Promoting better social skills and behavior is a top priority for anyone who works with learners with autism--but which practices really improve outcomes? Find out in this cutting-edge volume, a reader-friendly synthesis of the latest findings from more than 20 of today's top researchers in the field. Coordinated by the highly respected…

The purpose of this study was to critique in-print, post-1990 copyrighted stepfamily self-help books in order to provide guidance to helping professionals who work with these complex families. Of the 63 books reviewed, trained coders were able to strongly recommend 13 books for being well organized, for relying on clinical or empirical sources of…

Objective: Between September 2002 and February 2003, the authors assessed the effectiveness of a new, age-tailored, self-help smoking-cessation program for college students. Participants: College student smokers (N = 216) from 6 Ontario universities participated. Methods: The researchers used a randomized controlled trial with a 3-month telephone…

Personal empowerment is a guiding philosophy of many mental health service programs, but there has been little empirical research on the empowerment process in these programs. The authors examine social processes and consumer orientations within a self-help drop-in center for individuals with psychiatric disabilities, using intensive interviews…

Alcoholics Anonymous (AA) is the most widely used organization for the treatment of alcoholism. AA's philosophy has changed how many people view themselves and their substance use. The majority of substance abuse programs in the United States use the 12 steps, either by making them the basis of their treatment program, or by introducing AA to…

Anxious doctoral researchers can now call on a proliferation of advice books telling them how to produce their dissertations. This article analyzes some characteristics of this self-help genre, including the ways it produces an expert-novice relationship with readers, reduces dissertation writing to a series of linear steps, reveals hidden rules,…

Objective: This study examined differences in treatment rates for substance use disorders (SUD) among adolescents of white, black, Hispanic, Asian, Native American/Alaska Native, and Native Hawaiian/Pacific Islander race/ethnicity. Method: Eight years of cross-sectional data (2001-2008) were pooled from the National Survey on Drug Use and Health…

The self-help University of the Third Age (U3A) is an adult education approach for older people in which all the teaching and administration is carried out by unpaid volunteers. The purpose of this study was to reveal some of the successful ageing characteristics of the 205 independent U3As in Australia and the 60 independent U3As in New Zealand…

This study analyzes narratives of cyber-porn users and defines major patterns of distress as self-reported by contributors to a self-help group in the Internet. It applies narrative analysis methodology to 2000 messages sent by 302 members of an Italian self-help Internet community for cyber-porn dependents ("noallapornodipendenza").…

The paper reports on a field experiment conducted among poor women organized in self-help groups in the north-east of India. The experiment tests in a simple game whether overly optimistic expectations with respect to the benefits of exercising agency reduces one's appreciation of remaining with agency in the future. If so, unrealistic…

Background: This study investigated whether providing self-directed and web-based support for parents enhanced the effects of viewing a reality television series based on the Triple P--Positive Parenting Programme. Method: Parents with a child aged 2 to 9 (N=454) were randomly assigned to either a standard or enhanced intervention condition. In…

There is increasing evidence to demonstrate that clients who complete homework assignments have a better outcome in cognitive therapy (Kazantzis, Deane, & Ronan, 2000). Most clinicians recognize that enabling clients to effectively utilize homework can be a major task in itself, particularly with disorders such as depression, where individuals…

Objective: Heavy episodic drinking remains a significant problem on college campuses. Although most interventions for college students are behavioral, pharmacological treatments, such as naltrexone, could provide additional options. Participants: The authors evaluated receptivity to various alcohol treatment options in a general population of…

"Forbes" recently reported that Americans spent $11 billion in 2008 on self-help books, CDs, seminars, coaching, and stress-management programs--13.6 percent more than they did in 2005. Why the uptick? According to a recent "Publishers Weekly" cover story, conventional publishing industry wisdom holds that personal improvement titles do very well…

Several randomised controlled studies have shown the efficacy of Internet-based self-help treatments. These studies have centred their attention on axis I (efficacy) of the Guidelines for Empirically Validated Treatments, although there are a few studies that also take into account axis II (effectiveness). The aim of the present work was to test…