WEB TOOL TO DISSEMINATE EMPIRICALLY-BASED INTERVENTIONS TO SCHOOLS

NIMH
ID: 2R44MH084375-03
PI: MELISSA DEROSIER, JANEY MCMILLEN
TERM: 06/11 – 05/15

In the United States, approximately 15 million youth have a mental, emotional, or behavioral disorder and schools are the primary setting within which children and adolescents receive mental health (MH) services. The effectiveness of school MH programs has been repeatedly demonstrated for a wide array of behavioral and emotional disorders, including suicidality, substance abuse, ADHD, and mood, anxiety and conduct disorders. Unfortunately, however, despite gains in the identification of evidence-based interventions (EBIs) and a push for accountability in the education system, EBIs are rarely used in everyday practice by schools. Further, EBIs proven effective under strict research conditions often fail to achieve their intended outcomes when delivered in the “real world.” A growing body of literature demonstrates that the quality of implementation is directly related to the likelihood an EBI will be adopted and sustained within the school setting as well as the strength of its treatment effects. Increasing the extent to which school MH EBIs are used and implemented with high quality could significantly impact the MH of the nation’s youth.

Through Phase I of this project, we have created a prototype of Centervention, a web-based technology infrastructure designed to promote quality implementation of school MH EBIs on a broad-scale. Centerventiondecreases costs (time, financial, personnel) to both schools and intervention developers, enhances the integrity with which EBIs are implemented in the school setting, and increases dissemination of EBIs into “real world” everyday practice. Feasibility test results with school MH providers, teachers, administrators, and intervention developers provided substantial support for continued research and development (R&D) of Centervention, as well as essential constructive feedback to inform Phase II development.

This Phase II project will continue the R&D of Centervention. Based on Phase I feedback, the first task of Phase II will be to revise each CenterVention component to enhance usability and value. Once the full technology infrastructure is complete, a scientific evaluation of Centervention will be conducted through a randomized experimental design. After product testing is complete, each component of the Centervention product will be finalized based on test results and user evaluations. More information about Centervention can be found at www.centervention.org.

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.