Showing papers by "David C. Schwebel published in 2009"

Effect of Cell Phone Distraction on Pediatric Pedestrian Injury Risk

Abstract: OBJECTIVE. Early adolescents are using cell phones with increasing frequency. Cell phones are known to distract motor vehicle drivers to the point that their safety is jeopardized, but it is unclear if cell phones might also distract child pedestrians. This study was designed to examine the influence of talking on a cell phone for pediatric pedestrian injury risk. PARTICIPANTS AND METHODS. Seventy-seven children aged 10 to 11 years old completed simulated road crossings in an immersive, interactive virtual pedestrian environment. In a within-subjects design, children crossed the virtual street 6 times while undistracted and 6 times while distracted by a cell phone conversation with an unfamiliar research assistant. Participants also completed several other experimental tasks hypothesized to predict the impact of distraction while crossing the street and talking on a cell phone. RESULTS. Children's pedestrian safety was compromised when distracted by a cell phone conversation. While distracted, children were less attentive to traffic; left less safe time between their crossing and the next arriving vehicle; experienced more collisions and close calls with oncoming traffic; and waited longer before beginning to cross the street. Analyses testing experience using a cell phone and experience as a pedestrian yielded few significant results, suggesting that distraction on the cell phone might affect children's pedestrian safety no matter what their experience level. There was some indication that younger children and children who are less attentive and more oppositional may be slightly more susceptible to distraction while talking on the cell phone than older, more attentive, and less oppositional children. CONCLUSION. Our results suggest that cell phones distract preadolescent children while crossing streets. Keywords: Driver distraction; Pedestrian distraction Language: en

Perceived Racial/Ethnic Discrimination Among Fifth-Grade Students and Its Association With Mental Health

Abstract: Objectives. We sought to describe the prevalence, characteristics, and mental health problems of children who experience perceived racial/ethnic discrimination.Methods. We analyzed cross-sectional data from a study of 5147 fifth-grade students and their parents from public schools in 3 US metropolitan areas. We used multivariate logistic regression (overall and stratified by race/ethnicity) to examine the associations of sociodemographic factors and mental health problems with perceived racial/ethnic discrimination.Results. Fifteen percent of children reported perceived racial/ethnic discrimination, with 80% reporting that discrimination occurred at school. A greater percentage of Black (20%), Hispanic (15%), and other (16%) children reported perceived racial/ethnic discrimination compared with White (7%) children. Children who reported perceived racial/ethnic discrimination were more likely to have symptoms of each of the 4 mental health conditions included in the analysis: depression, attention deficit ...

Familial risk factors for self-immolation: a case-control study.

Abstract: Objective: Women are the primary victims of self-immolation in Iran; between 70-88% of self-immolation patients are women. The aim of this study is to investigate familial risk factors for self-immolation patients. Methods: In a case-control study, 30 consecutive cases of deliberate self-inflicted burns admitted to the regional Burn Centre (Imam Khomeini hospital in Kermanshah province, Iran) were compared with 30 controls selected from the community and matched by sex, age, and living area. All cases and controls were reviewed for familial variables, including history of suicide in the family, parental divorce, current conflict with parents, parental death, history of mental disorders in parents, history of addiction in parents, parents' marital conflict, marital conflict with spouse, conflict with other members of the family, addictive disorder in spouse, and socioeconomic level of family. Results: Using chi-square test of association, two variables were significantly associated with self-immolation. Marital conflict with spouse (OR 7.80, 95% CI 1.84-33.09) and conflict with other members of the family (OR 10.00, 95% CI 2.94-34.00) were associated with increased risk of self-immolation. The associations of other variables in both case and control groups were not statistically significant. Conclusions: Findings from this study suggest marital conflict with the spouse and conflict with other members of the family are risk factors for self-immolation. Screening, identification, and education of at-risk individuals on problem solving and other aspects of coping skills, as well as interpersonal relationships, could be appropriate preventive actions and strategies to reduce self-immolation in Iran. Language: en

An intervention to reduce kerosene-related burns and poisonings in low-income South African communities.

Abstract: Objective: Unintentional injury rates in low- and middle-income countries are up to 50 times higher than high-income nations. In South Africa, kerosene (paraffin) is a leading cause of poisoning and burns, particularly in low-income communities where it serves as a primary fuel for light, cooking, and heating. This study tested a community-based intervention to reduce kerosene-related injury risk. The intervention used a train-the-trainers model, whereby expert trainers train local paraprofessionals, who in turn deliver educational materials to community residents. The intervention was theory-driven, pragmatically motivated, and culturally sensitive. Design: Prospective quasi-experimental intervention design with nonequivalent case versus control groups. Main Outcome Measures: Three primary outcome measures were considered: self-reported knowledge of kerosene safety, observed practice of safe kerosene use, and self-reported recognition of risk for kerosene-related injury. Results: ANOVA models suggest a large and significant increase in self-reported kerosene-related knowledge in the intervention community compared to the control community. There were smaller, but statistically significant changes, in kerosene-related safety practices and recognition of kerosene injury risk in the intervention community compared to the control community. Conclusion: The intervention was successful. A train-the-trainers model might be an effective educational tool to reduce kerosene-related injury risk in low-income communities within low- and middle-income countries. Language: en

Paraffin-related injury in low-income South African communities: knowledge, practice and perceived risk

Abstract: Resumen Lesiones asociadas a queroseno en comunidades de ingresos bajos de Sudafrica: conocimientos, practicas y riesgo percibido Objetivo Determinar los conocimientos de las personas con riesgo de sufrir lesiones por uso de queroseno acerca de los problemas de seguridad asociados; las medidas que toman para protegerse a si mismos y a su familia de las lesiones relacionadas con el queroseno, y su manera de percibir el riesgo que corren de sufrir tales lesiones. Se analizo ademas la relacion entre esos factores y la edad, el sexo, el nivel de instruccion y los ingresos.Metodos En 2007 se recluto aleatoriamente a una muestra de 238 habitantes de distritos de viviendas sociales cercanas a Ciudad del Cabo, Sudafrica. Ayudantes de investigacion debidamente adiestrados entrevistaron a los participantes para determinar su nivel de conocimientos sobre las medidas de seguridad que requiere el queroseno y su percepcion del riesgo de sufrir lesiones como consecuencia de su uso. Los investigadores inspeccionaron los hogares de los participantes para evaluar las practicas de seguridad relacionadas con el queroseno. Se realizaron analisis descriptivos y de correlacion.Resultados Los participantes tenian unos conocimientos relativamente escasos sobre las medidas de seguridad que exige el queroseno. Presentaban una alta frecuencia de practicas peligrosas y un nivel moderado de riesgo percibido de sufrir lesiones. El conocimiento de las normas de seguridad para el queroseno y la observancia de practicas seguras estaban correlacionados positivamente. La posesion de unos mayores conocimientos sobre el tema estaba correlacionada negativamente con la percepcion del riesgo de sufrir lesiones, pero no habia ninguna correlacion entre la percepcion y las practicas seguras. El nivel de escolaridad, el numero de ninos en el hogar y la frecuencia del uso de queroseno estaban relacionados positivamente con los conocimientos, pero no con las practicas seguras. La unica correlacion significativa con esas practicas fueron unos mayores ingresos, quiza como reflejo de la repercusion de los recursos financieros en las practicas de seguridad relacionadas con el queroseno.Conclusion Si se desea desarrollar intervenciones eficaces de fomento de la seguridad del manejo del queroseno, es necesario comprender los niveles basales de los conocimientos al respecto, las practicas y el riesgo percibido de sufrir lesiones entre las poblaciones en riesgo. Nuestros resultados podrian ser de utilidad para disenar intervenciones que amplien los conocimientos y propicien tanto unas practicas mas seguras como una percepcion precisa del riesgo de sufrir lesiones por uso de queroseno.Resultats Les sujets de l’etude avaient relativement peu de connaissances sur la securite de la paraffine. Ils appliquaient frequemment des pratiques dangereuses et leur perception du risque de traumatisme etait limitee. La connaissance des notions de securite concernant la paraffine et celle des pratiques sans risque d’utilisation de ce produit etaient correlees positivement entre elles. Il existait une correlation negative entre la possession de connaissances etendues et la perception d’etre expose a un risque de traumatisme, mais l’application de pratiques sans risque n’etait pas correlee a la perception d’un risque de traumatisme. On relevait une correlation positive entre l’education formelle des sujets, le nombre d’enfants au domicile et la frequence d’utilisation de la paraffine d’une part, et le niveau de connaissance d’autre part, mais non entre ces parametres et la mise en œuvre de pratiques sans risque. Le seul parametre correle significativement a l’application pratiques sans risque etait le niveau de richesse, ce qui reflete peut etre l’impact des moyens financiers sur les pratiques d’utilisation de la paraffine.Conclusion Pour mettre au point une intervention reussie en faveur de l’utilisation sans risque de la paraffine, il faut connaitre les niveaux de depart en termes de connaissances, de pratique et de perception du risque de traumatisme parmi les populations a risque. Nos resultats pourraient etre utiles a la conception d’interventions visant a renforcer les connaissances, ameliorer la securite des pratiques et affiner la perception du risque de traumatisme dans l’utilisation de paraffine.

Caregiver supervision and injury risk for young children: time to re-examine the issue

Abstract: Thirteen years ago, this journal published an opinion paper entitled, “Parental supervision: a popular myth”, which argued that the concept of supervision was poorly defined in terms of injury risk and that published calls for greater parental supervision to reduce child injury risk had no empirical basis.1 As both Morrongiello’s case–control study in this issue,2 and Petrass’s recent systematic review3 demonstrate, empirical data are beginning to accumulate which show that caregiver supervision does in fact reduce child injury risk and which help us to develop a better understanding of the issues around defining and measuring caregiver supervision. Most contemporary definitions of supervision focus on three attributes: attention to the child’s behaviour, proximity to the child, and continuity of supervision.3–6 Attention refers to both visual and auditory attention to the child’s activity and behaviour and can range from full undistracted attention to completely absent attention. Proximity refers to the caregiver’s physical proximity to the child, which ranges from physical contact (necessary, for example, with infants in swimming pools) to very long distances away (fairly common in playground and sometimes pedestrian settings). Continuity of supervision can range from constant visual and auditory attention, without interruption, to intermittent visual and auditory checking on the child’s behaviour (eg, when a parent is cooking upstairs but checks on a toddler in the basement every 5 minutes or so). A significant challenge in using the taxonomy of attention, proximity and continuity to describe caregiver supervision of children for research purposes is identifying appropriate strategies to assess each attribute. Many experts feel that naturalistic observation is the richest source of ecologically valid information because it offers real-world assessment of how caregivers supervise children in real environments. Logistically, however, naturalistic observations can be difficult, especially if the goal is to measure real-world …

Personality and injury risk among professional hockey players

Abstract: Background: Although much is known about risk for athletic injury, research on the roles of individual differences in personality and temperament on athletic injury has lagged. We hypothesized that professional athletes with high sensation-seeking and extraversion scores, and with low effortful control scores, would experience more injuries over the course of a season, would have more severe injuries, and would miss more total days of play. Methods: Prospective design with questionnaire report at time one and injury tracking throughout an 18-week athletic season. Setting: Professional hockey team in the United States. Participants: Eighteen professional hockey players (ages 21-33). Measurements: Players completed self-report personality (Sensation-Seeking Scale, Form V) and temperament (the Adult Temperament Questionnaire) measures. Quantity and severity of injury, as well as playing time missed, were tracked for 18 weeks. Results: On average, players experienced almost 6 injuries causing a loss of 10 playing days through the season. Those players scoring high on Boredom Susceptibility and Total Sensation-Seeking incurred more total injuries. Those scoring high on temperamental neutral perceptual sensitivity suffered more severe injuries. Conclusions: Athletes who suffered more injuries reported a preference for stimulating environments and boredom with non-stimulating environments. Injury severity was not correlated with sensation-seeking but was related to temperamental perceptual sensitivity. Implications for identification of injury-prone athletes, pre-injury training, and post-injury treatment are discussed.

Configural Approaches to Temperament Assessment: Implications for Predicting Risk of Unintentional Injury in Children

Abstract: This study used two configural approaches to understand how temperament factors (surgency/extraversion, negative affect, and effortful control) might predict child injury risk. In the first approach, clustering procedures were applied to trait dimensions to identify discrete personality prototypes. In the second approach, two- and three-way trait interactions were considered dimensionally in regression models predicting injury outcomes. Injury risk was assessed through four measures: lifetime prevalence of injuries requiring professional medical attention, scores on the Injury Behavior Checklist, and frequency and severity of injuries reported in a 2-week injury diary. In the prototype analysis, three temperament clusters were obtained, which resembled resilient, overcontrolled, and undercontrolled types found in previous research. Undercontrolled children had greater risk of injury than children in the other groups. In the dimensional interaction analyses, an interaction between surgency/extraversion and negative affect tended to predict injury, especially when children lacked capacity for effortful control.

Injury risk in children with asthma.

Abstract: Background. Asthma is the most common chronic illness in American children. Injury is the most common acute medical condition and also the leading cause of mortality. Previous research examining possible links between pediatric asthma and injury is inconclusive. Objective. This study investigates the relationship between pediatric asthma and injury. Methods. Asthma diagnosis and multiple child, parent, and family characteristics were assessed from 878 families when children were 54 months. Parents reported child injuries regularly over the next 2.5 years. Results. Children with asthma had more injuries than children without asthma, even after controlling for child, parent, and environmental covariates. Conclusions. Four-year-old children diagnosed with asthma appear to have increased risk of injury over their peers as they enter the early elementary school years, and the authors discuss the possible causes of this relationship.

Language acculturation and pediatric injury risk.

Abstract: The number of immigrant children in the US continues to grow rapidly, but pediatric immigrant health remains a poorly understood domain. Previous research suggests immigrant children have reduced risk for injury, but the reason for that finding remains unknown. One leading hypothesis is cultural—less acculturated children in the United States appear to be protected from injury—but the combined influence of immigrant status and acculturation is unclear. This study examines the roles of immigration and language acculturation on pediatric injury risk. Samples of 8,526 children and 4,010 adolescents included in the 2003 California Health Interview Survey were studied. The primary analytic technique was Poisson regressions predicting incidents of injury requiring professional medical attention. Predictor variables included demographic characteristics, health insurance availability, birthplace (US vs. other), and language acculturation. Both birthplace and language acculturation were related to children’s and to adolescent’s risk for unintentional injury, but language acculturation emerged as the stronger univariate predictor and only multivariate predictor of injury in both models. Possible interpretations of the results are discussed.

Preventing paraffin-related injury.

Abstract: Paraffin (called kerosene in North America and other parts of the world) is the most commonly used fuel in ‎non-electrified dwellings worldwide. It is especially popular in Africa and South Asia. Although paraffin ‎offers many advantages – especially its comparatively low cost to produce – it poses two major risks of ‎injury. First, paraffin poisoning is common, either through ingestion or through inhalation of smoke and ‎fumes. Second, paraffin is highly flammable, and poses fire risk through multiple causes. This commentary ‎discusses strategies to prevent paraffin-related injury. Prevention of paraffin-related injury must be through ‎multiple strategies, and should include policy-oriented change, changes to the safety of home environments, ‎and behavioral changes targeting how individuals store and use paraffin and paraffin appliances. We review ‎successful prevention strategies in each of these domains and discuss appropriate research and community ‎initiatives that should be implemented to improve paraffin safety among at-risk populations.

The role of psychology in injury prevention efforts

Abstract: Injury is a worldwide epidemic, accounting for 9% of global mortality and 5 million deaths each year.1 The fields of public health, engineering and medicine have been the traditional and successful forerunners in injury prevention, but the race to prevent injury is far from complete. Despite collaborative efforts between traditional injury-related fields and other fields such as the social and behavioural sciences, injury rates continue to escalate in some parts of the world. In the August 2008 issue of Injury Prevention , Tran and Hyder2 alerted current researchers to the growing burden of injury, and highlighted the dire need for capacity building to tackle this problem. As psychologists, in this essay we describe ways to stimulate interest in our colleagues to pursue injury-related research and practice. We hope this interest will complement current injury prevention efforts by offering a perspective that …

Do Visually Salient Stimuli Reduce Children's Risky Decisions?

Abstract: Children tend to overestimate their physical abilities, and that tendency is related to risk for unintentional injury. This study tested whether or not children estimate their physical ability differently when exposed to stimuli that were highly visually salient due to fluorescent coloring. Sixty-nine 6-year-olds judged physical ability to complete laboratory-based physical tasks. Half judged ability using tasks that were painted black; the other half judged the same tasks, but the stimuli were striped black and fluorescent lime-green. Results suggest the two groups judged similarly, but children took longer to judge perceptually ambiguous tasks when those tasks were visually salient. In other words, visual salience increased decision-making time but not accuracy of judgment. These findings held true after controlling for demographic and temperament characteristics.

A Low Cost Approach to Pediatric Pedestrian Safety in Virtual Reality

Abstract: Virtual reality (VR) technology has shown tremendous advancements in recent times. Several VR tools have been developed which depict advanced virtual environments that allow user interaction and manipulation. These tools have found many applications in training and learning. A VR tool is proposed in this paper to study the behavior of children when they are faced with real-world situations of road safety. The driver for this study is the fact that pedestrian injuries are a major cause of death among children ages 5-9 in the United States. The proposed VR tool includes VR software and hardware to simulate a virtual environment faced by a typical pedestrian while crossing the street(s). The VR tool represents a street with simulated traffic patterns and an avatar to represent the pedestrian. It is aimed at training children on safely crossing the roads in order to avoid accidents. The virtual environment will allow users to engage in (and investigators to measure)street-crossing behavior in a controlled environment.

PerceivedRacial/EthnicDiscriminationAmongFifth-Grade StudentsandItsAssociationWithMentalHealth

Abstract: tion. Methods. We analyzed cross-sectional data from a study of 5147 fifth-grade students and their parents from public schools in 3 US metropolitan areas. We used multivariate logistic regression (overall and stratified by race/ethnicity) to examine the associations of sociodemographic factors and mental health problems with perceived racial/ethnic discrimination. Results. Fifteen percent of children reported perceived racial/ethnic discrimination, with 80% reporting that discrimination occurred at school. A greater percentage of Black (20%), Hispanic (15%), and other (16%) children reported perceived racial/ethnic discrimination compared with White (7%) children. Children who reported perceived racial/ethnic discrimination were more likely to have symptoms of each of the 4 mental health conditions included in the analysis: depression, attention deficit hyperactivity disorder, oppositional defiant disorder, and conduct disorder. An association between perceived racial/ ethnic discrimination and depressive symptoms was found for Black, Hispanic, and other children but not for White children. Conclusions. Perceived racial/ethnic discrimination is not an uncommon experience among fifth-grade students and may be associated with a variety of mental health disorders. (Am J Public Health. 2009;99:878‐884. doi:10.2105/ AJPH.2008.144329)