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- All Subjects: Mental Health
- Creators: Sanford School of Social and Family Dynamics
- Member of: Barrett, The Honors College Thesis/Creative Project Collection
- Resource Type: Text
on-cisgender identity, age of awareness, age of social transition, primary caregiver acceptance, secondary caregiver acceptance, and mental health. Hypotheses were partially supported for age of social transition with mental health, parental acceptance with mental health, and awareness-transition gap with parental acceptance. This study investigated under studied concepts of social transition and parental acceptance that appear to have an effect on the mental health of transgender adults.
This study examines how a 2013 Arizona law on shared parenting would affect living arrangements, and thus mental health measures. There were two hypotheses. According to the Law Change Hypothesis, it was hypothesized that parenting time in Arizona would be more equal following the 2013 Arizona law change while there would be no change in parenting time in other states following the 2013 Arizona law change. It was further hypothesized that child mental health would be better after the law change in Arizona with no change being seen in other states. Results of this study were almost completely inconsistent with the hypothesis. According to the Law Reflect Hypothesis, the law is actually reflecting the behavior of the community and their thoughts on equal parenting time becoming more favorable, and therefore a change towards more equal parenting time would be found prior to 2013 in Arizona with no change seen in other states. Furthermore, as the Arizona community’s behavior changed, child mental health would be better with no change being seen in other states. Regressions found that a small change toward more equal parenting and closeness with father was prior to 2013 for Arizona students, compared to out-of-state students, although it did not find that the year of divorce resulted in less anxiety, stress, and depression. This partially agrees with past research that the 2013 law is working as intended, even if it started working earlier than we thought. This does not agree with previous research stating there is a connection between equal parenting and better mental health. This is important because this study questions the efficacy of an important and controversial policy. If future studies are consistent with this one, the effectiveness of the Arizona 2013 law change on mental health will need to be further evaluated.
We attempted to apply a novel approach to stock market predictions. The Logistic Regression machine learning algorithm (Joseph Berkson) was applied to analyze news article headlines as represented by a bag-of-words (tri-gram and single-gram) representation in an attempt to predict the trends of stock prices based on the Dow Jones Industrial Average. The results showed that a tri-gram bag led to a 49% trend accuracy, a 1% increase when compared to the single-gram representation’s accuracy of 48%.
Previous research on law enforcement officers has not included studies of marital relationships from the spouse perspective, and tend to focus on workplace-based manifestations of stress and other health issues. This study fills a gap in current research by surveying police wives about their personal experiences of marriage to law enforcement officers, and mental health as it relates to themselves and their husbands. We examined the association of mental health stigma with marital quality in a sample of 969 police wives. We found a significant negative association between wives’ perceptions of police officers’ mental health stigma and marital quality, and additionally that wife characteristics of positive emotion and reappraisal are positively associated with marital quality, but do not act as moderators. We also discussed methods of reducing negative impacts of mental health stigma on marital quality, specifically mandatory police officer counseling and marital quality interventions.
Indian-American young adults are often caught between the cultures of their parents and their environment, and these two cultures can impact their views based on the cultures' views. In this project, I created an overview of personal accounts of Indian-American young adults on their experiences with mental health struggles, and receiving counseling and treatment. This study analyzed a sample of accounts and testimonials previously collected through a qualitative review. I found that many of the Indian-American young adults were open to mental health counseling and treatment, but saw Indian cultural views as a barrier.
Psychedelics have sparked widespread interest as they offer a potential new form of therapeutic treatment. This thesis paper explores the current and upcoming psychedelics that are being researched for their use in a therapeutic setting. The main substances discussed are lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD), methylenedioxymethamphetamine (ecstasy/molly/MDMA), and ketamine (esketamine). This paper also discusses the mechanism of action for each drug and the underlying research that has been found to support the ethical use of these substances alongside talk therapy
The sociological model of mental illness (Weitz, 2020, pp. 146-148) offers a much needed contrast to the disproportionate dominance of the medical model in research, public policy, and popular discourse (Weitz, 2020, pp. 145-146 & 158-160). Unfortunately, the sociological model receives little attention in comparison (Mulvaney, 2001), although there has been a slight revival in recent years. However, the bulk of research on mental illness within the sociological model is predominantly quantitative, relying heavily on statistics and reducing complex systemic processes to various separated variables (Chandler, 2019; Mullaney, 2016; Spates & Slatton, 2021). Both sociological and psychological research on mental illness tend to be dominated by a highly quantitative focus on ‘social factors’, and generally shy away from examining the role of macro-level social structures and institutions. Consequently, even the sociological model of mental illness tends to fall short of implicating the underlying socio-economic system as a potential contributor to psychological harm and distress. This paper offers critiques of the medical model of mental illness and highlights both the strengths and shortcomings of work in the sociological model. I will also attempt to address these issues by providing a sociological and philosophical analysis of how the capitalist socio-economic system, and systems of oppression in general, shapes social constructions of mental illness and inflicts chronic stress and stigma, leading to much of the psychological distress that many people currently experience.