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Item Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction as a Culturally Relevant Treatment for Racial or Ethnic Minorities(IntechOpen, 2022-04-19) Williams, Tiffany; Lynch, Esther; Jones, Paigean; Harrison, RheaRacial or ethnic minorities (REM) are at a particularly high risk of experiencing mental health conditions. Unlike their White counterparts, social determinants of health (e.g., poverty, racialized violence, or discrimination) exacerbate REM quality of life. REM are less likely than non-Hispanic Whites to seek and receive mental health treatment. Additionally, REM are more likely to experience systemic barriers (e.g., cultural mistrust, stigma, lack of access, and financial barriers), which further complicates their willingness and capacity to seek treatment. While Evidence-Based Treatments (EBTs) are identified as empirically supportive treatments for a range of mental health conditions, there is skepticism about their cultural appropriateness and relevance for REM populations. Clinicians must be culturally competent and use clinical tools (e.g., Multidimensional Model for Developing Cultural Competence) to assist in promoting cultural competence. Likewise, practitioners must be conscientious and knowledgeable about the pitfalls of EBTs when working with REM. Mindfulness-based techniques, such as MBSR, are culturally sensitive and inclusive of historical, social, and cultural ideologies that align with the needs of REM. MBSR has the potential to offer holistic coping given its effectiveness in promoting neurological, physical, and psychological healing.Item The Effects of Gendered Racial Microaggressions on Black Women Worker's Mental Health(2025-08-05) Williams, Tiffany; Erving, Christy; Popplewell, RaymondItem Racism as a Predictor of PTSD Symptoms in Black Americans(2025-08-05) Sanders, Steven; Hooper, Vaughan; Popplewell, Raymond; Tookes-Williams, Kiara; Peters, Keyishi; Williams, TiffanyItem Facilitating Healing for Black Women Experiencing Gendered Racism and Traumatic Stress: The Moderation of Psychosocial Resources(Fortune Journals, 2023-10-11) Williams, Tiffany; Erving, Christy; Frierson, Whitney; Gao, Fanchen; Bass, Jeffery; Martin, Reniece; Mitchell, TaejaBlack women must navigate a tumultuous sociopolitical terrain while simultaneously managing their psychological health. Experiences of gendered racism increase Black women’s vulnerability to psychological distress. Gendered racial microaggressions, a specific type of microaggression, account for the intricate ways racism and sexism intersect. The association between Black women’s experiences of gendered racial microaggressions and traumatic stress was investigated among 201 Black female-identified undergraduate and graduate students attending a Historically Black College or University. Whether psychosocial resources (i.e., resilience, social support, mastery, self-esteem) moderated the linkage between gendered racial microaggressions and traumatic stress was also examined. Gendered racial microaggressions were positively associated with traumatic stress. The microaggression Assumptions of Beauty and Sexual Objectification was the most strongly associated with traumatic stress, followed by Angry Black Woman. Resilience and mastery were protective factors, reducing the influence of gendered racial microaggressions on traumatic stress. In addition, high levels of social support reduced the impact of Assumptions of Beauty and Sexual Objectification on traumatic stress. To foster healing and posttraumatic growth for Black women, psychologists must decolonize their understanding and treatment of mental illness. Practice and research implications are discussed.Item Interesecting Harms: Gendered Racial Microaggressions, Chronic Pain, and PTSD among Black Women(2025-08-05) Williams, Tiffany; Erving, Christy; Simpson, RoneishaItem Race- and Gender-Based Oppression Increase Black Women's Vulnerability to Posttraumatic Stress: The Psychology of Radical Healing Fosters Posttraumatic Growth(2025-05-01) Williams, Tiffany; Erving, ChristyItem Testing indirect effect with a complete or incomplete dichotomous mediator(Wiley, 2023-11) Jia, Fan; Wu, Wei; Chen, Po-Yi; Psychology, School of SciencePast methodological research on mediation analysis mainly focused on situations where all variables were complete and continuous. When issues of categorical data occur combined with missing data, more methodological considerations are involved. Specifically, appropriate decisions need to be made on estimation methods of the indirect effects and on confidence intervals for testing the indirect effects with accommodations of missing data. We compare strategies that address these issues based on a model with a dichotomous mediator, aiming to provide guidelines for researchers facing such challenges in practice.Item Discovery and validation of blood biomarkers for suicidality(Springer Nature, 2013) Le-Niculescu, H.; Levey, D. F.; Ayalew, M.; Palmer, L.; Gavrin, L. M.; Jain, N.; Winiger, E.; Bhosrekar, S.; Shankar, G.; Radel, M.; Bellanger, E.; Duckworth, H.; Olesek, K.; Vergo, J.; Schweitzer, R.; Yard, M.; Ballew, A.; Shekhar, A.; Sandusky, G. E.; Schork, N. J.; Kurian, S. M.; Salomon, D. R.; Niculescu, A. B., III; Psychiatry, School of MedicineSuicides are a leading cause of death in psychiatric patients, and in society at large. Developing more quantitative and objective ways (biomarkers) for predicting and tracking suicidal states would have immediate practical applications and positive societal implications. We undertook such an endeavor. First, building on our previous blood biomarker work in mood disorders and psychosis, we decided to identify blood gene expression biomarkers for suicidality, looking at differential expression of genes in the blood of subjects with a major mood disorder (bipolar disorder), a high-risk population prone to suicidality. We compared no suicidal ideation (SI) states and high SI states using a powerful intrasubject design, as well as an intersubject case-case design, to generate a list of differentially expressed genes. Second, we used a comprehensive Convergent Functional Genomics (CFG) approach to identify and prioritize from the list of differentially expressed gene biomarkers of relevance to suicidality. CFG integrates multiple independent lines of evidence-genetic and functional genomic data-as a Bayesian strategy for identifying and prioritizing findings, reducing the false-positives and false-negatives inherent in each individual approach. Third, we examined whether expression levels of the blood biomarkers identified by us in the live bipolar subject cohort are actually altered in the blood in an age-matched cohort of suicide completers collected from the coroner's office, and report that 13 out of the 41 top CFG scoring biomarkers (32%) show step-wise significant change from no SI to high SI states, and then to the suicide completers group. Six out of them (15%) remained significant after strict Bonferroni correction for multiple comparisons. Fourth, we show that the blood levels of SAT1 (spermidine/spermine N1-acetyltransferase 1), the top biomarker identified by us, at the time of testing for this study, differentiated future as well as past hospitalizations with suicidality, in a live cohort of bipolar disorder subjects, and exhibited a similar but weaker pattern in a live cohort of psychosis (schizophrenia/schizoaffective disorder) subjects. Three other (phosphatase and tensin homolog (PTEN), myristoylated alanine-rich protein kinase C substrate (MARCKS), and mitogen-activated protein kinase kinase kinase 3 (MAP3K3)) of the six biomarkers that survived Bonferroni correction showed similar but weaker effects. Taken together, the prospective and retrospective hospitalization data suggests SAT1, PTEN, MARCKS and MAP3K3 might be not only state biomarkers but trait biomarkers as well. Fifth, we show how a multi-dimensional approach using SAT1 blood expression levels and two simple visual-analog scales for anxiety and mood enhances predictions of future hospitalizations for suicidality in the bipolar cohort (receiver-operating characteristic curve with area under the curve of 0.813). Of note, this simple approach does not directly ask about SI, which some individuals may deny or choose not to share with clinicians. Lastly, we conducted bioinformatic analyses to identify biological pathways, mechanisms and medication targets. Overall, suicidality may be underlined, at least in part, by biological mechanisms related to stress, inflammation and apoptosis.Item Individual psychotherapy for schizophrenia: trends and developments in the wake of the recovery movement(Dove Press, 2013-08-06) Hamm, Jay A.; Hasson-Ohayon, Ilanit; Kukla, Marina; Lysaker, Paul H.; Psychiatry, School of MedicineAlthough the role and relative prominence of psychotherapy in the treatment of schizophrenia has fluctuated over time, an analysis of the history of psychotherapy for schizophrenia, focusing on findings from the recovery movement, reveals recent trends including the emergence of the development of integrative psychotherapy approaches. The authors suggest that the recovery movement has revealed limitations in traditional approaches to psychotherapy, and has provided opportunities for integrative approaches to emerge as a mechanism for promoting recovery in persons with schizophrenia. Five approaches to integrative psychotherapy for persons with schizophrenia are presented, and a shared conceptual framework that allows these five approaches to be compatible with one another is proposed. The conceptual framework is consistent with theories of recovery and emphasizes interpersonal attachment, personal narrative, and metacognitive processes. Implications for future research on integrative psychotherapy are considered.Item Novel 5' Untranslated Region Directed Blockers of Iron- Regulatory Protein-1 Dependent Amyloid Precursor Protein Translation: Implications for Down Syndrome and Alzheimer’s Disease(Public Library of Science, 2013-07-31) Bandyopadhyay, Sanghamitra; Cahill, Catherine; Balleidier, Amelie; Huang, Conan; Lahiri, Debomoy K.; Huang, Xudong; Rogers, Jack T.; Psychiatry, School of MedicineWe reported that iron influx drives the translational expression of the neuronal amyloid precursor protein (APP), which has a role in iron efflux. This is via a classic release of repressor interaction of APP mRNA with iron-regulatory protein-1 (IRP1) whereas IRP2 controls the mRNAs encoding the L- and H-subunits of the iron storage protein, ferritin. Here, we identified thirteen potent APP translation blockers that acted selectively towards the uniquely configured iron-responsive element (IRE) RNA stem loop in the 5' untranslated region (UTR) of APP mRNA. These agents were 10-fold less inhibitory of 5'UTR sequences of the related prion protein (PrP) mRNA. Western blotting confirmed that the 'ninth' small molecule in the series selectively reduced neural APP production in SH-SY5Y cells at picomolar concentrations without affecting viability or the expression of α-synuclein and ferritin. APP blocker-9 (JTR-009), a benzimidazole, reduced the production of toxic Aβ in SH-SY5Y neuronal cells to a greater extent than other well tolerated APP 5'UTR-directed translation blockers, including posiphen, that were shown to limit amyloid burden in mouse models of Alzheimer's disease (AD). RNA binding assays demonstrated that JTR-009 operated by preventing IRP1 from binding to the IRE in APP mRNA, while maintaining IRP1 interaction with the H-ferritin IRE RNA stem loop. Thus, JTR-009 constitutively repressed translation driven by APP 5'UTR sequences. Calcein staining showed that JTR-009 did not indirectly change iron uptake in neuronal cells suggesting a direct interaction with the APP 5'UTR. These studies provide key data to develop small molecules that selectively reduce neural APP and Aβ production at 10-fold lower concentrations than related previously characterized translation blockers. Our data evidenced a novel therapeutic strategy of potential impact for people with trisomy of the APP gene on chromosome 21, which is a phenotype long associated with Down syndrome (DS) that can also cause familial Alzheimer's disease.