Wednesday, September 12, 2012

Families and Urban Youth

Gorman-Smith, Tolan, Henry, and Florsheim (2000) also found that exceptionally functioning families protected inner-city African American and Mexican American boys from adjustment difficulties.

Recent work by O'Neal (2001) found that family characteristics were stronger than individual characteristics in protecting junior high age youth from the effects of community violence.
Kliewer, W., Cunningham, J.N., Diehl, R., Parrish, K.A., Walker, J.M., Atiyeh, C., Neace, B., Duncan, L., Taylor, K. & Mejia, R. (2004). Violence Exposure and Adjustment in Inner-City Youth: Child and Caregiver Emotion Regulation Skill, Caregiver-Child Relationship Quality, and Neighborhood Cohesion as Protective Factor. Journal of Clinical Child & Adolescent Psychology, 33(3), 477-487.  

Let's aim to work with families - instead of relying primarily on individual counseling with youth.  

If you have not been adequately trained to work with families, please figure out how to learn and practice often.

If you are scared to work with families, then ask for help.


If you had a mixed experience with your own family, you are not alone.  Welcome to the club.


If you don't believe that working with families will make a difference or if you believe that families will refuse to work with you, then you are right.


If you believe that working with families is one of the most effective things you can do and you believe that families want to get along better because they love each other, then you are right.


What do you choose to believe?
"A belief is only a thought you continue to think.  A belief is nothing more than a chronic pattern of thought, and you have the ability - if you try even a little bit - to begin a new pattern, to tell a new story, to achieve a different vibration, to change your point of attraction." --Esther Hicks

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