The relative efficacy of coping skills training and group discussion as stress management techniques for forensic psychiatric patients

Based on pretreatment levels of anxiety, 21 involuntarily confined forensic psychiatric patients were assigned to one of three experimental conditions: stress management training, stress discussion, or no treatment control. Measures of anxiety, physical health, mood, adherence to "irrational beliefs" hypothesized by Ellis (1962) to be related to dysphoric emotions, and a measure of hospital ward adjustment were collected before and after treatment. Subjects originally assigned to the waiting list control group later received exposure to either the stress management training condition or the stress discussion condition. Measures of nonspecific treatment effects generally showed that both group treatments generated equivalent treatment credibilities. The self-report measures of mood and physical health demonstrated that exposure to the stress management training condition resulted in pre to posttreatment improvement, while exposure to the stress discussion condition did not. Also, subjects exposed to the stress management training condition decreased their endorsement of "irrational beliefs," while subjects exposed to stress discussion condition did not. Neither condition resulted in reduced pre to posttreatment changes in state or trait anxiety or improved ward adjustment. It was concluded overall that the stress management training procedure was a moderately effective stress reduction technique for forensic psychiatric patients. Directions for future research are presented as interpretive limitations of the present results.

Name thesis:degree_name

Ph. D.

Level thesis:degree_level

doctoral

Discipline thesis:degree_discipline

Psychology

Department dc:contributor.department

Psychology

Grantor dc:publisher

Virginia Polytechnic Institute and State University

Year dc:date.issued

1981

Author dc:creator

• McClaren, Harry Albert

Statement dc:rights

• In Copyright

Licence dc:rights.uri

• http://rightsstatements.org/vocab/InC/1.0/

Language dc:language.iso

en_US

Handle dc:identifier.uri

http://hdl.handle.net/10919/74824

OAI identifier oai:identifier

oai:vtechworks.lib.vt.edu:10919/74824