2005 APA Student Poster Presenters ~ Washington D. C.

 

Supavan Khamphakdy-Brown & Johanna E. Nilsson
University of Missouri - Kansas City
The relationships among social support, spirituality, acculturative stress, and mental health in Laotian Refugees and Immigrants

Social support and spirituality have been positively correlated with coping with stress and traumatic life events (Sarason & Sarason, 1998; Siegal & Schrimshaw, 2002). Given the acculturation and adjustment difficulties many refugees and immigrants face, this study examines whether spirituality and social support may buffer stress, reduce psychological distress, and increase life satisfaction among Laotians. One-hundred and forty Laotian refugees and immigrants from a large mid-western Buddhist temple completed a survey battery. Simultaneous regressions revealed that spirituality predicts life satisfaction, social support predicts acculturative stress, and existential well-being, a component of spirituality, predicts depression and acculturative stress. Implications for counseling Laotian refugees and immigrants are discussed.

Frances C. Shen  & Jane Swanson
Southern Illinois University 
Developing an Asian American stereotypes scale

Asian Americans are commonly stereotyped in society as intelligent, hard working, and academically successful (Wong, Lai, Nagasawa, and Lin, 1998). Some researchers suggest that the internalization of these stereotypes in the Asian American population may result in negative consequences (Sue & Kitano, 1973; Lee, 1994). Since no measure exists to date that encompasses all aspects of Asian American stereotypes, the purpose of this study is to develop a measure that assesses the internalization of Asian American stereotypes (IAASS).

A total of 294 Asian American college students (30 for pilot study, 264 for study) from university campuses across the U.S. were recruited to complete the IAASS. Through the process of conducting an exploratory principal components analysis with an oblique rotation (promax), a total of nine components were identified as the most conceptually interpretable scale with the most sound factor structure. The final scale (101 items) consists of nine subscales: English Language Use, Importance of Family, Academic Conscientiousness and Achievement, Emotional Expressiveness, Pursuit Prestigious Careers, Outspokenness/Assertiveness, Self-Expectations of Math/Science Abilities, Other-Expectations of Math/Science Abilities, and Future Success. Research and clinical implications are discussed.

Kenneth T. Wang, Mantak Yuen, & Robert B. Slaney 
Penn State University 
Perfectionism in Chinese high school students from Hong Kong

The factor structure and psychometric properties of the Chinese version of the Almost Perfect Scale-Revised (APS-R; Slaney, Mobley, Trippi, Ashby, & Johnson, 1996) were assessed. A cluster analysis located three groups among the 509 Chinese high school students from Hong Kong. Participants were grouped into adaptive perfectionists, maladaptive perfectionists, and non-perfectionists, which replicated past U.S. studies. A comparison of group means on depression, satisfaction with life, loneliness, and academic achievements revealed similarities and differences when compared to previous studies using U.S. participants. Adaptive perfectionists appeared to be psychologically healthier than maladaptive perfectionists. Adaptive perfectionists reported higher scores on Satisfaction With Life and lower scores on Depression and Loneliness than the two other groups. Interestingly, although the maladaptive perfectionists had higher discrepancy scores, there were no significant differences between maladaptive perfectionists and non-perfectionists on the dependent variables.

Rufus R. Gonzales, Kimberly R. Bena, & Laura Dick 
Loyola University - Chicago 
The role of positive and negative affect in minority students’ perceptions of self, family, peer and school environments

A comprehensive review of the subjective well-being (SWB) literature by Lightsey(1996) set the foundation for the current view that well-being is comprised of a global sense of life satisfaction in combination with a balance between positive and negative affect. The current study sought to explore the understudied area of adolescent SWB. Specifically, it explored the extent to  which positive and negative affect are influenced by four domains: self, family, peers, and school environment. A sample of 164 students(55% female)  ranging in age from 12 – 16 years old were read one of two vignettes and asked to respond to a series of questions about the main vignette figure, Anna, and her  adjustment to a new environment after a move to a different neighborhood. In the “positive” vignette, Anna is described as adjusting successfully, whereas  in the “negative” vignette, she is described as adjusting unsuccessfully. Responses were categorized qualitatively, and grouped into six areas of  influence over the four domains: Worldview, Support, Adjustment, Tangible Help, Goal Setting/Skills, and Pressure/Stress. Further exploratory analyses will focus  on detecting gender differences, and differences between positive and negative vignettes.

Bryant Jensen 
Arizona State University  
An analysis of the impact of teacher characteristics on the mathematic achievement of Spanish-speaking kindergartners

The number of children beginning public school in the United States who solely speak Spanish-Spanish-speaking kindergartners (SSK)-continues to increase. Currently, one in five children in U.S. public schools comes from immigrant families, the majority of which are from Latin American ancestry. SSK academically lag behind their peers  in all subject areas at the beginning of and throughout the schooling trajectory. Home and school factors contribute to these differences. Among school factors that account for variations in academic achievement, teacher characteristics have been shown to significantly contribute. The purpose of this study is to describe the academic risk factors and educational state of SSK as they begin kindergarten in terms of mathematic achievement, evaluate the impact of three teacher characteristics on the mathematic achievement of SSK, and determine whether these effects are mediated by the teachers' perception of child's approach to learning.

Ruth Chu-Lien Chao
University of Missouri - Columbia 
Counselors’ multicultural counseling competence: Multicultural training, ethnic identity development, and color-blind racial attitudes

This study explored the relation between multicultural counseling competence (MCC) and (a) social desirability, (b) counselor’s race, (c) multicultural training, (e) ethnic identity, and (f) color-blind racial blind attitude. With web-survey, the research had 338 participants recruited from graduate programs in counseling psychology. Most participants (68%) were White (n = 231); 32% were racial/ethnic minorities: Asian American/Pacific Islander (n = 26), African American or Black (n = 27), Latino(a) (n = 34), and Native American (n = 20). The number of multicultural courses ranged from 0-5 (M = 1.76; SD = 1.83); multicultural research projects, 0-20 (M = 2.80; SD = 5.48); multicultural workshops, 0-50 (M = 5.52; SD = 11.02).

Using the hierarchical regression analysis – counselors’ race, multicultural training, ethnicity identity, and color-blind racial attitudes as a whole—all these variables were found to contribute significant variance to MCC as measured by MCKAS, total R2 = .52. Social desirability was found not related to MCC possibly because Poenterott et al. (2002) eliminated items related to social desirability. In addition to race and training, ethnic identity and color-blind racial attitudes were strong predictors, suggesting that, in terms of MCC, the crucial roles of awareness and knowledge of one’s identity and the existence of racism. 

Anita G. Wells, Owen Richard Lightsey, Jr., Todd Pietruszka, Mei-Chuan Wang, Ayse C. Uruk, & Brett A. Stancil 
University of Memphis  
Emotion-focused coping mediates the negative affect-pain distress relationship among African American women

The authors tested whether positive affect and negative affect mediate the relationship of coping and fear of pain with pain-related distress (PD) among 159 African American undergraduate women. Whether coping styles mediate the effects of affect on PD also was tested. Fear of pain, emotion-oriented coping, and negative affect accounted for unique, additive variance in PD subtypes, accounting together for between 23% and 35% of the variance. Emotion-oriented coping and negative affect also predicted global PD, and negative affect fully mediated the effects of emotion-oriented coping on PD somatic anxiety. Results suggest that counselors can reduce African American women clients’ PD by helping to decrease their focal fears of minor and medical pain and their reliance on emotion-oriented coping.

Dionne M. Smith
John Hopkins School of Public Health  
In their own voices: Attitudes about mental health utilization by African-American females at a PWI

This study explored the attitudes of mental health utilization by African American female students at a Predominantly White Institution (PWI). Because African American females have been found to underutilize mental health services, particularly those provided by the university, the study’s goals were to explore participants’ beliefs related to (a) treatment efficacy, (b) barriers to seeking mental health services (accessibility, availability, acceptability, and accountability), and (c) counselor preferences (race, gender, age, religious orientation and sexual orientation). The data from this study were analyzed using a modified grounded theory approach to identify participant attitudes regarding the utilization of mental health services. The findings resulted in the development of a theory of mental health utilization. In addition, recommendations, based on the data from the study, are provided for the following three entities: (a) mental health professionals, (b) university counseling centers, and (c) mental health-related training programs.

Nicholas C. Scull, Francisco Villegas, Alberta M. Gloria, & Jeanett Castellanos 
University of Wisconsin-Madison  
Latino male undergraduates’ well-being: Cultural fit and coping responses

Given that Latino men and their unique educational experiences are rarely studied separately from their Latina counterparts, this study addressed Latino men’s perceptions of their educational environment, cultural congruity within the university environment, and how their coping responses predicted their subsequent well-being. Participants (N = 100) were primarily first-generation students whose most commonly reported coping response was actively finding out more about the situation and taking a positive planned action, followed by drawing upon past experiences. The least frequently used coping responses were to seek professional advice and to pray or consult with a priest/minister. Cultural congruity and the coping response of taking a planned positive approach were most predictive of psychological well-being.

Greta Winograd & Georgiana Shick Tryon
City University of New York  
Ethnic society immersion and the counseling expectations of students in an opportunity program

First-year college students from African-American and Hispanic backgrounds who participate in an Opportunity Program on their university campus  completed measures assessing their counseling expectations, individual  characteristics (self-esteem, attributional style, and problem-solving  appraisal), and level of acculturation (dominant society immersion and ethnic society immersion). Ethnic society immersion and individual  characteristics interacted to predict counseling expectations in a number  of domains (general counseling expectations, expectations for personal  commitment, expectations for facilitative conditions, and expectations for counselor expertise). These results suggest that psychologists who provide  counseling services or make referrals to students who share characteristics with this sample can use information pertaining to clients' self-esteem,  attributional style, problem-solving appraisal, and ethnic society immersion to assist clients in modifying unrealistic expectations.

Michael Lau & George S. Howard
University of Notre Dame  
Extreme response style: A review of the evidence, assessment and potential solutions to the problem 

Extreme response style (ERS) is the tendency for some respondents to use the more extreme ends of a Likert-type scale, independent of item content (Paulhus, 1991). For example, to the extent that two groups differ on ERS, between-group comparisons would be confounded and inaccurate. Multicultural psychological research in particular has been sensitive to the potentially deleterious effects of the phenomenon (Chun, Campbell, & Yoo, 1974; Hui & Triandis, 1989; Iwawaki, Zax, & Mitsuoka, 1969; Zax & Takahashi, 1967). Despite some awareness of the problem, cross-cultural research persists in neglecting the potential threat of extreme responding in psychological measures. We argue that this is a consequence of a variety of factors including ignorance or unfamiliarity of the problem and a lack of recognized solutions to control for such response bias. This paper highlights ERS by reviewing the evidence, assessment methods and more recent proposals to address the problem in psychological research. Additionally, the consequences of ERS on the conclusions drawn from research are discussed.     

**Note: University affiliation listed for first author.**

 

2004 APA Student Poster Presenters ~ Honolulu, Hawaii

   G.E. Kawika Allen
            University of Utah
Biracial Identity Development: A Multivariate Profile Analysis and Theoretical Formulation of Racial Identity among Biracial Polynesian/Caucasian Individuals
    The U.S. Bureau of the Census (1992) foresees that by the year 2050, the representative face of America will no longer be those of European Anglo-Saxon descent. Biracial people are having a growing impact in the U.S. with respect to the meaning and value of race. One of these fast growing groups of biracial Americans is the Polynesian/Caucasian population.
     This study explores how biracial Polynesian/Caucasian individuals identify themselves in terms of their parents’ racial groups based on the participants’ social and psychological experiences. Other psychosocial factors (i.e., phenotype, language, geographic location, cultural activities and organizations) are also explored.
     The participants are those with one parent of a Polynesian race (i.e. Hawaiian, Tongan, Samoan, Fijian, Tahitian, and Maori) and the other parent of European American heritage. Currently, 51 (twenty-six females and twenty-five) Polynesian/Caucasian individuals have completed the Biracial Identity Attitude Scale (BIAS). According to the profile analysis, results show that participants identify and affiliate more with the parent who is Polynesian than is Caucasian as indicated on higher mean scores on all subscales. Results imply the significant influence and dominance of the culture, traditions, customs, belief system, and values of the Polynesian people. Influential factors such as phenotype, language, geographic location, cultural activities and organizations, language, family, peers/friends also play a role in the racial identity development. Religion and self-esteem will also be examined.  

   Corey Scheidegger
            Arizona State University
Constructs Impacting Psychological Well Being in Ethnically Diverse Adolescents 
     This study examined the interdependence between several constructs among ethnic minority youth believed to contribute to psychological well-being and identity development in early adolescence.  Although the constructs of mattering, self-concept formation, depression, and anxiety have been identified as significant, they had yet to be analyzed concurrently among ethnic minority students.  For this study, the researchers believed a high degree of interdependence would exist between the four psychological constructs for the specified population, and that the adolescent’s sex would contribute differential effects. 
     Sixty-eight junior high students were drawn from six public schools (aged 11-14).  Of these 68 adolescents, there were 49 males; 32 Hispanics, 10 African Americans, 6 Asians, 4 Native Americans, and 16 in the ‘other’ category.  Self-report assessments were completed in their classrooms, and included the General Mattering Scale (Marcus, 1991) and Beck Youth Inventories (Self-Concept, Depression, and Anxiety) (Beck, 2001).          
     This study revealed the interdependence of the psychological constructs of anxiety, depression, and self-concept on ethnic minority adolescents. The results indicate a strong, positive relationship between anxiety and depression, and a negative relationship between depression and self-concept scores.  Finally, a significant interaction was found by sex as females demonstrated higher scores in depression and anxiety.

   Tammy Hietpas
            Arizona State University
Multicultural Training in Graduate Counseling and Graduate Counseling Psychology

 

   Carrie Casteñeda
            University of Utah
Language Brokers
Qualitative methods were used to examine the effects of language brokering on the relationship between Mexican immigrant children and their monolingual parents. Language brokering is the complex process children engage in when translating and interpreting for their monolingual parents. This study also investigated the deeper meanings of language brokering as a gendered experience. Participants included 13 Mexican heritage adult women who participated in in-depth, semistructured interviews. Preliminary analyses revealed experiences of racism, sexism, and discomfort in some of their experiences. Most recalled enjoying being helpful to their parents, however a few participants disliked the experience. Finally, most of the women expressed feeling closer to their parents, relatives, and community due to their experiences. Further analysis will incorporate data collected from focus groups. Understanding the content and extent of language brokering will help psychologists incorporate these brokering tasks in their cognitive and language assessments and can work with these children to identify their brokering skills as social and academic strengths. Furthermore, this study centralizes the voices and experiences of women of color. Understanding these experiences will inform the practice and training of future psychologists who work directly with women that once acted as language brokers.

   Sylvia Gomez
            Washington State University
Racial Ethnic Minority and Whites Students' Perceptions of their Supervision

   A Yang
            University of Wisconsin-Madison
Hmong Cultural Identity and Academic Achievement: Calm Heart Manual 
Using a culturally sensitive model for school based interventions developed by Bass and Coleman (1997), a program for Hmong youth was developed and implemented in a Mid-Western State.  Literature has shown that the development of a positive ethnic/cultural identity promotes academic achievement.  This program starts with the hypothesis that the stronger and more positive a youth’s cultural identity, the better his or her performance in and connection with school will be.  Based on five core Hmong values (respect, caring, hard work, ethics and wisdom) a manual was created to enhance cultural identity among Hmong youths.  By creating a learning environment conducive to developing positive qualities that are core to the culture (the five core values), emphasizing group solidarity, and learning to negotiate dominate culture from a position of strengths, Hmong youths can benefit from the program.  A unique feature of this program is that it is being delivered by school personnel (mostly European descended) after being trained by the authors. The trainees received ongoing supervision in the process. 

    Wei-min Wang
             Indiana University
The Glass Ceiling:  Minorities and Women in Counseling/Personnel
This study aims to explore the perceptions of the Glass Ceiling phenomenon in the top ten counseling/personnel services programs as ranked by the U.S. News and World Report (2003).  Among the 38 surveys distributed to nine programs, 15 surveys were returned from five programs, and two participants were interviewed by phone.  These participants include non-Hispanic-White American males, non-Hispanic-White American females, African American females, and Latino/Hispanic males.  The ranks of the participants include assistant professors, associate professors, and full professors.  Results indicated that minority faculty members perceived the Glass Ceiling in their programs, while non-Hispanic-White faculty members did not perceive it.  Compared to the non-Hispanic-White faculty group, minority faculty members perceived their opportunities for advancement are worse than for others.  Further, when being asked for systematic factors that hinder their advancement, minority faculty members indicated more factors than non-Hispanic-White faculty members.