INTRODUCTION

1. The Relationship Between Child Treatment Gains and Parent Stress in an Adolescent DBT Program Sean C. Carey, B.A., Benjamin N. Johnson, B.A., Noriel E. Lim, Ph.D., Cynthia Ramirez, Ph.D., & Lorie A. Ritschel, Ph.D. Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences  Emory University School of Medicine INTRODUCTION PARTICIPANTS SAMPLE ITEMS • While much evidence supports the inclusion of parents in DBT skills training for adolescents, few studies have examined changes in parent symptomatology over the course of these treatments1. • A patient’s symptomatology may exacerbate distress experienced by their caregivers, whereas improvement may alleviate some of the stress experienced by a patient’s parents. • Beck Anxiety Inventory: • Hands trembling • Difficulty breathing • Fear of dying • Borderline Symptom List-23-Supplement: • “I hurt myself by cutting, burning, strangling, headbanging etc.” • “I told other people that I was going to kill myself” • “I had outbreaks of uncontrolled anger or physically attacked others” • Parental Stress Scale: • “I sometimes worry whether I am doing enough for my child” • “The major source of stress in my life is my child” • “The behavior of my child is often embarrassing or stressful to me” Participants completed a 6-month DBT skills training program involving parallel adolescent and parent groups. Data were included from 21 families, comprising 33 parents and 21 adolescents. Demographic data are shown to the left. RESULTS CURRENT STUDY • The goal of the present study is to examine the relationship between treatment gains of patients and their parents in an adolescent DBT program. • HYPOTHESIS: improvement in adolescent symptomatology will correlate with decreased parental stress. DISCUSSION MEASURES • Improvements in adolescent anxiety and externalizing behaviors correlate with decreases in parent stress levels.Changesin parent stress did not correlate with changes in other adolescent symptoms studied. • Parent stress may be linked to the most salient of the adolescents’ symptoms. The BAI focuses especially on somatic symptoms which may be visible to the parent, especially if they lead to behaviors such as school avoidance. BSL-23-S items capture behaviors that may greatly distress parents and which often lead caregivers to bring their adolescents to our clinic. • Limitations of this research is the use of change scores and the use of correlational analyses. Further research is needed to parse out causal relationships between adolescent and parent symptomatologies. • Parents • Parental Stress Scale2 • Measures stress associated with parenting • Adolescents • Beck Anxiety Inventory3 • Measures intensity of anxiety symptoms in the past week • Beck Depression Inventory4 • Measures frequency and intensity of depressive symptoms in past two weeks • Difficulties in Emotion Regulation Scale5 • Measures six subscales of emotion dysregulation • Borderline Symptom List-236 • Measures borderline symptomatology • Supplement section measures severe externalizing behaviors • The Hope Scale7 • Measures two subscales of goal-oriented thinking PSS = Parental Stress Scale, BAI = Beck Anxiety Inventory, BDI = Beck Depression Inventory, DERS = Difficulties in Emotion Regulation Scale, BSL-23 = Borderline Symptom List-23, BSL-23-S = Borderline Symptom List-23 Supplement Section, Hope = The Hope Scale *p < .05 (1-tailed), **p < .01 (1-tailed) • REFERENCES • MacPherson, H. A., Cheavens, J. S., & Fristad, M. A. (2013). Dialectical Behavior Therapy for Adolescents: Theory, Treatment Adaptations, and Empirical Outcomes. Clinical child and family psychology review, 1-22. • Berry, J. O., & Jones, W. H. (1995). The parental stress scale: Initial psychometric evidence. Journal of Social and Personal Relationships, 12(3), 463-472. • Beck, A. T., Epstein, N., Brown, G., & Steer, R. A. (1988). An inventory for measuring clinical anxiety: Psychometric properties. Journal of Consulting and Clinical Psychology, 56, 893-897. doi: 10.1037/0022-006X.56.6.893 • Beck AT, Steer RA, Brown GK. Manual for Beck Depression Inventory II (BDI-II). San Antonio, Tex.: Psychology Corporation, 1996. • Gratz, K. L., & Roemer, L. (2004). Multidimensional assessment of emotion regulation and dysregulation: Development, factor structure, and initial validation of the difficulties in emotion regulation scale. Journal of Psychopathology and Behavioral Assessment, 26, 41-54. doi: 10.1023/B:JOBA.0000007455.08593.94 • Bohus, M., Kleindienst, N., Limberger, M. F., Stieglitz, R.-D., Domsalla, M., Chapman, A. L.,... Wolf, M. (2009). The short version of the borderline symptom list (BSL-23): Development and initial data on psychometric properties. Psychopathology, 43, 32-39. doi: 10.1159/000173701 • Snyder, C. R., Harris, C., Anderson, J. R., Holleran, S. A., Irving, L. M., Sigmon, S. T.,… Harney, P. (1991). The will and the ways: Development and validation of an individual-differences measure of hope. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 60, 570-585. doi: 10.1037/0022-3514.60.4.570 This work was supported by the Fuqua Family Foundations and the John and Mary Brock Foundation