Wadiya Udell

The Development of Argument Skills

This work sought to obtain experimental evidence to corroborate cross-sectional patterns of development in argument skills and to evaluate the effectiveness of an intervention designed to foster development of these skills in academically at-risk 13- to 14-year-olds. Students participated in 16 sessions of a collaborative, goal-based activity providing dense exercise of argumentive thinking. One condition included peer dialogues; another did not. The former was the more effective, although both groups progressed. Participants showed increased frequency of usage of powerful argumentive discourse strategies, such as counterargument, and decreased frequency of less effective strategies. Quality of individual arguments (for or against a claim) also improved, supporting the existence of a close relation between these two kinds of argument skills.

Coordinating own and other perspectives in argument

What does it take to argue well? The goal of this series of studies was to better understand the cognitive skills entailed in argument, and their course of development, isolated from the verbal and social demands that argumentive discourse also entails. Findings indicated that young adolescents are less able than adults to coordinate attention to both positions in an argument, an age-related pattern that parallels one found in discourse. Contributing to this weakness was inattention to the opposing position (in both constrained and unconstrained formats), but not ability to address the opposing position when explicitly asked to do so. In addition to implementing the necessary dual focus, results point to the importance of developing epistemological understanding of the relevance of the opposing position to argument, as well as of the goals of argument more generally. The results also reflect the close parallels between dialogic and non-dialogic argument.

Young urban adults' heterosexual risk encounters and perceived risk and safety: A structured diary study

Using diary methods, we explored characteristics of young adults’ sexual risk interactions over a 2‐week period and the framing effects indicate in associations between the perceived risk and safety of these sexual risk behaviors. We screened all participants to ensure moderate to high scores on an HIV knowledge measure. Men (n = 44) and women (n = 48) enrolled at an inner‐city college collected diary data, generating reports of 440 sex occasions over a 2‐week period (1,278 person‐days). Despite participation in sexual risk activities, including highly inconsistent condom use during intercourse, participants uniformly reported high safety and little to no risk. Only womens perceptions of safety (not risk) were associated with condom use, mens perceptions of both safety and risk were unrelated. Ratings of safety and risk appeared to operate independently for the most part. Sex with new partners and new sexual activity were associated with both judgments of greater risk and lower safety were associated for men only. These results add to the growing evidence that young people fail to integrate their general knowledge regarding HIV risk into their personal interactions. This study has implications for the development of cognitive models around sexual decision‐making for young adults at risk for HIV and may provide insight into the contextual features of sexual interactions associated with young peoples perceptions of risk and safety.

A Cognitive Analysis of College Students’ Explanations for Engaging in Unprotected Sexual Intercourse

Young adults, including college students, engage in high levels of unprotected sexual activity despite relatively high rates of HIV/STI and pregnancy-related knowledge. Little is known about the cognitive strategies that young people use to explain this inconsistency. The current study examined young people’s explanations for engaging in unprotected sexual activity in their committed relationships. A total of 63 young adults (32 women and 31 men) completed daily diaries over a 3-week period, providing a total of 1,284 daily reports tracking their condom use and non-use during intercourse. Diary collection was followed by in-depth interviews designed to explore participants’ decision-making regarding their participation in sexual intercourse unprotected against infection or unwanted pregnancy. Less than a quarter of the sample used condoms or oral contraceptives consistently. Participants primarily viewed condoms as a means of preventing pregnancy; few described disease prevention as a main motivation for their use. Analysis of the cognitions underlying explanations for condom and contraception non-use were classified as (1) general biased risk evaluation, (2) biased evidence evaluation, (3) endorsement of poor alternatives, (4) focus on spurious justifications, (5) dismissing risk, and (6) ignoring risk. Prevention interventions should incorporate methods to challenge young people to acknowledge personal risk and commit themselves to taking steps to reduce this risk.

The Relationship Between Early Sexual Debut and Psychosocial Outcomes: A Longitudinal Study of Dutch Adolescents

In a longitudinal dataset of 470 Dutch adolescents, the current study examined the ways in which early sexual initiation was related to subsequent attachment, self-perception, internalizing problems, and externalizing problems. For male adolescents, analyses revealed general attachment to mother and externalizing problems at Wave 1 to predict to early transition at Wave 2. However, there was no differential change in these psychosocial factors over time for early initiators of sexual intercourse and their non-initiating peers. For female adolescents, the model including psychosocial factors at Wave 1 did not predict to sexual initiation at Wave 2. However, univariate repeated measures analyses revealed early initiators to have significantly larger increases in self-concept and externalizing problems than their non-initiating female peers. While the difference between female early initiators and non-initiators were statistically significant, the mean levels of problem behaviors were very low. The findings suggest that, contrary to previous research, early sexual initiation does not seem to be clustered with problem behaviors for this sample of Dutch adolescents.

Nurse-delivered counselling intervention for parental HIV disclosure: results from a pilot randomized controlled trial in China.

Objective:The objective of this study was to design and conduct a preliminary evaluation of an intervention to assist parents in decision-making about disclosure of their HIV diagnosis to their children. Design:This was a pilot randomized controlled trial (RCT) with blinded assessment. Participants were randomized to intervention or treatment-as-usual (TAU) arms. Setting:The study occurred at an outpatient HIV primary care centre in Shanghai, China. Participants:Participants were 20 HIV-positive outpatients with at least one child (13–25 years old) who was unaware of the parents HIV diagnosis. Intervention:The nurse-delivered intervention involved three, hour-long, individual sessions over 4 weeks. Intervention content comprised family assessment, discussion of advantages and disadvantages of disclosure, psycho-education about cognitive, social and emotional abilities of children at different developmental stages, and disclosure planning and practicing via role-plays. Main outcome measure(s):Primary study outcomes for intervention versus TAU arms were self-reported disclosure distress, self-efficacy, and behaviours along a continuum from no disclosure to full disclosure and open communication about HIV. Results:In all cross-sectional (Wald tests) and longitudinal (general estimating equations) analyses, at both postintervention (4 weeks) and follow-up (13 weeks), effects were in the hypothesized directions. Despite the small sample size, most of these between-arm comparisons were statistically significant, with at least one result for each outcome indicating a ‘large’ effect size. Conclusion:Our results suggest that nurses are able to deliver a counselling intervention in a clinic setting with the potential to alleviate parental distress around HIV disclosure to their children. Findings warrant future trials powered for efficacy.

Developing Argument Skills in Severely Disadvantaged Adolescent Males in a Residential Correctional Setting.

We investigate whether the intervention designed by Kuhn and Udell (2003) to develop argument skills could be implemented productively among adolescent males in a residential juvenile detention facility—boys who were educationally disengaged and severely disadvantaged academically as well as socially. Compared to a control group from the same institution who did not participate, participants in the intervention exhibited superior argument skills following the intervention. In dialogic argumentation with a peer, they made more counterarguments against the opponents claims, and they more often voiced rebuttals of the opponents counterarguments of their own claims. Also, inindividual arguments in support of their own positions, they offered more and higher-quality reasons, relative to the control group. In addition to these cognitive skill gains, possible enhancements in cognitive engagement and mental self-management and self-control are discussed.

Mentoring the Mentors of Underrepresented Racial/Ethnic Minorities Who are Conducting HIV Research: Beyond Cultural Competency

The majority of literature on mentoring focuses on mentee training needs, with significantly less guidance for the mentors. Moreover, many mentoring the mentor models assume generic (i.e. White) mentees with little attention to the concerns of underrepresented racial/ethnic minorities (UREM). This has led to calls for increased attention to diversity in research training programs, especially in the field of HIV where racial/ethnic disparities are striking. Diversity training tends to address the mentees’ cultural competency in conducting research with diverse populations, and often neglects the training needs of mentors in working with diverse mentees. In this article, we critique the framing of diversity as the problem (rather than the lack of mentor consciousness and skills), highlight the need to extend mentor training beyond aspirations of cultural competency toward cultural humility and cultural safety, and consider challenges to effective mentoring of UREM, both for White and UREM mentors.

Parenting Practices and Adolescent Decision-Making: The Importance of Racial Socialization

SUMMARY The current work sought to understand the ways in which family-level factors are related to youths decisions regarding two hypothetical social dilemmas commonly faced by youth in high risk environments – deciding how to respond to persistent teasing and whether to intervene in a group fight. Specifically, the study focused on the relationship between African American youths range of decisions on the two social dilemmas and five parenting practices previously identified as correlates to youth well-being. Analyses of data gathered from 118 African American youth and their caregivers revealed that only racial socialization parenting practices were significant factors against choosing escalating options on the two dilemma scenarios. These results add to the growing evidence of the positive effects of racial socialization upon African American youth. The current study highlights the importance of examining the ways in which racial socialization can enhance the decision-making of African American youth

Does Parental Monitoring Moderate the Impact of Community Violence Exposure on Probation Youth’s Substance Use and Sexual Risk Behavior?

The present study examined whether parental monitoring buffers the negative effects of communtity violence exposure on probation youth’s substance use and sexual risk behaviors. Among a sample of 347 Chicago youth on probation, ages 13–17 years, parental monitoring did not moderate the relationship between community violence exposure and probation youth’s sexual risk and substance use. However, parental monitoring was independently associated with less engagement in sexual risk and substance use, and community violence exposure was independently associated with more risk behavior among probation youth. The present study contributes to the growing literature on the impact of community violence exposure and parenting on adjudicated youth risk.