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Mental health challenges have been recognized as one of the most prevalent issues impacting children and families within the United States. Children and families of color are disproportionately affected by this due to lack of access to preventative and ongoing supports, and programs that can help address their overall well-being. These issues are even more severe for those that are at risk or interact with the child welfare system. Social workers use various clinical modalities to assess and support them. In the recent years, child welfare agencies have turned to Evidence based programs (EBPs) as a best practice to meet the needs of children and families. The Title IV-E Prevention Services Clearinghouse, established by the Administration of Children and Families is a landmark effort to review and promote such EBP's that prevents foster care placements, including mental health programs. While the Clearinghouse has reviewed 141 programs and services, out of which 71 have been rated as promising, supported, or well-supported, there is a dearth of culturally responsive programs that have met the Clearinghouse criteria. Given the overrepresentation of African American and Native American Families in the child welfare system, and the critical role of the Clearinghouse in reviewing and promoting EBPs, this paper highlights the philosophical, administrative, cultural and logistical barriers for culturally relevant programs to be accepted into the Clearinghouse. It also provides specific recommendations on how the Clearinghouse and researchers can build EBPs that account for the intersection between mental health, social location and cultural identities of the children and families that social workers serve. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]

Several abstracts of research studies presented at the 40th Annual Meeting of the Association for Applied Psychophysiology and Biofeedback held in April 2009 in are presented, including "Novel Approach to Adolescent Physical Activity: Mood-Booster Acute Exercise," "Wellness Programming for First Year Medical Students" and "Repetitive TMS Affects EEG Gamma and ERP During Perceptual Processing in Autism."

Sickle cell disease (SCD) complications place patients at risk for poor psychosocial adaptation, including depression and anxiety symptoms. This study aimed to test a mediator model based on the Risk and Resistance model to explore the role of intrapersonal characteristics and stress processing variables in psychosocial functioning. Participants were 44 adolescents with SCD, 15 healthy siblings, and 43 primary caregivers, recruited from an East Coast comprehensive sickle cell center. The participants completed paper and pencil measures of resilience factors (attributional style, hope, coping) and internalizing symptoms (depression, anxiety). Internalizing symptoms among adolescents␣with SCD and healthy siblings did not differ and were within non-clinical ranges. Self-esteem of adolescents with SCD was correlated with less depression and anxiety and sense of inadequacy was associated with poorer functioning. There were no findings to support the role of coping in psychosocial adjustment. Although the mediation hypothesis was not supported, findings highlighted the resilience of this sample of adolescents with SCD. Determining how these resilience factors protect adolescents with SCD may aid in the development of psychosocial interventions. In particular, interventions should focus on improving intrapersonal skills and coping with stress and investigate ways to tailor these interventions to African-American populations. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]