Background: The last two decades have seen the development of theoretical models of hope, which have greatly influenced the field of positive psychology and the study of well-being. Recently, there has been increased interest in using these theories to create interventions and other strategies to enhance hopefulness among clinic-referred individuals and members of the community. We used meta-analysis to determine whether these hope enhancement strategies were associated with (a) increased hopefulness, (b) improved life satisfaction, and (c) decreased psychological distress among participants. Results: Analysis of 27 studies involving 2, 154 participants showed significant, but small, effect sizes for hopefulness and life satisfaction and no overall relationship between hope enhancement strategies and decreased psychological distress. Moderation tests indicated greater effect sizes for studies involving brief interventions, conducted in laboratory settings, and administered to students or individuals recruited from the community. Results also suggested publication bias. Conclusions: As the current study provides only modest evidence for the ability of hope enhancement strategies to increase hopefulness or life satisfaction and no consistent evidence that hope enhancement strategies can alleviate psychological distress., traditional psychotherapeutic interventions or other effective positive psychological constructs (e.g., gratitude, optimism, mindfulness) might best be targeted in applied settings.
Recent research suggests that most 4-year college students diagnosed with specific learning disability (SLD) do not meet objective criteria for the disorder, show normative deficits in academic skills, or have childhood histories of SLD. The purpose of this study was to examine the functioning of students diagnosed with SLD attending community college. We reviewed SLD documentation for 359 community college students previously diagnosed with SLD and receiving academic accommodations. Most students met objective criteria (82.3%) and were first diagnosed in childhood (93.3%). Most students also showed average intellectual functioning and below-average to borderline academic achievement. However, 27.3% showed uniformly low ability and achievement scores, suggesting possible misclassification. Students who failed to meet objective criteria for SLD often submitted test data that lacked current, adult-normed standardized test scores; many were diagnosed based on response to intervention and submitted only an individualized education program or summary of performance. This finding provides initial evidence of a disconnect between the qualitative documentation that secondary schools provide and the quantitative documentation that postsecondary institutions require for SLD classification.
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