Dr. Manuel Sprung, an assistant professor of psychology at Southern Miss Gulf Coast, is focusing on how intrusive thoughts associated with the storm can undermine concentration levels of children ages 5 to 8.

Sprung and a group of Southern Miss students, including doctoral students Diane Compton and Deidra Yeater, and senior Lindsay Chustz, along with a team from Harvard University, will study four groups of approximately 50 children each, two from the Gulf Coast area and one from Hattiesburg. For comparison purposes, a fourth group of children unaffected by the storm who live in the Boston area will be part of the study.

At Harvard, Dr. Paul Harris, the university’s Victor S. Thomas Professor of Education, and Shu-Ju Yang, M.S., and Angie Kim, M.S., are assisting Sprung in identifying participants for the control group from Boston.

The research project will conclude at the end of this year.

“At first, I was personally overwhelmed by the storm and just wanted to get away from it all,” Sprung said. “But at some point, I realized that this presented an opportunity too, an opportunity to examine the psychological impact of a natural disaster on young children.

“Every day these children, particularly those on the Gulf Coast, still see the storm’s effects – damaged homes and buildings, downed trees and power lines. This environment might add to the occurrence of intrusive thoughts and that’s one thing our research is examining.”

A combination of questionnaires, interviews, games and other activities are being used in the study to measure children’s understanding of their own thinking, measure of attention, measure of inhibition, vocabulary and questions about storm-related intrusive thoughts.

Sprung believes his research has considerable implications for counselors, educators and others working with young children and also said it is important to realize that this age group’s understanding of how the human mind works might be quite different from what adults and older children understand.

“Previous research suggests that young children (ages 5 to 8) cannot understand that our mind is partially uncontrollable,” Sprung said. “They seem not to understand that sometimes we have thoughts that we actually do not want to have. I believe intervention programs for children who have experienced a potentially traumatizing event, such as Hurricane Katrina, should include interventions that aim to improve children’s level of understanding about how the mind works, which might also improve their ability to deal with unwanted (intrusive) thoughts.”

Chustz, an undergraduate psychology major from Brandon, has been working with eight 5-year olds at the Southern Miss Child Development Center and said they have been enthusiastic participants.

“Some of them say they think about it (Hurricane Katrina) a lot, depending on the severity of the impact the storm had on them,” Chustz said. “They’ll start telling (in the interviews) about trees on their house, what they and their families did during the storm, if they lost a pet. It’s very interesting to see how they react when they discuss it, and it’s good for them. I don’t think they need to keep it bottled inside.”

Chustz uses a variety of methods to collect data with her group, including the common “Simon Says” game, used to measure the ability to inhibit an impulsive reaction.

In another measurement, children are told the following story about a little girl: “Sally loves to ride her bicycle and she always dreamed of winning the town bicycle race. For a year, she practiced and practiced. Finally, the day of the race came. Sally pedaled as fast as she could, but when she got to the trickiest turn on the course, another biker ran right into her, and they both fell onto the ground. Sally was not injured, but the other man broke his leg and had to be taken away in an ambulance. Sally was very scared.”

After the story is finished, children are shown a picture of Sally on the day after the bicycle race, while she is working on her math homework, and they are told that suddenly Sally starts to think about the bicycle race the day before. At this point, one of the most crucial elements of the exercise is that children are asked to judge how Sally feels when she starts to think about the bicycle race - if she meant to start thinking about it, and also if she wanted to stop thinking about it.

Angie Kim believes the study could pave the way for further research on the same topic or similar issues involving the impact of natural disasters or traumatic events on children’s cognitive abilities.

“With the control group that hasn’t been affected, we may see how some thoughts that we might not have considered to be intrusive actually are,” Kim said. “By studying the differences between the groups from Mississippi and the control group (from Boston), we can certainly understand how such a disaster could have an impact.”

As people from across the country have contributed money, volunteer time and other donations to assist those affected by the storm, Kim sees the project as a way that academia can go a step further to help through research.

“It’s a great way to show the contributions that the social sciences are making and how we help humanity through our research,” she said.

Participants are still needed for the research project. Parents, educators or other professionals working with children ages 5 to 8 living in the Hattiesburg and Gulf Coast areas that may be interested in taking part in the study should contact Sprung at 228.865-4512 or by e-mail at manuel.sprung@usm.edu.

Last updated: 02/28/06