Negative Urgency Linked to Craving and Substance Use Among Adults on Buprenorphine or Methadone.

Despite the effectiveness of medication-assisted treatment (MAT), adults receiving MAT experience opioid cravings and engage in non-opioid illicit substance use that increases the risk of relapse and overdose. The current study examines whether negative urgency, defined as the tendency to act impulsively in response to intense negative emotion, is a risk factor for opioid cravings and non-opioid illicit substance use. Fifty-eight adults (predominately White cis-gender females) receiving MAT (with buprenorphine or methadone) were recruited from online substance use forums and asked to complete self-report questionnaires on negative urgency (UPPS-P Impulsive Behavior Scale), past 3-month opioid cravings (ASSIST-Alcohol, Smoking, and Substance Involvement Screening Test), and non-opioid illicit substance use (e.g., amphetamines, cocaine, benzodiazepines). Results revealed that negative urgency was associated with past 3-month opioid cravings, as well as past month illicit stimulant use (not benzodiazepine use). These results may indicate that individuals high in negative urgency would benefit from receiving extra intervention during MAT.

Community arts engagement supports perceptions of personal growth in older adults.

PURPOSE: The effects of arts engagement on older adults have been well-documented. However, the ways older adults overcome common situational and dispositional barriers to enhance personal growth and well-being are less known. METHODS: Fifty-six community dwelling older adults (71.3 ± 4.6 years) took part in dance, music, or a control workshop two times/week for ten weeks. Participants' personal growth was examined through focus groups and surveys in this mixed-methods study. RESULTS: Focus group and survey results revealed participants experienced personal growth through engaging in the dance and music arms of the experiment. Participants, especially those in arts workshops, described personal growth experiences aligning with four themes: increased social connections, developed new skills, utilized a growth mindset, and used creativity to overcome situational and dispositional barriers to participation. The barriers included musculoskeletal challenges, hearing impairments, and difficulty retaining new information. CONCLUSIONS: The study yielded high adherence and retention rates, and participants reported increased engagement within their communities. Our observations provide avenues for future practitioners and facilitators to create programming that empowers older adults and utilizes participants' ongoing feedback to support access, inclusion, and sense of community.

Dance, Music, and Social Conversation Program Participation Positively Affects Physical and Mental Health in Community-Dwelling Older Adults: A Randomized Controlled Trial.

INTRODUCTION: As the world population ages, practitioners use community-engaged interventions to help older adults stay healthy. Engaging in arts programs (e.g., dance or music) reportedly improves physical and mental health, but little research exists examining these effects in community-dwelling older adults. Our purposes were to examine how taking part in 10-week, twice per week community arts programs (dance and music) and control (social conversation) affected physical and mental health in community-dwelling older adults and their perceptions after program participation.
Methods: In this randomized controlled trial, 64 older adults over 65 years of age (71.3 ± 4.6 years, 166.9 ± 8.3 cm, 78.1 ± 18.1 kg) took part in community-engaged arts programs: ballroom dance (n = 23), music (ukulele-playing, n = 17), or control (social conversation n = 24), two times per week for 10 weeks. Participants' physical health using the Short Physical Performance Battery (SPPB; score 0 = worst to 12 = best) and mental health using the Montreal Cognitive Assessment (MoCA; score = 0 to 30, where less than 26 = normal) were tested three times: 1. before (pre), 2. at the end of 10 weeks (post-1), and 3. 1 month after intervention (post-2). Separate 3 (group) x 3 (time) ANOVAs and adjusted Bonferroni pairwise comparisons as appropriate examined changes across groups and time. Focus group interviews and surveys were audio recorded, transcribed, and analyzed using inductive thematic analyses to examine participants' perceptions.
Results: Across all groups, participants had an 87.8% attendance and an 87.5% retention rate. Participants' SPPB performance improved over time (pre = 10.5 ± 1.4, post-1 = 10.7 ± 1.3, post-2 = 11.3 ± 1.0; p < 0.001), but similarly across groups (p = 0.40). Post-hoc analyses revealed that performance improved from pre to post-1 (p = 0.002) and pre to post-2 (p < 0.001). Participants' cognition improved over time (pre = 26.3 ± 2.8, post-1 = 27.3 ± 2.6, post-2 = 27.5 ± 2.5, p < 0.001), and similarly across groups (p = 0.60). Post-hoc analyses revealed that cognition improved from pre- to post-1 (p = 0.002), and pre- to post-2 (p = 0.001). Participants consistently mentioned increased social engagement as the major reason for participation.
Conclusions: Overall, taking part in community-engaged arts (dance and music) and social conversation programs positively influenced physical and mental health in older adults. Still, as all groups improved equally, the results may partly be due to participants having normal physical and mental function pre-participation and due to them learning the test over time. These study findings imply that providing fun and free community-engaged programs that empower participants to be more engaged can positively influence physical and mental health and promote successful aging in older adults.

When Triggers Become Tigers: Taming the Autonomic Nervous System via Sensory Support System Modulation.

Personalized recovery technologies may enable individuals with Substance Use Disorder (SUD) to monitor and manage acute craving and drug use urges in ways that improve drug-seeking decisions in real-time. Direct and indirect regulation of the autonomic nervous system through sensory input monitoring and modulation may enhance control over behavioral decisions and prevent relapse. A personalized sensory support system that monitors neurophysiological reactivity and offers non-pharmacological point-in-time personalized digital interventions may increase awareness of and control over craving reactivity. It is critical to be able to detect these warning signs and intervene early and effectively. The use of wearable technologies that assess point-in-time neurophysiological escalation and shape behavioral response through personalized interventions could be transformative in allowing individuals to better manage their recovery as they transition out of institutions and move back into community settings.

Ashes2Art: Mitigation Strategies for Short-and Long-term Distress in Emergency Services Personnel During COVID-19.

Ashes2Art, a nonprofit organization working with fire fighters and first responders since 2017, promotes creativity to counter balance the exposure to extreme loss and trauma. Operating under the Northern Virginia Emergency Medical Services Council, Ashes2Art provides art supplies, art classes, and a creative community of support to mitigate the deleterious effects the stress of the job can take on fire fighters and first responders' health and mental health. During the COVID-19 pandemic, Ashes2Art has seen an increased demand for art supplies and the, now online, creative arts classes and self-care strategies. Currently, approximately 100 emergency services personnel and family members are actively participating in these initiatives during this crisis. Managing the cumulative emotional load these first responders and their families experience is paramount to COVID-19 recovery efforts and post-pandemic operations. Helping first responders and their families manage the short- and long-term emotional toll from the work they do in responding to the COVID-19 crisis is paramount to the United States' successful recovery back to a well-functioning post-pandemic society. This paper suggests that enhancing well-being through mindfulness-focused creative arts engagement might be one effective tool to be included as part of routine self-care protocols for first responders and their families.

Integrating social neuroscience and social work: innovations for advancing practice-based research.

Throughout the social work profession, there is ongoing interest in building a social science agenda that can address the complex practice-based questions faced by social work professionals today. Methodological innovations and unique funding opportunities have already significantly advanced research on social work practice. Still, there is enthusiastic discussion of how to ensure that such capacity development helps the profession move forward in ways that make use of the biological sciences and that facilitate social work-specific contributions to the larger interdisciplinary scientific community. This article describes how the social work profession can make use of biomedical knowledge and technological advances from social neuroscience to inform psychosocial treatment development, and it illustrates an application to social work practice by giving an example of a substance abuse treatment development process built on social neuroscientific research.

Parental aspirations for their children's educational attainment: relations to ethnicity, parental education, children's academic performance, and parental perceptions of school climate.

This study examined parental aspirations for their children's educational attainment in relation to ethnicity (African American, Asian, Caucasian, Hispanic), parental education, children's academic performance, and parental perceptions of the quality and climate of their children's school with a sample of 13,577 middle and high school parents. All parents had relatively high educational aspirations for their children, and within each ethnic subgroup, parental education and children's academic performance were significantly and positively related to parental aspirations. However, moderating effects were found such that Caucasian parents with lower levels of education had significantly lower educational aspirations for their children than did parents of other ethnicities with similar low levels of education. Although the strength of the relationship between parental perceptions of school-related factors and parental aspirations for their children's educational attainment was not strong, it was most predictive of non-Caucasian parental aspirations for their children.

Estimating person--environment transactions on intention to change drug-using behaviors.

The community attachment model of addiction is an ecologically based social process model that suggests social context referents (peers, family, neighbors, etc.) will influence attachment to addiction or recovery communities, via cognitive, affective, and behavioral commitments. This study examined the influence of social context referents on intention to change drug using behavior, and examined moderating effects of three contextual indicators (labor market attachment, educational attainment, and family poverty status) on these relationships. The study sample consisted of 302 adults in inpatient and outpatient substance abuse treatment facilities, who completed a set of instruments that included the Ecological Assessment of Substance Abuse Experiences (EASE), a new instrument designed to measure the influence of social context referents on addiction and recovery attachment processes. Results showed that all three contextual indicators moderated relationships among social context referenced attitudes, drug use concern, and intention to change drug using behaviors. Findings suggest that practitioners should attend to both microlevel orientations to social context and macrolevel contextual dimensions (e.g., labor force attachment), as both may influence behavioral change opportunities.

A pilot study of a dual processing substance user treatment intervention with adults.

This study responds to the identified need for evidence-based substance abuse interventions by examining the effects of an innovative dual processing substance use intervention aimed at decreasing the risk for substance relapse by targeting emotional regulation capacity. The study was completed in partnership with a Latino-serving community-based substance user treatment agency in a rural Northeastern region of the United States in 2005-2006 and was supported with pilot monies from the University at Albany School of Social Welfare NIDA-funded research center. The sample (N = 29) was comprised of adults with a diagnosis of substance dependence seeking treatment in an outpatient program. Study findings indicated that individuals who participated in the dual-processing treatment group decreased their craving with a trend toward increased self-efficacy over time in treatment and did not show treatment response differences across Latino and non-Latino clients, suggesting that treatment application was similar across these groups. The study's limitations are noted.

Examining the relative importance of social context referents in predicting intention to change substance abuse behavior using the EASE.

There is growing consensus across literatures that more than individual motivation and "will to change" influence whether a client will be able to make and sustain recovery-related changes to prevent drug relapse post-treatment. New areas of inquiry in the substance abuse field have proposed conceptual models that promote an integration of both individual and social context factors, which offer the opportunity for important developments in clinical practice. This study examined the influence of social context referents on clients' intention to change substance abusing behaviors. The Ecological Assessment of Substance abuse Experiences (EASE), an instrument that measures the influence of social context referents on addiction and recovery behaviors, was administered to 302 inpatient and outpatient adults in treatment for substance abuse. Results showed that the number of people in his/her social network favorable towards recovery (Beta=.222); the extent to which one personally identifies with being in recovery (Beta=.339); the perceived importance of people in the client's social network encouraging recovery-related behaviors (Beta=.369); weak beliefs that drugs will lead to positive outcomes (Beta=-.220); and strong beliefs that recovery will lead to positive outcomes (Beta=.307) were all associated with intention to change substance abusing behavior.

Race and ethnic differences and human figure drawings: clinical utility of the DAP:SPED.

This study examined race and ethnic differences on the Draw A Person: Screening Procedure for Emotional Disturbance (DAP:SPED; Naglieri, McNeish, & Bardos, 1991) for youths 6 though 17 years of age for 2 matched samples. Samples were drawn from the DAP:SPED nationally representative standardization sample and matched on gender, grade, and school classroom. No statistically significant differences were found for big figure, small figure, or shading item composites. A statistically significant difference was found between Black-White pairs on figure omissions but showed a small effect size (d value = .25). Further, no statistically significant differences were found between the DAP:SPED Total T scores for Black and White youth (M = 47.67, SD = 10.09; N =138) or Hispanic and White youth (M = 48.20, SD = 9.56; N = 59), showing very small effect sizes. In addition, equivalence testing showed similarities across race and ethnic pairs for all composites and DAP:SPED total score, lending preliminary support to the DAP:SPED's clinical utility as a measure that yields similar scores across these groups.

Ecological Assessment of Substance-abuse Experiences (EASE): findings from a new instrument development pilot study.

A newly developed instrument that assesses a client's orientation to addiction or recovery communities using social context referents was pilot tested with a sample of 103 adults seeking treatment for substance abuse at outpatient and residential treatment facilities on the East Coast. Preliminary findings show promising subscale reliabilities, and suggest that drug- and recovery-related social identities are related to drug-use severity and drug-use concern; and drug-related attitudinal congruence between the treatment-seeker and family and treatment-seeker and other significant persons are related to intention to make behavioral changes in reducing substance abuse.

A bio-behavioral model of addiction treatment: applying dual representation theory to craving management and relapse prevention.

A bio-behavioral approach to drug addiction treatment is outlined. The presented treatment model uses dual representation theory as a guiding framework for understanding the bio-behavioral processes activated during the application of expressive therapeutic methods. Specifically, the treatment model explains how visual processing techniques can supplement traditional relapse prevention therapy protocols, to help clients better manage cravings and control triggers in hard-to-treat populations such as chronic substance-dependent persons.

Confirmatory factor analysis of the geriatric depression scale.

PURPOSE: The Geriatric Depression Scale (GDS) is widely used in clinical and research settings to screen older adults for depressive symptoms. Although several exploratory factor analytic structures have been proposed for the scale, no independent confirmation has been made available that would enable investigators to confidently identify scores for the subdimensions of depression represented in the scale. DESIGN AND METHODS: This article describes a confirmatory factor analysis of the 30-item GDS, with the factor structure based on an exploratory principal components analysis that was published earlier. The original study sample consisted of 327 community-dwelling adults aged 65-94 years. The confirmatory factor analysis was performed on data from an independent sample of 294 adults aged 60-98 years who resided in retirement facilities. RESULTS: The proposed final measurement model uses 26 of the items from the GDS in five factors and obtains a goodness-of-fit index of.90. The resulting distinct subdimensions are Dysphoric Mood, Withdrawal-Apathy-Vigor, Hopelessness, Cognitive, and Anxiety. IMPLICATIONS: Although results should be considered preliminary, the use of these five subdimensions as subscales for scoring purposes may improve the precision and utility of the GDS as an assessment tool for older adults in health, mental health, and research contexts.

Investigating the validity of the Draw-A-Person: Screening Procedure for Emotional Disturbance: a measurement validation study with high-risk youth.

This validity study examined the extent to which the Draw-A-Person: Screening Procedure for Emotional Disturbance (DAP:SPED; J. A. Naglieri, T. J. McNeish, & A. N. Bardos, 1991) was a significant predictor of behavioral functioning within a clinical sample of 68 latency-age children (6-12 years old) receiving counseling services at outpatient and residential treatment facilities. Study results showed that the total DAP:SPED (man, woman, and self scores summed) was a significant predictor in explaining variation in internalizing behavioral disturbance. Specifically, the DAP:SPED remained a moderate strength predictor of internalizing behavioral disturbance after controlling for the Child and Adolescent Adjustment Profile parent-report behavioral measure. Findings lend preliminary support to the DAP:SPED's validity in providing assessment information about child behavioral functioning. Continued validation investigation along these lines is recommended.