Jerome Short, Ph.D. Associate Professor of Psychology Director of Clinical Training Licensed Clinical Psychologist

Department of Psychology 3F5 George Mason University 4400 University Drive Fairfax, VA 22030-4444

I am a Clinical-Community Psychologist and my theoretical orientation is integrative and includes interpersonal, emotion-focused, cognitive, and behavioral perspectives. My research focuses on understanding and helping families cope with stressors such as parental divorce, parental alcoholism, and parental death. I have developed a preventive intervention for older children and adolescents designed to teach coping skills, enhance self-esteem, and develop assertiveness skills to resist peer pressure. These skills are associated with less anxiety, depression, antisocial behavior, and substance use.

Currently, I am working on the development and evaluation of a psychological fitness program with college students and elderly adults, evaluation of substance abuse prevention, suicide prevention, and HIV prevention at local community mental health centers, and religious coping. I have developed a psychological fitness intervention that teaches people daily cognitive, behavioral, emotional, and interpersonal exercises and have found that these exercises are related to increased life satisfaction, self-esteem, optimism, perceived academic competence, and perceived body image among college students. The exercises are also related to decreased anxiety, depression, and anger. I am planning longitudinal follow-ups, identification of the most effective exercises, and application of the intervention to other populations. I am developing a Psychological Fitness website to describe my intervention.