Jennifer Lavoie - Academia.edu (original) (raw)

Papers by Jennifer Lavoie

Law and Human Behavior, 2008

Perceptions of children's credibility were studied in two experiments wherein participants watche... more Perceptions of children's credibility were studied in two experiments wherein participants watched a videotape of a 4-to 5-or a 6-to 7-year old child report details of a play session that had been experienced once (single-event) or was the last in a series of four similar play sessions (repeat-event). The child's report was classified as high or low accurate. In Experiments 1 and 2, reports of repeat-event children were judged to be less believable on several measures. In Experiment 1, younger children were viewed as less credible than older children. In both experiments, neither undergraduates nor community members correctly discriminated between high-and low-accurate reports. Content analysis in Study 3 revealed the relationship between age and event frequency and children's credibility ratings was mediated by the internal consistency of children's reports. Recent research on children's reports of instances of repeated events has identified several challenges facing children who report repeated abuse. These data bring to light another potential difficulty for these children. Keywords Children. Law. Perceived credibility. Repeat events In child sexual abuse (CSA) cases, there is rarely any corroborating evidence (Bruck, Ceci, & Hembrooke, 2001; Lamb, 1999; Pezdek et al., 2004) and so decisions about children's credibility made by child protection workers, police, prosecutors, and triers of fact are often determinative of the investigative and/

The American journal of forensic psychology, 2015

The present study examined the diagnostic capabilities of Criterion-Based Content Analysis (CBCA)... more The present study examined the diagnostic capabilities of Criterion-Based Content Analysis (CBCA) and Reality Monitoring (RM) techniques in successfully distinguishing between reports of an event that were based on a single, repeated, or fabricated experience. Children (aged 7-8, N = 60) participated in a play session once, four times, or were coached to fabricate taking part in the event. One day after the target event, the children were interviewed for their memory of the play session. Recall reports were then coded using CBCA and RM criteria. Results indicated that initial global appraisals of perceived credibility failed to correctly assess authenticity of the account. Although single event reports were more likely to be classified as more credible than the other two conditions, accounts based on repeated experience were perceived only to be as credible as untrue accounts. Two models of Principal Component Analysis were generated in order to identify underlying dimensions of CBC...

Law and Human Behavior, 2008

Perceptions of children's credibility were studied in two experiments wherein participants watche... more Perceptions of children's credibility were studied in two experiments wherein participants watched a videotape of a 4-to 5-or a 6-to 7-year old child report details of a play session that had been experienced once (single-event) or was the last in a series of four similar play sessions (repeat-event). The child's report was classified as high or low accurate. In Experiments 1 and 2, reports of repeat-event children were judged to be less believable on several measures. In Experiment 1, younger children were viewed as less credible than older children. In both experiments, neither undergraduates nor community members correctly discriminated between high-and low-accurate reports. Content analysis in Study 3 revealed the relationship between age and event frequency and children's credibility ratings was mediated by the internal consistency of children's reports. Recent research on children's reports of instances of repeated events has identified several challenges facing children who report repeated abuse. These data bring to light another potential difficulty for these children. Keywords Children. Law. Perceived credibility. Repeat events In child sexual abuse (CSA) cases, there is rarely any corroborating evidence (Bruck, Ceci, & Hembrooke, 2001; Lamb, 1999; Pezdek et al., 2004) and so decisions about children's credibility made by child protection workers, police, prosecutors, and triers of fact are often determinative of the investigative and/

Archives of Psychiatric Nursing, 2013

Sources of perceived stress, coping style and coping efficacy were investigated among psychiatric... more Sources of perceived stress, coping style and coping efficacy were investigated among psychiatric patients being discharged to the community. The study's purpose was to (i) qualitatively characterize sources of perceived stress; (ii) identify preferred coping styles, and (iii) test the effectiveness of coping styles. Thematic coding of participants' narratives revealed that dominant stressors were family relationships, mental health symptoms, and employment issues. Consistent with previous findings among non-clinical samples, problemfocused coping styles were predictive of decreased perceived stress and increased perceived efficacy, whereas emotion-oriented coping styles were negatively associated with these outcomes. Contrary to hypotheses, avoidance coping styles was unrelated to outcomes.

Journal of Police and Criminal Psychology, 2022

Using the current empirical landscape of police responses to people in mental health crisis as a ... more Using the current empirical landscape of police responses to people in mental health crisis as a backdrop, this methods paper makes an argument for the central role of collaborative co-design and production by diverse community experts and stakeholders to build transformative specialized training for frontline officers. Subject matter experts (SMEs) from across key domains participated in focus groups and curriculum creation, with outputs being the co-development of a conceptual approach and an innovative experiential learning training program. Part 1 unpacks the team’s conceptual development of a relational policing approach. This humanized method is shaped by procedural justice, trauma-informed, person-centred, and cultural safety frameworks. Part 2 details the co-production of a novel problem-based training method for a police service in Southern Ontario, Canada. The program centres on the acquisition of core competencies related to relational policing, de-escalation, and mental ...

Canadian journal of psychiatry. Revue canadienne de psychiatrie, Jan 15, 2016

Housing First (HF) has been shown to improve housing stability, on average, for formerly homeless... more Housing First (HF) has been shown to improve housing stability, on average, for formerly homeless adults with mental illness. However, little is known about patterns of change and characteristics that predict different outcome trajectories over time. This article reports on latent trajectories of housing stability among 2140 participants (84% followed 24 months) of a multisite randomised controlled trial of HF. Data were analyzed using generalised growth mixture modeling for the total cohort. Predictor variables were chosen based on the original program logic model and detailed reviews of other qualitative and quantitative findings. Treatment group assignment and level of need at baseline were included in the model. In total, 73% of HF participants and 43% of treatment-as-usual (TAU) participants were in stable housing after 24 months of follow-up. Six trajectories of housing stability were identified for each of the HF and TAU groups. Variables that distinguished different trajecto...

Social Science Computer Review

This article reports on community perspectives about the regulation of municipality-led Big Data ... more This article reports on community perspectives about the regulation of municipality-led Big Data initiatives developed through an exploratory, deliberative democracy-informed approach. While analytics hold great promise for policy design and service delivery improvements, their mythologized nature may elicit a blind faith in empirical outcomes, leading to misrepresentation or omission of marginalized populations. Scholars have begun pointing to public consultation as a means of avoiding these challenges, suggesting that a truly “smart city” should vet potential Big Data polices through the community in order to identify locally relevant concerns. The Big Data in Cities: Barriers and Benefits symposium, held in May of 2017, took a deliberative democracy approach designed to contribute toward a midsized southern Ontario city’s regulatory framework for data aggregation and mobilization. Approximately 100 self-selected participants (primarily public advocates) attended a 2-day symposium...

Policing: A Journal of Policy and Practice

Social Work in Mental Health

An integrative review was conducted to evaluate and synthesize the current state of knowledge of ... more An integrative review was conducted to evaluate and synthesize the current state of knowledge of family carers' experiences of emergency psychiatric crises of an adult relative. A literature review was performed by searching key terms in EBSCO (CINAHL, Criminal Justice Abstracts, Social Work Abstracts), and Proquest (MEDLINE, PsycINFO) citation databases; 3,350 citations were retrieved and screened for inclusion. Data synthesis of 25 articles meeting inclusion criteria revealed the following five themes: building to crisis; conflicted emotional experience; police apprehension; invisible experts; and "need to know." Findings provide essential insight into family carers experiences and needs during crisis that is informative for emergency mental health response practices.

Journal of Urban Health, 2016

Housing quality (HQ) is associated with mental health, and may mediate outcomes in housing interv... more Housing quality (HQ) is associated with mental health, and may mediate outcomes in housing interventions. However, studies of housing interventions rarely report HQ. The purpose of this study was to describe HQ in a multi-site randomized controlled trial of Housing First (HF) in five Canadian cities and to examine possible differences by treatment group (HF recipients and treatment-as-usual (TAU) participants who were able to find housing through other programs or on their own). We also examined the association between HQ and the primary trial outcome: housing stability. The performance of a new multi-dimensional standardized observer-rated housing quality scale (the OHQS) in a relatively large cross-site sample was also of interest. HQ was rated by trained research assistants for 204 HF participants and 228 TAU participants using the OHQS. General linear regression models were used to examine unit/building quality scores by group and site adjusting for other group differences, and as a predictor of housing stability outcomes after 24 months of follow-up. The OHQS was found to have good reliability and validity, but because most of the neighborhood subscale items were negatively correlated with the overall scale, only unit and building items were included in the total HQ score (possible scores ranging from 13.5 to 135). Unit/building HQ was significantly better for the HF group overall (91.2 (95 % CI = 89.6-92.9) vs. 88.3 (95 % CI = 86.1-90.5); p = .036), and in one site. HQ in the TAU group was much more variable than the HF group overall (W (mean) = 24.7; p < .001) and in four of five sites. Unit/building HQ scores were positively associated with housing stability: (73.4 (95 % CI 68.3-78.5) for those housed none of the time; 91.1 (95 % CI 89.2-93.0) for those housed some of the time; and 93.1 (95 % CI 91.4-94.9)) for those housed all of the time (F = 43.9 p < .001). This association held after adjusting for site, housing characteristics, participant ethnocultural status, community functioning, and social support. This study demonstrates that HQ can be as good or better, and less variable, in HF programs in Canada that systematically and predominantly source housing stock from the private sector compared to housing procured outside of an HF program. HQ is also an important predictor of housing stability outcomes.

Studies in Symbolic Interaction, 2014

Cyberpsychology: Journal of Psychosocial Research on Cyberspace, 2012

Encyclopedia of Psychology and Law, 2008

Legal and Criminological Psychology, 2008

ABSTRACT Purpose. Three studies were conducted to determine the effect of a judicial declaration ... more ABSTRACT Purpose. Three studies were conducted to determine the effect of a judicial declaration of competence on perceptions of credibility towards a child witness and an adult defendant.Methods. Undergraduates read vignettes about a 5- or a 13-year-old child witness or an adult involved in either a sexual assault case or a motor vehicle accident case. In the child conditions, the case was either preceded by a declaration of the child's competence to testify (either specific or general declaration) or there was no mention of the competence of the child. Participants then rated the perceived credibility of both the complainant/witness and the defendant.Results. A judicial declaration of competence that was targeted at the particular child sometimes increased the credibility ratings of the child and decreased those of the defendant, sometimes to levels beyond those observed in the adult conditions. These effects on credibility were not replicated when a general declaration of all children's competence was used. In fact, the general declaration sometimes resulted in more positive ratings of the defendant.Conclusions. These results are discussed in the context of recommendations for the use of competence evaluations and declarations of competence in court.

Journal of Urban Health, 2014

Quality of housing has been shown to be related to health outcomes, including mental health and w... more Quality of housing has been shown to be related to health outcomes, including mental health and well-being, yet "objective" or observer-rated housing quality is rarely measured in housing intervention research. This may be due to a lack of standardized, reliable, and valid housing quality instruments. The objective of this research was to develop and validate the Observer-Rated Housing Quality Scale (OHQS) for use in a multisite trial of a "housing first" intervention for homeless individuals with mental illness. A list of 79 housing unit, building, and neighborhood characteristics was generated from a review of the relevant literature and three focus groups with consumers and housing service providers. The characteristics were then ranked by 47 researchers, consumers, and service providers on perceived importance, generalizability, universality of value, and evidence base. Items were then drafted, scaled (five points, half values allowed), and pretested in seven housing units and with seven raters using cognitive interviewing techniques. The draft scale was piloted in 55 housing units in Toronto and Winnipeg, Canada. Items were rated independently in each unit by two trained research assistants and a housing expert. Data were analyzed using classical psychometric approaches and intraclass correlation coefficients (ICC) for inter-rater reliability. The draft scale consisted of 34 items assessing three domains: the unit, the building, and the neighborhood. Five of 18 unit items and 3 of 7 building items displayed ceiling or floor effects and were adjusted accordingly. Internal consistency was very good (Cronbach's alpha=0.90 for the unit items, 0.80 for the building items, and 0.92 total (unit and building)). Percent agreement ranged from 89 to 100 % within one response scale value and 67 to 91 % within one half scale value. Inter-rater reliability was also good (ICCs were 0.87 for the unit, 0.85 for the building, and 0.93 for the total scale). Three neighborhood items (e.g., distance to transit) were found to be most efficiently rated using publicly available information. The physical quality of housing can be reliably rated by trained but nonexpert raters using the OHQS. The tool has potential for improved measurement in housing-related health research, including addressing the limitations of self-report, and may also enable documenting the quality of housing that is provided by publicly funded housing programs.

Law and Human Behavior, 2008

Perceptions of children's credibility were studied in two experiments wherein participants watche... more Perceptions of children's credibility were studied in two experiments wherein participants watched a videotape of a 4-to 5-or a 6-to 7-year old child report details of a play session that had been experienced once (single-event) or was the last in a series of four similar play sessions (repeat-event). The child's report was classified as high or low accurate. In Experiments 1 and 2, reports of repeat-event children were judged to be less believable on several measures. In Experiment 1, younger children were viewed as less credible than older children. In both experiments, neither undergraduates nor community members correctly discriminated between high-and low-accurate reports. Content analysis in Study 3 revealed the relationship between age and event frequency and children's credibility ratings was mediated by the internal consistency of children's reports. Recent research on children's reports of instances of repeated events has identified several challenges facing children who report repeated abuse. These data bring to light another potential difficulty for these children. Keywords Children. Law. Perceived credibility. Repeat events In child sexual abuse (CSA) cases, there is rarely any corroborating evidence (Bruck, Ceci, & Hembrooke, 2001; Lamb, 1999; Pezdek et al., 2004) and so decisions about children's credibility made by child protection workers, police, prosecutors, and triers of fact are often determinative of the investigative and/

The American journal of forensic psychology, 2015

The present study examined the diagnostic capabilities of Criterion-Based Content Analysis (CBCA)... more The present study examined the diagnostic capabilities of Criterion-Based Content Analysis (CBCA) and Reality Monitoring (RM) techniques in successfully distinguishing between reports of an event that were based on a single, repeated, or fabricated experience. Children (aged 7-8, N = 60) participated in a play session once, four times, or were coached to fabricate taking part in the event. One day after the target event, the children were interviewed for their memory of the play session. Recall reports were then coded using CBCA and RM criteria. Results indicated that initial global appraisals of perceived credibility failed to correctly assess authenticity of the account. Although single event reports were more likely to be classified as more credible than the other two conditions, accounts based on repeated experience were perceived only to be as credible as untrue accounts. Two models of Principal Component Analysis were generated in order to identify underlying dimensions of CBC...

Law and Human Behavior, 2008

Perceptions of children's credibility were studied in two experiments wherein participants watche... more Perceptions of children's credibility were studied in two experiments wherein participants watched a videotape of a 4-to 5-or a 6-to 7-year old child report details of a play session that had been experienced once (single-event) or was the last in a series of four similar play sessions (repeat-event). The child's report was classified as high or low accurate. In Experiments 1 and 2, reports of repeat-event children were judged to be less believable on several measures. In Experiment 1, younger children were viewed as less credible than older children. In both experiments, neither undergraduates nor community members correctly discriminated between high-and low-accurate reports. Content analysis in Study 3 revealed the relationship between age and event frequency and children's credibility ratings was mediated by the internal consistency of children's reports. Recent research on children's reports of instances of repeated events has identified several challenges facing children who report repeated abuse. These data bring to light another potential difficulty for these children. Keywords Children. Law. Perceived credibility. Repeat events In child sexual abuse (CSA) cases, there is rarely any corroborating evidence (Bruck, Ceci, & Hembrooke, 2001; Lamb, 1999; Pezdek et al., 2004) and so decisions about children's credibility made by child protection workers, police, prosecutors, and triers of fact are often determinative of the investigative and/

Archives of Psychiatric Nursing, 2013

Sources of perceived stress, coping style and coping efficacy were investigated among psychiatric... more Sources of perceived stress, coping style and coping efficacy were investigated among psychiatric patients being discharged to the community. The study's purpose was to (i) qualitatively characterize sources of perceived stress; (ii) identify preferred coping styles, and (iii) test the effectiveness of coping styles. Thematic coding of participants' narratives revealed that dominant stressors were family relationships, mental health symptoms, and employment issues. Consistent with previous findings among non-clinical samples, problemfocused coping styles were predictive of decreased perceived stress and increased perceived efficacy, whereas emotion-oriented coping styles were negatively associated with these outcomes. Contrary to hypotheses, avoidance coping styles was unrelated to outcomes.

Journal of Police and Criminal Psychology, 2022

Using the current empirical landscape of police responses to people in mental health crisis as a ... more Using the current empirical landscape of police responses to people in mental health crisis as a backdrop, this methods paper makes an argument for the central role of collaborative co-design and production by diverse community experts and stakeholders to build transformative specialized training for frontline officers. Subject matter experts (SMEs) from across key domains participated in focus groups and curriculum creation, with outputs being the co-development of a conceptual approach and an innovative experiential learning training program. Part 1 unpacks the team’s conceptual development of a relational policing approach. This humanized method is shaped by procedural justice, trauma-informed, person-centred, and cultural safety frameworks. Part 2 details the co-production of a novel problem-based training method for a police service in Southern Ontario, Canada. The program centres on the acquisition of core competencies related to relational policing, de-escalation, and mental ...

Canadian journal of psychiatry. Revue canadienne de psychiatrie, Jan 15, 2016

Housing First (HF) has been shown to improve housing stability, on average, for formerly homeless... more Housing First (HF) has been shown to improve housing stability, on average, for formerly homeless adults with mental illness. However, little is known about patterns of change and characteristics that predict different outcome trajectories over time. This article reports on latent trajectories of housing stability among 2140 participants (84% followed 24 months) of a multisite randomised controlled trial of HF. Data were analyzed using generalised growth mixture modeling for the total cohort. Predictor variables were chosen based on the original program logic model and detailed reviews of other qualitative and quantitative findings. Treatment group assignment and level of need at baseline were included in the model. In total, 73% of HF participants and 43% of treatment-as-usual (TAU) participants were in stable housing after 24 months of follow-up. Six trajectories of housing stability were identified for each of the HF and TAU groups. Variables that distinguished different trajecto...

Social Science Computer Review

This article reports on community perspectives about the regulation of municipality-led Big Data ... more This article reports on community perspectives about the regulation of municipality-led Big Data initiatives developed through an exploratory, deliberative democracy-informed approach. While analytics hold great promise for policy design and service delivery improvements, their mythologized nature may elicit a blind faith in empirical outcomes, leading to misrepresentation or omission of marginalized populations. Scholars have begun pointing to public consultation as a means of avoiding these challenges, suggesting that a truly “smart city” should vet potential Big Data polices through the community in order to identify locally relevant concerns. The Big Data in Cities: Barriers and Benefits symposium, held in May of 2017, took a deliberative democracy approach designed to contribute toward a midsized southern Ontario city’s regulatory framework for data aggregation and mobilization. Approximately 100 self-selected participants (primarily public advocates) attended a 2-day symposium...

Policing: A Journal of Policy and Practice

Social Work in Mental Health

An integrative review was conducted to evaluate and synthesize the current state of knowledge of ... more An integrative review was conducted to evaluate and synthesize the current state of knowledge of family carers' experiences of emergency psychiatric crises of an adult relative. A literature review was performed by searching key terms in EBSCO (CINAHL, Criminal Justice Abstracts, Social Work Abstracts), and Proquest (MEDLINE, PsycINFO) citation databases; 3,350 citations were retrieved and screened for inclusion. Data synthesis of 25 articles meeting inclusion criteria revealed the following five themes: building to crisis; conflicted emotional experience; police apprehension; invisible experts; and "need to know." Findings provide essential insight into family carers experiences and needs during crisis that is informative for emergency mental health response practices.

Journal of Urban Health, 2016

Housing quality (HQ) is associated with mental health, and may mediate outcomes in housing interv... more Housing quality (HQ) is associated with mental health, and may mediate outcomes in housing interventions. However, studies of housing interventions rarely report HQ. The purpose of this study was to describe HQ in a multi-site randomized controlled trial of Housing First (HF) in five Canadian cities and to examine possible differences by treatment group (HF recipients and treatment-as-usual (TAU) participants who were able to find housing through other programs or on their own). We also examined the association between HQ and the primary trial outcome: housing stability. The performance of a new multi-dimensional standardized observer-rated housing quality scale (the OHQS) in a relatively large cross-site sample was also of interest. HQ was rated by trained research assistants for 204 HF participants and 228 TAU participants using the OHQS. General linear regression models were used to examine unit/building quality scores by group and site adjusting for other group differences, and as a predictor of housing stability outcomes after 24 months of follow-up. The OHQS was found to have good reliability and validity, but because most of the neighborhood subscale items were negatively correlated with the overall scale, only unit and building items were included in the total HQ score (possible scores ranging from 13.5 to 135). Unit/building HQ was significantly better for the HF group overall (91.2 (95 % CI = 89.6-92.9) vs. 88.3 (95 % CI = 86.1-90.5); p = .036), and in one site. HQ in the TAU group was much more variable than the HF group overall (W (mean) = 24.7; p < .001) and in four of five sites. Unit/building HQ scores were positively associated with housing stability: (73.4 (95 % CI 68.3-78.5) for those housed none of the time; 91.1 (95 % CI 89.2-93.0) for those housed some of the time; and 93.1 (95 % CI 91.4-94.9)) for those housed all of the time (F = 43.9 p < .001). This association held after adjusting for site, housing characteristics, participant ethnocultural status, community functioning, and social support. This study demonstrates that HQ can be as good or better, and less variable, in HF programs in Canada that systematically and predominantly source housing stock from the private sector compared to housing procured outside of an HF program. HQ is also an important predictor of housing stability outcomes.

Studies in Symbolic Interaction, 2014

Cyberpsychology: Journal of Psychosocial Research on Cyberspace, 2012

Encyclopedia of Psychology and Law, 2008

Legal and Criminological Psychology, 2008

ABSTRACT Purpose. Three studies were conducted to determine the effect of a judicial declaration ... more ABSTRACT Purpose. Three studies were conducted to determine the effect of a judicial declaration of competence on perceptions of credibility towards a child witness and an adult defendant.Methods. Undergraduates read vignettes about a 5- or a 13-year-old child witness or an adult involved in either a sexual assault case or a motor vehicle accident case. In the child conditions, the case was either preceded by a declaration of the child's competence to testify (either specific or general declaration) or there was no mention of the competence of the child. Participants then rated the perceived credibility of both the complainant/witness and the defendant.Results. A judicial declaration of competence that was targeted at the particular child sometimes increased the credibility ratings of the child and decreased those of the defendant, sometimes to levels beyond those observed in the adult conditions. These effects on credibility were not replicated when a general declaration of all children's competence was used. In fact, the general declaration sometimes resulted in more positive ratings of the defendant.Conclusions. These results are discussed in the context of recommendations for the use of competence evaluations and declarations of competence in court.

Journal of Urban Health, 2014

Quality of housing has been shown to be related to health outcomes, including mental health and w... more Quality of housing has been shown to be related to health outcomes, including mental health and well-being, yet "objective" or observer-rated housing quality is rarely measured in housing intervention research. This may be due to a lack of standardized, reliable, and valid housing quality instruments. The objective of this research was to develop and validate the Observer-Rated Housing Quality Scale (OHQS) for use in a multisite trial of a "housing first" intervention for homeless individuals with mental illness. A list of 79 housing unit, building, and neighborhood characteristics was generated from a review of the relevant literature and three focus groups with consumers and housing service providers. The characteristics were then ranked by 47 researchers, consumers, and service providers on perceived importance, generalizability, universality of value, and evidence base. Items were then drafted, scaled (five points, half values allowed), and pretested in seven housing units and with seven raters using cognitive interviewing techniques. The draft scale was piloted in 55 housing units in Toronto and Winnipeg, Canada. Items were rated independently in each unit by two trained research assistants and a housing expert. Data were analyzed using classical psychometric approaches and intraclass correlation coefficients (ICC) for inter-rater reliability. The draft scale consisted of 34 items assessing three domains: the unit, the building, and the neighborhood. Five of 18 unit items and 3 of 7 building items displayed ceiling or floor effects and were adjusted accordingly. Internal consistency was very good (Cronbach's alpha=0.90 for the unit items, 0.80 for the building items, and 0.92 total (unit and building)). Percent agreement ranged from 89 to 100 % within one response scale value and 67 to 91 % within one half scale value. Inter-rater reliability was also good (ICCs were 0.87 for the unit, 0.85 for the building, and 0.93 for the total scale). Three neighborhood items (e.g., distance to transit) were found to be most efficiently rated using publicly available information. The physical quality of housing can be reliably rated by trained but nonexpert raters using the OHQS. The tool has potential for improved measurement in housing-related health research, including addressing the limitations of self-report, and may also enable documenting the quality of housing that is provided by publicly funded housing programs.