Benton County, Oregon is presently experiencing a crisis level of police contacts with mentally ill suspects. The cause of this sudden increase is currently unknown and local law enforcement is not adequately equipped or funded to respond to this development. This report summarizes the recent literature on law enforcement encounters...
State and federal aid payments to local governments have grown explosively over the last fifteen years. One reason for this growth is that the donor governments can alter a local government's budget choices through grants. Grants have not remedied social problems, however, because the local governments' responses to grants were...
Grounded in life span theory, this study explored how personal goals (as measured by possible selves) related to depressive symptoms in older adults. Possible selves represent individuals' ideas of what they would like to become (hoped-for selves) and what they are afraid of becoming (feared selves). Possible selves are also...
The present study explores the topic of Multiracial Identity Development and how parents play an important role in the identity development of children. The role of parents becomes crucial for parents of Multiracial children as they transmit cultural values, beliefs, language, and practices. Although models of racial identity development exist,...
The purpose of this observational study was to describe the frequency of coercive behavior among siblings in foster care, a diverse population at high risk for mental health impairment. We examined differences in coercion frequency at the level of the individual child (i.e. age & gender), sibling dyad (i.e. age...
According to the World Health Organization (2019), every 40 seconds, approximately one person from around the world dies from suicide. The highest percentage of adults with major depression and serious thoughts of suicide are between 18 to 25 years of age (Shen & Millet 2003-2012, p. 31). Studies have indicated...
Transitioning periods throughout an individual’s life are inevitable, and can be a traumatic experience if a person is not equipped with necessary skills to cope with them. No matter where one is from or what language they speak, every person will have a transitioning experience, whether it be negative or...
As more awareness of the global issue of sex trafficking comes to light, counselors must prepare to provide therapeutic services to this specific client population (Litam & Lam, 2021). Individuals who have survived sex trafficking are entering mental health counseling practices and community agencies regularly (Ide & Mather, 2019); yet,...
The purpose of the study was to: (1) test a client-outcome
evaluation methodology in a community mental health clinic, (2)
relate a measure of clients' recent life change to client outcomes,
(3) relate functions staff perform for clients to staff mental health
profession and to client outcomes, and (4) suggest...
The Wanniya-laeto, often referred to as Veddas, are the indigenous people of Sri Lanka. They live primarily in governmental designated areas in the forest with a few Vedda villages on the eastern coastal region. In-depth, semi-structured interviews as well as participant observation were the methods used to access the perceptions...
Distress among resettled refugees in the U.S. consistently reflects refugees’ experiences of discrimination, re-traumatization, gaps in healthcare services, and disrupted expectations and lived-realities. This thesis aims to fill a critical need for ethnographic studies investigating how recent anti-immigrant, -Muslim, and -Arab rhetoric and policies combine with chronic gaps in services...
This study investigated the attitudes of mental health counselors toward persons
with Acquired Immunodeficiency Syndrome (AIDS). Three hundred and fifty-eight
members of the American Mental Health Counselors Association were mailed a survey
packet including an Attitude Towards AIDS Victims scale and an additional two
questions assessing comfort with clients with...
The purposes of this study were to assess mental
health counselors' knowledge of AIDS and to determine the
effect of various independent variables upon knowledge. The
variables used were gender, professional contact with PWAs,
personal contact with PWAs, age, sexual preference, AIDS
training, and personal acquaintance with a person who...
The present study investigated the relationship between mental health counselor's self-efficacy and multicultural counseling competency. Counselor self-efficacy and multicultural counseling competency were assessed using two self-report measures. The Counselor Self-Efficacy Scale (CSES) and the Multicultural Counseling Awareness Scale: Form B (MCAS:B) were administered to members of the Oregon Mental Health...
The purpose of this dissertation study was to increase understanding of licensed mental health professionals' experiences as they have encountered and navigated through compassion fatigue (CF). CF is a complex construct with an attendant constellation of secondary stress responses. In order to examine the complex and varying factors associated with...
Native Americans in southwest Oregon are a heterogenous
group comprising one-quarter of the state's total Indian
population. Despite their notable size, Native Americans in
this six county area are either ineligible for, or inaccessible
to, federally sponsored Indian health facilities available
to Native peoples elsewhere. Research was conducted
over an...
Changing trends within the mental health system treatment practices demand exploration of the cultural context of assessment and treatment of Black/African Americans. Culturally competent assessments include a realistic integration of historical context. Clinicians counseling Black/African Americans must be prepared to assess and address PTSD, racial trauma, micro-aggressions, and other known...
Previous reports on the state of the Latino/a-focused mental health literature suggest that the quantity of Latino/a-focused articles within the mental health field continued to be disproportionate to the growing percentage of Latino/as in the United States (Liang, Salcedo, Rivera, & Lopez, 2009). As such, Latino/a mental health experiences, needs,...
A consistent research question in caregiving is why caregivers show individual differences in their abilities to manage stress. This study focuses on the personality traits of spouse caregivers to assess individual differences which enable them to adapt to their particular caregiving situation. Previous research has established concurrent relationships between personality...
Mental illness is a universal phenomenon, but cultural context has a profound influence on how it is perceived, classified, and treated. Most systematic research on public attitudes toward mental illness has been completed in Western societies. The emergence of multicultural psychotherapy in the West has helped professionals recognize the extent...
