7 research outputs found
The Evaluation of Attitudes towards Individuals with Mental Illness among Counselors in Training
Negative attitudes and stigma associated with mental illness have a profound impact on individuals who experience them. Researchers have defined stigma as the attribution of a deviant characteristic to members of a particular group. Persons with severe and persistent mental illness (SPMI) face many difficulties that impact their full participation in social life. Although attitudinal reactions to individuals with SPMI have improved considerably over the last few decades, there are still areas for improvement. Limited research has been conducted to evaluate attitudes and stigma associated with individuals with SPMI among human service professionals-in-training (HSPs). For this study HSPs were defined as individuals entering into social service, mental health, and substance abuse professions. Further, there have only been a few published studies in attitude research that utilized randomized vignettes portraying individuals with two different mental health diagnoses. Data collection occurred in counselor education and similar programs at many universities. A total of 79 participants (20 males and 58 females) took part in this study. Recruitment efforts reached HSPs at 27 universities throughout the contiguous United States. For this study, participants were asked to respond to self-report surveys and to one of two written vignettes to quantify their attitudes toward the individuals depicted in them. The two vignettes described an individual with a mental illness and differed in the diagnosis attributed to the individual: schizophrenia spectrum disorder in one vignette and generalized anxiety disorder in the other vignette. Results indicated that although there were slight mean differences between the two groups of participants, the differences were not statically significant, t (77) = 0.63, p =53. The Attribution Questionnaire-27 (AQ-27; Corrigan, 2012) gathered overall attitudes towards mental illness. The Mental Health Provider Stigma Inventory (MHPSI; Kennedy, Abell, & Mennicke, 2014) was used to collect data on attitudes, behaviors, and social pressure impacting stigma towards individuals who have SPMI. Data collected with these two scales yielded evidence to indicate that participants held stigmatizing attitudes towards individuals with SPMI. Data gathered suggested that graduate students in rehabilitation counselor education programs expressed fewer stigmatizing attitudes than students from other programs. This result was seen across both measures. Data were collected on frequency of contact with persons with mental illness to evaluate the association between contact frequency and knowledge of mental illness and negative attitudes. Demographic data gathered included gender, age, professional training, and number of years of work experience in a counseling-related role. Further, a hierarchical multiple regression was used to determine which order of predictors were statistically significant to the outcome measure. Prior literature suggest that prior contact and familiarity scores playing a more important role in predicting the outcome variable (AQ-27) then the demographic information. The first model was statistically significant F(6,72) =3.64, p= .003 and explained 23% of the variance in the dependent variable (AQ-27 total scores). After the input of these demographic factors the second step included LOF and SADP- PCF-R scores. After entry of the second step the overall variance was 28%. The second model was statically significant F(8,70) = 3.39 p = 002 and explained an additional 4% variance in the model. In the final adjusted model, four out of the seven predictor variables were statistically significant. A small pilot study consisting of rehabilitation counseling professionals was used to develop the methodologies for this study. The primary limitation of the primary study was the sample size. Further details of the methodology used and limitations of this particular study will be described in subsequent chapters. Implications of this study and suggested future research are proposed
Evaluation of General and Specific Assistive Technology Knowledge Among Students with Disabilities in Postsecondary Environments
The use of technology has become fairly integrated into our personal, educational, and professional lives. Students with disabilities attending postsecondary institutions may require the use of Assistive Technology (AT) for their educational pursuits and access to other technology. This study quantified students\u27 general knowledge of AT and specific knowledge of Dragon NaturallySpeaking software. In addition, this study examined the relationship between disability support services received and current knowledge of AT among students with disabilities in a postsecondary environment. Participants were recruited from those who received disability support services at a midsize university in Illinois. An online survey was administered to 41 participants that included the Prior Knowledge of Assistive Technology Instrument (PKATI). Results indicated that participants\u27 knowledge was influenced by three factors; prior training in AT within a postsecondary institution, access and availability to AT within postsecondary environments, and personal confidence in understanding of AT
Students’ Perception on the Relative Fairness of Selected Educational Accommodations
The purpose of this study is to assess the relative fairness of selected educational accommodations provided to peers who have disabilities. This study utilized two scales developed by Upton (2000) which quantifies the relative fairness that students perceive towards the provision of selected educational accommodations. The findings of this study yielded evidence to support that level of education at a university level might have an influence on the students’ perceptions about educational accommodations offered to the students with disabilities. These surveys were distributed to around 409 students at a mid-size southern public university in the United States. Implications of these findings and suggestions for future research are provided
Finishing the euchromatic sequence of the human genome
The sequence of the human genome encodes the genetic instructions for human physiology, as well as rich information about human evolution. In 2001, the International Human Genome Sequencing Consortium reported a draft sequence of the euchromatic portion of the human genome. Since then, the international collaboration has worked to convert this draft into a genome sequence with high accuracy and nearly complete coverage. Here, we report the result of this finishing process. The current genome sequence (Build 35) contains 2.85 billion nucleotides interrupted by only 341 gaps. It covers ∼99% of the euchromatic genome and is accurate to an error rate of ∼1 event per 100,000 bases. Many of the remaining euchromatic gaps are associated with segmental duplications and will require focused work with new methods. The near-complete sequence, the first for a vertebrate, greatly improves the precision of biological analyses of the human genome including studies of gene number, birth and death. Notably, the human enome seems to encode only 20,000-25,000 protein-coding genes. The genome sequence reported here should serve as a firm foundation for biomedical research in the decades ahead