Day 1 :
Keynote Forum
Joris J Van Hoof
University of Twente, Netherlands
Keynote: Adolescent alcohol intoxication in the Netherlands. Prevalence, characteristics, treatment and the role of alcohol availability and compliance with legal age limits
Time : 10:30-11:15
Biography:
Joris J Van Hoof holds a PhD in Behavioural Sciences with a dissertation entitled “Sweet sixteen and never been drunk? Adolescent alcohol use, predictors and consequences” (2010). His research interests include compliance with various legislations (including legal age limits for alcohol sales). He is an Assistant Professor at the Department of Communication Science, he was rewarded with a Talent Scheme Veni Award from the Dutch Science Foundation. He advices several national Ministries on alcohol policy and research methodology (mystery shopping) and he frequently appears in various media.
Abstract:
The aim of this study was to evaluate trends in prevalence of alcohol-related hospital admittances in adolescents in the Netherlands from 2007 up to 2014. Thereby this study identified trends in gender, age, blood alcohol concentration, duration of reduced consciousness and parental permission in alcohol intoxicated adolescents. In the eight years, 4782 adolescents were reported. In total, 4351 questionnaires (91%) were returned. 88% of the adolescents were admitted because of alcohol intoxication (with reduced consciousness). Since 2007, the average age increased from 14.9 to 15.4 years, the blood alcohol concentration increased from 1.83 to 1.96 g/l while duration of reduced consciousness remained constant around 3 hours. In 2014, the minimum legal drinking age increased from 16 to 18 years; nevertheless in 2014 a 10% increase in prevalence was seen. However, in 2014 a decreasing number of adolescents had parental permission to drink alcohol. This study confirms that the problem of alcohol-related harm in adolescents is an issue of continuing importance and it confirms ongoing need for focused pediatric care Furthermore the association between simultaneous drug use and blood alcohol concentration (BAC) in heavy adolescent alcohol drinking events was investigated. This study analyzed 3376 adolescents hospitalized because of acute alcohol intoxication between 2007 and 2014 in the Netherlands. In total, 11.1% of them had simultaneously used drugs and alcohol; of which 6.7% used cannabis and 3.3% used stimulants (ecstasy, amphetamine, cocaine and GHB). This study found BAC was lower in both groups of drug users compared with non-drug users. Both drug groups continued to be associated with lower BAC after correction for age, gender and educational level. Future research should examine the causality of the relationship between drug use and BAC.
Keynote Forum
Patricia Van Wijngaarden-Cremers
Dimence Mental Health, Netherlands
Keynote: Functional diagnosing of challenging behaviour in adolescents with ASD in a clinical setting
Time : 11:35-12:20
Biography:
Patricia J M Van Wijngaarden-Cremers is a Psychiatrist and working as an Expert for the Center of Expertise SCOS (Specialized Center Developmental Disorders) and Addiction Psychiatry Mental Health Hospital' Dimence". She is a Senior Research Fellow at the Medical Center of the Radboud University in Nijmegen. Her research focuses on gender differences in developmental disorders in particular the interaction between developmental and environmental factors (such as socialization, education, stress, substance abuse) on the development of psychopathology
Abstract:
Purpose: To introduce the notion of diagnosing as an broad process of assessment not to be confused with classifying psychopathology into DSM or ICD terms.
Methods: Comorbidity in Autism Spectrum Disorder is more rule than exception. In clinical practice women with ASD challenging internalizing problems (suicidal/self harm) and externalizing behaviour (aggression-substance abuse) pose gross problems to teams that are not used to work with this category of patients. The literature will be reviewed and in a series of case presentations we will depict the situation. In doing that I will broaden the focus of the diagnostic process: This includes the individual diagnostic profile: Psychopathology and neuropsychological profile but also a functional assessment of the impact of behaviours of the patient on fellow patients and staff and family thus leading to a systemic analysis of patterns of interactions between all involved, that need to be addressed in order to foster change for the better.
Conclusions: A true diagnostic appraisal is an essential step in order to define what is needed for and from the patient but also from and within the staff in cooperation with the relatives to break out of the vicious circle of powerlessness that the challenging behaviour of women with ASD may induce.rn
- Child and Adolescent Psychology, Autism Spectrum Disorders
Location: Windsor II
Session Introduction
Shireen Mohammad Kanakri
Ball State University, USA
Title: Healthy environments for children with autism
Time : 12:20-12:55
Biography:
Shireen Mohammad Kanakri has completed her PhD at the age of 32 years from Texas A&M University with a Certificate in Healthcare Hospitals Design. She is an Assistant Professor in Ball State University and a Director for Director of Autism Behavioral Health LAB. She has published many papers in reputed journals and has been serving as an Editorial Board Member of repute.
Abstract:
Autism has been generally ignored by the interior design community and excluded from building codes and guidelines even those developed specifically for special needs individuals. In reference to this exclusion, Baron, of the International Code Council Stated, “I know of no building or accessibility code that incorporates requirements specifically to address children with autism. Therefore, one of the primary aims of this research is to correct this exclusion by developing a preliminary framework of interior design guidelines for autism. Deasy and Laswell discuss the architect’s use of common patterns of cognition to guide and manipulate user behavior in a space. If one looks at the meaning or the cognitive value given to an experience, it becomes clear the way in which a user typically interprets his interior environment. Acoustics is one of the most important issues in interior design. No specific references are made in the mandates regarding individuals with developmental disorders or autism but the term “consideration” is used in reference to “other communication disorders” (UN Global Program on Disability, 1993). To reach this goal of developing a framework for architectural guidelines for autism, an extensive literature review was conducted. Research results indicate that environment is important to the treatment of autism because it influences behavior. This research gives practical solutions that architects and designers can use to modify the environment for children with autism. These modifications will help these children develop their skills, cope with auditory problems and improve their behaviors.
Amanda Venta
Sam Houston State University, USA
Title: Adolescent-Parent attachment is critically related to adolescent mental health and treatment
Time : 12:55-13:30
Biography:
Amanda Venta serves as an Assistant Professor in the Department of Psychology at Sam Houston State University. She completed her Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology at the University of Houston and completed her pre-doctoral internship in the Menninger Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences at Baylor College of Medicine, specializing in the treatment of children and adolescents. Her primary research interests are the development of psychopathology in youth and the protective effect of attachment security. She has published widely in these areas and has received related research funding from the National Institutes of Mental Health and the American Psychological Foundation
Abstract:
Adolescence is a period of social reorientation with related changes in the adolescent’s entire social world—including in their attachments to caregivers. The overarching aim of this presentation is to convey the critical importance of considering adolescent attachment for mental health researchers and clinicians by describing (1) recent advances in the measurement of adolescent attachment, (2) the clinical implications of insecure attachments for adolescents, and (3) emerging evidence regarding the role of adolescent attachment in psychological and psychiatric treatment. To that end, data will be presented from five studies conducted with adolescents receiving inpatient psychiatric treatment. First, data will be presented on the recently developed Child Attachment Interview, an interview-based measure that assesses attachment implicitly by asking respondents to describe and reflect on their current attachment relationships. Evidence of strong concurrent and convergent validity for this measure will be presented. Second, studies representing an emerging body of evidence relating attachment insecurity to psychopathology will be presented. Specifically, attachment insecurity relates to depression and suicide-related thoughts, Borderline Personality Disorder features, and peer problems in adolescents with documented mental health concerns. Finally, data from adolescents completing medium-stay inpatient psychiatric treatment will be presented. Evidence that insecure attachment is a significant predictor of treatment outcome and the important role of emotion regulation will be discussed.
Vicky Tsang
Hong Kong Insitute of Education, People\'s Republic of China
Title: Using the video-based social information processing schedule to identify differences in empathic functioning between children with ASD and or ADHD
Time : 14:15-14:50
Biography:
Vicky Tsang has completed her PhD from Deakin University in the Faculty of Health, Medicine, Nursing & Behavioral Sciences, School of Behavioral Sciences and Social Development in 2009. Before starting her teaching career, she was a Licensed Occupational Therapist both in USA and in Hong Kong. Currently, she is an Assistant Professor at the Department of Special Education and Counselling. She has a strong research interest in the development and validation of assessment instruments for students with special educational needs.
Abstract:
This article reports on the construction, reliability and structural validity of the newly developed video-based Social Information Processing Interview Schedule (SIPIS). Scale construction was based on the theory of social information processing and prior exploratory research on empathic functioning. The psychometric properties of the SIPIS were investigated using Rasch analysis. Latent subtype analysis was performed on the SIPIS and the Social Responsiveness Scale-Second Edition (SRS-2) data for 60 children (8 through 12 years of age). Subtypes were compared for encoding of social information/motor empathy, emotion identification/affective empathy and social reasoning/cognitive empathy. Findings from Rasch analyses indicate that the SIPIS is highly reliable and structurally valid to differentiate item difficulty and performance of empathic functioning across different groups of primary students. Latent subtype analysis revealed four group differences: One group without behavioral problems, one with only Attention Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) behavior, one with only Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) behavior and one with comorbid symptoms of ASD and ADHD. Although children with ASD and ADHD share common social interaction deficits, there is a specific difference in the quality of their empathic functioning with more cognitive-based deficits in the ASD group and more attention and emotional regulatory attributes in the ADHD group. Therefore, the different subtypes of children with ASD and or ADHD will most likely benefit from clinical approaches targeting different behaviors.
Maree Sugai
Tohoku University of Community Service and Science,Japan
Title: Hidden people: Hidden lives
Time : 14:50-15:25
Biography:
Maree Sugai is a full time senior lecturer, faculty member and researcher at Tohoku University of Community Service and Science (KU) in Japan. She has been teaching in Japan for over twenty years and has published and presented at social science, psychology and behavioral science conferences in America, Canada, and Japan. Her thesis was in intercultural communication and her current research area is in acute social withdrawal/hikikomori. She has worked on the governing board of a mental health rehabilitation center in Japan for fourteen years; assisting in counseling for, and including, families who have lost members to suicide and for those who have suffered severe trauma, or are severely depressed or psychotic. Her academic training is in socio-linguistics and medical anthropology.
Abstract:
Investigating the culture bound phenomenon of ‘Adolescence without End’. The hidden lives of one million adolescents and young adults in Japan who have opted out of society and its expectations and confine themselves to their rooms in a state of acute social withdrawal; hiding away from all connection with society. What leads them into hiding and why do they stay so long? Looking specifically at culture bound aspects of educational and child raising norms within the target country that may be triggers, this paper aims to identify factors that suggest a connection between avoidance strategies in verbal communication and the physical manifestation of hiding away. By examining possible triggers and connecting data, I will present a risk factor cline of students who may be susceptible to becoming hikikomori (hidden away) and in turn raise some questions regarding how cautious and sensitive early intervention may or may not provide some relief to this increasing social and depressive disorder.
Ikuko Shibya, Takashi Kawanabe
Osaka Seiki College, Ritsumeikan University, Japan
Title: Children’s knowledge about using scissors and its influence on their motor performance
Time : 15:25-16:00
Biography:
Ikuko Shibuya specializes in developmental and clinical psychology. Now she is an associate professor at the Department of Preschool Education of Osaka Seikei College. Jin Shotoku had engaged in special needs education at an elementary school and so on. He is now a professor at Ogaki Womens’ College. Takashi Kawanabe specializes in educational psychology. He works at Ritsumeikan University as an associate professor at Institute for Teaching and Learning
Abstract:
Tool use is a goal-oriented, object manipulation that demands highly cognitive efforts. Shibuya (2012) demonstrated that some children notably lacked the precision to cut figures on a paper although they appropriately held scissors. And this might be caused by poor motor planning and control. This study aimed to examine children’s knowledge of a strategy of the motor planning and control to use scissors purposefully. Study 1 investigated how children understood the knowledge of “trade-off” relationship between motor speed and motor accuracy. It was hypothesized that children who understood the “trade-off” relationship would be good at motor planning, which would let them cut a circle accurately. The children were classified into two groups according to their response to the knowledge problems; “well understanding” and “poor understanding”. The “well understanding” group cut more accurately than the other group in a marginal significance. However, several children in the “poor understanding” group cut a circle without any error, and vice versa. These results suggest that the knowledge of “trade-off” relationship partly influences children’s motor performance, but it is just one of the factors. In Study 2, we focused on the different aspects of children’s knowledge related to movement, that is, the knowledge of smooth bimanual coordination strategy. Specifically, whether the children understood that bracing and rotating a paper by non-dominant hand affect motor accuracy was examined. Based on the results of Study 1 and 2, the influence of children’s recognition related to movement on their motor performance will be discussed in the session.
Ajayi Hannah Olubunmi
Obafemi Awolowo University, Nigeria
Title: Psychological implications of reading difficulty among children in South Western States, Nigeria
Time : 16:20-16:55
Biography:
Ajayi Hannah Olubunmi has completed her PhD. She is a Senior Lecturer in the Institute of Education, Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile–Ife, Nigeria. She specializes in the Early Childhood Education from the premier university, University of Ibadan, Nigeria as well as International Child & Youth Care Development from University of Victoria, British Colombia, Canada. She has bias in Language Arts/ Reading development in children. She has published over 24 articles in referred journals both nationally and internationally. She has attended several national and international conferences where she presented papers. She is the Managing Editor of Ife Journal of Theory and Research in Education (IJOTRE). She has also authored textbooks for early years. She has served as resource person for UNICEF (Nigeria) and National Education and Research Development Commission (NERDC) to develop Learning Standards and Curriculum of Early Childhood Programme in Nigeria.
Abstract:
Reading is germane to life and academic success. There is virtually no school subject that does not require the acquisition of reading skill. In spite of its importance, it has been identified that many children have difficulty in reading thereby leading many of them to be at risk of educational completion. Various efforts are been employed to salvage the situation but no study has really been carried out to probe into the psychological implications reading difficulty may have on children with a view to determining better intervention for the situation. Hence this study is embarked upon. Six hundred pupils were purposively selected from the South western public primary school of Nigeria based on reading difficulty. Two instruments namely; Reading Difficulty Screening Tool (RDST) used to identify pupils who have reading difficulty and Reading Difficulty Psychological Scale (RDPS) which assessed the psychological influence of the reading difficulty on the pupils. Findings showed that reading difficulty has psychological implications on children. Recommendations were proffered.
Umesh Raj Aryal
1Kathmandu Medical College, Nepal
Title: Psycho-social factors influencing smoking behavior of Nepalese adolescents
Time : 16:55-17:30
Biography:
Umesh Raj Aryal is working as an Assistant Professor of Bio statistics at Department of Community Medicine, Kathmandu Medical College, Nepal. He has completed his PhD (Medical science) from Gothenburg University at Sweden and MSc (Statistics) from Tribhuwan University, Nepal. He is currently interested in tobacco epidemiology specially among adolescents and young adult. He has published more than 15 papers in peer reviewed journals and 2 academic book. He is an Editorial Board Member of Journal of Kathmandu Medical College. He is also working as Member Secretary of KMC-IRC and Coordinator of Research Committee at KMC. He is also Member of Society for Research on Nicotine and Tobacco.
Abstract:
Psycho-social factors influencing smoking behavior of Nepalese adolescent: The Global Youth Tobacco Survey (GYTS) provides useful information for monitoring the tobacco use and the impact of intervention among adolescents. Understanding the influence of psycho-social factors (demographic, environmental, motivational and programmatic factors) is essential to ensure success of effective intervention program. This study utilized the GYTS 2011 data of Nepal with the main aim is to assess influence of several psycho-social factors among adolescents to become current smoking. The GYTS is a cross-sectional study that applies a two stage cluster sample to acquire a representative sample of schools and students (n=2878). Prevalence of current smoking was 4.7% (95% CI: 4.2; 5.9) of which 75.7% (95% CI: 67.6-82.6) were male. Multivariable logistic regression revealed that demographic factor (being male (AOR=2.50; 95% CI: 1.51-4.14) and age >15 years (2.93;1.77-4.86), environmental factors (friend smoking (5.72; 2.69-12.1), exposed to smoking in closed places (3.6; 1.89-7.02) and outdoor places (1.99;1.03-3.87)); motivational factors (ever offered free cigarettes by tobacco company representative (1.83;1.15;2.90) and programmatic factor (taught about danger sign of smoking (0.49; 0.32-0.77)) are associated with current smoking. The results of Structural Equation Modeling (SEM) indicates model fits well based on criteria for goodness of fit: (CFI=1, TFI=1, RMSEA=0.00). The SEM revealed that age, sex, friend smoking, exposure to smoking at closed places and ever offer of free cigarettes were predictors of current smoking habits. Our findings suggest that an understanding of the influencing factors provides important insight for comprehensive school based tobacco intervention programs.
Ajayi Hannah Olubunmi
Obafemi Awolowo University, Nigeria
Title: What parents and teachers know about their preschool children\'s psychological characteristics?
Time : 17:30-18:05
Biography:
Ajayi Hannah Olubunmi has completed her PhD. She is a Senior Lecturer in the Institute of Education, Obafemi Awolowo University, Ile-Ife, Nigeria. She specializes in the Early Childhood Education from the premier university, University of Ibadan, Nigeria as well as International Child & Youth Care Development from University of Victoria, British Colombia, Canada. She has bias in Language Arts/ Reading development in children. She has published over 24 articles in referred journals both nationally and internationally. She has attended several national and international conferences where she presented papers. She is the Managing Editor of Ife Journal of Theory and Research in Education (IJOTRE). She has also authored textbooks for early years. She has served as resource person for UNICEF (Nigeria) and National Education and Research Development Commission (NERDC) to develop Learning Standards and Curriculum of Early Childhood Programme in Nigeria.
Abstract:
Often times, comments such as, 'He/She is too playful', 'Too quiet in class', 'He/She is non-compliant', 'Too stubborn', 'Too aggressive' 'Too rough/clumsy' and all sorts are written in children's progress reports and they were sent home by teachers. At the same time, parents sometimes come to school stating, "My child is too playful/stubborn" and alike. They then call for the child to be disciplined to correct such behaviour. Considering the nature of such interactions that exists between some parents, teachers and the preschool children, this therefore raises questions as do parents or teachers really understand the psychological characteristics of children? Or why do they treat children in such a harsh manner in the guise of discipline? The period between births to five years of a child is a critical time for all round development. It is a sensitive period which if mishandled may result in deficit in personality development. It is against this backdrop that this study is conceived to examine parents and teachers' understanding of children psychological characteristics. Four hundred preschoolers' parents and two hundred and fifty preschool teachers purposively selected were used for the study. Patents-Teachers' Children Psychological Characteristics Perspectives Questionnaire (PTPCPQ) was used for the study. It has three sections, Section A solicited information about the demographic information of the respondents. Section B focused on parents perspectives of children's psychological characteristics which is on 4- Likert scale. Section C focused on preschoolers' teachers perspectives. Data were analyzed using appropriate statistical tools, results presented and recommendations proffered for the appropriate stakeholders