Adverse childhood experiences exacerbate the association between day-to-day discrimination and mental health symptomatology in undergraduate students

Background: Background: Background: Adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) and day-to-day discrimination (hereafter, “discrimination”) both contribute to mental health symptomatology in young adulthood, but how these constructs interact and whether they are associated with mental health remains unclear. This study evaluated whether the relation between discrimination in young adulthood and mental health symptomatology varied as a function of ACEs exposure. Methods: Undergraduates (n = 251) completed self-report measures related to ACEs, discrimination, and mental health symptomatology (i.e., depression, anxiety, somatization, and psychological distress). Linear and logistic regression models were implemented to test for potential exacerbation effects of ACEs on the relation between discrimination and mental health symptomatology. Results: Participants with greater discrimination exposure and ACEs reported significantly more depression, anxiety, and somatic symptoms, along with more psychological distress, relative to those with less discrimination exposure and few or no ACEs. Limitations: Data were cross-sectional, thus, causality cannot be inferred. ACEs and discrimination measures examined ACE counts and general discrimination, respectively, which did not allow for examination of possible differences across specific ACEs (e.g., childhood sexual abuse vs. neglect) or specific types of discrimination (e.g., sexual-orientation-based discrimination vs. race-based discrimination). Conclusions: Conclusions: These results are among the first to inform the conceptualization of ACEs and discrimination in etiological models of young adults’ mental health. Both ACEs and discrimination, rather than exposure to only one of these stressors, may be synergistically associated with young adults’ mental health symptomatology. Clinicians could address stress-sensitive mental health issues by assessing for both ACEs and discrimination exposure

School-based yoga intervention increases adolescent resilience: A pilot trial

Background: Youth often experience stressors leading to negative long-term outcomes. Enhancing social-emotional attributes is important to foster resiliency to face these challenges. Yoga may enhance social-emotional resiliency among youth. However, research replicating such results inschool-settings is limited. This research details an investigation of the effects of the Kripalu Yoga in the Schools (KYIS) intervention integrated into a physical education class among a racially/ethnically diverse student population.Method: Middle school sixth grade students (n = 23 students; 52% female; mean age = 12.1 years) were either enrolled in physical education class that included KYIS (n = 9), or were enrolled in art and music (control condition; n = 14). To evaluate effects on student characteristics, self-report questionnaires of social-emotional competence and problem behaviour were administered pre- and post-delivery of the curriculum.Results: Students receiving the intervention increased in social-emotional competence over time relative to the control condition. Although promising, results should be interpreted with caution, as students who received the yoga intervention scored significantly lower on social-emotional competence than students in the control group at pre-intervention measurement time point.Conclusions: Yoga may improve social-emotional competence among youth and future research should explore the utility of yoga curricula in school setting

Effects of Samatha Meditation on Active Academic Engagement and Math Performance of Students with Attention Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder

Students with attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) often do not actively engage in academic instruction because they have difficulty in attending to task demands in the classroom. Without adequate intervention, this may result in poor academic outcomes for these students. In a multiple baseline design study, we taught four 5th-grade students Samatha meditation and assessed active engagement in math instruction and the percentage of math problems correctly solved during baseline, meditation training, and meditation practice phases. Results showed the students had varying but low percentages of intervals of active engagement in math instruction during baseline, but evidenced statistically significant increases from baseline to the meditation practice phase. Similarly, their low but varying percentages of math problems solved correctly during baseline showed statistically significant increases from baseline to the meditation practice phase. These results suggest that Samatha meditation may enhance cognitive processes in students with ADHD at a level to benefit them academically