Browsing by Subject "social support"

Now showing 1 - 6 of 6
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    Bystanders to College Bullying: An Application of the Bystander Intervention Model
    (2019-07) Danielson, Carly
    College bullying is a damaging health problem. Many campuses have bullying prevention efforts, yet few are tailored to bystanders. This is unfortunate, as peer bystanders are present in most bullying situations and know about incidents before campus officials. However, many bystanders fail to intervene due to fear and uncertainty about how to safely and effectively help. This dissertation utilized mixed methods research to pursue three goals. First, informed by the bystander intervention model (BIM; Latané & Darley, 1970), focus groups were conducted to explore how college students: 1) notice bullying, 2) interpret harm, 3) feel motivation to help, 4) know how to help, and 5) implement intervention decisions. These results uncover how bystanders communicatively construct their bullying experiences, as well as the range of possibilities and difficulties encountered when making intervention choices. The second goal of this project was to analyze whether participation in long-term focus groups serve as a bullying intervention in and of itself. A pre- and post-test design revealed that participants in the intervention group had higher bystander intervention scores. Initiatives that involve education and group-dialogue sessions have great potential to improve bystanders’ attitudes and behaviors that support bullied peers. Last, students evaluated 28 bystander responses to bullying that varied along three dimensions: 1) helpful to unhelpful, 2) safe to unsafe, and 3) direct to indirect. These evaluations illustrate the range of intervention options as a mechanism to reduce passive and avoidant bystander roles. This study’s findings encourage campuses to adopt bystander intervention campaigns to curtail bullying.
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    Cigarette Smoking, Social Support, and Workplace Smoke-free Policies among an Urban American Indian Population
    (2017-12) Lamont, Genelle
    Background: Despite a high prevalence of cigarette smoking and smoking-related morbidity and mortality among U.S. American Indians (AI), few studies have investigated tailored community and workplace interventions, including cessation programs. The purpose of this study was to determine the association of (1) the presence of a workplace smoke-free policy and (2) perceived social support among family and friends for quitting smoking with current smoking in a representative sample of urban AI adults. Methods: Data collected using respondent-driven sampling (RDS) from the 2011 Tribal Tobacco Use Prevalence Study was used to analyze the risk of being a current smoker when exposed to (1) workplace smoke-free policies and (2) perceived social support using two log multinomial regression models, adjusted for potential confounders based upon exposure-specific Directed Acyclic Graphs. Study-eligible participants were: self-identified AI, aged 18+, and residents of Hennepin or Ramsey Counties, Minnesota with a separate residence from the recruiter. Data were weighted to account for variation in participant network size using RDS Analysis Tool, V. 5.6., and participant demographics using U.S. Census 2010, yielding 940 of 964 completed interviews with full demographics. Results: Lack of a workplace smoke-free policy was associated with a 36 percent increase in risk of being a current smoker (PR = 1.36, 95% CI = 1.29 to 1.42) compared to a former smoker and a 41 percent decrease in risk of being a former smoker (PR = 0.59, 95% CI = 0.55 to 0.64) compared to a nonsmoker. Additionally, exposure to quite a bit or a lot of social support for quitting or staying smoke-free was associated with an 11 percent decrease in the risk of being a current smoker (PR = 0.89, 95% CI = 0.86 to 0.91) and an eight percent decrease in risk of being a former smoker (PR = 0.92, 95% CI = 0.88 to 0.95) compared to being a nonsmoker, respectively. There was also an eight percent decrease in risk of being a current smoker (PR = 0.92, 95% CI = 0.90 to 0.94) compared to a former smoker with exposure to quite a bit or a lot of social support for quitting or staying smoke-free versus no social support. Conclusions: Further study of Minnesota AI work environments and strategies for encouraging employers to implement and enforce complete smoking bans is warranted. AI smoking cessation programs may benefit from inclusion of family and friend support mechanisms.
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    Prenatal depressive symptoms and social support: An examination of their role in prenatal care adequacy, birth outcomes, and risk for postpartum depressive symptoms among low-income urban women
    (2016-05) Sidebottom, Abbey
    Background. Decreasing the prevalence of inadequate prenatal care, poor birth outcomes, and postpartum depression are public health priorities. Objectives. To examine, in a low-income, racially diverse, urban clinic-based sample the associations of: 1) Social support and depressive symptoms with prenatal care adequacy. 2) Social support and depressive symptoms with poor birth outcomes. 3) Prenatal and postpartum depressive symptoms, as well as their magnitude, and correlates of occurrence. Methods. The study sample was women who received prenatal care at five community health centers from 2005-2009. Maternal data from prenatal and postpartum risk screening tools were linked to data from their infants’ birth certificates. We examined the associations of social support and prenatal depressive symptoms with late and less than adequate prenatal care (Paper 1, n = 2,341) and preterm birth, low birthweight, and small size for gestational age (Paper 2, n = 2,868). We also characterized depressive symptoms in the prenatal and postpartum periods (Paper 3, n = 594). For all papers, multivariable analyses included personal, social, behavioral, and environmental risk factors associated with maternal and infant health. Results. Lack of social support was associated with inadequate prenatal care. Women with poor partner support and depressive symptoms were at the highest risk for starting care late. Neither prenatal depressive symptoms nor social support were independently associated with birth outcomes. There was an association between prenatal and postpartum depressive symptoms. Over half of women with postpartum symptoms had elevated symptoms prenatally. Variability in risk markers suggest unique risk factors are associated with experiencing depressive symptoms in either or both time periods. Conclusions. This study assessed understudied psychosocial risks with public health priority outcomes in a sample of women served by the public health system. Findings support efforts to increase screening for prenatal depression to better identify those at risk of postpartum depression.
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    Relationships between Adolescent Stress, Depressive Symptoms, Social Support, Coping and Sexual Risk Behavior in Young Adulthood
    (2017-01) Ghobadzadeh, Maryam
    Objective To describe longitudinal associations among adolescent stressful life events, depressive symptoms, coping skills, social support, and young adult sexual risk behaviors and sexually transmitted infection (STI) in the United States. Design A total of 18,924 participants aged from 12 to 18 at baseline were included in the analysis. The study's design was a secondary analysis of three waves of longitudinal data utilized structural equation modeling (SEM) to test direct and indirect effects of adolescent stressful life events, depressive symptoms, problem-focused coping skills, unhealthy coping strategies, and social support on young adult sexual risk behavior. To examine the hypotheses of this study, three main structural models were evaluated. Model 1 explores the effects of depressive symptoms and stressful life events as the potential mediator of the association between mental health problems and sexual risk behavior, while Model 2 tests mediating effect of unhealthy coping strategies. Lastly, Model 3 examines the indirect effects of problem-focused coping skills and social support on sexual risk behavior. Results As anticipated, direct effects were found for adolescent stressful life events and unhealthy coping strategies on young adult sexual risk behavior. Adolescent stressful life events and unhealthy coping also significantly mediated the relationship between depressive symptoms and young adult sexual risk behavior. Higher social support from family and problem-focused coping strategies were associated with lower depressive symptoms and stressful life events in adolescence. Adolescent social support from family and problem-focused coping skills were shown to influence young adult sexual risk behavior indirectly through reducing stressful life events. Conclusions Given the associations between stressful life events, depressive symptoms, and sexual risk behavior, these findings highlight a need for screening for depression and stressful life events in adolescents. Findings may also be useful to inform interventions for high-risk adolescents facing psychological stressors and suggest that coping skills training and enhancing social support should be specific targets.
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    Sociodemographic and Psychological Differences in Global Self-Worth Among Adolescent Ultimate Players
    (2020-12) Espinoza, Sarah
    Sport is an important context in adolescent development. A wealth of research has investigated how the experiences young people have and relationships they build within sport impact their self-perceptions, specifically, their global self-worth. Understanding how global self-worth can be affected by athletic experiences has been key to designing psychologically safe and promotive physical activity spaces, and such research (largely guided by Harter’s mediational model) has informed pedagogy and practice in sport settings and physical education. One adolescent sport context—ultimate—has been left out of this work, though it has tens of thousands of youth participants in the United States and abroad. Extant research on youth sport and global self-worth may not be immediately applicable to understanding ultimate, as ultimate has a unique body of participants, refereeing system, culture, and je ne sais quoi from other sports. Thus, the purpose of this study was to explore sociodemographic and psychological differences in adolescent ultimate players’ global self-worth. Participants (N = 380, mean age = 17.1 years) completed measures of global self-worth, perceived athletic and social competence, perceived social support, and sociodemographic information at a single timepoint. Hierarchical regression analyses indicated that identifying as a boy, identifying as Caucasian/White rather than Asian/Asian American, and having higher perceived ultimate competence, social competence, and social support from parents significantly predicted variance in participants’ global self-worth. No significant relationships were found between global self-worth and years of experience in ultimate, highest level of ultimate played, playing on single-gender or mixed-gender ultimate teams, or perceived social support from ultimate coaches, teammates, or opponents. In sum, being good at ultimate, able to make friends and fit in with peers, and feeling valued by one’s parents contribute to adolescent ultimate players’ global self-worth. Youth ultimate programs should take steps to give participants the best possible chances of having adaptive self- worth by sustaining their feelings of competence and support.
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    Understanding and facilitating peer communication in online health communities
    (2022-07) Levonian, Zachary
    When a person has a health crisis, the availability of social support affects both their physical and mental health. Online communities can make support available by providing a place to connect with peers who have had similar experiences. However, finding relevant peers to talk to and learn from is challenging. Algorithmic systems for peer matching could help people find relevant peers, but designing such systems requires an understanding of how people use online communities for support—when, how, and to whom they connect. I collaborated with a large existing online community—CaringBridge.org—to understand how patients experiencing a health crisis and their non-professional caregivers use CaringBridge to seek and receive support. Based on this understanding, I created a recommendation system to facilitate peer connections on CaringBridge. CaringBridge users of my system received email recommendations for peer users they may wish to connect with. By collecting survey and usage feedback, I advance an understanding of when support seekers and providers connect with potentially-supportive peers. Taken together, my work describes quantitatively and qualitatively the use of health-related online communities for receiving and providing social support. My work has implications for the deployment of peer-matching systems that facilitate supportive communication.