DANESHVAR RAFTAR
Year:2006 | Volume:13 | Issue:16 (SPECIAL EDITION ON PSYCHOLOGY 6)|Papers Count:11

One of the major preventive measures against addiction is the performance of programs based on information dissemination approach. In such program, people get familiar with some of the facts concerning the consequences of addiction. The adolescents, who face the self-introduced drug abusers and their families, will learn about the results of addiction and will be able to control their behavior and views in the future (Lockwood 2000). In this research, drug abusers and their families attended programs held at high schools and explained about the negative consequences of drug abusing which sabotaged their psychosocial life. More than one thousand high school students (Experimental group) participated in this program through seven sessions after answering the inventory about their views toward addiction (pretest). They responded to the inventory after attending the sessions (Posttest). The results show significant differences (p<.01) in the views of the students toward addiction after and before participation in the program. In comparison with the control group, the subjects in experimental group changed their views negatively toward addiction because of facing the experiences of drug abusers about addiction.

To examine reliability and validity of the Mental Health Inventory (MHI), 160 students from the University of Tehran (n=80; 50 females, 30 males) and Iran University of Science and Technology (n=80; 50 females, 30 males) participated in this study as an experimental and a control group respectively. All participants filled out the Beck Depression Inventory (BDI), the Beck Anxiety Inventory (BAI), and the General Health Questionnaire (GHQ). Test retest reliability and internal consistency of the MHI were examined at satisfactory levels. Concurrent validity of the MHI was calculated according to correlation coefficients between the scores on the MHI and total score of the GHQ. All correlations were statistically significant. The results also supported discriminate validity of the MHI.

The main purpose of this research was to investigate the relationship between family function and religiosity with identity crisis. The research sample is comprised of 312 high school boys and girls in the third grade chosen through cluster sampling. The tools employed in this research were as follows: Family Assessment Device, Mabad questionnaire and Personal Identity Test. The collected Data was analyzed using Hest (for comparison of the two sex groups) correlation, and step-by-step regression. Results revealed a significant inverse relationship between family function and religiosity, and identity crisis. Two constructs of family function (roles and problem solving) had significant inverse relationship with identity crisis. Results also indicated that between family function and religiosity, the latter explains most variations concerning identity crisis. Furthermore, among family function constructs Roles and Problem Solving, in response, explain most variations concerning identity crisis. It became obvious that there is a significant difference between the religiosity of the two sex groups, and that girls have a stronger religious belief than boys do. No significant difference is observed between boys and girls identity crises. Finally, the research confirmed the influence of family function and religiosity on identity crisis. This implies the importance of family and religion in identity formation of adolescents.

The major aim of this research was to investigate psychometric properties of "NEO-Five Factor Inventory" (NEO-FFI). To this aim, after doing preliminary stages and resolving possible problems, the exploration of this scale was conducted in two studies: in the first study, in order to assess reliability using internal consistency, 604 undergraduate students of Tehran, Amirkabir and Shahed Universities (334=female and 270=male) with average age of 21.8 (sd=2.49) were selected by available sampling method. Students completed NEO-FFI. Results of this study indicated that Neuroticism and Conscientiousness had acceptable internal consistency in all subjects (higher than 0.70). Of course, Cronbach Alfa of Extroversion and Agreeableness were higher than suggested level for group comparisons (higher than 0.5). Therefore, only openness lacked acceptable internal consistency. In the second study, in order to assess construct validity of NEO-FFI, Pearson's product-moment correlation was calculated for five factors of NEO-FFI and 9 facets of "Symptom Checklist-90- Revised" (SCL-90-R). Results of these analyses indicated that Neuroticism with all facets of SCL-90-R, Conscientiousness with all facets of SCL-90-R with the exception of paranoid thinking (Bonferroni correction not considered) and obsessive-compulsive facets (Bonferroni correction considered), Agreeableness and Extroversion with 3 and 7 facets of SCL-90-R (Bonferroni correction considered) had significant correlation. Openness did not show any significant correlation with facets of SCL-90-R. Besides, among these factors, only the relationships of Neuroticism with facets of SCL-90-R was a significant positive correlation and the remaining factors had not significant correlation or had significant negative correlation with facets of SCL-90-R. In conclusion, results of this study with respect to literature review about investigating psychometric properties of NEO-FFI in non-English cultures suggest need to investigate factor structure of this in Iranian population.

The purpose of this research was to Construct and validate the Short Form of Iranian Police Stress Scale (IPSS-Zarifiyan yegane and Khalambor, 2004) by Factor Analysis and assessing reliability and validity. 3650 police officers of IRIPF (Islamic Republic of Iran Police Force) personnel throughout the country completed the IPSS questionnaires. Based on of factor analysis of collected data, 40 items of 85 items of questionnaires were eliminated and therefore IPSS short form (i.e. IPSS-A) was provided. IPSS-A validity was determined by correlation coefficient between long form and short form (r=0.98 for the 1st factor & r=0.96 for the 2nd factor) and its reliability was identified by test-re-test method (r=0.78 for the 1st factor & r=0.80 for the 2nd factor) and internal consistency «Cronbach Alpha Coefficient», (a=0.93 for the 1st factor & a=0.91 for the 2nd factor). Overall, obtained validity and reliability coefficients for IPSS-A were satisfactory for p<0.001. Based on the results of this research IPSS-A can be used in psychological research for identifying police stress.

The main purpose of this study is to obtain and compare the effects of self-esteem group training utilizing behavioral and cognitive-behavioral techniques of social adjustment of Esfahan University students living in dormitory. The research sample, comprising of 30 dormitory students selected through survey, are randomly placed in two groups, an experimental and a control group. Each group included ten subjects. The instruments utilized were Ellis pope's self-esteem inventory, and social adjustment test made by the researcher.The independent variable of the study was eight-session self-esteem group training utilizing behavioral and cognitive-behavioral techniques, which was for the experimental groups.The results showed that self esteem group training utilizing behavioral and cognitive-behavioral techniques has been significantly effective on students' social adjustment and self esteem (p<0.005).Moreover, behavioral and cognitive-behavioral techniques have been significantly effective on students' social adjustment and there were significant differences between the two techniques (p<0.005).

Present research aimed to explore factor structure and psychometric properties of the Illness Attitude (lA) Scale. The study is therefore, performed through three stages. In the first stage, for parallel factor analysis, 929 Shahed University students, selected through cluster sampling, filled out the questionnaire during the academic year 2001-2002. At this stage, the lA scale conceptualized as a five-factor measure; i.e. fear of illness and disease, frequency of treatment, hypochondriacally beliefs and symptom effects, health behavior, and thanaphobia. In the second stage, the reliability of the scale was measured by determining Cronbach Alpha and reliability coefficient by test-retest and mean inter-item correlation. Results showed an appropriate reliability for the scale. The third stage of the study focused on discriminant and construct validity of IAS scale. Results showed that the following four factors; fear of illness and disease, frequency of treatment, hypochondriacal beliefs and symptom effects, and health behavior, can significantly discriminate psychological patients from healthy subjects which is considered as an appropriate discriminant validity of these four factors. In order to determine the construct validity of IAS Scale, Pearson's Product- Moment correlation between this scale and three other scales; i.e. hypochondriacal subscale of MMPI-2, Bodily complaints subscale of SCL-90- R and bodily symptoms subscale of GHQ was calculated. The result indicated an appropriate construct validity of the IAS factors except for the thanaphobia factor. As a result, the present research provides the evidence for rightness of factor structure, and the acceptable reliability of these factors, as well as emphasizing the validity of the factors except the thanaphobia factor.