1. Appleby College
Life Strategies Programme:
Relevant Research
Annotations
Ray Pidzamecky M.S.W. RSW
Director of Youth Support Programs
2003

2. 2
To identify and validate a need is a crucially important prerequisite to action. Action
intended to address the need, solve a problem or make things better requires not only
courage but also tenacity of the highest degree. It is no wonder that social science
literature is painfully full of surveys or other systematically obtained information that
describe how bad things are. Unfortunately, there is proportionately little reported about
efforts to make things better. People who undertake such efforts, while few, have made,
however great contributions to understanding what works and in so doing encouragement
for others to do likewise. The Appleby College Life Strategies Programme components
are based on the soundly evaluated efforts of such courageous people. A sampling of
their contribution follows.
EMOTIONAL INTELLIGENCE
Introduction
The empirical evidence pertaining to emotional intelligence falls into two kinds. The first
is of the survey kind whereby emotional quotient factors are correlated with success/best
performance in an occupational group. There is an exponentially growing array of
information in this regard available from the publisher of both currently available
measurement tools. The EQi is a self-report standardized instrument, which has been
correlated with success in an ever broadening list of occupations. The MSCEIT is more
of an ability measure of emotional intelligence. It too is being correlated with
occupational group success. Less information is available about this instrument because
of its more recent introduction.
The Life Strategies initiative at Appleby College while based on the research that
occupational success is influenced less by grades and more by emotional intelligence, is
justified essentially by the data that emotional intelligence can be promoted/improved
upon by deliberate/focused effort.
The emotional – literacy/intelligence educational courses have remote roots in the
‘affective-education’ movement of the 1960’s. Many of these courses and the
momentum for their spread came from an ongoing series of school-based prevention
programs, each targeting a specific problem: teen smoking, drug abuse, pregnancy,
dropping out, and most recently violence. Prevention programs were found to be far
more effective when they teach a core of emotional and social competencies, such as
impulse control, managing anger, and finding creative solutions to social predicaments.

3. 3
W.T. Grant Consortium on the School-Based Promotion of Social Competence, Drug and
alcohol prevention curricula. In David Hawkins et al., (eds) Communities that care, San
Francisco: Jossey-Bass, 1992.
This was a five-year project sponsored by the W.T. Grant Foundation, in which a
consortium of researchers studied prevention programs identifying the
ingredients crucial to the success of the ones that worked. The list of
competencies, regardless of the specific problem a program was designed to
prevent are virtually identical with the competencies that define emotional
intelligence.
Clarke, Gregory, The prevention of depression in at-risk high school adolescents. Paper
presented at the American Academy of Child and Adolescent Psychiatry, Oct. 1993.
In a special after-school class, seventy-five mildly depressed students learned to
challenge their thinking patterns associated with depression. They learned to
become more adept at making friends, to get along better with their parents, and
to engage in more social activities they found pleasant. By the end of the eight-
week program, 55% of the students had ‘recovered’ from their mild depression,
while only about 25% of equally depressed students who were not in the program
had begun to pull out of their depression. A year later 25% of those in the
comparison group had gone on to fall into a major depression, as opposed to
only 14% of the students in the depression prevention program. While only eight
sessions long, the program cut the risk of depression in half.
Asher, Steven & Williams, Gladys, Helping children without friends in home and school
contexts. Children’s social development: Information for parents and teachers. Illinois;
University of Illinois Press, 1987.
Third and fourth graders least liked in their classes were identified. They were
given six sessions in how to ‘make playing games more fun” through being
“friendly, fun and nice.” To avoid stigma, the children were told that they were
acting as ‘consultants’ to the coach, who was trying to learn what kinds of things
make it more enjoyable to play games. The children were than coached to act in
ways that were found to be typical of more popular students. This minicourse in
getting along had a remarkable effect: a year later the children who were
coached were solidly in the middle of classroom popularity. None were social
stars, but none were rejects.

4. 4
Nowicki, Stephen. A remedial procedure for nonverbal processing deficits. Unpublished
manuscript, Duke University, 1989.
Social outcasts were trained to hone their ability to reach and respond adaptively
to other children’s feelings. The children, for example, were videotaped while
practicing expression of feelings such as happiness and sadness, and then
coached to improve their emotional expressiveness. They then tried out their
newly honed skills with a child they wanted to make friends. A 50% to 60%
success rate was found in raising the popularity of rejected children.
Woods, Don, Developing problem solving skills: The McMaster problem solving program.
Journal of Engineering Education, 1997.
A 120 hour program designed to develop skills in: self-management, problem
solving, interpersonal and group kills, self-assessment, change management,
and lifetime learning were made compulsory for engineering students.
Improvements were obtained not only between baseline and post program
results but also in job performance as reported by those who recruit exclusively
from the engineering program before and after the introduction of the mandatory
problem-solving component.

5. 5
SOCIAL ECOLOGY
The importance of environment on individual and group functioning has a long tradition
of being examined and interventions evaluated. Social ecologists have focused their
attention on correlating well-defined environmental characteristics with the psychosocial
functioning of its inhabitants. Repressive environments, for example have been shown to
inhibit development or to regress its inhabitants to lower stages/phases of functioning in a
desperate attempt to find a way of being which was previously associated with comfort.
Similarly, regressive environments have been found to precipitate authoritarian, self-
serving cognitions and behaviours from its inhabitants. In contrast supportive social
networks, opportunities to participate and influence one’s environment have been found
to be positively correlated with psychosocial well being and positive development.
Most social ecological research has been conducted in institutional settings, focusing on
what variables combine to create a certain ‘climate’ and how conditions in a particular
environment are perceived from the perspective of staff and those who the environment is
intended to serve.
Moos, R.H. Systems for the assessment and classification of human environments: An
overview. In Rudolf H. Moos and Paul M. Insel (eds.), Issues in social ecology. Palo Alto:
National Press Books, 1974.
Environmental assessment systems for a variety of settings ranging from homes
for the aged to correctional facilities are described. The organizational specific
assessment tools were found to characterize settings in a valid and reliable
manner. Predominant features (eg a program focus) are described as associated
with individual positive benefits whereas other features (eg rules and regulations
focus) are described as having less beneficial impact on individuals. The
environmental assessment tools’ capability to tap into how staff and clients view
the climate is described as revealing where, and how to intervene so that agreed
upon objectives can be pursued.
DeLeon, G. & Melnick, G. Therapeutic community scale of essential elements
questionnaire. New York: Community Studies Institute, 1993.
The tool assesses the extent to which a program has the generic characteristics
of a therapeutic community by measuring treatment approach and structure,
community as a positive change agent, education and other activities. The
instrument is reported to have good reliability and validity and when used to
characterize an environment to predict within acceptable confidence levels
individual functioning.

6. 6
Wells, L.M. Singer, C., & Polgar, A.T. To enhance quality of life in institutions: An
empowerment model. Toronto: University of Toronto Press, 1986.
With the use of a Multiphasic Environmental Assessment Procedure this
demonstration project characterized control and experimental group facilities also
including the perceptions of staff compared to the perceptions of clients. The
information was then used to design interventions with which to impact on
conditions that were found to be divergent from the theoretical ideal. The
interventions are reported to have achieved the intended results including
congruence between staff and client perceptions. When combined with other
changes a significant improvement in the quality of life as experienced by the
people who work and live in the experimental group facilities is reported.

7. 7
MORAL DEVELOPMENT
The study of moral development can be categorized into longitudinal studies which
produced and confirm a cross cultural, invariant hierarchical sequence and interventions
specifically designed to promote the acquisitions of the next stage of moral reasoning to
where the individual currently functions.
The intervention programs invariably take place in institutional settings and rely on
environmental conditions as well as, clearly defined interventions by staff. Additionally,
some research has also focused on the family as a qualitatively different and perhaps
more primary social environment for development. In all, the basis for intervention and
evaluation is grounded in what has come to be known as the Kohlbergian view that
‘development is the aim of education’ and that ‘just education’ is best achieved through a
just community approach that includes moral discussion.
Power, Clark. The just community approach to moral education. Journal of Moral
Education, Vol. 17, Number 3, October 1988.
This paper describes the evolution of the just community approach to moral
education. It examines the evolution from the discussion of moral issues as a
means of promoting moral development to the introduction of more
comprehensive approaches that successfully combine democratic and collectivist
values. The experimental programs described were located in public high
schools. Evaluation of the programs support a conclusion that it is possible and
desirable to establish cultures based on principles of a just community because
such cultures are conducive to the development of socio-moral reasoning and
action.
Lickona, Thomas. Creating the just community with children. Theory Into Practice, Vol.
XVI, Number 2, April, 1977.
This paper examines the benefits of moral discussion with elementary school
students. Class meetings, which involved the whole group, conducted in a circle
for 15-30 minutes, were most effective when held every day. Some teachers
held the meetings twice a day, once at the end of the morning and once at the
end of the afternoon. The positive moral atmosphere created by the discussions
are reported to have precipitated changes in stage of moral reasoning although
small and slow to appear when measured by traditional ‘interview’ methods. An
observational rating scale, however, that measures 12 dimensions in a class
room setting is described as more easily applied and capable of quantifying
children’s developmental gains.

8. 8
Lind, G. Educational environments which promote self-sustaining moral development.
Paper presented at the 1996 meeting of AERA/Division E. New York.
Lind, G., & Althof, W. Does the just community program make a difference? Measuring and
evaluating the effect of the DES project. Moral Education Forum, 17 19-28, 1992.
Lind, G. & Wakenhut, R. Testing for moral judgment competence. In G. Lind, H.A.
Hartmann, & R. Wakenhut (eds), Moral development and the social environment: Studies in
the philosophy and psychology of moral judgment and education. Chicago: Precedent
Publishing Inc., 1985.
All three references describe the basic tenants of just community/democratic
education, correlating quantitative and qualitative environmental features with
moral developmental gains. The ‘better’ the environment the more pronounced
are the moral developmental gains which are also evidenced by concomitant
(socially responsible) behaviours.
Kohlberg, L., Scharf, P., & Hickey, J. The Justice structure of the prison: A theory and an
intervention. The Prison Journal, Vol. 11, No. 2, 1971.
This is considered to be one of the most seminal works in the design of a just
community and measuring the impact it has on the moral perspective and
behaviour of individuals. In part the just community design was based on
understanding how the prison’s autharian, repressive sometimes punitive
environment is antithetical to development and to survive require regressive
ideas and behaviours from those who have achieved higher stages of moral
reasoning. In part the just community was also modeled on high school
initiatives, which produced a one-stage upward movement in 33% to 50% of the
students compared to 5% of the students in control populations. The greatest
accomplishment of the program initially is described as a move to socially
responsible self-government followed by moral stage perspective development.