Research, experience & sources
Dr. J brings research, lived experience, and live facilitation to the resources here. Explore the research and ideas behind the practices.
01 / Dr. J’s research
The research asks what people are carrying, what they need, and what keeps them from saying so. Handwritten responses address struggle, feelings, needs, reasons for silence, and hope, with variations across settings.
Dr. Julia Garcia reports a collection of over 20,000 written responses from over 100 institutions, updated November 9, 2026. This describes the broader collection, not the number of responses coded in the comparison below.
The findings below come from a harmonized comparison of this subset, not the entire collection. Recurring silence codes include self-reliance or being “the strong one” (154 responses), fear of judgment (153), and not wanting to be a burden (118). Each count uses all 1,271 coded response units as its base, including those with a missing or unclear silence response.
These patterns inform questions about listening, speaking, and creating room for another person’s experience. They are not population prevalence estimates.
The exercise was used in live group settings, with a voluntary invitation to pass written cards forward. Responses were transcribed and thematically coded. The current comparison combines ten groups using harmonized categories; the reason for silence is a central focus.
Counts represent coded response units, which may combine continuation scans. They are not counts of scans or independently verified unique participants. Group settings, roles, ages, and prompt wording differ. The comparison is observational and does not establish that the exercise caused an outcome.
The collection documents what writers expressed under these prompts. It is not a clinical trial, a validated diagnostic instrument, or an outcome evaluation of these free guides. Formal instrument validation and coding-reliability studies remain research directions. No independent peer-review status is claimed for this analysis.
| Group | Coded responses |
|---|---|
| First-year university students | 284 |
| University student leaders, multi-state conference | 130 |
| University student leaders, Utah | 58 |
| Foundation employees and affiliated summit adults | 80 |
| Community adults | 62 |
| School staff, Ohio | 96 |
| High school students, Indiana | 68 |
| School staff, Indiana | 207 |
| High school students, Michigan | 213 |
| Dental practice staff and leaders | 73 |
| Total | 1,271 |
Source: Garcia (2026), Salem dental-staff coded corpus, “Ten Cohorts Harmonized” worksheet. The counts above were recomputed from its 1,271 records. The underlying research archive is maintained by Dr. Julia Garcia. This public summary contains no participant quotations or individual records.
02 / Research informing the practices
These published studies give context for selected practices. They did not evaluate Dr. J’s guides or establish that every exercise works for every reader.
Weger, Castle Bell, Minei, and Robinson (2014) compared active listening, advice, and simple acknowledgment in conversations involving 115 participants. Active-listening recipients reported feeling more understood. This was a study of initial interactions, not parent-child relationships or the five A’s.
Connection to the guide: a rationale for making space to listen before deciding what someone needs.
International Journal of Listening · Read the study ↗Gollwitzer and Brandstätter (1997) studied implementation intentions: specifying the situation in which a goal-directed action will happen. Their experiments found benefits for completing or initiating intended actions.
Connection to the guide: make a concrete follow-through plan after a pitch. The research did not test product sales, conversion rates, or the guide’s five-part timing.
Journal of Personality and Social Psychology · Read the study ↗Kross and colleagues (2014) studied how language used in self-talk affects responses to social stress. In their public-speaking experiment, using one’s name and non-first-person pronouns during preparation reduced distress and improved performance ratings relative to first-person self-talk.
Connection to the guide: a basis for experimenting with a little distance in self-coaching. The finding concerns a particular preparation exercise, not the entire Show Up as You guide.
Journal of Personality and Social Psychology · Read the study ↗Choose a resource for the conversation in front of you.
Explore the free guides ↗Keep in touch
Questions, conversations, or an invitation to your next event.
The 5 Habits of Hope, read by Dr. J.
Journey with Dr. J podcast Visit my website