban middle school students, we need to increase our understanding of important factors in their career development. The results of this study supported some applications of Krumboltz’s social learning theory to at-risk urban youth and found (a) a significant and positive association between participants’ success learning experiences and their expressed occupational interests, and (b) a positive association between their career self-efficacy beliefs and inventoried occupational interests. However, no association was found between participants’ success learning experiences and their highest or most ideal occupational aspirations. Further research with methods and measures that are reliable and validated with this population is needed to replicate the results of this study. In turn, career counselors might use this understanding to better design effective interventions for at-risk diverse urban youth.

Career Assessment as a Learning Tool

Career assessment instruments summarize the consequences of past learning experiences and have traditionally been used to match respondents with occupations and educational institutions. However, the instruments can also be used to suggest additional learning experiences needed by clients. Clients need not merely match current interests to occupations but can learn new interests. Current beliefs may not be nearly as useful as beliefs learned after a new look at the evidence. Values, traditionally sacrosanct, are similarly subject to change as the result of new learning. Personality preferences and inclinations were learned in the past and continue to be modified by daily interactions. Career counseling can thus be seen as a complex process of helping people design and implement a continuing series of learning experiences to enhance their lives.

Quality of Master’s Education A Concern for Counseling Psychology?

The authors offer an analysis of current challenges and opportunities regarding the long-standing issue about the quality and status of master’s education relevant to training and practice in counseling psychology. Highlighted are historical context, controversies regarding licensure and accreditation (e.g., the 2009 Council for Accreditation of Counseling and Related Educational Programs standard that bans counseling psychology faculty as core), and data on counseling master’s programs in departments affiliated with American Psychological Association–accredited doctoral programs in counseling psychology. In an effort to constructively address issues of concern, the authors propose recommendations to differentiate and integrate master’s education with doctoral training by emphasizing the unique contributions of counseling psychology. Their recommendations build on the core values and synergistic potential of counseling psychology foundations both in counseling (e.g., in educational applications and service to multicultural communities) and in professional psychology (e.g., in extending benchmark competencies for training and using scientific research to inform value-added outcomes for effectively serving public mental health needs).

Career-Related Success-Learning Experiences of Academically Underachieving Urban Middle School Students

Evidence has supported the effectiveness of educational and psychosocial interventions that include strengths and promote the competence enhancement of schoolchildren. Nevertheless, students in low-income, culturally diverse urban schools who are academically underachieving may be the least likely but most in need to experience feedback about their strengths and potential competence for academic and career development. In the context of providing a preventative career exploration intervention, this instrumental case study of eight low-income Hispanic and Black urban middle school students identified as academically underachieving explored how four theoretically based types of success-learning experiences were associated with their evolving career-related interests and ability beliefs. Results include analyses of qualitative and quantitative data, themes (including those not captured by theoretical constructs), and narrative summaries of the accomplishment stories of these youth, as derived from interviews. Implications for theory, research, and practice are discussed.

Cultural Adjustment and Social Justice Behaviour: The Role of Individual Differences in Multicultural Personality

The present study examined altruistic behaviour using broad personality traits (the Big Five) and the narrow personality trait of cultural adjustment (multicultural personality) while controlling for social justice attitudes and other demographic variables. Using an analogue version of a modified dictator game, 153 participants were required to divide a variable amount of money between themselves and a hypothetical recipient who was treated unfairly in a prior dictator game (based on results from a separate sample). We varied the race (Black and White) and gender (male and female) of the fictional recipient to present the individual as either advantaged or disadvantaged in society. Participants were randomly assigned to one of three conditions with the recipient presented as (i) a White man, (ii) a White woman, or (iii) a Black man. A separate sample of 71 participants rated recipients as treated unfairly and as representing a marginalized group. Results showed that subscales of the Multicultural Personality Inventory predicted giving behaviour above and beyond the variance accounted for by broad personality traits and attitudes towards social justice. The discussion focuses on implications for research in social justice based on cultural adaptation and personality. Copyright

Integrating Master’s Education in Counseling Psychology for Quality, Viability, and Value Added

In this rejoinder, we review contributions by Palmer and Horne of their responses to our earlier submission in this issue. Together, we present a compelling case for the urgent imperative to constructively address the role of master’s education as a priority in counseling psychology. We not only need to address pressing threats to the viability of counseling psychology but also need to seize opportunities to enhance the quality and value added in our training to help meet vast needs for mental health services. Finally, we extend our analysis and recommendations for strategies to reintegrate and update our foundational counseling master’s training to bridge the sequence and to connect core values of counseling psychology training, for example, the Masters in Counseling Accreditation Committee (MCAC) option and the Counseling Master’s Benchmark Competencies.

Counseling Older Workers Confronting Ageist Stereotypes and Discrimination

As people live longer and work longer, the prevalence of older adults in the workforce has increased. Ever greater numbers of these workers face an economic recession that has exacerbated financial stress and sharply raised the unemployment rate (Butler 2008; Sok 2010; U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics 2008).