Attitudes about Addiction: A National Study of Addiction Educators

The following study, funded by the National Institute of Drug Abuse (NIDA), utilized the Addiction Belief Inventory (ABI; Luke, Ribisl, Walton, & Davidson, 2002) to examine addiction attitudes in a national sample of U.S. college/university faculty teaching addiction-specific courses (n = 215). Results suggest that addiction educators view substance abuse as a coping mechanism rather than a moral failure, and are ambivalent about calling substance abuse or addiction a disease. Most do not support individual efficacy toward recovery, the ability to control use, or social use after treatment. Modifiers of addiction educator attitudes include level of college education; teaching experience; licensure/certification, and whether the educator is an addiction researcher. Study implications, limitations, and directions for future research are discussed

A randomized control trial examining the effect of acceptance and commitment training on clinician willingness to use evidence-based pharmacotherapy

This study evaluated the effectiveness of acceptance and commitment training (ACT) for increasing drug and alcohol counselors' willingness to use evidence-based agonist and antagonist pharmacotherapy. Fifty-nine drug and alcohol counselors were randomly assigned to either a 1-day ACT workshop or a 1-day educational control workshop. Both groups then attended a 2-day workshop on empirically supported treatments for substance abuse. Measures were taken at pre- and posttraining and 3-month follow-up on reported use of pharmacotherapy, willingness to use pharmacotherapy, perceived barriers to implementing new treatments, and general acceptance. As compared with those in the education alone condition, participants in the ACT condition showed significantly higher rates of referrals to pharmacotherapy at follow-up, rated barriers to learning new treatments as less believable at posttraining and follow-up, and showed greater psychological flexibility at posttraining and follow-up. Mediational analyses indicated that reduced believability of barriers and greater psychological flexibility mediated the impact of the intervention. Results support the idea that acceptance-based interventions may be helpful in addressing the psychological factors related to poor adoption of evidence-based treatments

Clinical supervision of court-referred juvenile offenders: Are juvenile referrals the least among equals?

In the counseling field, clinical supervisors operate between the line-level counselor and the organizational administration. They are responsible for both the efficient operation of the therapeutic aspect of the organization, and the supervision, training, and management of the therapists. The quality of the treatment offered by an institution can be assessed by a number of measures, including the ratio of clinical supervisors to counselors, the training and experience of the clinical supervisor, and the number of different tasks the clinical supervisor is asked to perform. Through a survey of clinical supervisors in five western states we compared the differences among clinical supervisors who had large versus small numbers of court-referred juveniles in their programs. Data indicate that therapeutic programming and clinical supervision are different in programs with a high proportion of court ordered juvenile offenders relative to those with a high proportion of private referrals. This programming, however, may be superior to the programming and clinical supervision received in programs with fewer court-ordered juvenile offenders.Clinical supervision Court referred juveniles Juvenile treatment

Encyclopedia of Substance Abuse Prevention, Treatment, and Recovery

This comprehensive resource makes a great companion to works such as Edith M. Freeman\u27s Substance Abuse Treatment (Sage, 1993), Gary L. Fisher and Thomas C. Harrison\u27s Substance Abuse (4th ed., Allyn & Bacon, 2008), and most of the works in Guilford\u27s Substance Abuse series. Highly recommended for research and academic libraries. —John R.M. Lawrence—Reflecting the recent explosion in the knowledge base of all aspects of the alcohol and drug abuse field, the presents state-of-the-art research and evidence-based applications. The Encyclopedia\u27s approximately 350 A-to-Z signed entries focus on the information that addiction treatment and prevention professionals and allied health professionals need to effectively work with clients. Features Provides comprehensive and authoritative coverage of such areas as the neurobiology of addiction, models of addiction, sociocultural perspectives on drug use, family and community factors, prevention theories and techniques, professional issues, the criminal justice system and substance abuse, assessment and diagnosis, and more Focuses on concepts of addiction and treatment practices, but also addresses commonly used and abused drugs, including recreational, prescription, and over-the-counter Offers a Reader\u27s Guide that lists topic categories with specific entries Presents cross-references at the end of each entry to help readers locate related information in other entries, as well as Further Readings for those who wish to pursue topics in more depth Includes an appendix listing of58 different drugs and substances with corresponding relevant entries The Encyclopedia of Substance Abuse Prevention, Treatment, and Recovery is intended for use by pre-service and in-service addiction prevention and treatment providers and allied professionals in the fields of criminal justice, counseling, social work, public health, nursing, medicine, other health care professions, education, and family studies.https://digitalcommons.unomaha.edu/criminaljusticefacbooks/1033/thumbnail.jp

Burnout among the addiction counselling workforce: The differential roles of mindful- ness and values-based process and work-site factors. Jour- nal of Substance Abuse Treatment

Abstract Although work-site factors have been shown to be a consistent predictor of burnout, the importance of mindfulness and values-based processes among addiction counselors has been little examined. In this study, we explored how strongly experiential avoidance, cognitive fusion, and values commitment related to burnout after controlling for well-established work-site factors (job control, coworker support, supervisor support, salary, workload, and tenure). We conducted a cross-sectional survey among 699 addiction counselors working for urban substance abuse treatment providers in six states of the United States. Results corroborated the importance of work-site factors for burnout reduction in this specific population, but we found that mindfulness and values-based processes had a stronger and more consistent relationship with burnout as compared with work-site factors. We conclude that interventions that target experiential avoidance, cognitive fusion, and values commitment may provide a possible new direction for the reduction of burnout among addiction counselors