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3C Institute

SOCIAL AND EMOTIONAL SKILLS TRAINING WITH YOUNG CHILDREN (INSIGHT!)

NIH
ID: 5R44MH070162-03A
PI: JANEY MCMILLEN, PHD
TERM: 05/06 – 04/08

Social interactions are laden with emotionally charged information and individuals who lack emotional intelligence skills can have difficulty negotiating interpersonal situations. For children, limited emotional intelligence impacts their social relationships with the peer group and can result in negative social experiences. Decades of research in developmental psychopathology support the significant and unique contribution of social problems in the emergence of negative outcomes, including risk for mental health problems. Research shows that emotional intelligence skills can be targeted and bolstered through group interventions and that interventions are enhanced when training extends to multiple settings (e.g., intervention setting and home) and practice outside of the treatment sessions is included.

During the Phase I project, the prototype for Insight! was developed and tested for feasibility within three targeted markets: school- and community-based mental health professionals and elementary school teachers. Skill acquisition and product feasibility were also tested with parents and children. Product feasibility was successfully established and Phase I results provided substantial support for continued development.

This Phase II project utilized Phase I findings to revise, modify, and extend intervention components to maximize quality and effectiveness. The resulting program for emotional intelligence training was titled, Emotional Literacy in the Classroom (ELC). ELC offers multimedia resources and a skill-based curriculum specifically aimed at enhancing emotional intelligence competencies in 5 to 7 year olds. ELC also provides a unique means of bridging the intervention setting with home efforts to promote emotional and social functioning of children. A scientific evaluation of the efficacy of the intervention was conducted to assess skill acquisition and emotional, social, and behavioral functioning. Results indicated that the ELC curriculum was effective for increasing children’s emotional knowledge when implemented as part of the regular education curriculum for Kindergarten through second grade classrooms. Use of ELC had a significant impact on children’s ability to recognize emotions in themselves and in others, a skill that is considered essential for regulating emotions.

The ELC program is currently available for purchase through www.selmediainc.com.

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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.