The Effects of Ethnic Matching on Abusive/Neglectful Minority Clients' Counseling Satisfaction, Engagement, Pre-mature Termination, and Outcome
Year of Dissertation:
2010
Program:
Educational Psychology
Advisor:
Georgiana Shick Tryon
This dissertation explored the relationship of ethnic matching between abusive and/or neglectful ethnic minority parents and minority counselors. Specifically, it examined these clients' satisfaction with and engagement in counseling as well as type of termination (unilateral or continuing) and outcome (client adjustment, meeting of agency goals, and re-abuse). This study also looked at the relationships of ethnic identity and acculturation discrepancies of clients who abused their children and their counselors, who were either ethnically matched or not matched, to client satisfaction, client engagement, client termination type, and client outcome.
Effects of Group Parent-Training with Online Parent-Teacher Communication on the Homework Performance of Elementary School Students
Year of Dissertation:
2012
Program:
Educational Psychology
The purpose of this study was to investigate the effectiveness of the Homework Improvement Program, a 5-week group-formatted parent training program, in enhancing the homework performance of children experiencing homework difficulties. The study was conducted in an elementary school with a sample consisting of the parents of seven students (N=7) in grades 5 and 6 who were experiencing significant homework difficulties. In accordance with the Conjoint Behavioral Consultation (CBC) model which emphasizes the importance of home-school communication, online Electronic Daily Report Card (EDRC) software was developed as a component of the program through which parents were provided a direct avenue of communication with their child's teacher. The EDRC attempted to address limitations of previously developed home-school communication methods, while maximizing efficiency, and minimizing teacher obligation. It was also designed to be user-friendly for parents. The EDRC informed parents of their child's homework assignments, instructions, and teacher expectations on a daily basis. It also served as a data collection tool through which parents could be provided with regular feedback regarding their child's progress through the program.
DOES A COURSE IN CLASSROOM MANAGEMENT AFFECT TEACHERS' SELF-PERCEIVED EFFICACY IN CLASSROOM MANAGEMENT?
Year of Dissertation:
2009
Program:
Educational Psychology
The literature on teacher burnout clearly indicates that classroom management problems are primary causes contributing to teachers leaving the field. Efficacy beliefs influence the individual's cognition and affect to mobilize the necessary psychological resources to accomplish a specific task. Lower perceived self-efficacy in classroom management directly impacts personal accomplishment. While much research has examined teacher efficacy in general, little research has looked at classroom management in particular. This study sought to contribute to the teacher efficacy in classroom management literature by investigating if a course in classroom management increased teacher efficacy in classroom management as contrasted with a comparative graduate course in the exceptional child. The investigator administered at pre and posttest the Teacher Efficacy in Classroom Management and Discipline Scale (SEBM) and used the71 graduate students' course grades along with behavior vignettes as a means to externally validate their self-perceived teacher efficacy beliefs. The current study also investigated the effect of mediating variables, such as gender, age, ethnicity, the number of years teaching, child or childless, socio-economic status, undergraduate and graduate grade-point averages on teacher efficacy in classroom management. The results indicated that students in the classroom management course were significantly better at identifying target behaviors and interventions for the behavior vignettes than were students in the exceptional child course. In addition, teaching experience for classroom management students related positively to classroom management self-efficacy scores at posttest, but not at pretest, and none of the other mediating variables related to self-efficacy scores. Participants in the classroom management course did not statistically differ in gains on classroom management self-efficacy scores as compared with participants in the exceptional child course. Moreover, there was no significant relationship between course grades and posttest self-efficacy scores for both classes. Results are discussed in terms of implications for school psychologists, study limitations, and suggestions for future research.
An Examination of the Goodness of Fit Model: How is the Relationship Between Child Temperament and Behavior Expressed in Different Types of Classroom Environments?
Year of Dissertation:
2010
Program:
Educational Psychology
The present study examined how the relationship between child temperament and behavior is expressed in different types of classroom environments in prekindergarten settings. Other goals of the study were to further operationalize the goodness of fit model in school settings and to evaluate possible interactions of process variables indicative of classroom quality with child temperament to see if these interactions predicted child behavior and social skills. Participants included 130 students and their teachers (N = 11) in three prekindergarten settings. Child temperament was measured using the Total Temperament score from the Teacher and Caregiver Temperament Inventory for Children (TACTIC; Billman & McDevitt, 1998). Classroom quality and environment characteristics were measured using the Program Structure scale of the Early Childhood Environment Rating Scales-Revised (ECERS-R; Harms et al., 2005) and the Sensitivity subscale score from the Caregiver Interaction Scale (CIS; Arnett, 1989). Outcomes in behavioral and social domains were measured using the Externalizing Behavior Problems and Social Skills subscales on the Preschool and Kindergarten Behavior Scales- Second Edition (PKBS-2; Merrell, 2002). Hierarchical linear modeling indicated that child temperament alone was the sole predictor of child externalizing behavior, while child temperament, disability status, and school program structure predicted child social skills. Overall, the study indicated that the goodness of fit model when operationalized in terms of the transactional relationship between temperament and environmental demand factors of characteristics of the classroom setting (as informed by the classroom quality literature) has predictive value and describes child behavioral and social outcomes in prekindergarten settings.
Phonemic Awareness Instruction: Effects of Letter Manipulation and Articulation Training on Learning to Read and Spell
Year of Dissertation:
2010
Program:
Educational Psychology
This study investigated the effect of two types of phonemic awareness instruction on learning to read and spell words. English speaking preschoolers were taught to segment words into phonemes using either letters or letters combined with articulation pictures. Participants possessed letter name knowledge but were nonreaders prior to training. Triplets were formed based on similar scores on the segmentation, word reading and vocabulary pretests and members were randomly assigned to three conditions: letter manipulation only (LO), letter manipulation plus articulation (LPA), and no treatment control conditions. LO children were taught letter-sound correspondences and use of letters to spell phonemes in words. LPA children received LO training and in addition the use of articulatory pictures to spell phonemes. Control children remained in their classrooms.
The Effect of Using Art Activities in Home Literacy Bags
Author:
Heather brookman kadish
Year of Dissertation:
2011
Program:
Educational Psychology
The present study examined the impact of including art activities in family literacy materials on parents' beliefs about reading and their self-efficacy beliefs about their ability to teach reading to their young children. The study took place over five weeks in a private day school in New York City with middle to upper-class population. The 70 student participants (i.e., across kindergarten through second grade) were randomly assigned to either treatment (i.e., literacy bags with art experience) or control (i.e., no art), with assignment done separately for males and females. Multi-item measures were used that assessed demographics, home literacy environment, family involvement in school, children's interest in literacy, and parental efficacy and reading beliefs. Though not statistically significant, parents' self-efficacy scores in the experimental group improved and their enjoyment scores increased over time while the parents' scores in the control group fluctuated randomly across the four weeks with marginally significant differences between the two groups found during the last week. A modest statistically significant correlation was found between parents' self-efficacy and parental involvement. The students in the experimental group reported that they enjoyed the artwork. The current study suggested that offering a broader range of literacy activities can enhance and increase the impact of parent involvement initiatives in children's literacy learning. The findings suggest a relationship between parental self-efficacy and parental involvement, and that art activities affect both of these factors. Results raised the possibility that there is value in exploring ways to extend the benefit of art activities. Limitations of the study included the variable aspects of self-reporting for data collection, potential incongruence between books used and students' particular interests and skills, limited and homogenous population sample, and limited family background information. Future research should further explore the effect of incorporating art on parents' self-efficacy and reading beliefs.
Case Residuals in Structural Equation Modeling
Year of Dissertation:
2011
Program:
Educational Psychology
From the beginning, lead methodologists in psychometrics and quantitative psychology have been well aware of the problems of fitting structural and confirmatory factor models. The question we approach in our research is how to best detect this misfit and how to identify specific sources of misfit by scrutinizing the data at the case level. Since Anscombe's seminal 1973 paper, detecting problems at the case level in ordinary least-squares regression has become the norm in statistical modeling. In contrast, the usual practice in fitting structural and confirmatory factor models has been to only examine misfit at the variable and sufficient statistic level. This practice ignores a small body of literature that has arisen since the early 1990s about diagnostics of case level and case by variable level misfit. An important paper by Bollen and Arminger (1991) and a follow-up paper by Raykov and Penev (1999), have developed theory behind Individual Case Residuals (ICRs). These papers help lay the ground work for more detailed case and case by variable level diagnostics, without discarding traditional variable oriented procedures. Our goal is to demonstrate uses of multivariate techniques, such as robust Mahalanobis distances, biplots and cluster analysis to analyze the multivariate dataset of ICRs and thereby detect sources of data problems with respect to a target model. We hope to encourage researchers to make better use of case level diagnostics among the various classes of latent variable models, especially with the advent of multivariate tools in packages such as R and SAS.
Does Temperament Relate to Sensory Processing Styles in 3 -to 5-year Old Preschoolers with Disabilities
Author:
Jeanne Cavanaugh-Todd
Year of Dissertation:
2010
Program:
Educational Psychology
The purpose of the present study was to examine the relationship between
Parental Involvement of Chronically Ill Mothers and Its Impact on the Child's Education
Year of Dissertation:
2009
Program:
Educational Psychology
This study examined how maternal chronic illnesses may affect children's academic functioning through parental involvement. Levels of maternal demands of illness were measured in order to see if they affect the levels of parental involvement and children's grades. Four research questions are addressed in this study. Do the maternal demands of illness affect children's educational achievement? Do the maternal demands of illness impact the extent of parental involvement? Does parental involvement of mothers with chronic illness influence their children's academic achievement? Does positive parental involvement mediate or moderate the impact of maternal chronic illness on children's educational performance? One hundred fifty mothers diagnosed with Multiple Sclerosis (MS), diabetes, cancer, HIV/AIDS, Myelodysplasic Syndrome, and Fibromyalgia and with a child in middle school or high school (aged 10-18) participating in this study were recruited from national organizations, clinics, and social support groups serving patients with chronic illnesses. Participants completed a 184-item questionnaire that was composed of measures of 1) parent demographic information, 2) parent medical information, 3) child demographic information, 4) Demands of Illness Inventory (DOII), 5) parental self-efficacy, 6) parental educational aspirations, 7) grade expectations, 8) school contact and participation, 9) Parent Involvement in School Interview, 10) home supervision, and 11) children's educational outcomes. Each participant was compensated ten dollars for completing the questionnaire. Overall, the results suggest that the majority of students of mothers with chronic illness were able to function adequately in terms of academic achievement. However, children's academic functioning may be at risk when their mothers experienced high levels of illness demands as a result of their chronic illness. Children's grades were found negatively related to levels of demands of illness their mothers experienced. This study also revealed that levels of demands of illness imposed on the mothers with chronic illness and disruption in normal family functioning were negatively related to parental self-efficacy in helping their children succeed in education. Moreover, this study found that parental self-efficacy mediated the effects of maternal demands of illness on children's academic achievement. Children of chronically ill mothers with higher academic efficacy tended to do better academically than those of mothers with lower levels of efficacy. Finally, among different forms of parental involvement, parental educational aspirations and grade expectations were positively related to children's educational performance in terms of grades.
Improving the Acquisition and Retention of Science Material by Fifth Grade Students Through the Use of Imagery Interventions
Year of Dissertation:
2011
Program:
Educational Psychology
A strong base of knowledge in vocabulary is imperative for all students as they are exposed to a great deal of novel words throughout their academic careers, especially in content areas such as science. By devising effective interventions to teach science vocabulary, literacy and science can be integrated and students' mastery of novel words will improve.