This study related length of residency, motivational style, and the resident's role in deciding to move to a nursing facility to adjustment, represented by a number of variables (e.g., desired control, expected control, life satisfaction, and affect). Fifty-five residents of nursing facilities and assisted-living apartments were given an interview, compiled of a number of brief measures relating to aspects of adjustment. While results from multivariate analyses of variance failed to support any of the hypotheses, post-hoc univariate analyses of variance and regression analyses revealed important relationships between motivational style and voluntariness regarding the move and factors of adjustment. Overall, post-hoc findings indicated that, in the relatively constrictive environment of the nursing home, persons with a non-self-determined motivational style and persons who decided themselves to come to the nursing home had higher scores on various factors related to adjustment.

Existing studies of people who are homeless provide descriptive information about the heterogeneity of the population. Families who are homeless are the fastest growing subset of this population. This study examined the variability in psychological and social functioning among homeless mothers and attempted to identify risk factors that predict level of adult functioning. Data was collected from 76 homeless mothers with minor aged children receiving services at area shelters. The sample was divided between highly structured and unstructured shelter environments. Each participant completed an extensive interview which included measures of personal and family history, risk factors and current psychological and social functioning. Social functioning was able to be predicted by a number of these risk factors.

Stress responses and coping strategies were assessed for 155 fire fighters who worked during and immediately following Hurricane Andrew in Dade County, Florida in 1992. The participants were surveyed approximately two months after the hurricane, and again one year following the hurricane. The purpose of this study was to evaluate the relationship between the amount of emotional social support received and the amount of symptomatology the participants experienced. This study also introduced empathy as a form of perceived emotional social support and examined the relationship between the empathy felt by the participants and the symptomatology they experienced. For this study, empathy was defined as a participant's ratings of feeling that others truly understand what he or she has been through and is feeling. While other forms of received motional social support were related to an increase in symptomatology, more empathy was related to less symptomatology, in some cases significantly.

The purpose of this study was to assess the outcome of a therapeutic horseback riding program on physically disabled.