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Associations Between Physical Activity Levels And Physical And Mental Health In Military Veterans., Troy Hubert

Theses and Dissertations--Psychology

Research suggests that higher rates of health conditions are associated with lower levels of physical activity, but this association is not well characterized in U.S. Military Veterans. The current study utilized a sample of U.S. military veterans (n = 3,989) from the 2019-2020 National Health and Resiliency in Veterans Study (NHRVS). Physical activity levels (insufficient, moderate, and active), physical and mental health were evaluated with a variety of self-report questionnaires. After controlling for covariates, veterans with any disability, asthma, chronic pain, diabetes, high cholesterol, and stroke were significantly less likely to report sufficient physical activity compared to insufficient physical …

Ethanol Decreases Expression Of Developing Neurons, But Not Neuronal Viability, In A Cultured Rat Hippocampus, Cassidy Count

Theses and Dissertations--Psychology

As of 2019, alcohol use disorders (AUDs) affect roughly 14.1 million individuals over the age of 18 and cost up to $249 billion in economic burden in the United States. In addition to central nervous system (CNS), those affected by AUDs can present with cognitive and behavioral abnormalities. Specifically, those affected by AUDs experience deficits in memory consolidation and retrieval as well as executive functioning, which may be due to cellular changes within the hippocampus. There are at least two prominent and contended theories which explain the mechanism of functional impairment caused by alcohol: 1) alcohol induces excitotoxic neuronal death …

Understanding Cancer Patients' Desire To Quit Tobacco Without Assistance: A Mixed-Methods, Longitudinal Study, Tia Borger

Theses and Dissertations--Psychology

Introduction: Unassisted attempts to quit tobacco are a well-established reason for quit failure. Nonetheless, many cancer patients prefer to make a quit attempt without using evidence-based tobacco treatment. This study aimed to understand the rationale that underlies cancer patients’ desire to quit tobacco without assistance and to track longitudinally the smoking cessation outcomes of patients with this preference. Method: In a mixed-methods, longitudinal study, 35 cancer patients who were current tobacco users and declined tobacco treatment because of the desire to quit on their own provided data via three questionnaires and 1-2 semi-structured interviews across 60 days. Participants were recruited …

A Pilot Randomized Controlled Trial Of Smoking Cessation Induction Treatment For Rural, Underserved Cancer Survivors Across The Continuum Of Motivation To Quit, William Bowling

Theses and Dissertations--Psychology

The United States’ smoking prevalence has decreased substantially, but this public health improvement is unevenly distributed across the population. A promising individual-level approach to cancer control equity is to develop more acceptable and efficacious interventions that are widely disseminated to rural and other disadvantaged cancer survivors. Smoking cessation induction focuses not on long-term abstinence, but on engaging people in the process of making quit attempts and may be ideal for hard-to-reach populations. The aim of this pilot randomized controlled trial was to evaluate the feasibility and acceptability of a smoking cessation induction intervention designed for rural cancer survivors. The treatment …

Religious Beliefs And Behaviors As Predictors Of Substance Use In First-Year College Students: A Longitudinal Study, Hannah B. Mcgee

Theses and Dissertations--Psychology

Substance use is prevalent on college campuses (e.g., Douglas et al., 1997) and can create significant negative consequences (Kodjo & Klein, 2002; NIAAA, 2006). Research suggests that religious beliefs and religious behaviors interact to predict risky substance use in first-year undergraduate students, such that students with religious beliefs but no corresponding behaviors are at risk for significant alcohol use and related problems (Brechting et al., 2010; Cole et al., 2020). However, these studies have only been cross-sectional in nature.

The current study assessed longitudinally if the interaction of religious beliefs/behaviors influenced first-year undergraduate student substance use across the early adjustment …

The Role Of Alexithymia And Affective Lability In Disordered Eating Behaviors, Anna Marie Lilia Ortiz

Theses and Dissertations--Psychology

Affective distress may influence eating disorder behaviors in multiple ways. Affective lability refers to the tendency to experience frequent and striking fluctuations in mood. There is considerable evidence that it predicts eating disorder symptoms. Further, alexithymia is characterized by difficulties identifying and describing feelings and an externally oriented thinking style. Alexithymia has also been implicated in the development and maintenance of eating disorders. To date, these risk factors have been studied separately. Given the evidence that both alexithymia and affective lability are affective components associated with eating disordered behaviors, it may be important to examine possible relationships among alexithymia, affective …

Adhd-Internalizing Disorder Co-Occurrence In Childhood And Adolescence: Comparing Network And Latent Variable Conceptualizations, Patrick Kenneth Goh

Theses and Dissertations--Psychology

Co-occurrence of attention-deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) with depression or anxiety (i.e., internalizing disorders) is a major route to poor outcomes, with temperament traits presenting as potential shared risk markers that underlie these disorders’ development and characterization. Prior work investigating the nature of ADHD-internalizing disorder co-occurrence using structural equation modeling has provided support for both temperament-based common cause (i.e., effortful control and negative affect as liabilities for multiple disorders) and direct causation (i.e., ADHD directly contributing to risk for internalizing disorders) effects separately. Using a network approach, the current study represented the first attempt to integrate these effects into one model while …

Cancer Patients’ Tobacco Use And Tobacco Treatment Referral Response: Implementation Outcomes At A National Cancer Institute- Designated Cancer Center, Tia Borger

Theses and Dissertations--Psychology

Smoking after cancer diagnosis is linked to cancer-specific and all-cause mortality among other adverse outcomes. Yet, 10-20% of U.S. cancer survivors are current smokers. Implementation of evidence-based tobacco treatment in cancer care facilities is widely recommended, yet rarely accomplished. This study focuses on the early outcomes of a tobacco treatment program integrated within an NCI-designated cancer center. Participants consist of 26,365 patients seen at the cancer center during the first 18 months of implementation. The study is a retrospective chart review of patients’ tobacco use, and among current users, patients’ treatment referral response. Over 99% of patients were screened for …

When Brain Stimulation Backfires, Sarah Beth Bell

Theses and Dissertations--Psychology

tDCS brain stimulation does not always work in the intended direction. It has been found to sometimes worsen behavior rather than improve it. A preliminary study shows that people high on sensation-seeking and lack of premeditation were prone to reverse effects of tDCS on performance on a Stop Signal Task. Both of these constructs are related to dopamine levels. Study 2 seeks to intentionally cause a reverse effect of tDCS by increasing participants’ dopamine levels via caffeine. There was not a significant interaction between tDCS and caffeine on errors on the Stop Signal Task in this study. However, other factors …

Neuropsychological Correlates Of Striatal Dopaminergic Dysfunction In Parkinson’S Disease, Brittany D. Walls

Theses and Dissertations--Psychology

Parkinson’s disease (PD) is a common neurodegenerative disorder associated with dysfunction of the basal ganglia, which contributes to a range of motor, cognitive, and affective symptoms. Striatal dopaminergic deficits are one of the core pathological mechanisms thought to contribute to the extra-motor (i.e., cognitive and affective) symptoms in early PD. The present study investigated the relationship between striatal dopaminergic integrity and cognition in 21 patients with PD and 21 age and education matched controls. Each individual underwent dopamine transporter (DaT) imaging with single photon emission computed tomography (SPECT) (i.e., DaTscan) and standardized neuropsychological testing. Strong positive associations were found between …

Attentional Bias To Alcohol In An In Vivo Setting, Ramey G. Monem

Theses and Dissertations--Psychology

The phenomenon of attentional bias to alcohol, where drinkers demonstrate a preference in allocating visual attention towards alcohol-related stimuli rather than neutral stimuli, is well-established. Studies detecting this phenomenon typically utilize computer-administered stimulus presentation tasks such as the visual dot probe task. Despite their frequency of use, these tasks do not represent the ways in which individuals typically encounter alcohol outside of the laboratory. Typical environments where alcohol is present allow individuals to move about freely and encounter alcohol while also being exposed to many other stimuli. This dissertation sought to implement a novel approach to assessing attentional bias in …

The Effect Of Early Life Photoperiod Manipulation On Cocaine-Induced Behavioral Sensitization In Male And Female Japanese Quail, Shannon Elizabeth Eaton

Theses and Dissertations--Psychology

Estrogens seem to play a role in the locomotor activating effects of cocaine. Japanese quail provide a good model for hormonal manipulation as alterations of their photoperiod controls hormone levels. The current study aims to examine the role of early life photoperiod manipulation in cocaine-induced behavioral sensitization in quail. It was expected that if quail were raised on a short photoperiod, they would have a reduction in gonadal hormones and this reduction in hormones would affect the acquisition of cocaine-induced behavioral sensitization. Quail were raised on an 8L:16D or a 16L:8D light cycle. Following 2 days of habituation, quail were …

Internalizing And Externalizing Dysfunction: An Integrative Model Of Adolescent Drinking, Leila Guller

Theses and Dissertations--Psychology

Separate externalizing and internalizing pathways to problem drinking have been described. However, internalizing and externalizing are substantially correlated, thus, there is good reason to believe that these two forms of dysfunction behaviors do not operate independently.

We tested an integrative developmental model of transactions among internalizing symptomatology, externalizing personality, and psychosocial learning in the prediction of both drinking problems and future internalizing symptoms. To do so, we studied a large sample (n = 1910, 49.9% female) of children over a critical developmental period, from the spring of 5th (last year elementary school) grade through the spring of 9th grade (first …

Decision-Making Processes, Driving Performance, And Acute Responses To Alcohol In Dui Offenders, Walter Roberts

Theses and Dissertations--Psychology

Alcohol-impaired driving is a major cause of motor vehicle accident and death in the United States. People who are arrested for DUI (Driving under the Influence) are at high risk to reoffend; approximately one in three of these individuals will commit another DUI offense in the three years following their first conviction (Nochajski & Stasiewicz, 2006). This high risk for recidivism in these individuals suggests that cognitive characteristics may contribute to a pattern of pathological decision making leading to impaired driving. Indeed, individuals with a history of DUI report higher rates of impulsiveness and behavioral dysregulation compared to their nonoffending …

Gαq-Associated Signaling Promotes Neuroadaptation To Ethanol And Withdrawal-Associated Hippocampal Damage, Anna R. Reynolds

Theses and Dissertations--Psychology

Prolonged, heavy consumption of alcohol produces marked neuroadaptations in excitatory neurotransmission. These effects are accelerated following patterns of intermittent heavy drinking wherein periods of heavy consumption are followed by periods of abstinence. Studies have shown that neuroadaptive changes in the glutamatergic N-methyl-D-aspartate (NMDA) receptor produces excitotoxicity during periods of withdrawal; however, upstream targets were not adequately characterized. The present studies sought to identify these targets by assessing the role of group 1 metabotropic glutamate receptors (mGluR) and intracellular calcium in promoting cytotoxicity of hippocampal cell layers in vitro. It was hypothesized that ethanol-induced activity of mGluR1-and-5 contributes to hippocampal …

Development Of An Avian Model For Identifying Individual Differences In Drug Vulnerability, Beth A. Rice

Theses and Dissertations--Psychology

The attribution of incentive salience to cues that become associated with drugs of abuse is a critical characteristic of individuals who may be vulnerable to drug addiction. Rodents with the propensity to sign track are thought to be vulnerable to drug abuse. The goal of the current work was to investigate whether sign trackers (STs) would acquire cocaine conditioned place preference (CPP) to a discrete cue using an avian species. In Experiment 1, sign and goal trackers (GTs) were first identified using a one third rank order split. Following identification, cocaine-CPP was conducted with a discrete cue in each end …

Attentional Bias And Alcohol Abuse, Jessica Jane Weafer

Theses and Dissertations--Psychology

Selective attention towards alcohol-related cues (i.e., “attentional bias”) is thought to reflect increased incentive motivational value of alcohol and alcohol cues acquired through a history of heavy alcohol use, and as such attentional bias is considered to be a clinically relevant factor contributing to alcohol use disorders. This dissertation consists of two studies that investigated specific mechanisms through which attentional bias might serve to promote alcohol abuse. Study 1 compared magnitude of attentional bias in heavy (n = 20) and light (n = 20) drinkers following placebo and two doses of alcohol (0.45 g/kg and 0.65 g/kg). Heavy drinkers displayed …

Using The Scrambled Sentences Test To Examine Relationships Between Cognitive Bias, Thought Suppression And Borderline Personality Features, Paul Jefferson Geiger

Theses and Dissertations--Psychology

Cognitive bias and thought suppression are two maladaptive patterns of thinking that have been associated with borderline personality disorder (BPD). Negative cognitive biases related to BPD include thoughts that they are bad, powerless, or vulnerable and that the world is dangerous. Thought suppression is a maladaptive emotion regulation strategy where unwanted thoughts are intentionally pushed out of one’s consciousness. However, previous research has connected thought suppression and cognitive biases to BPD only via self-report measures. The present study examined whether a laboratory task meant to measure cognitive bias and thought suppression (Scrambled Sentences Test) would predict BPD features over and …