Journal of Prevention & Intervention in the Community最新文献

This article presents the reflections and insights of a graduate of Spalding's Psy.D. program who took the Program Evaluation course that is the focus of this special issue 20 years ago and has made Program Evaluation a central component of his career. Helpful elements of the course are noted as are ways that the course could have been strengthened then as well as now. Implications of these insights for the future of the course are also detailed.

This cross-sectional study was conducted as an experiential project in a graduate Program Evaluation class. We worked together as a team to solve difficulties that occurred when evaluating a program for the first time, including overcoming initial fears and identifying the appropriate focus. The goal of this study was to identify the most common barriers to attendance at Bridgehaven Mental Health Services, a community-based outpatient program tailored to aid in the transition from hospitals to community living. External barriers to attendance were examined by an adapted version of the Structural Barriers to Clinic Attendance Scale (SCBA) and a researcher-created qualitative measure. Between-group t-tests and non-parametric analyses indicated that a far walk from the bus stop and negative perceptions of staff behavior were significant external barriers to Bridgehaven attendance among 42 adult members with severe mental illness. Additionally, themes from the qualitative data revealed that 74.7% of members viewed other obligations and appointments as barriers to their attendance. About half of the members surveyed indicated the positive impact of groups on attendance. Overall findings revealed the importance of considering external barriers, particularly issues related to transportation, scheduling, and social perceptions when identifying solutions to declining attendance rates. Through the process of conducting this study, we learned invaluable skills (e.g., problem-solving, teamwork, collaboration, and flexibility) that will carry with us as we evaluate programs in the future.

A program evaluation of a community outpatient mental health program was conducted as part of a required course in Spalding University's School of Professional Psychology. Specifically, the program evaluation examined how the client-specific factors of motivation to change were related to attendance and participation in services. Motivation to change was assessed by surveying program participants utilizing the University of Rhode Island Change Assessment (URICA). Students hypothesized stage of change would be significantly correlated with attendance rates. Results indicate stage of change was related to attendance, with pre-contemplation scores negatively associated with attendance although most of the specific analyses were not statistically significant. Students' experiences and feedback regarding conducting the program evaluation are discussed.

This article provides details of the background for the focus of this special issue-the accounts from groups of students who conducted evaluations of a local agency while enrolled in a Program Evaluation course in a Psy.D program. These projects were a part of the 5th year that students in the course worked explicitly with an agency on a Program Evaluation. Important themes and insights from the experiences of all 5 years are presented. Analysis of course evaluation data indicates these evaluation group projects were associated with a significant increase in the rating students gave the course. Comments from students on the evaluation forms likewise support the value of this experience, as well as pointing out some additional areas for consideration.

In a doctoral clinical psychology program, students are frequently challenged to learn and implement new skills to improve the lives of their clients. Conducting a program evaluation, from beginning to end, is one such example. This article describes the experience of its authors in completing a program evaluation for a local agency in Louisville, KY as a class project. The project resulted in a proposed procedure to monitor therapeutic outcomes of the agency's clients (the agency refers to them as "members"). The authors discuss the class process, how they decided on a topic for the project, the use of monitoring outcomes in community mental health settings, why monitoring outcomes is so important, and the new proposed outcome assessment procedure, limitations, and future directions. Free measures were selected to meet the perceived needs of the agency and were presented to the staff in a final presentation. Finally, the authors examined their overall experience regarding participation in the project.

Churches are enduring social institutions that play a critical role in the promotion of health and wellbeing. In this introduction, the function of churches as community change agents is highlighted. A brief history of the role of churches in shaping and transforming social systems is provided along with examples of recent church-based change efforts. Further, this issue presents six articles that explore church-based change efforts impacting relationship development, trauma response, wellbeing, pandemic response, and attitudes toward environmental justice. Each article identifies a specific social problem and examines how churches promote prevention and intervention efforts to address the problem. Overall, this issue suggests that churches continue to serve as a resource for community change and that helping professionals should seek to engage with churches when promoting health.

This study examines attachment styles, religiosity as measured by religious coping, and church activities, for their possible impact on feelings of well-being in an Indonesian Christian community. This cross-sectional study was conducted on both purposive and snowball samples of 264 Christians from Bandung and Semarang, Indonesia. The study hypothesized that a more positive Self-Other Model of attachment, greater positive religious coping, and higher church involvement would predict greater well-being as measured by flourishing/eudaimonic, affective, and subjective well-being scales. Pearson correlation and multiple regression methods were used to analyze data. Results indicated that 15% of the total variance in affective well-being is attributable to positive self-model attachment, positive religious coping, and higher subjective religiosity/spirituality. The study also found that 9.9% of the total variance in flourishing or eudaimonic well-being is counted for the self-model. However, neither predictor was correlated to hedonistic or subjective well-being. Greater religiosity, as measured through the church activities, was also not correlated with greater measures in the three types of well-being. This study concluded that the predictive power of religiosity such as church activities and attachment to well-being may depend on the characteristics of the culture.

The church is commonly assumed to scaffold individuals' socially supportive relationships and prosocial behavior. If true, that would make the church an important support for individual development and community change, facilitating and fostering healthy relationships and positive interactions with others. In this study, we analyzed experimental data collected from 30 churches in three Latin American countries to assess the impact of an intervention targeting relational ministry practices on 6- to 14-year-old children's perceived support and prosocial behavior. Data were collected from children before (n = 710) and after (n = 612) the intervention in treatment (n = 25 churches) and control (n = 5 churches) conditions. Results indicated that the introduction of socially supportive practices in church children's ministries increased children's prosocial behavior, an effect mediated by changes in perceived support. Implications for children's development and the church as a means of community change are discussed.