INTERACTION BETWEEN TIME AND VERBAL FLUENCY: A BEHAVIORAL MODEL FOR REDUCING AGGRESSIVE
Creators: name: Brinson, Leslie Clay
Publisher: name: Digital Repository at the University of Maryland
Year: 1971

description: This investigation was undertaken for the purpose of critically evaluating the contributions of two variables, time in therapy and verbal fluency, believed important to counseling outcomes. In addition, the study attempted to test the efficiency with which a behavioral model designed specifically for reducing aggressive behaviors, reduces overt and covert aggression of delinquent boys. The consideration that directly prompted the development of the investigation was the researcher's observations that few research studies have been organized that systematically and rigorously measure the therapeutic efficacy of counseling techniques and methods wit minority groups, particularly young, black delinquents; for no study could be found that related these variables of time and verbal fluency to counseling outcomes with this carefully drawn sample. The criteria for selecting subjects to be included in the study were that each subject be an adjudicated delinquent and must have committed a crime of a magnitude sufficient to result in being incarcerated for more than ninety days. This period of incarceration must have been in progress during the time counseling was offered. To satisfy this criterion, students from a residential center for young delinquent boys were selected. By treating these subjects it could be assumed that any change in aggressive behaviors might well have resulted from treatment effects in that the residents were subjected to similar stimuli and were randomly assigned to treatment groups. The analysis of the data was accomplished through the use of a two-way analysis of variance which was representative of a 2x4 factorial design with four levels of time forming the vertical dimension and the two levels of client verbal fluency forming the horizontal dimension. The level of significance was set at .05, a level at which all four hypotheses were tested. Since specific questions were raised prior to the initiation of the experiment, the method of paired comparison was the dictated strategy for analyzing the data statistically. The actual statistical tools used were the t and F tests. It was observed that the raw data (gain scores derived via ______ the differences between ____ of pre and post testing) were skewed in a form that threatened the power of the design; thus, as a corrective measure, the data were transformed through the use of a square root transgeneration. It was found that a statistical significant difference existed between clients' mean gain scores for 0 hour of counseling and the average of 3, 6, and 9 hours of counseling. This finding held only when the criterion was the overt aggression which compared the effects of the behavior model to the effects of no counseling at all. A second finding was that a significant linear trend was found across the means of the treatment dimension representing time. Again, this finding held only when the criterion was the overt aggression measure. Statistical analysis of the data fail to support any hypotheses regarding significant effects of interaction and verbal fluency for either the overt or covert measures. With respect to the variable of time, the paradoxical findings were that subjects counseled via the behavioral model for 3, 6, and 9 hours actually showed increments of aggression or the overt measurement scale when compared to the control group which received no counseling. Further, the findings regarding trends in the data were that there were significant linear trends that characterized the data; however, these trends were in a negative direction which lends to the conclusion that the mean gains of aggression were larger as clients' time in counseling increased. It is therefore concluded that the behavioral model was an ineffective method of successfully working with the selected sample of young, black delinquents in terms of reducing their manifest aggression. More pointedly, according to the evidence at hand, this model has a deleterious effect on clients in that their aggression increases with the use of it. The second variable under study, verbal fluency, did not affect clients' outcomes in therapy on either criterion. Accordingly, clients identified as having high verbal fluency make no more gains in therapy than those identified as having low verbal fluency. There were no statistical significant interaction effects.