Michael C. Roberts

Helping children cope with disasters and terrorism.

General Conceptual and Key Issues Children Experiencing Disasters: Definitions, Reactions, and Predictors of Outcomes Assessment of Children and Adolescents Exposed to Disaster Intervention Approaches Following Disasters Multicultural Issues in the Response of Children to Disasters Natural Disasters Hurricanes and Earthquakes Wilderness Area and Wildfire Disasters: Insights from a Child and Adolescent Screening Program Floods Residential Fires Human-Made/Technological Disasters Toxic Waste Spills/Nuclear Accidents Mass Transportation Disasters Dam Break: Long-Term Follow-up of Children Exposed to the Buffalo Creek Disaster The Traumatic Impact of Motor Vehicle Accidents Acts of Violence Shootings and Hostage Takings The Aftermath of Terrorism Children Under Stress of War Exposure to Community Violence Conclusions and Implications Helping Children and Youth Cope After Disasters: Where Do We Go From Here?

Beyond Appearance: A New Look at Adolescent Girls.

Going beyond superficial media stereotypes, this volume seeks to present a balanced view of teenage girls. It reviews and assesses research on girls from a variety of racial, ethnic and socio-economic backgrounds, searching for commonalities and differences. The contributing authors explore topics at the heart of adolescence, including gender-role prescriptions, body-image concerns, relationships with family and peers, sexual decision-making, experiences at school and in the community, and health and safety concerns. A concluding chapter suggests ways of improving the support that can be given to adolescent girls on their developmental journey.

The Efficacy of Adherence Interventions for Chronically Ill Children: A Meta-Analytic Review

OBJECTIVES To provide quantitative information about the overall effectiveness of adherence interventions to improve adherence and health outcomes for children with chronic illnesses. To evaluate statistically the potential moderators. METHODS A meta-analysis was performed on 71 adherence intervention studies. RESULTS Weighted-mean effect size (ES) across all the adherence outcomes for group design studies was in the medium range (mean d = 0.58) and for single-subject design studies was in the large range (mean d = 1.44). The weighted mean ES across all health outcome measures for studies using group designs was in the medium range (mean d = 0.40) and for studies using single-subject designs was in the large range (mean d = 0.74). CONCLUSIONS Adherence interventions for children with chronic illnesses effectively increase adherence and result in some positive health benefits. Intervention and methodological variables had significant impact on ESs. High levels of heterogeneity characterized the data.

Vignette methodologies for studying clinicians’ decision-making: Validity, utility, and application in ICD-11 field studies ☆

Vignette-based methodologies are frequently used to examine judgments and decision-making processes, including clinical judgments made by health professionals. Concerns are sometimes raised that vignettes do not accurately reflect “real world” phenomena, and that this affects the validity of results and conclusions of these studies. This article provides an overview of the defining features, design variations, strengths, and weaknesses of vignette studies as a way of examining how health professionals form clinical judgments (e.g., assigning diagnoses, selecting treatments). As a “hybrid” of traditional survey and experimental methods, vignette studies can offer aspects of both the high internal validity of experiments and the high external validity of survey research in order to disentangle multiple predictors of clinician behavior. When vignette studies are well designed to test specific questions about judgments and decision-making, they can be highly generalizable to “real life” behavior, while overcoming the ethical, practical, and scientific limitations associated with alternative methods (e.g., observation, self-report, standardized patients, archival analysis). We conclude with methodological recommendations and a description of how vignette methodologies are being used to investigate clinicians’ diagnostic decisions in case-controlled field studies for the ICD-11 classification of mental and behavioural disorders, and how these studies illustrate the preceding concepts and recommendations

The relationship between children's coping styles and psychological interventions for cold pressor pain

&NA; This study examined the hypothesis that matching pain management interventions to childrens preferred coping methods would increase pain tolerance and decrease self‐reported pain during the cold pressor pain paradigm. Children aged 8–10 years were classified as ‘attenders’ (focusing on the stimulus) or ‘distractors’ (focusing away from the stimulus) based upon their spontaneous coping responses during a baseline exposure to the cold pressor. Children were then randomly assigned to 1 of 3 intervention conditions (sensory focusing, imagery, or no intervention) and completed the cold pressor procedure again 2 weeks later. A significant interaction was found between coping style and intervention. Children who were classified as distractors demonstrated greater tolerance when taught to use imagery techniques (a ‘matched’ intervention). Although pain ratings tended to be lower for distractors using imagery, the significant interaction resulted from an increase in ratings for the distractors using sensory focusing (i.e., a ‘mismatched’ intervention). Results suggest that, for distractors, interventions that are consistent with natural coping methods are most effective in enhancing abilities to cope with pain, while a mismatched intervention reduces coping abilities. The findings also suggest further study regarding how to provide effective pain intervention with attenders, since neither intervention enhanced coping in this group.

A model for training psychologists to provide services for children and adolescents.

Center for Mental Health Services Background and rationale for a comprehensive model of training for psychologists to provide services to children and adolescents are outlined. Eleven integrated aspects of training are described with respect to training topics, justification for the training, and ways to implement the training. The model described addresses the need for guidance in training specialists in psychologically based mental health services for children, adolescents, and their families. Practitioners can use this model to assess their own backgrounds, knowledge, and skills in working with these populations. Children, adolescents, and their families represent a large segment of the population whose mental health needs are un- derserved (Markel-Fox & Stiles, 1996; Saxe, Cross, & Sil- verman, 1988). The relative lack of psychologists adequately trained to provide assessment, treatment, and prevention ser- vices to these groups pose s a major obstacle to providing more and better services. Over many years, professionals have in- creasingly recognized the need for an updated, comprehensive, and integrated outline of training components in the area of THE GENESIS OF THIS MODEL

Psychologists’ perspectives on the diagnostic classification of mental disorders: Results from the WHO-IUPsyS Global Survey

This study examined psychologists’ views and practices regarding diagnostic classification systems for mental and behavioral disorders so as to inform the development of the ICD-11 by the World Health Organization (WHO). WHO and the International Union of Psychological Science (IUPsyS) conducted a multilingual survey of 2155 psychologists from 23 countries, recruited through their national psychological associations. Sixty percent of global psychologists routinely used a formal classification system, with ICD-10 used most frequently by 51% and DSM-IV by 44%. Psychologists viewed informing treatment decisions and facilitating communication as the most important purposes of classification, and preferred flexible diagnostic guidelines to strict criteria. Clinicians favorably evaluated most diagnostic categories, but identified a number of problematic diagnoses. Substantial percentages reported problems with crosscultural applicability and cultural bias, especially among psychologists outside the USA and Europe. Findings underscore the priority of clinical utility and professional and cultural differences in international psychology. Implications for ICD-11 development and dissemination are discussed.

Handbook of Evidence-Based Therapies for Children and Adolescents

Section I: Establishing the Need and Criteria for Evidence-based Therapies.- Evidence-based Therapies for Children and Adolescents: Problems and Prospects.- Empirically Supported Treatments and Evidence-based Practice for Children and Adolescents.- Methodological Issues in the Evaluation of Therapies.- Evidence-based Therapies: Translating Research into Practice.- Section II: Evidence-based Therapies for Specific Disorders or Conditions.- Psychosocial Treatments for Phobic and Anxiety Disorders in Youth.- Panic Disorder in Adolescents.- Evidence-based Treatment of Pediatric Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder.- Interventions for Posttraumatic Stress in Children and Adolescents Following Natural Disasters and Acts of Terrorism.- Mood Disorders in Childhood.- Empirically Supported Psychotherapies for Adolescent Depression and Mood Disorders.- Evidence-based Therapies for Adolescent Suicidal Behavior.- Evidence-based Treatments for Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD).- Evidence-based Therapies for Oppositional Behavior in Young Children.- Treating Conduct Problems, Aggression, and Antisocial Behavior in Children and Adolescents: An Integrated View.- Components of Evidence-based Interventions for Bullying and Peer Victimization.- Pain and Pain Management.- Evidence-based Treatments for Children with Chronic Illnesses.- Evidence-based Therapies for Enuresis and Encopresis.- Evidence-based Therapies for Children and Adolescents with Eating Disorders.- Evidence-based Therapies for Pediatric Overweight.- Evidence-based Therapies for Autistic Disorder and Pervasive Developmental Disorders.- Evidence-based Treatment for Children with Serious Emotional Disturbance.- Evidence-based Approaches to Social Skills Training with Children and Adolescents.- Evidence-based Treatments for Adolescent Substance Use Disorders.- Section III: Implementation Issues.- Dissemination of Evidence-based Manualized Treatments for Children and Families in Practice Settings.- Client, Therapist, and Treatment Characteristics in EBTs for Children and Adolescents.- Implementing Evidence-based Treatments with Ethnically Diverse Clients.- Evidence-based Therapy and Ethical Practice.- Adoption of Evidence-based Treatments (EBTs) in Community Settings: Obstacles and Opportunities.- Evidence-based Assessment for Children and Adolescents.- Graduate Training in Evidence-based Practice in Psychology.- Emerging Issues in the Continuing Evolution of Evidence-based Practice.

Disorders specifically associated with stress: A case-controlled field study for ICD-11 mental and behavioural disorders

As part of the development of the Eleventh Revision of International Classification of Diseases and Related Health Problems (ICD-11), the World Health Organization Department of Mental Health and Substance Abuse is conducting a series of case-controlled field studies using a new and powerful method to test the application by clinicians of the proposed ICD-11 diagnostic guidelines for mental and behavioural disorders. This article describes the case-controlled field study for Disorders Specifically Associated with Stress. Using a vignette-based experimental methodology, 1,738 international mental health professionals diagnosed standardized cases designed to test key differences between the proposed diagnostic guidelines for ICD-11 and corresponding guidelines for ICD-10. Across eight comparisons, several proposed changes for ICD-11, including the addition of Complex PTSD and Prolonged Grief Disorder, produced significantly improved diagnostic decisions and clearer application of diagnostic guidelines compared to ICD-10. However, several key areas were also identified, such as the description of the diagnostic requirement of re-experiencing in PTSD, in which the guidelines were not consistently applied as intended. These results informed specific revisions to improve the clarity of the proposed ICD-11 diagnostic guidelines. The next step will be to further test these guidelines in clinic-based studies using real patients in relevant settings.

Innovative Treatment for Children With Serious Emotional Disturbance: Preliminary Outcomes for a School-Based Intensive Mental Health Program.

This article describes the development, implementation, and preliminary evaluation of a school-based Intensive Mental Health Program (IMHP) for 50 children (42 boys, 8 girls) with severe, early-onset, serious emotional disturbances (SED). Eighty-four percent of the children showed clinically significant improvement in overall functioning as measured by the Child and Adolescent Functional Assessment Scale (CAFAS). Child functioning at home and school, behavior toward others, regulation of moods and emotions, self-harm, and problems in thinking improved significantly. Results provide initial support for the IMHP as a promising approach to serving the needs of children with SED.