This study evaluated All4You!, a theoretically based curriculum designed to reduce sexual risk behaviors associated with HIV, other STDs, and unintended pregnancy among students in alternative schools. The study featured a randomized controlled trial involving 24 community day schools in northern California. A cohort of 988 students was assessed…

Twenty-nine years ago Minnesota Longitudinal Study of Parents and Children (MLSPC) was launched at the Institute of Child Development, University of Minnesota. It was one of the first prospective longitudinal studies of how parent-infant attachment develops, how it changes over time, and how the quality of attachment in infancy influences…

Objective: Working to optimize treatment outcome and use resources efficiently, investigators conducted the first test of an existing parent-only group cognitive-behavioral therapy protocol to treat 24 children 7 to 16 years old with primary anxiety disorder diagnoses. Method: Over the course of 7 months, the authors evaluated a manual-based…

"Education Matters" is the monthly newsletter of the Association of American Educators (AAE), an organization dedicated to advancing the American teaching profession through personal growth, professional development, teacher advocacy and protection. This issue of the newsletter includes: (1) Arrested Development: Time for Professional Development…

Character education is a fairly new and rapidly evolving topic for curriculum interventions. Character can encompass such moral and ethical values as respect, fairness, and caring -- as well as responsibility, trustworthiness, and citizenship. It can refer to the demonstration of these values in behavior, reasoning, and emotions. The What Works…

This study sought to determine the effectiveness of systematically designed instructional programs in helping adult hypertensives to achieve and maintain dietary sodium intake. Sixty-six subjects were randomly allocated to one of three groups: task-centered instruction; task-centered instruction plus goal-setting and self-monitoring; or control.…

Subjects (N=109) completed a behavioral weight-management program either with or without the addition of hypnosis. Both interventions resulted in significant weight reduction. At the eight-month and two-year follow-ups, the hypnosis clients showed significant additional weight loss and were more likely to have achieved and maintained their…

Results indicated that parents socially validated the effects of behavior therapy in that they judged the children as significantly improved after treatment, and that the effects of treatment were also socially validated by the parents' indication that they were more willing to interact with the children after treatment than before treatment.…

The paper suggests that some of the practical implications of the no difference in treatment conclusion is quite questionable and that parents of retarded children need assistance which will be different from that required of parents of nonretarded children. (Author/SBH)

In this challenge study of 18 children, aged 4-12, on the Feingold Diet to reduce hyperactivity, evaluations of 14 objective measures in a double-blind, cross-over design yielded no significant differences between diet infraction and noninfraction. (Author/SJL)

Evaluates the Federal Bureau of Prisons' substance abuse treatment program's effectiveness in reducing prisoner misconduct. Results show that program graduates are 74 percent less likely to engage in misconduct over a 14-month period than a comparison group. This benefit is shared by male and female inmates alike. (Contains 25 references and 2…

Chronic pain patients (n=94) completed measures of physical and psychological functioning, health care utilization, pain beliefs, and use of pain coping strategies at admission and three to six months after inpatient pain treatment. Improved functioning and decreased health care use were associated with changes in both beliefs and cognitive coping…

The SeniorCise booklet and program (based on the Transtheoretical Model of behavior change) were evaluated by 61 older adults; 91% said it helped them think about exercise and 72% engaged in exercise. Positive aspects were presentation, instructions, motivation, and ease of understanding. Few illustrations and lack of a Spanish edition were…

In Study 1, we examined the independent effects of reinforcer consumption during sessions and meal consumption prior to sessions on performance maintained by food reinforcement. Nine individuals with developmental disabilities participated. On alternate days, a preferred edible item was delivered during (a) seven sessions conducted before lunch…

The authors sought to determine whether a greater academic incentive would improve the effectiveness and student adherence to a 12-week voluntary exercise program designed to decrease students' percentage of body fat. They randomly assigned 210 students to 1 of 2 groups with different academic reward structures. The group with the greater reward…