1. Presention for Middle School Youth
Worries and Anxieties: It’s Not Unusual – An Innovative Psychoeducational
Presention for Middle School Youth
Jenna Paternostro, Micaela Thordarson, Melissa Tamas, Sarah Tabbarah, Lisa Hoyman, and Robert D. Friedberg
Center for the Study and Treatment of Anxious Youth at Palo Alto University
Introduction
Methods
Results
Participants
N = 42 sixth grade middle school students
Delivered in a traditional classroom
Worries and Anxieties: It’s Not Unusual
Interactive psychoeducational presentation on anxiety symptoms in the structure of a talk show
Hosts dressed in costume, played music to accompany various components of the presentation, and used props (e.g. plastic bugs and fly swatters)
A powerpoint presentation with illustrative examples of cognitive distortions, including images that students perceived differently, guided the program
Hosts facilitated a group discussion on when anxiety and worries are helpful but also how they can be harmful
Hands-on activities demonstrated the connection between thoughts, feelings, and behaviors commonly associated with anxiety
Students each practiced the activity to “Swat the [Worry] Bug” and replace the bug with a more balanced thought
Hosts completed the presentation with a review of the skills learned and ways that students might use the new tools in school
Dissemination efforts
Transporting mental health services to school-based settings dominate dissemination literature in recent years
In usual care settings, barriers including high costs of services, waitlists, and transportation requirements, make seeking services difficult (Herzig-Anderson, et al., 2012)
Providing mental health services in schools is accepted as a promising avenue for increased access to resources for children (Miller et al., 2011)
Currently, 70% of mental health services are provided in schools (Herzig-Anderson, et al., 2012)
Anxiety amongst children
Children predominately display mental health symptoms in academic settings (Durlak et al., 2004)
Anxiety is the most prevalent psychological disorder in adolescents and plagues between 6-11% of school-aged children (Briggs-Gowan et al., 2000)
Anxiety is associated with high rates of school refusal, poor academic performance, and impairments in school and social functioning
Greater emphasis on academic success contributes to higher rates of anxiety and depression in youth
Why is a psychoeducational presentation to a class important?
The new Affordable Care Act (ACA) mandates emphasize early intervention and prevention efforts
Successfully providing psychoeducation to classrooms addresses the ACA initiatives by focusing attention towards quickly and efficiently delivering prevention and early intervention programs in a large group format
81% learned that the manner in which an event is understood shapes the way one acts and feels.
76% identified that how a situation is perceived can lead to missing or ignoring important facts that are presented.
85% established that when worry occurs, it often tends to catastrophize the experience.
73% acquired that worry thoughts are like worry bugs
71% recognized that they can use cognitive restructuring techniques to decrease their worry.
90% reported that they enjoyed the presentation and 85% thought the class was interesting.
Measure
Satisfaction measure
Anonymous measure to evaluate program interest and satisfaction
3-point Likert scale “Yes, Maybe, No”
Sample items:
“I enjoyed the presentation”
“I thought the presentation was interesting”
“I learned that the way you see things shapes the way you act and feel”
“I learned that the way you see things may cause you to ignore or miss important facts”
“I learned that when you worry you tend to catastrophize”
“I learned that these thoughts are like worry bugs”
“I learned that you can use the Just Because technique to ease your mind”
Discussion
The current findings are extremely promising and suggest that this interactive psychoeducational program is a way for middle school students to learn about anxiety disorders. In addition, the educational content of the presentation was acquired well. Results of the study provide further understanding of the viability of transporting psychoeducation to school-based settings.
Purpose
The current study extends the literature by examining the satisfaction ratings of students
This innovative prevention program aspires to capture the attention and interest of middle school students
By providing a stimulating prevention program, students are more likely to maintain attention and take away key concepts that will benefit possible mental health symptoms that arise
It was the intention that students would learn the effects that anxiety has on one’s thoughts, feelings, and behaviors
In addition, students would learn a fun, quick tool for combatting anxious thoughts that they can implement on their own.
Last, by presenting psychoeducational programs to traditional classrooms, a greater number of students receive crucial information on common anxiety symptoms.
References
Briggs-Gowan, M. J., Horwitz, S. M., Schwab-Stone, M. E., Leventhal, J. M., & Leaf, P. J. (2000). Mental health in pediatric settings: Distribution of disorders and factors related to service use. Journal of the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, 39, doi: /
Durlak, J. A., Weissberg, R. P., Quintana, E., & Perez, F. (2004). Primary prevention: Involving schools and communities in youth health promotion. In L. A. Jason, C. B. Keys, Y. Suarez-Balcazar, R. R. Taylor & M. I. Davis (Eds.), Participatory community research: Theories and methods in action (pp ). Washington, DC: American Psychological Association.
Herzig-Anderson, K., Colognori, D., Fox, J. K., Stewart, C. E., & Masia-Warner, C. (2012). School-based anxiety treatments for children and adolescents. Child and Adolescent Psychiatry of North America, 21(3), doi: 1-/1016/j.chc
Miller, L. D., Laye-Gindhu, A., Bennett, J. L., Lui, Y., Gold, S., March, J. S., Olson, B. F., & Waechtler, V. E. (2011). An effectiveness study of culturally enriched school-based CBT anxiety prevention program. Journal of Clinical Child & Adolescent Psychology, 40(4), doi: /
Data Analysis
To determine how many students found the psychoeducational program interesting, satisfying, and gained new understanding of anxiety symptoms as well as quick tools to combat anxious thoughts, frequency distribution graphs were run using the statistics program SPSS.
Address correspondence to Jenna Paternostro at