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Sarajane Rodgers, Psy.D., is a 2021 graduate of the Psy.D. Program in Clinical Psychology at Antioch University, New England

Dissertation Committee:

  • Gargi Roysircar, EdD, Committee Chair
  • Meghan Collier, PhD, Committee Member
  • Reem Tarazi, PhD, Committee Member

Keywords

sickle cell, poor people in Haiti, attention, emotion regulation, sleep, single case assessment profile analysis

Document Type

Dissertation

Publication Date

2021

Abstract

Hemoglobin disorders or inherited blood diseases affect about 5% of the world population. One main category of these disorders is sickle-cell disease (SCD). SCD can cause many physical complications, such as kidney problems, leg ulcers, and chronic pain. Less frequently discussed symptoms include complications like attention problems and emotion regulation. The study looked at a small sample of pediatric and adult patients (N=22) with SCD at a primary care clinic in a very poor community in Haiti, researching sleep and emotion regulation, given their shared neurobiological systems. As these symptoms can influence attention, the relationships among attention, emotion, and sleep were examined. A Haitian population was chosen because of the high rates of SCD in Haiti, the need to conduct international studies in SCD, and the long-standing collaboration between the Antioch Multicultural Center for Research and Practice and the Haitian primary care clinic, Partners in Development. The study provides a preliminary set of data from a select Haitian population for the measures used: (a) demographics questionnaire; (b) the Berlin Questionnaire (Netzer, Stoohs, Netzer, Clark, & Strohl, 1999); (c) the Cognitive Emotion Regulation Questionnaire (Garnefski, Kraaij, & Spinhoven, 2002), and (d) the Conners Continuous Auditory Test of Attention (Conners, 2015). Findings presented are generally descriptive. Sleep problems (specifically snoring/nighttime breathing problems) and emotionality were significantly positively related to a moderate degree. Emotionality and sleep problems were not significantly related to attention; however, both were significantly positively related to attention to a moderate degree when the sample size was doubled with simulated data. Age was not correlated with sleep problems, emotionality, or attention. Participants were divided into two groups based on the presence or absence of documented attention problems. Results revealed that individuals with a history of documented attention problems had fewer sleep, emotionality, and attention problems on standardized tests but the differences were not significant. A single case assessment profile analysis was performed with three participants because the small sample size did not allow testing of potential group differences and because of the preliminary nature of the study. The findings, limitations of the study, and future directions of research are discussed.

Comments

Sarajane Rodgers

ORCID Scholar ID# 0000–0003–4150–0311

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