Long-term findings from Woodridge in reducing illegal cigarette sales to older minors.

The purpose of the present study is to assess the effectiveness of an enforcement program in reducing cigarette sales to older minors in a community that had been successful in reducing illegal sales of cigarettes to younger minors. Cigarette sales rates were monitored over a 3-year period with quarterly compliance testing in Woodridge, Illinois. Sales rates for older minors were found to be only slightly higher than those of younger minors with one exception.

Reducing the illegal sales of cigarettes to minors: analysis of alternative enforcement schedules.

The majority of adolescent smokers are able to purchase cigarettes even though laws prohibit the sale of cigarettes to minors (Radecki & Zdunich, 1993). The present study focused on merchant licensing, civil penalties, and monitoring of merchant behavior. Several different schedules of enforcement in the city of Chicago were evaluated to determine the optimal schedules to reduce the sale of cigarettes to minors in a major metropolitan area.

Dissociation between declarative and procedural learning in dementia and depression.

Declarative and procedural learning were assessed in patients with probable Alzheimer's Disease (AD) and major depression, patients with AD and no depression, patients with major depression but no dementia, and a group of age-comparable nondemented and nondepressed normal controls. AD patients showed significant deficits in declarative but not in procedural learning, while depressed nondemented patients showed the opposite pattern (i.e.

Estimating rates of chronic fatigue syndrome from a community-based sample: a pilot study.

Most of the Chronic Fatigue Syndrome (CFS) epidemiological studies have relied on physicians who refer patients having at least six months of chronic fatigue and other symptoms. However, there are a number of potential problems when using this method to derive prevalence statistics. For example, some individuals with CFS might not have the economic resources to access medical care.

Community building: Our next frontier.

Today's society is faced with numerous, escalating problems like homelessness, drug addictions, and violence, and some of these problems may be related to a declining sense of community. In this article, we trace some of the historical reasons that account for why many individuals no longer have a strong sense of community. Example are provided of the development of communities that provide members with a sense of connectedness and cohesion.

Twelve-step program use among Oxford House residents: spirituality or social support in sobriety?

Oxford House is a self-help, self-governed, democratic communal-living environment for recovering alcoholics and polysubstance abusers. In this study, 134 male residents (M age = 34 years old) were personally interviewed on their recovery process and, in particular, on their experience with 12-step programs such as Alcoholics Anonymous (AA). Most residents (76%) reported they attended weekly AA meetings to assist in their recovery, mainly to acquire effective techniques to maintain sobriety (72%).

Analysis of clustered data in community psychology: with an example from a worksite smoking cessation project.

Although it is common in community psychology research to have data at both the community, or cluster, and individual level, the analysis of such clustered data often presents difficulties for many researchers. Since the individuals within the cluster cannot be assumed to be independent, the use of many traditional statistical techniques that assumes independence of observations is problematic. Further, there is often interest in assessing the degree of dependence in the data resulting from the clustering of individuals within communities.

A follow-up of a media-based, worksite smoking cessation program.

Described an examination of data collected 2 years following the onset of a media-based, worksite smoking cessation intervention. Thirty-eight companies in Chicago were randomly assigned to one of two experimental conditions. In the initial 3-week phase, all participants in both conditions received self-help manuals and were instructed to watch a 20-day televised series designed to accompany the manual.

A comprehensive multi-media program to prevent smoking among black students.

Much research has been done in developing and implementing smoking prevention programs; however, few studies have focused on urban Black populations. In November of 1989, a comprehensive prevention program was implemented to decrease the incidence of new smokers within the adolescent population in a Black community. The program combined a school-based curriculum with a comprehensive media intervention.

Prevalence of chronic fatigue syndrome-related symptoms among nurses.

Chronic Fatigue Syndrome is an illness that is characterized by debilitating fatigue and a group of other related symptoms. Few epidemiological studies have been conducted, and none have focused on a nursing population. The present study is the first to assess the prevalence of Chronic Fatigue Syndrome-related symptoms in a sample of nurses.

Chronic Fatigue Syndrome: New hope from psychoneuroimmunology and community psychology.

Chronic Fatigue Syndrome is a baffling disease potentially affecting millions of Americans. New insights and developments in the fields of psychoneuroimmunology and community psychology may offer promising new leads in helping people recover from this debilitating illness. The experiences of a CSF-afflicted person in struggling to overcome this disease are used to illustrate the usefulness to recovery of concepts in the fields of psychoneuroimmunology, community psychology, and primary prevention.

Training parents in a preventive intervention for transfer children.

Parents whose children were identified as being at-risk for academic difficulties following a transfer into a new school were involved in either a school-based tutoring program or a school-based tutoring program with a parent training component. When parents actively worked with their elementary school age children at home, the children evidenced better grades at the end of the school year. A variety of other social adjustment measures also indicated that when parents and school-based personnel worked together in the preventive effort, the outcomes were more favorable.

Sensitivity and specificity of the Mini-Mental State Exam in the diagnosis of dementia.

The Mini-Mental State Exam (MMSE) is a brief cognitive test that assesses several cognitive domains, such as orientation, attention, concentration, memory, language, and constructional abilities. While the MMSE was found to be valid and reliable in the diagnosis of moderate dementia, its sensitivity and specificity for the diagnosis of mild dementia has been rarely examined. We assessed the specificity and sensitivity of the MMSE in a consecutive series of 44 patients with mild dementia, and a group of age-comparable normal controls.

Eco-transactional behavioral research.

Over the past few years, developmental and community theorists have begun speculating about and researching transactional and ecological processes. Rather than just focus on individual-unit phenomena, the transactional theorists point to reciprocal effects of different systems such that people are influenced and influence others over long periods of time. Ecological theorists have identified interrelationships between different systems or ecologies.

Validating a brief Pupil Evaluation Inventory.

A shortened version of the Pupil Evaluation Inventory (PEI) was evaluated. The shortened version consists of nine items and was administered to 381 third-, fourth-, and fifth-graders in Chicago area Catholic schools. A factor analysis revealed the same factor structure as the original measure.

Active enforcement of cigarette control laws in the prevention of cigarette sales to minors.

Objective: To assess the effect that cigarette legislation would have on reducing merchant sales rates of cigarettes to minors and the affect on adolescent smoking behavior.

Design: Observational survey of merchant selling behaviors and adolescent smoking habits before and after passage of legislation.

Setting: The setting for the merchant survey was Woodridge, Ill (population 25,200), a suburban community of Chicago.

A large-scale, short-term, media-based weight loss program.

Background: This article describes the evaluation of a media-based weight loss and nutrition program.

Methods: Fifteen broadcasts were aired on a Chicago television news program over a three-week period in November of 1986. Some participants (n = 37) received the television program and an accompanying manual, and some (n = 37) received, in addition to the television and media interventions, encouragement to attend self-help groups dealing with obesity.

A social stress model of substance abuse.

The social stress model provides a framework for detecting protective factors that may contribute to adolescents' resiliency when confronted with compelling influences to engage in substance abuse. Parameters of the model were tested in 2 urban high school samples (N = 124) of Black (78%), White (16%), and Hispanic (6%) adolescents aged 12-14 years. Pretest and posttest measures, designed to detect the relative influence of stress, social networks, social competencies, and community resources on levels of students' usage, were completed at the beginning and end of the school year.

Incentives and competition in a worksite smoking cessation intervention.

We evaluated a worksite smoking cessation program that employed multicomponents including support groups, incentives, and competition. The combination of incentives and other components increased participation rates to over 80%. Forty-two percent of smokers were abstinent at six months, compared to 13 percent of a control group (difference 29 percent, 95% CI 9, 49).

A televised, self-help, cigarette smoking cessation intervention.

A televised, self-help cigarette smoking cessation intervention was conducted and evaluated. During the 20-day program, reports were broadcast daily on the evening news programs of the local affiliate station of a national television network. Two samples of smokers who requested self-help manuals were interviewed by telephone immediately following the conclusion of the program and again 3 months later concerning their demographic characteristics, participation in the program, and smoking and quitting experiences.

A worksite smoking cessation intervention involving the media and incentives.

This study evaluated an attempt at 38 workplaces to help employees stop or reduce their levels of smoking. In past research, worksite support groups, in combination with a media smoking cessation program and self-help manuals, were found to be effective in helping employees quit smoking. Unfortunately, recidivism was found at the follow-up evaluations.

Factors in smoking cessation among participants in a televised intervention.

This paper analyzes factors associated with smoking cessation during a 1-year period following a televised, self-help intervention among a sample of smokers who registered and participated in the program. Factors examined include readiness to quit smoking, extent of use of self-help materials, degree of exposure to the televised intervention, and environmental support for quitting from within the smoker's household. Behavioral response immediately following the intervention appeared to persist over the year of observation.