VTechWorks Repository :: Browsing by Author "Bradburn, Isabel S."

Browsing by Author "Bradburn, Isabel S."

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Cross-Cultural Differences in the Determinants of Maternal Emotion Coaching: Role of Maternal Emotional Awareness and Emotion Regulation
Tan, Lin (Virginia Tech, 2017-04-28)
Despite many positive outcomes associated with emotion coaching, factors related to individual differences in emotion coaching have yet to be explored. The current study examined cultural differences in the role of maternal characteristics, specifically emotional awareness and emotion regulation, as determinants of emotion coaching. These findings will facilitate culturally desired emotion socialization practices leading to optimal emotional development of children. In the current study, I translated two English-based questionnaires into Chinese to assess maternal emotional awareness and emotion coaching. Next, I examined relations of reappraisal, suppression, and emotional awareness to maternal emotion coaching. I also investigated the role of maternal emotional awareness as a mediator in the relation of maternal use of reappraisal and suppression to maternal emotion coaching in both Chinese and American cultures. Participants included American (n=164) and 163 Chinese (n=163) mothers. Maternal emotional awareness was measured using subscales of Toronto Alexithymia Scale 20 and Difficulties in Emotion Regulation Scale. Emotion regulation strategies were assessed using Emotion Regulation Questionnaire. To measure emotion coaching, mothers completed Parents' Beliefs about Children's Emotions questionnaire. Structural equation models were estimated to examine how maternal emotional awareness and emotion regulation related to emotion coaching. Results confirmed the reliability and validity of the Chinese questionnaires. Maternal emotion coaching did not include mothers' views about negative emotions because equivalence could not be established across Chinese and American cultures; therefore, the emotion coaching discussed in this study is different from previous research on emotion coaching that typically involves responses to negative emotions. Maternal emotional awareness was associated with their emotion coaching in both samples and the strength of the association was not different across cultures. However, relations of reappraisal and suppression to emotional awareness and emotion coaching were different across Chinese and American samples. Emotional awareness mediated the relation of reappraisal to emotion coaching only in the American sample. Additionally, emotional awareness was a mediator of the relation of suppression to emotion coaching in both samples. Overall, the findings of this study supported that maternal emotional awareness and use of emotion regulation strategies are important determinants of maternal emotion coaching in both cultures.
A Cross-national Study: Using Face-Negotiation Theory to Understand Gender, Commitment and Culture in Coping Strategies toward a Partner's Infidelity
Chang, Wei-Ning (Virginia Tech, 2017-06-06)
The current study explored coping strategies toward the context of discovering a partner's sexual infidelity. There were two primary goals for the current study. First, the current study examined the gender and national differences in conflict styles toward the context of discovering a partner's sexual infidelity. Second, the current study examined the relationship between face concerns and commitment. There were national and gender differences on self-construal face concern, face-concern and conflict styles in the current study. The current findings also suggested that face concern is moderating the relationship between commitment and conflict styles. The limitation and future directions were discussed as well as the clinical implications in the current study.
Faith of Our Mothers: Religiosity in Adult Daughter-Mother Relationships
Earles, Lesley Ann (Virginia Tech, 2016-07-06)
In this hermeneutic phenomenological study, a purposive sample of 12 religious women considered their experiences of religiosity with their mothers and larger family systems. Adult daughters reflected on the significance and meaning of religion in their lives and relationships, particularly the interaction of mothers and adult daughters concerning spirituality, beliefs, and experiences including intergenerational transmission of religiosity. Adult daughters were queried regarding maternal religious influence and the challenges of being women. Data were collected to saturation and analyzed to consider individual narratives about families into the development of three themes: Family Connections, Religious Consciousness, and Encountering Community. Gilligan's theory of moral development, including the ethic of caretaking, is employed to consider religiosity in the adult daughter-mother relationship. Limitations, clinical implications, and future directions are explored. In summary, spheroids increase anti-inflammatory potential of eBMSCs and are practical for clinical use. Increased anti-inflammatory efficacy was demonstrated in a model of in vivo inflammation. This dissertation provides an understanding of the anti-inflammatory activities of eBMSC spheroids that can be used to develop an OA therapy.
Illuminating inequality in access: Variation in enrollment in undergraduate engineering programs across Virginia's high schools
Knight, David B.; Grohs, Jacob R.; Bradburn, Isabel S.; Kinoshita, Timothy J.; Vaziri, Stacey; Matusovich, Holly M.; Carrico, Cheryl (2020-10-06)
Background Determining the root causes of persistent underrepresentation of different subpopulations in engineering remains a continued challenge. Because place-based variation of resource distribution is not random and because school and community contexts influence high school outcomes, considering variation across those contexts should be paramount in broadening participation research. Purpose/Hypothesis This study takes a macroscopic systems view of engineering enrollments to understand variation across one state's public high school rates of engineering matriculation. Design/Method This study uses a dataset from the Virginia Longitudinal Data System that includes all students who completed high school from a Virginia public school from 2007 to 2014 (N= 685,429). We explore geographic variation in four-year undergraduate engineering enrollment as a function of gender, race/ethnicity, and economically disadvantaged status. Additionally, we investigate the relationship between characteristics of the high school and community contexts and undergraduate engineering enrollment across Virginia's high schools using regression analysis. Results Our findings illuminate inequality in enrollment in engineering programs at four-year institutions across high schools by gender, race, and socioeconomic status (and the intersections among those demographics). Different high schools have different engineering enrollment rates among students who attend four-year postsecondary institutions. We show strong associations between high schools' engineering enrollment rates and four-year institution enrollment rates as well as moderate associations for high schools' community socioeconomic status. Conclusions Strong systemic forces need to be overcome to broaden participation in engineering. We demonstrate the insights that state longitudinal data systems can illuminate in engineering education research.
Implementation and Evaluation of a Community Gardening and Nutrition Program among at-risk Youth
Reese, Felicia Lorene (Virginia Tech, 2013-06-01)
Background: Community-based participatory research (CBPR) has been recommended as an effective approach to engage communities in implementing research projects relevant to their needs and interests. Following this approach, the Dan River Partnership for a Healthy Community was formed to address regional obesity concerns in the Dan River Region, a health disparate area located in south central Virginia and north central North Carolina. Community gardens were identified as a priority, and the development and implementation of this study continues previous collaborative efforts in evaluating the effectiveness of community gardens within this region. Objectives: The primary aim of this study was to determine if applying the Social Cognitive Theory (SCT) to an adapted curriculum throughout a 10-week gardening and nutrition education intervention would increase youths' willingness to try fruits and vegetables (FV), self-efficacy for eating and asking for FV and gardening, knowledge of nutrition and gardening, and outcome expectations for FV. Secondary aims were to determine if age groups or attendance rates would positively influence outcome measures and to qualitatively evaluate youths' perceptions about their experiences and opinions about the program. Methods: Utilizing a pre-post design, researchers delivered this program once weekly with 60 minutes of interactive nutrition or gardening education and 30 minutes of experiential gardening. Questionnaires included validated and novel measures. Repeated measure ANOVA analyses were used to determine changes in outcome measures. Post-program interviews were conducted with youth and qualitative data was coded and analyzed. Results: Of the 43 enrolled youth, 42 were African American. Although willing to try FV did not change significantly, there were significant improvements in self-efficacy for asking for FV from 1.70 (0.34) to 1.83 (0.29) (F=7.07; p=.013) and overall gardening knowledge from 14.53 (3.45) to 15.74 (3.90) (F=7.67; p=.01). There were also significant improvements in some of the knowledge subcategories for gardening and nutrition, including plant parts and my plate (p<0.05). Qualitative findings indicated the majority of the participants expressed positive perceptions of the program with the most liked components including food sampling, games and gardening experiences. Discussion and Implications: Our findings demonstrate the feasibility of developing and implementing an adapted theory-driven community gardening and nutrition education program for low socioeconomic youth in public housing. It implicates the need for future research on youth community gardens using the CBPR approach. Findings were shared with community partners and future efforts will expand this program.
The Mindful Transition to Parenthood Program: Developing and Evaluating a Psychoeducational-Experiential Intervention for Couples Expecting Their First Child
Gambrel, Laura Eubanks (Virginia Tech, 2012-09-27)
The transition from partnership to parenthood can be a time of excitement and rapid change for couples. After the birth of a first child, many couples also experience declines in relationship satisfaction leading to increased risk of relationship dissolution, postpartum depression, and negative child outcomes. Considering the frequency of this transition and the connection between parent relationship quality and health, it is surprising that relatively few intervention programs have focused on preparing couples for this life transition. Hence, I have developed a four week relationship enhancement intervention entitled the Mindful Transition to Parenting Program. This program is based on interpersonal neurobiology, which states that mindfulness training can change brain structures that can lead to increased attunement abilities and sustained improvements in relationship quality. The program focuses on improving mindfulness, empathy, emotionality, and relationship satisfaction for couples expecting their first child. In this research study, I determined the outcomes for couples who participate in this program through mixed methods research with a randomized experimental design. Thirty-three couples were randomly assigned by a coin-toss to either a waitlist control group, or the Mindful Transition to Parenting Program treatment group. Results demonstrated that men in the treatment group significantly improved in relationship satisfaction, negative affect, and mindfulness when compared to the control group. Women had no significant treatment effects, though treatment group women had small effect size improvement in three measures of empathy. The emergent qualitative themes for participants in the program included: (1) positive changes for self, (2) improvements in couple relationship, (3) feeling more prepared for baby, and (4) male involvement. Mixed methods analyses revealed that men in particular benefited from the social support, increased connection with their babies, and more identification with the role of father that the program provided. These are promising results, showing that a brief intervention including mindfulness and skill-based learning can have positive effects on couples in the transition to parenthood. I conclude by discussing clinical implications and future research directions.
Mothers’ and Fathers’ Differential Discussion of Emotion with their School-Age Children
Devine, Diana (Virginia Tech, 2018-12-03)
Parental socialization of emotions has been a topic of interest in developmental research for decades because of the importance of understanding how children learn about their emotions. The influence of the sex of both parent and child, however, are often not considered, and research on parent emotion socialization has often focused on infants and young children. Not considering these constructs during middle childhood ignores the importance of this developmental period, during which children have a more established gender identity and thus might recognize a shared identity with a parent. Emotion socialization from both parents during this developmental period has the potential to differentially inform children’s expectations of gender norms related to emotions. Men and women interpret and express their emotions differently and may differentially socialize their children regarding emotions along these patterns. The current study examined parental emotion coaching and elaboration observed during discussions of positive and negative emotions between 44 children with their mothers and fathers, with specific focus on the sex of the parents and children. I expected that mothers would engage in more emotion coaching and use a more elaborative style than fathers. Additionally, I expected that parents of girls would be more encouraging of positive emotions than parents of boys and that parents of boys would be more discouraging of negative emotions than parents of girls. Children between the ages of 6 and 9 visited the Children’s Emotions Lab with their mothers and fathers on separate occasions and participated in an emotion talk task with each parent. Each pair discussed a time when the child was happy and a time when the child was upset; each discussion lasted two and a half minutes each. I found a significant emotion valence by child sex interaction: parents were more elaborative and encouraging when discussing positive emotions with daughters than with sons and that parents were more elaborative and encouraging when discussing negative events with sons than with daughters. There was also specific parent gender by child sex interaction: mothers were less elaborative and encouraging with daughters than sons and that fathers were less elaborative and encouraging with sons than daughters. Findings from this study suggest that parents’ experiences with their own emotions influence their emotion socialization practices with their children. Recommended practices for future studies and interventions are suggested.
An Ounce of Prevention: Evaluation of the Fun FRIENDS Program for Kindergarteners in a Rural School
Lewis, Krystal Monique (Virginia Tech, 2013-02-04)
Anxiety disorders are among the most common psychological disorders in childhood
with reported rates as high as 41.2% (Cartwright-Hatton, McNicol, & Doubleday, 2006; Cooley,
Boyd, & Grados, 2004). A majority of the anxiety intervention programs target children who are
7 years of age and older. Yet, many anxiety disorders develop in the preschool years (APA,
2000). Therefore, it seems desirable to work with young children who display early signs of
anxiety to provide them with skills that would protect them from later full-blown
psychopathology. Early intervention and prevention programs may be effective ways to modify
the developmental trajectory of anxiety disorders.

The present research reports findings from an anxiety prevention program for 4-7 year
olds. One hundred and ten children from two schools in a rural part of Southwest Virginia
participated. Fifty-seven children from one school received a classroom-based prevention
program on a weekly basis over 20 weeks. Fifty-three children from a second school served as a control group. The mean age of the sample was 5.11 years. Results suggested that anxiety was positively correlated with emotional symptoms (r = .67, p<.001), peer difficulties (r = .21,p<.05), and total difficulties (r =.29, p<.03) on the Strengths and Difficulties Questionnaire for all children. Overall, there were significant decreases in anxiety symptoms from pre to follow-up for both groups of children [F (1, 105) = 7.79, p =.006]. Unexpectedly, anxiety symptoms increased from pre to post for children in the intervention school whereas they decreased for children in the control school. Although these findings are reversed of what was expected, these results may have important implications concerning the importance of providing anxiety education and awareness for teachers. Implications of the current findings, limitations of the study, and directions for future research and dissemination are discussed.
Predicting Socioeconomic Success and Mental Health Outcomes for Young Adults who Dropped out of College
Faas, Caitlin Suzanne (Virginia Tech, 2013-10-31)
This dissertation is comprised of two studies that both aimed to understand the population of young adults who dropped out of college. Life course theory and the theory of emerging adulthood were used to create the theoretical foundation for the studies. The first study explored how students who dropped out of college were faring during young adulthood on multiple measures of well-being (personal income, job satisfaction, subjective socioeconomic success, mastery, happiness, depression, and stress). Five latent classes emerged from the data, which demonstrated the heterogeneity within the sample (N = 1,530). The second study then utilized the same sample to examine how transitions into adulthood predicted well-being during young adulthood while controlling for family of origin resources and developmental assets. The transitions to adulthood included timing of marriage, parenthood, and whether or not the young adult was living independently of their parents or not. The hypotheses based on theory were partially supported, with some differences existing between men and women. The discussion reviews the implications for practice and policy.
Predictors of Bystander and Defender Behaviors in Bullying: Maternal Reactions to Child Emotion and Empathy in the United States and South Korea
Shin, Eunkyung (Virginia Tech, 2020-06-08)
The increase in bullying and its detrimental impacts threaten children's healthy development across the world; however, little research has examined multi-factors related to bullying. Guided by ecological theory, this study examined ecological factors that related to children's bystander and defender behavior when they witness bullying. Considering the role of culture and maternal emotion socialization in children's socio-emotional development, cultural differences in the relation of maternal emotion socialization on children's reactions to bullying through their empathy were investigated. Children (10-12 years old) and their mothers in the United States (n=165) and South Korea (n=158) participated in an online survey. Mothers completed the Coping with Children's Negative Emotions to assess maternal unsupportive and supportive reactions to their children's emotions. Children reported on their empathy (i.e., personal distress and empathic concern) using the Interpersonal Reactivity Index and on their bystander/defender behaviors using the Types of the Conformity Groups in Bullying. For bystander behavior, mothers' unsupportive reactions were significantly correlated with children's bystander behavior through empathic concern in both cultures. Personal distress mediated the relation of maternal unsupportive reactions to bystander behavior only in the American sample. For defender behavior, American mothers' supportive reactions directly predicted defender behavior whereas the effect of Korean mothers' supportive reactions on defender behavior was mediated by empathic concern. More personal distress was related to more defender behavior in the American sample while less personal distress was related to more defender behavior in the Korean sample. Results of this study supported cultural differences in the relation of maternal emotion socialization to children's reaction to bullying. American children were more likely to help the victim when their mothers supported their negative emotions. For Korean children, mothers' supportive reactions were related to their prosocial behavior through their empathic concern. However, in both cultures, children's empathic concern was a significant mediator in the relation between maternal unsupportive reactions and bystander behavior. This finding may provide educational guidance to bullying intervention programs across cultures.
Refugee migration stress and family function: A phenomenological study of refugee mothers from East and Central Africa
Tsokodayi, Ruvimbo Tapiwa (Virginia Tech, 2019-07-25)
Refugee families who flee their homes as a result of conflict or persecution and face stressful migration experiences often struggle with trauma that may put them at increased risk for family discord and dysfunction. The purpose of this study was to use an interpretative phenomenological approach to explore the lived experiences of 8 refugee mothers resettled in the United States, in particular their experiences pre-, during, and post-migration, and to further examine the impact that these experiences had on their relationships to their children and families. The study also examined mothers' experiences with different forms of support systems post-resettlement. Participants were recruited through a resettlement agency in Roanoke, Virginia. This study illuminated a number of key findings to further inform research, theory, and practice with this population. Refugee mothers reported stressful and traumatic experiences across their migration, describing harsh living conditions, prolonged stays in refugee camps, and loss of children and other family members as some of the most stressful experiences. Once resettled, mothers spoke of continued challenges, including language barriers and inconsistent or arbitrary support from formal social support services. Findings also suggest resiliency among this sample of refugee families, with mothers highlighting strong relationships with their children during and post-migration. The current study further informs the family stress literature and contributes a strength-based framework to understanding challenges faced by refugee families across the migration period.
Relations Between Parent Emotion Coaching and Children's Emotionality: The Importance of Children's Cognitive and Emotional Self-Regulation
Day, Kimberly L. (Virginia Tech, 2014-04-27)
Children's self-regulation has been found to be related to optimal developmental outcomes; however, researchers are still investigating how cognitive and emotional regulation work together to explain development of self-regulation. This study investigated how children's private speech interacted with emotion regulation, conceptualized as effortful control, to predict children's emotionality. I also examined how private speech and effortful control may be different strategies of self-regulation that more fully explain the relation of parental emotion coaching philosophy to children's emotionality. Preschool-aged children (n = 156) and their primary caregivers participated in this study. Parental emotion coaching was observationally measured as encouraging of negative emotion when discussing a time when children were upset. Children's non-beneficial private speech was transcribed and coded during a cognitively-taxing task. Children's effortful control (attention shifting, attention focusing, and inhibitory control) and negative emotion (anger and sadness) were measured using parent-report on the Child Behavior Questionnaire (CBQ). It was found that children's parent-reported effortful control significantly mediated the relation between parent's observed emotion coaching philosophy and children's reported negative emotionality. Parents who did more emotion coaching had children reported to have greater effortful control and in turn were reported as less emotionally negative. While parental emotion coaching did not predict children's non-beneficial private speech, children who used less of the non-beneficial private speech were reported as less emotionally negative. Lastly, children's private speech and effortful control interacted to predict children's negative emotion. When children were low in effortful control they were high in negative emotion, regardless of how much non-beneficial private speech they used. However, children with higher levels of effortful control were reported as less negative when non-beneficial private speech was low. This research supports the importance of considering both cognitive and emotional development together, because private speech and emotion regulation interacted to predict children's negative emotionality. In addition, parents who support and encourage negative emotions may aid children's effortful control. This research further supports the importance of children's use of private speech in the classroom because non-beneficial private speech may be an additional cue for teachers and caregivers to know that a child needs assistance.
SAT patterns and engineering and computer science college majors: an intersectional, state-level study
Tan, Lin; Bradburn, Isabel S.; Knight, David B.; Kinoshita, Timothy; Grohs, Jacob R. (2022-11-05)
Background Numerous efforts worldwide have been made to increase diversity in engineering and computer science (ECS), fields that pay well and promote upward mobility. However, in the United States (U.S.), females and students from underrepresented racial/ethnic minority groups (URM) still pursue ECS training far less than do their peers. The current study explored sex and racial/ethnic differences in ECS college enrollment as a function of math and verbal SAT score patterns (balanced or imbalanced) using an intersectional approach within a U.S. context. Data represented a census of students who took the SAT, graduated from all Virginia public high schools between 2006 and 2015, and enrolled in a 4-year college (N = 344,803). Results Our findings show, within each sex, URM students were at least as likely as their non-URM peers to enroll in ECS programs when they scored within similar SAT score ranges. Students were more likely to enroll in ECS programs if their SAT profile favored math, compared to students with similar math and verbal SAT scores (balanced profile). This overall pattern is notably less pronounced for URM female students; their propensity to major in ECS appeared to be largely independent of verbal scores. Conclusions Our findings inform strategies to diversify ECS enrollment. If programs continue to emphasize SAT scores during admission decisions or if more systemic issues of resource allocation in secondary schools are not addressed, other efforts to broaden participation in ECS programs may fall short of goals. Our findings also highlight the importance of considering the intersection of sex and race/ethnicity for recruitment or other educational promotions.
A Snapshot of Virginia’s High School-to- Postsecondary Engineering and Computer Science Enrollments
Knight, David B.; Matusovich, Holly M.; Grohs, Jacob R.; Bradburn, Isabel S. (2022)
Enrollment in engineering and computer science postsecondary degree programs and careers (note: hereafter encapsulated by “engineering”) is not equally distributed across all segments of the population, despite continued investments and efforts to address this gap. This study aimed to better understand the transition from high school into enrollment in postsecondary engineering and computer science bachelor’s programs. Although our original goal was to examine enrollments across all Virginia public high schools for students attending a four-year university, either directly from high school or transferring from community college, we broadened the analysis to consider enrollments in engineering programs at community colleges as well based on early findings. We tracked (anonymous) individual students from Virginia public high schools into postsecondary enrollment (N=685,429 students, high school graduating years 2007-2014) using data from the Virginia Longitudinal Data System (VLDS). The VLDS connects student-level administrative data from the Department of Education (PK-12) to postsecondary records from the State Council of Higher Education for Virginia. To better understand or “unpack” why certain schools and divisions yield different engineering enrollment rates, we explored student data in VLDS, such as high school course taking, and also interviewed administrators, school counselors, and teachers from five purposefully sampled regional sites across the state. It is important to note that these data are based on cohorts that completed high school and enrolled in postsecondary institutions prior to the existence of COVID-19. It is too early to understand the effects of COVID-19 on pathways into engineering and computer science postsecondary institutions, but we would anticipate that observed inequities would likely deepen. Our results shed light on demographic and school-based patterns that could be used to (a) guide conversations around local and state policy; and (b) increase and broaden enrollment in engineering in Virginia. In addition to this summary report, we include: 1) analyses specific to your high school/division, and 2) a reflective tool aimed to help guide conversations with local stakeholders to think through these reports and analyses.
Social Equity and Inclusion in Education Policy. Audience Notes
Bradburn, Isabel S. (Virginia Tech, 2017-11-30)
This document includes notes written by members of the audience of the panel: Social Equity and Inclusion in Education Policy
Stimulus Matters: Effects of Familiarity versus Novelty
Buonomano, Lisa Cristine (Virginia Tech, 2008-03-21)
The ability to suppress a prepotent response is a crucial component of cognition that begins to develop during infancy and peeks during preschool. As part of understanding how one develops inhibitory control, learning about what conditions may help or hurt task performance is of great interest. The purpose of this project was to study the effects of familiarity and novelty on inhibitory control. Thirty-five preschoolers between two and five years of age were tested in four different versions of the Dimensional Change Card Sort (DCCS). Performance was no different among standard, 2D-familiar, and 3D-familiar conditions. When comparing novel with the standard condition, children performed worse (37% and 68% respectively). Findings support the attentional inertia hypothesis. An exploratory analysis on temperament was also investigated. Children who scored higher in effortful control performed better in the 2D-familiar condition.
Therapists' Use and Management of Eating Disorder Lived Experience in the Treatment of Clients with Eating Disorders
King, Ashley Ayn (Virginia Tech, 2022-04-07)
The treatment of eating disorders (EDs) presents many challenges. Therapists' reactions towards clients (countertransference) may further complicate treatment. Countertransference may be partially due to the therapist's own vulnerabilities. Due to the personal connection to the work, countertransference towards ED clients may be pronounced among therapists with eating disorder lived experience (EDLE). Previous research indicates that 25-50% of ED therapists have EDLE; yet, minimal research examines how therapists negotiate their experiences while treating ED clients. The existing literature largely operates from the assumption that EDLE is a liability. While therapists with EDLE have some distinct challenges, therapists with EDLE may also have a unique perspective to offer the ED profession. The present study sought to understand how therapists with EDLE use their EDLE as a resource in their clinical work with ED clients. The study was guided by the theoretical frameworks of social constructivism and symbolic interactionism, as well as the person-of-the-therapist clinical training philosophy. Using constructivist grounded theory methodology, semi-structured interviews (Mtime = 89 minutes) were conducted with 22 therapists with EDLE, who work with ED clients. Participants explored how they use and manage their EDLE during key tasks of treatment with their ED clients. Results revealed that therapists engaged in two, interconnected constellations of processes (systems) in order to use and manage their EDLE in clinical practice. The first system (The Central System) helps therapists transform their personal experiences into clinical guidance that they can use to inform their work. The second system (The Checks and Balances System) helps the therapist find a balance between connecting with the client, while also allowing for differences of experiences to emerge. Lastly, personal processes (personal meaning making, values surrounding authenticity, and stigma surrounding EDLE), existing outside of these systems, were also found to impact the ways in which therapists use and manage themselves. Findings have implications for the EDLE literature, by providing novel ways therapists can use their EDLE. Findings also have implications for the POTT framework by exploring how POTT can be adapted for therapists who share lived experiences with their clients. A POTT-EDLE is proposed for training therapists with EDLE.
Understanding Postpartum Depression from a Structural Family Theory Perspective: Examining Risk and Protective Factors
Banker, Jamie Elizabeth (Virginia Tech, 2010-08-24)
This study examined pregnancy risk and protective factors for developing postpartum depression from a structural family theory lens. The purpose of this study was to (1) examine previously identified pregnancy stressors to learn which stressors put women more at risk for postpartum depression and (2) to identify possible buffers for women who are at risk for developing postpartum depression. In this paper, two analyses were proposed. Analysis I, uses a hierarchal regression analysis to examine the impact of couple related stress on postpartum depression. Analysis II uses moderated multiple regression to test factors during pregnancy which may protect at-risk women from postpartum depression symptoms. Three post-hoc exploratory analyses were conducted following the originally proposed analyses. Secondary data was used in this study. The data was collected in four large urban hospitals in Utah from 2005-2007 and included 1568 women. The results of these analyses illustrate the importance of conceptualizing postpartum depression from a family systems perceptive. Specifically, this study shows that a couple's relationship, depending on the stress level experienced in the relationship, can be both a risk and protective factor for pregnant women.
Using Music and Emotion to Enable Effective Affective Computing
Bortz, Brennon Christopher (Virginia Tech, 2019-07-02)
The computing devices with which we interact daily continue to become ever smaller, intelligent, and pervasive. Not only are they becoming more intelligent, but some are developing awareness of a user's affective state. Affective computing—computing that in some way senses, expresses, or modifies affect—is still a field very much in its youth. While progress has been made, the field is still limited by the need for larger sets of diverse, naturalistic, and multimodal data. This work first considers effective strategies for designing psychophysiological studies that permit the assembly of very large samples that cross numerous demographic boundaries, data collection in naturalistic environments, distributed study locations, rapid iterations on study designs, and the simultaneous investigation of multiple research questions. It then explores how commodity hardware and general-purpose software tools can be used to record, represent, store, and disseminate such data. As a realization of these strategies, this work presents a new database from the Emotion in Motion (EiM) study of human psychophysiological response to musical affective stimuli comprising over 23,000 participants and nearly 67,000 psychophysiological responses. Because music presents an excellent tool for the investigation of human response to affective stimuli, this work uses this wealth of data to explore how to design more effective affective computing systems by characterizing the strongest responses to musical stimuli used in EiM. This work identifies and characterizes the strongest of these responses, with a focus on modeling the characteristics of listeners that make them more or less prone to demonstrating strong physiological responses to music stimuli. This dissertation contributes the findings from a number of explorations of the relationships between strong reactions to music and the characteristics and self-reported affect of listeners. It demonstrates not only that such relationships do exist, but takes steps toward automatically predicting whether or not a listener will exhibit such exceptional responses. Second, this work contributes a flexible strategy and functional system for both successfully executing large-scale, distributed studies of psychophysiology and affect; and for synthesizing, managing, and disseminating the data collected through such efforts. Finally, and most importantly, this work presents the EiM database itself.
Virginia Star Quality Initiative Family Child Care Home Provider Demonstration Pilot Evaluation Report
Bradburn, Isabel S.; Dunkenberger, Mary Beth; White, Nancy; Allen, Elizabeth (Virginia Tech Child Development Center for Learning and Research, 2011-08-05)
The Virginia Star Quality Initiative (VSQI) family child care home demonstration project was a pilot quality rating and improvement program designed to provide intensive professional development services to family child care home providers. The pilot project took place between October 1, 2010, and June 30, 2011, and was funded by federal American Recovery and Reinvestment Act monies awarded to the Virginia Department of Social Services. The Virginia Early Childhood Foundation (VECF) piloted the family child care home provider program as an extension of the classroom‐based VSQI, currently in its fifth year of a pilot phase. Through a competitive process, VECF selected six geographically and culturally diverse regions encompassing 35 Virginia localities to participate, with a recruitment target of 75 licensed family child care providers. Regions included nine localities in the Southwest (coordinated by Smart Beginnings Appalachia), Arlington/Alexandria, six localities in Central Virginia (coordinated by Smart Beginnings Central Virginia), Fairfax, seven localities in the Greater Richmond area (coordinated by the Richmond Resource and Referral Agency, ChildSavers) and five localities in South Hampton Roads (coordinated by Smart Beginnings South Hampton Roads and The Planning Council).

Browsing by Author "Bradburn, Isabel S."

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