African American Family Strengths Project (William Turner) This study investigates the role that family protective factors play in the prevention of substance abuse among African American Adolescents. The overall purpose of the research is to uncover the relationship that exists between adolescent substance abuse and family, school, and individual experiences among African-American adolescents and their families. The specific aims are: (1) to examine more closely the epidemiology of drug use and abuse within a cohort of African-American students using a prospective longitudinal design; and (2) to relate individual level longitudinal data with data at the family level collected over a five year period in order to triangulate on the multiple predictors of drug use and abuse among African-American adolescents.
Community Engaged Parent Education (William Doherty) The project goal is to build the capacity of parents, parent educators, and parent education programs to do citizen work. Citizen work is defined as an ongoing reflection on public issues related to parenting and child well being, combined with civic action on public issues that are of concern to parents in a community.
Couple Experiences of Sleeping Together Over the Life Cycle (Paul Rosenblatt) This is an intensive, qualitative interview study of couple experiences of sleeping together, from first learning how to share a bed through various challenges that emerge over the life cycle (for example, changes in physical health, changes in body size, menopause, onset of snoring). A book in preparation outlines the many complexities and rewards of couple bed sharing and what couple bed sharing reveals about human needs, the complexities of couple life, culture, and life in modern America.
Dollar Works (Jean Bauer). This educational program helps individuals understand and increase their economic well-being in the place where they work and live by teaching them the ABCs of Economic Literacy. It is targeted at newly employed individuals and families as they enter and maintain their place in the workforce. It is designed for agency staff and trained volunteers to work with individuals to sharpen or acquire skills for managing financial resources and take control of their lives in the financial transitions of their lives. The materials are available in English and Spanish.
End of Life Care in African American Families (William Turner) In this study we attempted to understand the African American caregiving experience in its multiple contexts. This research is based on in-depth ethnographic interviews and focus groups with African American family caregivers from various regions of the United States during a stressful time in their family development--caregiving at the end-of-life--and the grieving during the aftermath. The findings highlight the importance of hearing from African American families to gain an understanding of what services, including family therapy and other psychotherapy, they will need during this process. This study examines the ways in which African American family networks are mobilized to meet the caregiving demands when a family member in need of care experiences a sudden change in health status.
Etiology of Drug Abuse: Selective Prevention, Louisville Educational Achievement Project/LEAP (William Turner) The goal of the study is to evaluate the effectiveness of a selected, protocol-driven, school-based, summer program designed to reduce the influence of risk factors and strengthen protective factors that are related to substance abuse in youth. Clinical trials were conducted in three inner city schools in Jefferson County (Louisville). They focused on at-risk 4th graders, defined by poor academic performance and peer rejection, making the transition to the 5th grade.
Family Life in Korea (Paul Rosenblatt) Current research, with recent Family Social Science Ph.D. Sungeun Yang, involves studying what it means to young adult Koreans for a Korean married couple to choose not to have children.
Grief in Families (Paul Rosenblatt) This is an ongoing series of projects. One recently completed project involved intensive interviews of couples who experienced the death of a child. That research led to two books and a number of research articles. A current project (with doctoral student Beverly Wallace) involves intensive interviews of African-Americans about their experience of a death in the family. This has led to a book on African-American grief that should be published in 2005. A second current project (with recent Family Social Science Ph.D., Sungeun Yang) involves co-translation of a well-known Korean novel that focuses on a family dealing with the dying and death of one of the members of the family. Yang and I are also working on papers, based on the novel, on Korean families dealing with terminal illness of one of the partners. A project that is in the planning stage (with doctoral student Busisiwe Nkosi) deals with widowhood in Zulu culture in the country of South Africa. And another project in the planning stage deals with the impact of the death of a parent on the couple relationship of adult offspring of the parent.
International Adoption Project (Hal Grotevant) This study involves a survey of all Minnesota families who adopted children internationally between 1990 - 1998. This study is in collaboration with Drs. Megan Gunnar, Dana Johnson, Wendy Hellerstedt, and Richard Lee, all of the University of Minnesota. Approximately 2500 surveys have been received and are being analyzed.
Inter-Racial/Intercultural Couples (Paul Rosenblatt). Current work involves development of a theoretical family-systems-and-culture model.
Latinos/as’ Access to and Utilization of Mental Health Services in Rural Minnesota (Liz Wieling) This study investigates an underdeveloped area of research focusing on mental health services with Latino/a populations. The data will enhance our understanding of factors that lead to decreasing barriers and improving access to and utilization of mental health services to Latinos/as. Focus group and individual ethnographic interviews will take place with Latino/a community members and mental health professionals from a variety of disciplines in the Twin Cities area.
A Longitudinal Study of Rural Communities and Rural Low-Income Families (Jean Bauer) The overall goal of this project is to increase understanding of forces and opportunities that affect rural places and the people who live there. Existing panel data sets from the Rural Families Speak Project and a created community database to study the interrelationships among rural communities, low-income rural families, and policies are analyzed
Minnesota’s Diverse Families: Tracking Changes in Quality of Life (Martha Rueter, William Turner, Virginia Zuiker, Kathy Rettig, Jean Bauer) This research project is a long-range effort to track changes in family and life quality for various ethnic groups in Minnesota. The goal is to gain deeper understandings of the unique factors for each group that contribute to the development of productive individuals, family strengths, and strong communities. The 2000 United States Census indicates that Minnesota is becoming more racially and ethnically diverse. The State Demographic Center projects that by the year 2020, Minnesota’s minority populations will increase from 6.3% in 1990 to 15% of the total population. Rapid changes can create both stressors and opportunities that affect individuals, family groups, and communities. In order to meet the safety, health, and educational needs of our changing state population, it will be important to develop communication networks and to ask people about their changing needs and resources.
Minnesota / Texas Adoption Research Project (Hal Grotevant) This is a longitudinal, multi-site project aimed at understanding the experiences of adoptive kinship networks having different levels of openness in their relationships - some of the families have confidential adoptions, meaning that there is basically no contact between the adoptive family and the child's birth family; others have mediated adoptions, in which information is shared via a third party (usually a staff member at the adoption agency); yet others have fully disclosed open adoption, in which birth family and adoptive family members communicate directly with each other. Within each type of adoption, there is tremendous variation in the amount and frequency of contact and in who is involved in the contact. This study is in collaboration with Dr. Ruth McRoy, of the University of Texas at Austin, Susan Ayers-Lopez, University of Texas at Austin, Dr. Gretchen Wrobel, of Bethel College (St. Paul), and Dr. Deborah Lewis Fravel, of Indiana University.
Rural Educational Acheivement Project (REAP) Targeted Prevention for Fourth Grade High-Risk Youth (William Turner) The main goal of this study is to evaluate three levels of a substance abuse prevention program for 4th grade students. The first level (universal only) involves All Stars, Jr., a character education and problem behavior prevention program developed by William Hansen. The second level (universal plus selected) involves All Stars, Jr., plus a school-based summer program designed to reduce risk factors and strengthen protective factors related to drug use/problem behaviors among youth, GUTS (Gearing Up to Success). The third level (universal plus selected plus family) involves All Stars, Jr., GUTS, and Coping Power, a family program for parents of at-risk students. This intervention is selected in that only higher risk students (as defined by poor academic achievement and peer rejection) were chosen for participation in the intervention.
Rural Family Businesses: The Interactive Effect of Social and Economic Factors on Viability (Sharon Danes). Most of the research on family businesses emphasizes solely the economic success, or lack thereof, of the business rather than investigating a more inclusive definition of viability. Current data from farm business couples, resort business couples, and rural restaurant and motel business couples are being analyzed in order to investigate the interactive effect of social and economic factors on viability.
|
