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This research examined relationships between children's social awareness (ability to understand and negotiate intergroup relationships) and their narrative and persuasive writing. Forty 5th grade students wrote a short fictional narrative and a persuasive letter to their principal. Writing samples were coded for quality, form, and social awareness. Students also completed a questionnaire assessing their capacity to understand and negotiate social relationships. Scores from literacy assessments in vocabulary, reading, and reading comprehension were also obtained. Results suggest that children's quality of writing depends on both literacy and social skills. There was a positive relationship between social awareness and quality of writing in persuasive letters, controlling for vocabulary and demographic characteristics. In narratives, the positive effect was moderated by students' reading skill. The magnitude of the social awareness effect was stronger in the narratives of children who were below average readers, controlling for background characteristics. The paper highlights the educational importance of teaching both social and literacy skills in the classroom.

The goal of this study was to evaluate potential mental health benefits of yoga for adolescents in secondary school. Students were randomly assigned to either regular physical education classes or to 11 weeks of yoga sessions based upon the Yoga Ed program over a single semester. Students completed baseline and end-program self-report measures of mood, anxiety, perceived stress, resilience, and other mental health variables. Independent evaluation of individual outcome measures revealed that yoga participants showed statistically significant differences over time relative to controls on measures of anger control and fatigue/inertia. Most outcome measures exhibited a pattern of worsening in the control group over time, whereas changes in the yoga group over time were either minimal or showed slight improvements. These preliminary results suggest that implementation of yoga is acceptable and feasible in a secondary school setting and has the potential of playing a protective or preventive role in maintaining mental health.

The objective of this study was to test the hypothesis that participants in a therapeutic yoga program for a variety of back pain conditions would show improvements in back pain, back-related functionality, symptoms, mood, quality of life, and reduction in stress and the use of medication for back pain. Participants were 24 adults with a complaint of chronic back pain who participated in a yoga program for back pain. The sample encompassed a variety of complaints including back pain, neck/shoulder problems, spondylolisthesis, sciatica/leg numbness, scoliosis, and herniated disc. The 12-week program consisted of weekly group yoga classes based on the methodology of the Krishnamacharya Healing Yoga Foundation (KHYF). This method includes asana, pranayama, core strengthening, meditation, bhavana (visualization) and mantra. Participants also practiced regularly at home and maintained a journal. A battery of self-report questionnaires were administered at baseline, 12 weeks, and 24 weeks. Statistical significance was evaluated with one-sample t-tests on change scores. Twenty-two subjects completed both baseline and end-program questionnaires and 19 completed followup questionnaires. Subjects showed statistically significant improvements from baseline to end-program on the following scales: disability, stress, physical health (physical functioning and bodily pain), mental health (vitality, social functioning, and psychological well-being), bothersomeness of symptoms, negative mood (depression/dejection, anger/hostility, fatigue, and confusion/bewilderment). There was no significant change on use of medication. The end-program changes were sustained, and even strengthened, at the 24-week follow-up. Qualitatively, subjects reported strengthening of their back, more flexibility, reduced stress, better posture, reduced pain, and increased awareness. The results demonstrated that KHYF yoga classes lead to significantly improved quality of life for adult sufferers of back pain, including decreased disability and pain, and improved physical functioning and mood (less depressive feelings, anger, fatigue, and confusion). This study provided evidence that this yoga method ameliorates the negative effects of a very broad range of back pain disorders.

This article describes the evolution of a psychosocial intervention,pairing, from its initial utilization as an interpersonally oriented therapy for severely emotionally disturbed pre- and early adolescents in a special needs school, to its current usage as a public school prevention technique for at-risk youngsters, both aggressive and withdrawn, who are living under conditions of poverty and limited community supports. The evolution of the intervention is described parallel to both the evolution of its theoretical foundations and its associated empirical analysis and evaluation. Given that our approach to both intervention and basic research is clinical-developmental (each part of the discipline influencing the other), the facilitation of greater social competence through the intervention provides the impetus for our research inquiry into the nature of psychosocial development. A generic evaluation model that integrates both outcome behavior and psychosocial development is described as it is applied to the evaluation of this specific intervention's effectiveness.

Child-clinical assessment has traditionally relied on a set of techniques that fail to specify the links between intellect, affect, and behavior, making their articulation dependent on the interpretive skill of the clinician. In this paper, we attempt to illustrate how assessment approaches derived from the study of social-cognitive development and its relation to social behavior may help to bridge these gaps in a more direct fashion. We begin by sketching a conceptual model of the development of a particular form of social behavior—namely, interpersonal negotiation strategies (INS)—and its social-cognitive underpinnings. The model has served as the theoretical foundation for both interview and rating scale assessment techniques, which evaluate INS development in thought and action, respectively. We describe these assessment techniques, present a summary of the evidence supporting their internal and external validity, and describe and illustrate the ways in which various profiles of performance on the measures may carry implications for clinical diagnosis and treatment.

This study examines the relations among style and development level of four interpersonal and intrapsychic processes: interpersonal thought, self-reported interpersonal action, mechanisms of defense, and object representation. Subjects were 25 girls and 25 boys from the eighth grade of an urban public school System. All four constructs were measured along developmental and stylistic dimensions. Both interpersonal thought and self-reported action processes were measured with the hypothetical and real-life interpersonal negotiation strategies interviews of Selman and colleagues. Defensive process was measured with a questionnaire revised to include Vaillant's developmental analysis of defense mechanisms as well as assessment of style of defense (internalizing vs. externalizing). Object representation style and level were measured with constructs and instruments of Blatt and colleagues. The results supported the main hypothesis: Levels of defense mechanisms and object representation independently predicted level of self-reported interpersonal action, even when controlling for level of interpersonal thought (which also predicted action). This suggests that if there are gaps between interpersonal thought and action levels, the relative level of maturity of psychodynamic processes helps explain action level. In contrast, there were few relationships among the stylistic components of the four constructs, although each style construct was related to its associated level construct. Contrary to hypotheses, no gender differences were found on any of the composited level or style variables. The study suggests operational links between structural-developmental and psychodynamic aspects of personality.

Barney is a 15½-year-old boy who for many years has had a serious “attitude problem”; more recently, however, his attitude has improved. For the past 8 years he has attended a special day school for children and early adolescents with behavioral and/or social-emotional difficulties. The year Barney has just completed will be his last at the school; the joint educational-clinical team that monitors his progress has decided he is ready to try a return to public high school. Barney has improved considerably during the last 2 years in both his academic performance and his behavior. The change in Barney’s academic work is apparent in standardized achievement test scores and teacher reports. The change in his interpersonal thought and behavior—in the way he deals with his teachers and peers and with his own feelings under stress—is more uniquely documented. For the past 3 years Barney has participated in two research projects based on separate (though related) aspects of psychosocial development. These projects have tracked Barney’s progress in both interpersonal “thought” by which we mean social-cognitive capacity or understanding of hypothetical conflicts, and interpersonal “action,” meaning actual conduct or social behavior.