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3C Institute

New Online Courses Help Mental Health Clinicians Support First Responder Communities

UCF RESTORES, a nonprofit clinical research center and treatment clinic at the University of Central Florida led by Dr. Deborah Beidel, is working with 3C Institute to update and expand its catalog of e-learning courses. Two trainings, Trauma Management Therapy (TMT) and Understanding Firefighter Culture, are now available.

TMT is an evidence-based treatment for posttraumatic stress disorder that serves as the cornerstone of UCF RESTORES’s successful treatment approach. Understanding Firefighter Culture is designed for mental health clinicians who are interested in working more effectively with firefighters and paramedics/emergency medical technicians. A third e-learning course, Understanding Law Enforcement Culture, is currently in development.

Updated: Trauma Management Therapy

TMT has been updated to include the latest features available on 3C’s Dynamic e-Learning Platform (DeLP). The course engages learners through a combination of instructional videos, interactive features, and knowledge checks.

A man crouches down as lightning flashes from a dark cloud above him.
Example of a didactic video
Example of a knowledge check
Example of a knowledge check
Drag and drop activity that reinforces the concept of unconditioned stimuli, unconditioned responses, conditioned stimuli, and conditioned responses.
Example of a drag-and-drop activity
Scene construction interview menu that branches to DOs and DON'Ts.
Example of a menu
Handout on ASD and PTSD, two forms of trauma disorder.
Example of a resource

Published: Understanding Firefighter Culture

3C’s team of editors, graphic designers, and software developers worked closely with Dr. Beidel to translate her in-person cultural competency training into an online format. The course builds on the UCF RESTORES team’s experiences offering mental health services to firefighters throughout Florida. By examining the fire service’s unique culture, work-related challenges, and experiences that typically lead firefighters to seek treatment, the course seeks to improve mental health professionals’ ability to provide appropriate, personalized treatment to first responders. Placing this course online lets clinicians in other states take advantage of this training.

A didactic video explains the legal framework that supports firefighter culture.
Example of a didactic video
A knowledge check tests users about suicide among first responders
Example of a knowledge check
A drag-and-drop activity tests users on four types of recovery patterns.
Example of a drag-and-drop activity
Firefighter Rosetta Stone resource from Florida Firefighters Safety and Health Collaborative
Example of a resource
An interactive menu branches to three types of prevention and mitigation programs.
Example of a menu

Planned: Understanding Law Enforcement

UCF RESTORES is also looking to the future. Dr. Beidel and 3C are developing a cultural competency e-learning course focused on law enforcement. Like its fire service counterpart, this course will examine the unique characteristics and experiences that providers must consider when working with this population.

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    DEB CHILDRESS, PHD

    Chief of Research and Learning Content

    BIOGRAPHY

    Dr. Childress obtained her PhD in psychology at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill. Prior to coming to 3C Institute, she served as a research associate and a postdoctoral fellow in the Carolina Institute for Developmental Disabilities at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill working on a longitudinal imaging study aimed at identifying the early markers of autism through behavioral and imaging methodologies. She has 19 years of autism research experience, during which she has examined the behavioral, personality, and cognitive characteristics of individuals with autism and their family members. Dr. Childress also has experience developing behavioral and parent report measurement tools, coordinating multi-site research studies, and collecting data from children and families. She has taught courses and seminars in general child development, autism, and cognitive development at the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill.

    Expertise

    • autism
    • early development
    • behavioral measurement
    • integrating behavioral and biological measurement

    Education

    • Postdoctoral fellowship, Carolina Institute for Developmental Disabilities (Institutional NRSA-NICHD), University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
    • PhD, developmental psychology, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
    • BS, psychology (minor in sociology), University of Iowa

    Selected Publications

    • Elison, J. T., Wolff, J. J., Heimer, D. C., Paterson, S. J., Gu, H., Hazlett, H. C., Styner, M, Gerig, G., & Piven, J. (in press). Frontolimbic neural circuitry at 6 months predicts individual differences in joint attention at 9 months. Developmental Science.
    • Wassink, T. H., Vieland, V. J., Sheffield, V. C., Bartlett, C. W., Goedken, R., Childress, D. & Piven, J. (2008). Posterior probability of linkage analysis of autism dataset identifies linkage to chromosome 16. Psychiatric Genetics,18(2),85-91.
    • Losh, M., Childress, D., Lam K. & Piven, J. (2008). Defining key features of the broad autism phenotype: A comparison across parents of multiple- and single-incidence autism families. American Journal of Medical Genetics (Neuropsychiatric Genetics), 147B(4):424-33.
    • Wassink, T. H., Piven, J., Vieland, V. J., Jenkins, L., Frantz R., Bartlett, C. W., Goedken, R., … Sheffield, V.C. (2005). Evaluation of the chromosome 2q37.3 gene CENTG2 as an autism susceptibility gene. American Journal of Medical Genetics (Neuropsychiatric Genetics), 136, 36-44.
    • Barrett, S., Beck, J., Bernier, R., Bisson, E., Braun, T., Casavant, T., Childress, D., … Vieland, V. (1999). An autosomal genomic screen for autism. American Journal of Medical Genetics (Neuropsychiatric Genetics), 88, 609-615. doi: 10.1002/(SICI)1096-8628(19991215)88:63.0.CO;2-L
    • Piven, J., Palmer, P., Landa, R., Santangelo, S., Jacobi, D. & Childress, D. (1997). Personality and language characteristics in parents from multiple-incidence autism families. American Journal of Medical Genetics (Neuropsychiatric Genetics), 74, 398-411.
    • Piven, J., Palmer, P., Jacobi, D., Childress, D. & Arndt, S. (1997). Broader autism phenotype: Evidence from a family history study of multiple-incidence autism families. American Journal of Psychiatry, 154, 185-190.