Beatrice Krauss | Graduate Center of the City University of New York (original) (raw)

Papers by Beatrice Krauss

Journal of Health and Social Behavior, Mar 1, 1991

With improved understanding of the natural history of HIV/AIDS and the availability of effective ... more With improved understanding of the natural history of HIV/AIDS and the availability of effective early intervention, HIV infection recently has come to be conceptualized as a chronic illness. As we enter the next phase of the epidemic, insights into the challenges of daily living faced by seropositive persons will aid in designing appropriate interventions to educate for adaptive success and to ameliorate adaptive difficulties. In our analysis of focused interviews with 55 seropositive gay men, we identified three major adaptive challenges: dealing with the possibility of a curtailed life span, dealing with reactions to a stigmatizing illness, and developing strategies for maintaining physical and emotional health. The men's descriptions of these adaptive challenges are discussed in the context of adaptation to other chronic illnesses.

Gastrointestinal Endoscopy, May 1, 1994

A randomized controlled trial was conducted to determine if a videotaped presentation by a physic... more A randomized controlled trial was conducted to determine if a videotaped presentation by a physician conveys information more effectively than an in-person discussion by the same physician using the identical script. Two hundred one patients undergoing colonoscopy were enrolled in the study. Patients were randomly assigned to one of three groups: video plus discussion, video alone, and discussion alone. A validated, 13-item knowledge test and the State-Trait Anxiety Inventory were administered to all patients. Mean number of correct test answers for video plus discussion was 11.04; for video alone, 10.70; and for discussion alone, 9.61. ANOVA with planned orthogonal comparisons showed that the patients in the two video groups had significantly better scores (p < 0.001) than those in the discussion-only group. No difference was noted between the two video groups (p = 0.32). Anxiety did not increase with increased understanding of the risks and benefits of colonoscopy. This approach may work as well for other invasive medical procedures and could save physician time while laying a foundation for a more personalized discussion.

Journal of Methods and Measurement in the Social Sciences, Dec 31, 2020

Teaching of Psychology, Oct 1, 1982

... are frequently required as preprofessional training for nurses, business majors, and teachers... more ... are frequently required as preprofessional training for nurses, business majors, and teachers who will need an awareness of sex stereotyping in ... Since most psychology of women courses are taught by women, mainstreaming will expose students to the views of male faculty ...

Social Work in Public Health, Jun 1, 2012

Applied Psychology, Apr 1, 1999

Page 1. APPLIED PSYCHOLOGY: AN INTERNATIONAL REVIEW, 1999,48 (2), 153-173 Getting the Message: HI... more Page 1. APPLIED PSYCHOLOGY: AN INTERNATIONAL REVIEW, 1999,48 (2), 153-173 Getting the Message: HIV Information Sources of Women Who Have Sex With Injecting Drug Users-A Two-site Study Beatrice J. Krauss ...

Journal of Methods and Measurement in the Social Sciences, Oct 2, 2012

This paper provides a speculative discussion on what quasi-experimental designs might be useful i... more This paper provides a speculative discussion on what quasi-experimental designs might be useful in various aspects of HIV/AIDS research. The first author's expertise is in research design, not HIV, while the second author has been active in HIV prevention research. It is hoped that it may help the HIV/AIDS research community in discovering and inventing an expanded range of possibilities for valid causal inference.

Springer eBooks, Aug 24, 2011

ABSTRACT Parents and caregivers play a special role in HIV prevention efforts for youth. Parents ... more ABSTRACT Parents and caregivers play a special role in HIV prevention efforts for youth. Parents are able to reach youth early and in a non-controversial way. Parents can engage in continuous discussions about sex and sexuality, HIV, substance use, and sexual risk prevention. Having frequent contact with their children allows them to provide sequential and time-sensitive information that is immediately responsive to the child’s questions and anticipated needs. Parents and caregivers help youth shape and form healthy attitudes and behaviors, and support youth with supervision, positive reinforcement and skills building. Given the proper tools to harness their parenting and communication skills, parents and caregivers are a force to be reckoned with. There is a growing literature that highlights the important role parents and caregivers play in addressing teen substance use and sexual risk behavior; however, evidence-based interventions to strengthen parents’ role in HIV prevention or even in reproductive health promotion are rare and not widely disseminated. This chapter describes two evidence-based interventions, Parents Matter! and the Parent/Preadolescent Training for HIV (PATH) Prevention. Both are based on research addressing the need to intervene early, child–parent communication, and risk reduction science and strategies. Data on outcomes and description of the dissemination of these interventions are presented. Among the intriguing findings are that both projects were easily accepted by communities, both led to reported risk reduction or intention to reduce risk, and that improved communication may have generalized to create positive outcomes for risks other than those associated with HIV. Each intervention has found new audiences, through formal and informal pathways. A continuing challenge is to maintain and update interventions as new risks emerge and as new populations are at risk as the HIV epidemic changes.

Families in society-The journal of contemporary social services, Dec 1, 1997

In several New York City neighborhoods more than 1 In 10 adults and adolescents are infected with... more In several New York City neighborhoods more than 1 In 10 adults and adolescents are infected with HIV. Children in these neighborhoods are exposed both directly and indirectly to the effects o f the HIV epidemic. Exploratory group interviews were conducted to discover the HIV-related concerns of adolescent and preadolescent girls and boys living in a high-seroprevalence neighbothood and to specify the context within which children experienced those concerns. Results indicated that explanations about HIV focusing only on transmission and transmission prevention, whether in educational or family settings, may ignore compelling concerns of youth. Both risk of HIV and loss of neighbors and relatives to HIV perme ate daily life but in a way that prevents open discusslon. Children are eager to talk about social and personal issues regarding HIV.

Journal of Hospice & Palliative Nursing, Oct 12, 2020

Agitation is a common, treatable symptom that profoundly impacts quality of life and exacerbates ... more Agitation is a common, treatable symptom that profoundly impacts quality of life and exacerbates caregiver fatigue in the hospice setting for patients with dementia. The objective of this study was to analyze the efficacy of tailored nonpharmacological interventions for mitigation of unwanted behaviors in the population of patients with behavioral and psychological symptoms in dementia while receiving hospice care. The 4-domain Pittsburgh Agitation Scale (PAS; Motor, Verbal, Aggressive, Resistance to Care) was used for multiple baseline and posttest measurements of agitation. Effectiveness of nonpharmacological interventions was evaluated using analysis of variance for repeated measures for the total PAS score. Motor agitation was the presenting problem with highest-rated severity compared with Verbal, Aggression, and Resistance to Care domains. Analysis of variance demonstrated no difference between baseline referral and pretest total PAS measures (P = .8), but a significant drop in total PAS agitation after intervention (P < .001). The best outcomes, however, were with patients receiving both nonpharmacological and standard pharmacological interventions as opposed to nonpharmacological interventions alone (P = .034). For patients with dementia presenting with behavioral and psychological symptoms, selected nonpharmacological interventions provide significant mitigation of agitation.

Human Vaccines & Immunotherapeutics, Dec 7, 2022

Journal of Pediatric Psychology, Feb 1, 2006

Objective HIV-related stigma affects not only persons living with HIV (PLwHIV) but also their com... more Objective HIV-related stigma affects not only persons living with HIV (PLwHIV) but also their communities and families including children. This study aimed to determine whether an interactive training administered to community parents significantly increases their children's reported comfort interacting with PLwHIV. Methods A randomized clinical trial with random-quota dwelling unit sampling and a random invitation to treatment had 238 parent and 238 child participants. Results For children of trained parents, significant increases in comfort were obtained, baseline to 6-month follow-up, on 14 of 22 reported daily activities with PLwHIV. For children who recently interacted with a person living with HIV, this comfort predicted the number of recent activities, even after controlling for closeness to the person living with HIV and for the number of persons with HIV known, living or deceased. Conclusions Training parents to be HIV health educators of their children significantly impacts youth and shows promise for reducing HIV-related stigma and social isolation.

Journal of Abnormal Psychology, 1974

An attempt is made, using hypnosis to modify the perception of the passage of clock time, to alte... more An attempt is made, using hypnosis to modify the perception of the passage of clock time, to alter the amount of effective time available to subjects for free-recall learning. If effective time is manipulated successfully by the instructions designed to produce time distortion, subjects receiving hypnotic time distortion instructions designed to stretch 3 minutes into 10 should perform as well in a free-recall learning task as subjects allotted 10 minutes of nominal time and better than subjects allotted 3 minutes of nominal time for the task. This was found to be the case.

Journal of Abnormal Psychology, Aug 1, 1968

A cross-cultural survey of 58 cultures was undertaken to investigate the thwarting-disorientation... more A cross-cultural survey of 58 cultures was undertaken to investigate the thwarting-disorientation theory of suicide. It was hypothesized that suicide takes place in contexts in which a person's social ties are disrupted or threatened with disruption by the discretionary acts of himself or someone else. Also, it was posited that the more opportunities that a society provides for the occurrence of thwarting disorientation, the greater would be its suicide case rate. Evidence confirming these hypotheses was obtained.

Springer eBooks, Jun 13, 2006

Journal of Abnormal Psychology, 1968

The performance on a learning-set task of 20 normal and 20 brain-damaged 5s of comparable verbal ... more The performance on a learning-set task of 20 normal and 20 brain-damaged 5s of comparable verbal intelligence was contrasted. An analysis of variance showed that the normals were superior to the brain damaged in improvement over repeated trials of the same problem and over blocks of similar problems. The normals made fewer errors of perseverative type, repetitive type, and made fewer incorrect choices after a rewarded correct choice. In the normal group, commission of the latter 2 errors was related to verbal intelligence, with no such relationship being found for the brain-damaged Ss. An explanation in terms of conceptual functioning is presented.

Families in society-The journal of contemporary social services, Oct 1, 2003

WAR AND DISASTER MOST OFTEN STRIKE impoverished communities where multiple economic, social, and ... more WAR AND DISASTER MOST OFTEN STRIKE impoverished communities where multiple economic, social, and health stresses preexist (Summerfield, 2000). The Lower East Side of New York City (LES) became one of those communities on September 11, 2001, when youth and parents saw and heard the destruction of the World Trade Center 15 to 20 blocks away. The LES has been a center for sex and drug trade and a launching ground for upwardly mobile immigrants since the turn of the century. In the early 1980s, the LES became an epicenter for HIV; more than 1 in 10 adults and adolescents in this community are HIV antibody positive (HIV+; New York City Department of Health HIV/AIDS Surveillance Program, 2001; New York City Human Services Administration, 1990). LES children experience the death and illness of friends and relatives from HIV-related conditions frequently. More than half the children know an average of three persons who they are certain have HIV (persons with HIV or PwHIV). More than 95% of these PwHIVs are immediate or extended family or family friends; children know that a third of these PwHIVs are deceased (Krauss, 1999). Yet LES youth and their parents rank HIV 4th among a list of 10 neighborhood concerns. These include, in order, drug sales, drug use, welfare reform, HIV/AIDS, unemployment, teen pregnancy, sexually transmitted infections, crime, concerns about preparation of youth for adulthood, and violence (Jones, Reardon, & Bula, 1999). Beginning September 11, 2001, LES youth and their parents had to address unfolding challenges particular to their circumstances and geography-closing of schools; two-week blockading of their area to vehicular traffic and public transportation; anthrax scares; brief suspension of mail delivery; rumors of new, local terrorist attacks; ethnic conflict; renewed street violence; decline in policing; loss of local landmarks; and temporary closing or diversion of social and health services. Simultaneously, in the fall of 2001, families were coping

Frontiers in Public Health, Sep 8, 2016

While the psychological and health benefits of knowing one's HIV diagnosis have been documented f... more While the psychological and health benefits of knowing one's HIV diagnosis have been documented for adults and adolescents, practice is still in development for younger children. Moderating conditions for whether or not to tell a child he/she has HIV vary by region and local context. They include accessibility of treatment, consideration of HIV as a stigmatizing condition, prevalence of HIV, and an accompanying presumption that any illness is HIV-related, parent or caregiver concerns about child reactions, child's worsening health, assumptions about childhood and child readiness to know a diagnosis, and lack of policies such as those that would prevent bullying of affected children in schools. In this systematic review of the global literature, we summarize the reasons caregivers give for telling or not telling children 12 and under their HIV diagnosis. We also include articles in which children reflect on their desires for being told. While a broad number of reasons are given for telling a child-e.g., to aid in prevention, adaptation to illness (e.g., primarily to promote treatment adherence), understanding social reactions, and maintaining the child-adult relationship-a narrower range of reasons, often related to immediate child or caregiver well-being or discomfort, are given for not telling. Recommendations are made to improve the context for disclosure by providing supports before, during, and after disclosure and to advance the research agenda by broadening samples and refining approaches.

N & HC perspectives on community : official publication of the National League for Nursing

Families in transition (FIT), a joint program between Beth Israel Medical Center (BIMC) and Natio... more Families in transition (FIT), a joint program between Beth Israel Medical Center (BIMC) and National Development and Research Institutes, Inc., uses indigenous neighborhood women, Compañeras (companions), to conduct street outreach in a New York City neighborhood where HIV infection is rampant. The outreach workers inform people that, not only will they be assisted in talking about HIV and guardianship for their children, but that they will be provided information concerning access to food stamps, housing, health care, and other basic needs. Through community participation, the Compañeras empower themselves through knowledge making and sharing and, in the process, create conditions in which other women can began to effect changes in their individual lives and families. The ultimate goal of the project is to support HIV-infected women in finding their voices so that they can talk with their children and plan for their futures.

Journal of Hospice & Palliative Nursing, 2020