Prevention of Maladjustment to Life Course Transitions

Description:

This book provides a comprehensive and updated review of the concepts, models, and interventions related to the process of adjustment to life course transitions.

In times of transition, an individual is exposed to experiences that require them to assume new roles and exhibit updated behaviors. Regardless of the characteristics of these transitions, exposure to normative trajectories imposes on the person an intensive engagement in a process of (re-)adjustment. Sometimes this demand is beyond the scope of one’s ability, motivation, or comprehension. Hence, some people might ineffectively perceive and/or react to the change and end up feeling unable to handle the change and inclined to escape the situation. A preventive intervention that either reduces the impact of possible risk factors or fosters possible protective factors would support the people in managing the transition.

While the importance of prevention of maladjustment is repeatedly mentioned in the literature, this is the first-known book on how to prevent maladjustment. It examines how the sense of transition emerges, what adjustment means, the models that elaborate on how people manage in times of transition, what the antecedents of maladjustment are, and especially how maladjustment could be prevented. Out of these discussions, a new model, The Transitional Stress and Adjustment (TSA) Model, is suggested as a grand framework for paving a way forward to better prevent people’s maladjustment to life course transitions.

Prevention of Maladjustment to Life Course Transitions is a much-needed cornerstone in the future development within the prevention science framework. This book has interdisciplinary appeal for researchers, practitioners, and graduate students in psychology, sociology, public health, social work, criminology, medicine, health sciences, public policy, economics, and education who consider prevention an important vehicle of intervention to promote health and wellbeing. Its focus on the topic of adjustment also would be of special interest to those who explore child and youth development.

Preface

Review of the existing literature on adjustment to transition sheds only partial light on related questions. In fact, sometimes the more you read about adjustment, the less sure you are about what it really means. To exemplify the need for further clarifications, let’s consider the term honeymoon.

Theories and writings on adjustment processes in various contexts frequently use the term honeymoon to describe the early feelings that people have when they make a transition and approach a desired position. The term honeymoon is widely used in the context of transition to marriage; however, scholars in the social sciences use this term with reference to other types of transitions, such as among immigrants (Hashim, 2003), sojourners (Schartner & Young, 2015), workers (Sohier et al., 2021), adopted children (Goodwin et al., 2020), retired people (Wang et al., 2011), and more. Is such a universal use of this term justifiable?

First, let’s take a short journey in history. Some people believe that the tradition of going on a honeymoon after getting married comes from the nineteenth-century custom among upper-class couples in the United Kingdom, to go on a journey in which the couple introduces themselves to all of their relatives who couldn’t attend the wedding. However, why is it called “honey” and what is the “moon” doing there? These questions gain further mystery in light of the fact that this nineteenthcentury tradition was also referred to as a “bridal tour” – and not “honeymoon” – raising the possibility that these two journeys are not identical and that the “bridal tour” is not the origin of the “honeymoon” custom. Moreover, according to the Oxford English Dictionary, the first time the word “honeymoon” appeared earlier (spelled “honey moon”) is in John Heywood’s play (1546) entitled Dialogue Prouerbes Eng. Tongue – A dialogue conteinyng the nomber in effect of all the prouerbes in the englishe tongue. Thus, the question emerges as to the meaning of “honeymoon” back then, in the sixteenth century. Another suggestion, made by the wedding historian Susan Waggoner, is that the term honeymoon comes from the days when it was customary that the groom snatches the bride, hides her away in a secret place, and waits until she becomes pregnant or her family gives up searching for her. Why then is it called honey and moon? These words come from the

(Scandinavian) practice of drinking honey to improve the likelihood of conception, throughout the first month of marriage (represented by one moon cycle).

More important than the historical journey is a “journey” into the meanings that the term honeymoon conveys. Referring to the two possible explanations presented earlier, notably the two explanations share the common components of being separated from familiar people, joining someone who is essentially a stranger, moving from one place to another, going to distant locations, being exposed to new circumstances, being obliged to follow (compulsory) external social or food demands, being expected to like this new person (who kidnapped you) and/or this person’s unfamiliar relatives … and, to top it off, getting the message that honeymoon is not the reality – i.e., life after the transition is much less glorious and frequently more stressful. Hence, one cannot ignore the question: Is it a proper term to be used in current theories on transitions to various contexts? Is it true that using the term honeymoon in prevention intervention, which pursues to relieve the burden of transition, might even be misleading? Won’t it be better to replace it with a more phenomenological term (rather than a positively or negatively biased term), such as ignorance? Or even detachment? Well, it is believed that many would say “it depends …!” … the usefulness and accuracy of using this term or another depends on the circumstances, on the context, on the people … and so forth.

This book is about how “it depends”; i.e., what are the conditions and circumstances that increase the probability that a transition to new circumstances will be positive and successful? What prevention interventions can be conducted in order to foster people’s ability to effectively manage sometimes life-changing transitions they encounter? How can we turn people to become being less vulnerable to the possible negative implications of poorly managed life course transitions?

For the editor of this book, it is a temporary stop in a lifelong professional journey in pursuit of advancing our understanding of adjustment to life course transitions. This journey started many years ago; back in the 1970s, as a young military psychologist in the Israel Defense Forces (I.D.F.), where I was exposed to people who were functioning at almost the entire spectrum of human behaviors. On one edge of the spectrum there were soldiers, not necessarily in elite units, who were completely devoted to their military service, ready to literally give everything, including their life, in order to perform their military role as well as possible. Many of them talked about their (military) work in spiritual terms, e.g., a “mission in the service of my people/home/values …,” and their commitment to the I.D.F. was absolute. On the other edge of the spectrum were those soldiers, also in many of the army units and many who were prisoners in a military jail, who were completely unwilling to do anything for the sake of their military role. For them, any opportunity to escape (compulsory) military service was welcomed, to the point of committing risky suicidal behavior (i.e., extreme non-suicidal self-injury [NSSI]), with the (manipulative) goal of being released from military service by getting a psychiatric diagnosis (e.g., “being dangerous to oneself and to others”), which they considered an “achievement.” I was very preoccupied wondering what made these people behave so differently. No doubt that there were many personal and background factors that could explain these differences (e.g., family matters). Yet, I thought there might be something else, in addition.

During my military service I was requested to perform a professional (psychological) mission that required me to read hundreds of research reports that had been written by other military psychologists who had served in the Psychological Branch of the I.D.F. (since its establishment in 1948). While reading these numerous reports, I gradually realized that beyond individual differences, the differences between soldiers who are committed to the I.D.F. and those who aren’t already emerge within the few first weeks of their military service, after their enlistment. This led to my initiation of a long series of studies on the transition to military service, especially focusing on military basic training. These studies were very enriching, as I revealed plenty of evidence that supported my insights. Field studies – like the ones I conducted as an active participant-observer in various military camps, in which I joined new military recruits and stayed with them for several weeks until they completed their basic training – were eye-opening. In between these studies I repeatedly returned to the social science literature and performed an extensive review of existing explorations conducted by other armies, as well as by civic organizations. This review showed me that many of my own findings were in line with studies conducted in other countries, such as those published in the monumental book on The American Soldier during WWII (Stouffer et al., 1949). Based on these experiences and studies, I established a preparation program to prevent maladjustment to military service (e.g., Israelashvili, 1992). When I made the transition to an academic career, I initiated studies on K-12 students’ school adjustment (e.g., Israelashvili, 1997, 2017). Finally, I moved on to conduct studies and interventions among people experiencing transitions (see Chap. 7) in general. This extensive exposure to people in transition further strengthened my internal conviction, which started to evolve back then in the context of military adjustment, that there are many similarities across people’s experiences in the course of various types of life course transitions. The present book tries to convey this insight to its readers.

In his poem “Everything Changes” (1944), Bertolt Brecht says, “… Neu beginnen Kannst du mit dem letzten Atemzug …” (“… You can make a fresh start with your final breath …” [author’s translation]). Hopefully, this book will be a “first breath,” a fresh start for innovative explorations and interventions that will help in preventing people’s maladjustment to life course transitions.

Table of contents :

Preface
References
Acknowledgments
Contents
List of Figures
List of Tables
Contributors
About the Editor
Part I: Introduction
Chapter 1: The Need to Prevent Maladjustment to Life Course Transitions
A Historical Perspective on Adjustment to Transitions
Prevention Approaches to Maladjustment
Biologic Approaches
Psychosocial Factors
Postulates Regarding the Prevention of Maladjustment
Structure of the Book
References
Chapter 2: Adjustment to Transitions: Definitions of Terms
A Lack of Clear Definition
Transition
Ways of Managing Transitional Episodes
Adaptation vs. Adjustment
Socialization
Coping
A Closing Comment
References
Part II: Adjustment to Transitions
Chapter 3: Theories of Adjustment to Transitions
Personality Theories
Freud’s Psychoanalytic Theory
Rogers’s Client-Centered Therapy
Personality Trait Theories
Stress Theories
Selye’s (1975) Homeostasis Model
Lazarus’s Transactional Model of Stress and Coping
Hobfoll’s COR Model
Holmes and Rahe’s Stressful Life Events Approach
Typological Theories
Schlossberg: Human Adaptation to Transitions
Berry’s Acculturation Model
Bridges’s Model on Managing Transitions
Process Theories
Brammer: Coping with Life Transitions
Chaos Theories
Interactive Theories
Dawis and Lofquist’s Person-Environment Fit
Louis’s Surprise and Sense-Making Model
Bonnano’s Resilience Model
Stage Theories
A Word of Apology
References
Chapter 4: Reconsidering Stage Theories of Adjustment
Why Refraining From Stage Theories of Adjustment
Inside Stage Theories: A Search for Commonality
A Schematic Summary of Stage Theories
References
Chapter 5: Adjustment to Transitions: Common Components
Awareness of the Transition
The Appearance of Awareness
Lack of Awareness
Fear of Departing from the Previous Situation
Fear of the New Circumstances
Beliefs That People Have About the World and Themselves
A Note on the Honeymoon Period
Shock and Confusion
Exploration of the Situation’s Lawfulness (and Sense-Making)
Reassessment of Personal Rewards
Role Clarification and P-E Fit
Emergence of Personal Commitment
To Conclude
References
Chapter 6: The Transitional Stress and Adjustment (TSA) Model
The Premises of the Transitional Stress and Adjustment (TSA) Model
The Nature of Maladjustment
From Conceptualization to Empirical Tests
References
Chapter 7: Preliminary Explorations of the TSA Model’s Validity
Preliminary Empirical Explorations
Perceptions of Chaos
Perceptions of Lawfulness
Perceptions of Situational Rewards
An Evaluation of the TSA Model’s Structure
Study Hypotheses
Methods
Participants
Measures
Procedure
Statistical Analysis
Results
Intervention Studies
A TSA-Based Intervention to Prevent Work Maladjustment Among Waiters
Method
Participants
Measures
Procedure and Intervention
Results
A TSA-Based Intervention to Promote Immigrants’ School Adjustment
Participants and Procedure
Measures
Independent Variables
Results
Concluding Comment
References
Part III: Prevention of Maladjustment: Family Context
Chapter 8: The Transition to Parenthood: From Adjustment to Personal Growth
A Brief Description of Parents’ Characteristics in the Present Day
The Transition to Parenthood
Prevention of Maladjustment to Parenthood
Flourishing Due to Parenthood
The Transition to Parenthood: A Pathway to Personal Growth
Personal Growth in Early Parenthood
The Association Between Perceived Stress and Personal Growth
The Association Between Childbirth Characteristics and Personal Growth Following the Transition to Parenthood
The Contribution of Personal Resources and Context to Personal Growth
Personal Growth vs. Personal Adjustment
References
Chapter 9: Adjustment to Divorce
The Prevalence of Divorce
Problem
Models
Prevention
Summary and Future Directions
Further Comments on Programs to Prevent Maladjustment to Parental Divorce
References
Part IV: Prevention of Maladjustment: Educational Context
Chapter 10: The Transition to Secondary School: A Definition and Conceptualization of Adjustment During Adolescence
The Transition to Secondary School
The “P” in the Secondary School Transition Is an Adolescent
Secondary School Students’ Social Adjustment
Prevention of Secondary School Maladjustment
School Transitional Environment Project (STEP)
The Psychosocial Adjustment of Adolescents in Hong Kong
Adjustment to the Physiological Transition
Adjustment to the Psychological Transition
Adjustment to the Transition in the Family System
Adjustment to the Transition in the School System
Adjustment to the Community System
Positive Youth Development Approach
Positive Youth Development Programs in Different Chinese Contexts
The P.A.T.H.S. Project in Hong Kong
The Impact of the P.A.T.H.S. Project in Hong Kong
The Impact of the Project P.A.T.H.S. Outside of Hong Kong
P.A.T.H.S. as an Intervention to Promote Adolescent Development
A Final Comment on Adolescents’ Self-Esteem
References
Chapter 11: College Adjustment and Maladjustment
College Adjustment and Maladjustment
The Transition to College
The Current State of College Student Mental Health Concerns
Challenges for College Students Adjusting to College
Challenges with Helping Students
A Community of Support
Models of Positive Adjustment
The Stress-Diathesis Model
Facilitating Social Connection
Summer Programs and Transitioning to College
Shifting to a Population-Focused Paradigm
Prevention Interventions for College Campuses
Peer to Peer Interventions
Population-Focused Interventions
Resilience Building
Concluding Comments
References
Part V: Prevention of Maladjustment: Army Context
Chapter 12: Adjustment Following Separation: Prevention of Child Maladjustment Following Parental Deployment to War
Prolonged Parental Separation
Military Family Life
The Impact of Deployment Separation on Children, Parents, and Parenting
The Impact of Family Stress on Children Is Mediated Through Parenting
Prevention of Internalizing and Externalizing Problems by Strengthening Parenting in Military Families: Results from a Program of Research
Development and Testing of the ADAPT Prevention Program
Moving Onward: Lessons Learned and Scaling Up
Final Note on ADAPT and Other Life Course Transitions
References
Chapter 13: Veteran Transition to Civilian Life: Leveraging the Strengths of Military Culture
The Veteran Experience
Understanding Military Culture Informs Practice
Military Culture Shaping and Implications for Help-Seeking
Impact of War-Related Trauma Injuries Combined with Transition Reentry Shock
An Alternate Model for How Clinicians Can Better Serve Returning Veterans
Seeking Solutions: Group-Based Programs
Reframing the Therapeutic Process
Recruitment
The Veterans Transition Program: A General Overview
Therapeutic Enactment
Therapeutic Enactment Phases
Empirical Evidence
Implications for Professional Practice
Summary
A Final Note
References
Part VI: Prevention of Maladjustment: Civilian Context
Chapter 14: Adjustment to Immigration
The Immigration Experience
Adjustment to Immigration
Comments on the Acculturation Process
Additional Factors Associated with Adjustment Among Immigrants
The Case for Supporting Immigrant Students’ School Maladjustment
A TSA-Based Intervention to Promote Immigrants’ School Adjustment
References
Chapter 15: Inclusion: Environmental Efforts to Prevent Maladjustment in the Service of Human Growth
Threats to Be Faced: Inequalities and Social and Environmental Injustices
Inclusion
Building Inclusive Contexts
An Example: The Promotion of Inclusive Teaching Skills Among University Professors
Preparation of the “Inclusive Teaching” Project
Establishing a Work Group
Preparation of the Intervention Materials
Implementation
Inclusion from the TSA Perspective
An Example: Community Inclusion of Mental Health Outpatients
Final Comments
References
Part VII: Prospective Challenges
Chapter 16: Prevention of Maladjustment: Paving the Way Forward
Emerging Commonalities Across Life Course Transitions
Much Attention Is Given to Transitional Periods
Life Course Transitions Are Not an Individual Matter
Transitions Are Risky Periods
Interventions to Prevent Maladjustment Work
The Emergence of a Generic Theory of Adjustment to Transitions
Prevention of Maladjustment to Life Course Transitions: Possible Implications
Prevention of Maladjustment: The Challenges Ahead
Possible Clusters of Transitional Events
Possible Ethnic and Cultural Differences
Advanced Explorations of the Parental Role in Shaping Adjustability
The Impact of Repeated Exposure to Life Course Transitions
Can Knowledge on Resilience and Adjustment to Life Course Transitions Be Integrated?
References
Index