Publications by authors named "Jennifer C Wolff"

Disruptive behaviors are the most common clinical presentation in children and adolescents, particularly among disadvantaged youth referred to community mental health clinics (CMHCs). When left unaddressed, disruptive behaviors can increase the risk of adverse mental health outcomes. While parenting interventions are known to be efficacious and efficient treatment approaches, there are many barriers to involvement in such programs, particularly for disadvantaged populations.

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The COVID-19 pandemic resulted in significant changes in daily life, potentially impacting mental health and substance use behavior. Research on COVID-related changes in adolescent substance use have yielded mixed findings. The current cross-sectional chart review study compared rates of past-year substance use before and during COVID-19 among adolescent psychiatric inpatients, and investigated how motives for coping with COVID-19 changes were related to psychiatric acuity, and past-year substance use.

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Introduction: Disparities based on perceived race and ethnicity exist in all fields of medicine. Accurate data collection is crucial to addressing these disparities, yet few studies have evaluated the validity of data gathered. This study compares self-reported race and ethnicity data, considered the gold standard, with data documented in the electronic health record (EHR), to assess the validity of that data.

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Early pubertal timing is associated with more adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) and increased risk for psychopathology during adolescence. However, most work to date has used community or epidemiological samples, and it remains unclear whether these associations persist in acute clinical samples. The present study examined associations between age at menarche and ACEs, psychiatric symptoms, and emotion regulation difficulties in a sample of N = 140 adolescents on a psychiatric inpatient unit.

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There is limited work examining the association of race and ethnicity with restraint and seclusion (R/S) in pediatric inpatient psychiatric units. The present study assessed risk of R/S by race and ethnicity based on a retrospective review of electronic medical records (EMRs) from an adolescent inpatient psychiatric service. Demographic, diagnostic, and R/S data were analyzed for all 1,865 admissions of 1,327 patients from an adolescent unit at a child and adolescent psychiatric hospital from June 2018 to June 2021.

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Over the past decade, healthcare providers nationwide have contended with a growing boarding crisis as pediatric patients await psychiatric treatment in emergency departments (EDs). COVID-19 has exacerbated this urgent youth mental health crisis, driving EDs to act as crisis units. Journey mapping is a robust methodology with which to examine strengths and challenges in patient care workflows such as boarding and emergency psychiatric care.

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The prevalence of adolescent depression is increasing, particularly among girls. Existing evidence-based treatments have limitations and/or may not be acceptable to all adolescents and parents. There is evidence that hatha yoga may be useful as an adjunctive treatment for depression in adults.

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Purpose: Given increasing rates of depression in adolescents, there is a clear need for innovative treatments. In this pilot randomized clinical trial, we assessed acceptability and feasibility of two group-based interventions: yoga and cognitive-behavioral therapy (CBT). The goal of this work is to prepare for a future fully powered randomized trial to test the hypothesis that yoga is not inferior to an established adolescent depression treatment, namely, group CBT.

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Digital media, including smartphones and social media, are central in youths' lives. This study aimed to examine the role of digital media in psychiatric hospital admissions among adolescents. 343 psychiatrically-hospitalized youth (M = 15.

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Background: Adolescents in residential substance use treatment are at extremely high risk for relapse following discharge to the community. Parenting practices, including parental monitoring and parent-adolescent communication, have been established as key predictors of adolescent substance use outcomes and relapse. However, traditional office-based therapy may not be feasible for parents who face structural and systemic barriers.

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Evidence supports the use of brief psychosis-spectrum screening measures to identify individuals at elevated risk for psychosis, however, there is limited research on psychosis-spectrum screening among adolescents hospitalized for acute mental health concerns. Given the psychiatric vulnerability of this population, screening efforts within inpatient settings may help identify adolescents at greatest risk for ongoing mental health concerns including psychosis. This study investigates the use of two brief screening tools to identify psychosis-spectrum symptoms in psychiatrically hospitalized adolescents.

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Article Synopsis
  • - Sleep disruption is a significant public health issue for adolescents, and this study investigates how emotional experiences related to social media use affect sleep and mental health in psychiatrically hospitalized youth.
  • - Involving 243 adolescents, the research found that negative emotional responses to social media were associated with increased sleep disturbances and severe clinical symptoms, such as suicidal thoughts and attention problems.
  • - The study suggests that sleep disturbance may act as a mediator between negative emotional experiences on social media and clinical symptom severity, emphasizing the need for awareness around social media's impact on mental health in vulnerable youth populations.
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Introduction: Adolescent depression is a significant mental health concern. Emotion regulation difficulties have been associated with subsequent depressive symptoms, though different facets of emotion regulation are rarely compared. This study examined the degree to which trajectories of change in different facets of emotion regulation (goal-directed behavior, impulse control, and regulation strategies) and depressive symptoms were associated across twelve months in a clinical adolescent sample.

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