Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons^™

Innovation Influences Liking For Chocolates Among Neophilic Consumers, Christopher R. Loss, Debra Zellner, Francisco Migoya

Department of Psychology Faculty Scholarship and Creative Works

The fear of trying new foods is a major barrier for entry for innovative ingredients, foods, flavors, or cuisines into the market place. We explored the relationship between perceived innovation and liking for chocolates and degree of neophobia. Line scales were used to measure: innovation, liking, and perceived dollar value for three chocolate confections. One was a traditional confection (palette d′or), and two others were designed to be more innovative (white miso with dark chocolate and white chocolate with candied black olive). An analysis of variance found that panelists (n=44) perceived significant (p<0.01) differences among the chocolates in innovation, and liking, but not dollar value or estimated caloric content. The chocolate rated as the most innovative was also rated as the least liked. This finding is significant since the mean neophobia score of our subjects was quite low and very few of them would have been classified as neophobic. This current work suggests that acceptance of innovative new foods is dependent, in part, upon factors that transcend neophobic mindsets. Chefs and product developers should be aware of the fact that even among neophilic consumers who are quite willing to consume novel foods, there is a possibility that a food might be too innovative, resulting in a negative impact on liking.

Superior Episodic Memory In Inconsistent-Handers: A Replication And Extension Using Fnirs, Ruth Propper, Neil Patel, Stephen D. Christman, Christophe Carlei

Department of Psychology Faculty Scholarship and Creative Works

A large body of evidence supports the existence of a robust handedness difference in episodic memory retrieval, with inconsistent-handedness being associated with superior memory across a wide variety of paradigms, including superior retrieval of lab-based and real world memories. Despite superior episidoc memory in inconsistent-handers, and despite neuroanatomical and neurophysiological differences in cortical regions between inconsistent- and consistent-handers, we are aware of no studies to date that have examined physiological activity in the brains of inconsistent- versus consistent-handers while engaged in memory tasks. The purpose of this paper, therefore, is to present a first look at this issue, using functional …

Relationship Between Sustained Unilateral Hand Clench, Emotional State, Line Bisection Performance, And Prefrontal Cortical Activitya Functional Near-Infrared Spectroscopy Study, Ruth Propper, Kyle Dodd, Stephen D. Christman, Tad T. Brunyé

Department of Psychology Faculty Scholarship and Creative Works

Sustained unilateral hand clenching alters perceptual processing and affective/motivational state, with these alterations presumed to reflect increased hemispheric activity contralateral to the side of motor movement. However, data from electroencephalographic and imaging studies are contradictory regarding the relationship between sustained hand clenching and brain activity. In order to investigate the relationship between brain activity, sustained unilateral hand clenching, and changes in affect and perceptual processing, frontal hemispheric activity was measured via functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS), using derived O2Hb prior to, during, and post-sustained unilateral hand clench. Participants’ mood and spatial perception were recorded pre- and post-clenching. Sustained unilateral hand clenching …

Developing Local Oral Reading Fluency Cut Scores For Predicting High-Stakes Test Performance, Sally Grapin, John H. Kranzler, Nancy Waldron, Diana Joyce-Beaulieu, James Algina

Department of Psychology Faculty Scholarship and Creative Works

This study evaluated the classification accuracy of a second grade oral reading fluency curriculum-based measure (R-CBM) in predicting third grade state test performance. It also compared the long-term classification accuracy of local and publisher-recommended R-CBM cut scores. Participants were 266 students who were divided into a calibration sample (n = 170) and two cross-validation samples (n = 46; n = 50), respectively. Using calibration sample data, local fall, winter, and spring R-CBM cut scores for predicting students’ state test performance were developed using three methods: discriminant analysis (DA), logistic regression (LR), and receiver operating characteristic curve analysis (ROC). The classification …

Dismantling Motivational Interviewing: Effects On Initiation Of Behavior Change Among Problem Drinkers Seeking Treatment, Jon Morgenstern, Alexis Kuerbis, Jessica Houser, Svetlana Levak, Paul Amrhein, Sijing Shao, James R. Mckay

Department of Psychology Faculty Scholarship and Creative Works

Motivational interviewing (MI) is an efficacious treatment for alcohol use disorders. MI is thought to enhance motivation via a combination of 2 therapeutic strategies or active ingredients: 1 relational and 1 directional. The primary aim of this study was to examine MI's hypothesized active ingredients using a dismantling design. Problem drinkers (N = 139) seeking treatment were randomized to 1 of 3 conditions: MI, relational MI without the directional elements labeled spirit-only MI (SOMI), or a nontherapy control condition and followed for 8 weeks. Those assigned to MI or SOMI received 4 sessions of treatment over 8 weeks. All participants …

Mediators Of Interpersonal Psychotherapy For Depressed Adolescents On Outcomes In Latinos: The Role Of Peer And Family Interpersonal Functioning, Jazmin Reyes-Portillo, Eleanor L. Mcglinchey, Paula K. Yanes-Lukin, J. Blake Turner, Laura Mufson

Department of Psychology Faculty Scholarship and Creative Works

Peer and family interpersonal functioning were examined as mediators of the impact of Interpersonal Psychotherapy for Depressed Adolescents (IPT-A; Mufson, Dorta, Moreau, & Weissman, 2004) on depression and suicidal ideation among Latino youth. Only youth self-identifying as Latino (n = 50) were included in the analyses. The majority were female (86%) with a mean age of 14.58 (SD = 1.91). The current sample was drawn from the intent to treat sample of a clinical trial examining the effectiveness of IPT-A as compared with treatment as usual (TAU; Mufson, Dorta, Wickramaratne et al., 2004). Youth were randomly assigned to receive IPT-A …

The Role Of The Work Station: Visibility Of One's Computer Screen To Coworkers Influences Cyberloafing Through Self-Efficacy To Hide Cyberloafing, Kevin Askew, John E. Buckner

Department of Psychology Faculty Scholarship and Creative Works

The use of the Internet at work for reasons unrelated to work, or cyberloafing, is a potentially harmful behavior for organizations. Past studies have shown cyberloafing is driven in part by characteristics of the work environment (Askew, Vandello, & Coovert, 2012). However, there remains little research on how the work environment influences cyberloafing. Here, we tested hypotheses that work station properties (and electronic monitoring) would influence cyberloafing through self-efficacy to hide cyberloafing among a sample of working adults (N-202). We found evidence that visibility of ones computer screen influences cyberloafing through increased levels of ones self-efficacy to hide cyberloafing. In …

Does First Sex Really “Just Happen?” A Retrospective Exploratory Study Of Sexual Debut Among American Adolescents, Lisa D. Lieberman, Eva S. Goldfarb, Samantha Kwiatkowski, Paul Santos

Department of Public Health Scholarship and Creative Works

First sex marks a significant transition for most adolescents, yet teens often report that it was unplanned. Seventy-four college students participated in exploratory focus groups about their first sex. Although initially asked whether their first sex was spontaneous or planned, many participants revealed evidence of forethought or anticipation, signifying a third option, anticipation. This study suggests that the development and timing of sexual health messages should build on the apparent, albeit often unacknowledged, planning and thought that accompany the transition to first sex. Specifically, during the time immediately preceding first sex, young people might be particularly open to such messages.

Assessing Clinical Improvement In School-Based Treatment For Social Anxiety Disorder: Agreement Between Adolescents, Parents, And Independent Evaluators, Jeremy K Fox, Carrie Masia

Department of Psychology Faculty Scholarship and Creative Works

The Clinical Global Impressions of Improvement (CGI-I) scale is widely used in clinical trials to monitor clinically meaningful change during treatment. Although it is standard practice in research to have independent evaluators (IEs) complete the CGI-I, this approach is not practical in school and community settings. Few studies have explored the potential utility of other informants, such as youth and parents. Therefore, this study aimed to investigate agreement between IEs and both adolescents and parents in CGI-I improvement ratings in the context of a randomized controlled trial of cognitive-behavioral therapy for social anxiety disorder, as delivered by psychologists and school …

Encouraging Top-Down Attention In Visual Search: A Developmental Perspective, Regan Lookadoo, Jennifer Yang, Edward C. Merrill

Department of Psychology Faculty Scholarship and Creative Works

Four experiments are reported in which 60 younger children (7–8 years old), 60 older children (10–11 years old), and 60 young adults (18–25 years old) performed a conjunctive visual search task (15 per group in each experiment). The number of distractors of each feature type was unbalanced across displays to evaluate participants’ ability to restrict search to the smaller subset of features. The use of top-down attention processes to restrict search was encouraged by providing external aids for identifying and maintaining attention on the smaller set. In Experiment 1, no external assistance was provided. In Experiment 2, precues and instructions …

Tablet Computers And Forensic And Correctional Psychological Assessment: A Randomized Controlled Study, Christopher King, Kirk Heilbrun, Na Youngkim, Kellie Mcwilliams, Sarah Phillips, Jessie Barbera, Ralph Fretz

Department of Psychology Faculty Scholarship and Creative Works

Mobile computing technology presents various possibilities and challenges for psychological assessment. Within forensic and correctional psychology, assessment of justice-involved persons facilitated by such technology has not been empirically examined. Accordingly, this randomized controlled experiment involved administering questionnaires about risk-needs, treatment readiness, and computerized technology opinions to a large (N = 212) and diverse sample of individuals under custodial correctional supervision using either a tablet computer or traditional paper-and-pencil materials. Results revealed that participants in the paper-and-pencil condition completed the packet of questionnaires faster but omitted items more frequently. Older participants and those with lower levels of education tended to take …

Student Organizations As Avenues For Leader Learning And Development, Valerie Sessa, Nicole Alonso, Pamela Farago, Gaynell Schettino, Kelcie Tacchi, Jennifer Bragger

Department of Psychology Faculty Scholarship and Creative Works

This chapter describes theory and research demonstrating that the experiences students have within student organizations, and the people with whom they interact within those organizations, are powerful triggers for leader learning and development.

Neuroplasticity Pathways And Protein-Interaction Networks Are Modulated By Vortioxetine In Rodents, Jessica A. Waller, Sara Holm Nygaard, Yan Li, Kristian Gaarn Jardin, Joseph A. Tamm, Aicha Abdourahman, Betina Elfving, Alan Pehrson, Connie Sánchez, Rasmus Wernersson

Department of Psychology Faculty Scholarship and Creative Works

Background: The identification of biomarkers that predict susceptibility to major depressive disorder and treatment response to antidepressants is a major challenge. Vortioxetine is a novel multimodal antidepressant that possesses pro-cognitive properties and differentiates from other conventional antidepressants on various cognitive and plasticity measures. The aim of the present study was to identify biological systems rather than single biomarkers that may underlie vortioxetine's treatment effects. Results: We show that the biological systems regulated by vortioxetine are overlapping between mouse and rat in response to distinct treatment regimens and in different brain regions. Furthermore, analysis of complexes of physically-interacting proteins reveal that …

Advances In Understanding The Detectability Of Trustworthiness From The Face: Toward A Taxonomy Of A Multifaceted Construct, John Paul Wilson, Nicholas O. Rule

Department of Psychology Faculty Scholarship and Creative Works

Researchers have recently shown increasing interest in assessments of trustworthiness, devoting much attention to whether trustworthiness can be detected from a person’s facial appearance. This question has been investigated along diverse behavioral dimensions, using a wide variety of targets, and with great inconsistency in results. Here, we call for greater precision in defining trustworthiness. We review various subdomains of trustworthiness perception and argue that developing a more highly specified taxonomy of trustworthiness will allow for better predictions about when trustworthiness can be judged on the basis of appearance, for more precision in estimating how accurate people are in making such …

Liderazgo: Culturally Grounded Leadership And The National Latina/O Psychological Association, Marie L. Miville, Patricia Arredondo, Andrés J. Consoli, Azara Santiago-Rivera, Edward A. Delgado-Romero, Milton Fuentes, Melanie M. Domenech Rodríguez, Lynda Field, Joseph M. Cervantes

Department of Psychology Faculty Scholarship and Creative Works

This article, collaboratively written by the presidents of the National Latina/o Psychological Association (NLPA), presents leadership as conceptualized and practiced in NLPA. We first identify key leadership constructs in the available literature as well as relevant cultural values, describe liderazgo (leadership) through cultural lenses, and articulate the connections to counseling psychology and the social justice underpinnings that have guided NLPA's formation and development. We then present a number of events and decisions to illustrate how we have operationalized these organizing principles in both the daily management and long-term goals of NLPA. We conclude with a discussion of the future paths …

Exceptional But Not An Exception : Understanding How African American Women Make Their Way, Ebony E. White

Theses, Dissertations and Culminating Projects

Success in the US has been defined in White American terms (Katz 1985; Mangino, 2014), which may not reflect the values of African American women. The goal of this study was to provide practitioners (e.g., counselors, educators, researchers) with a perspective of African American women from their standpoint. African American women who were raised by female heads of households in under-resourced communities were given the opportunity to name, define, and describe their own successes. Using a phenomenological qualitative interview method of inquiry, a semi-structured interview was used to gain a more in-depth understanding of participants’ lived experiences and how they …

A Novel Surveillance Approach For Disaster Mental Health, Oliver Gruebner, Sarah R. Lowe, Martin Sykora, Karen Shankardass, S V. Subramanian, Sandro Galea

Department of Psychology Faculty Scholarship and Creative Works

Background

Disasters have substantial consequences for population mental health. Social media data present an opportunity for mental health surveillance after disasters to help identify areas of mental health needs. We aimed to 1) identify specific basic emotions from Twitter for the greater New York City area during Hurricane Sandy, which made landfall on October 29, 2012, and to 2) detect and map spatial temporal clusters representing excess risk of these emotions.

Methods

We applied an advanced sentiment analysis on 344,957 Twitter tweets in the study area over eleven days, from October 22 to November 1, 2012, to extract basic emotions, …

A Study Of Time- And Sex-Dependent Effects Of Vortioxetine On Rat Sexual Behavior: Possible Roles Of Direct Receptor Modulation, Yan Li, Alan Pehrson, Ronald S. Oosting, Maria Gulinello, Berend Olivier, Connie Sanchez

Department of Psychology Faculty Scholarship and Creative Works

Treatment-related sexual dysfunction is a common side effect of antidepressants and contributes to patient non-compliance or treatment cessation. However, the multimodal antidepressant, vortioxetine, demonstrates low sexual side effects in depressed patients. To investigate the mechanisms involved, sexual behavior was assessed in male and female rats after acute, and repeated (7 and 14 days) treatment with vortioxetine, flesinoxan (a 5-HT1A agonist), CP-94253 (a 5-HT1B agonist), or ondansetron (a 5-HT3 antagonist). These selective ligands were chosen to simulate vortioxetine's direct modulation of these receptors. Paroxetine was also included in the male study. Acute and repeated treatment with vortioxetine at doses corresponding to …

Racial Bias In Judgments Of Physical Size And Formidability: From Size To Threat, John Paul Wilson, Kurt Hugenberg, Nicholas O. Rule

Department of Psychology Faculty Scholarship and Creative Works

Black men tend to be stereotyped as threatening and, as a result, may be disproportionately targeted by police even when unarmed. Here, we found evidence that biased perceptions of young Black men's physical size may play a role in this process. The results of 7 studies showed that people have a bias to perceive young Black men as bigger (taller, heavier, more muscular) and more physically threatening (stronger, more capable of harm) than young White men. Both bottom-up cues of racial prototypicality and top-down information about race supported these misperceptions. Furthermore, this racial bias persisted even among a target sample …

The Relationship Between Pre-Verbal Event Representations And Semantic Structures: The Case Of Goal And Source Paths, Laura Lakusta, Danielle Spinelli, Kathryn Garcia

Department of Psychology Faculty Scholarship and Creative Works

We explored the nature of infants’ concepts for goal path and source path in motion events (e.g., the duck moved into the bowl/out of the bowl), specifically asking how infants’ representations could support the acquisition of the semantic roles of goal path and source path in language. The results showed that 14.5-month-old infants categorized goal paths across different motion events (moving to X, moving on Y), and they also categorized source paths if the source reference objects were highly salient (relatively large in size and colorful). Infants at 10 months also categorized goal paths, suggesting that the broad concept GOAL …

Trigger Warnings: From Panic To Data, Francesca Laguardia, Venezia Michalsen, Holly Rider-Milkovich

Department of Justice Studies Faculty Scholarship and Creative Works

Following a practice that originated online, university faculty and staff have increasingly used “trigger warnings” to alert students to the possibility that they might be affected or even harmed by potentially traumatic material. This practice has led to a passionate debate about whether such warnings stifle or encourage student expression and academic freedom, and whether they are beneficial or detrimental to learning. In this article, we illustrate the history and current state of this debate and examine the scientific support for the arguments for and against the use of such warnings. Specifically, we question the scientific basis for the suggestion …

Trigger Warnings: From Panic To Data, Francesca Laguardia, Venezia Michalsen

Department of Justice Studies Faculty Scholarship and Creative Works

Following a practice originated online, university faculty and staff have increasingly used “trigger warnings” to alert students to the possibility that they might be affected or even harmed by potentially traumatic material. This practice has led to a passionate debate about whether such warnings stifle or encourage student expression and academic freedom, and whether they are beneficial or detrimental to learning. In this article, we illustrate the history and current state of this debate, and examine the scientific support for the arguments for and against the use of such warnings. Specifically, we question the scientific basis for the suggestion that …

Cognitive And Personality Characteristics Of Masculinity And Femininity Predict Wayfinding Competence And Strategies Of Men And Women, Jennifer Yang, Edward C. Merrill

Department of Psychology Faculty Scholarship and Creative Works

Bem (1974) reconceptualized masculinity and femininity as independent and orthogonal constructs that both men and women possess to varying degrees. This perspective was used as a starting point to investigate whether the contributions of gender-typed characteristics can help to account for commonly observed gender differences in wayfinding (the ability to identify one’s current location and successfully navigate to an unseen location in the environment) favoring men. We further divided gender-typed characteristics into cognitive and personality characteristics to assess their separate influence on wayfinding and explored whether gender-typed characteristics predicted self-reported use of masculine wayfinding strategies (i.e., orientation strategies) and self-reported …

Innovations In Practice: The Relationship Between Sleep Disturbances, Depression, And Interpersonal Functioning In Treatment For Adolescent Depression, Eleanor Mcglinchey, Jazmin Reyes-Portillo, J Blake Turner, Laura Mufson

Department of Psychology Faculty Scholarship and Creative Works

Sleep disturbance is frequently comorbid with depression and sleep complaints are the most common residual symptoms after treatment among adolescents with depression. The present analyses investigated the effect of sleep disturbance in depressed adolescents treated with interpersonal psychotherapy for adolescents (IPT-A) versus treatment as usual (TAU) in school-based mental health clinics.

Serotonin Transporter-Independent Actions Of The Antidepressant Vortioxetine As Revealed Using The Sert Met172 Mouse, Alex G. Nackenoff, Linda D. Simmler, Nicole L. Baganz, Alan Pehrson, Connie Sánchez, Randy D. Blakely

Department of Psychology Faculty Scholarship and Creative Works

Selective serotonin (5-HT, SERT) reuptake inhibitors (SSRIs) are the most commonly prescribed treatments for depression. However, they have delayed efficacy and can induce side-effects that can encourage discontinuation. Recently, agents have been developed, including vortioxetine (Trintellix), that augment SERT blockade with interactions at other targets. At therapeutic doses, vortioxetine interacts with SERT as well as 5-HT1A, 5-HT1B, 5-HT3, and 5-HT7 receptors. We assessed the SERT-dependency of vortioxetine action using the SERT Met172 mouse model, which disrupts high-affinity interactions of many antidepressants with the transporter. We demonstrate that the SERT Met172 substitution induces an ∼19-fold loss in vortioxetine potency for SERT …

And, The Winner Is…A Visual Preference For Endpoints Over Starting Points In Infants’ Motion Event Representations, Laura Lakusta, Stephanie Difabrizio

Department of Psychology Faculty Scholarship and Creative Works

Infants represent objects that are endpoints in motion events and show a preference for encoding the endpoint (the duck waddles into a bowl) over the starting point (the duck waddles out of a box). This asymmetry continues to appear in nonlinguistic cognition and language throughout development. This study tests whether this asymmetry also shows up in 16-month-old infants’ visual preferences for motion events, and if so, for which types of events. Infants looked longer at events depicting an “agentive” figure (e.g., duck) moving into an object (endpoint) than out of an object (starting point), and this asymmetry persisted even when …

The Impact Of Trial Penalty And Evidence Strength On Plea Deal Decision-Making, Yaritza Diaz

Theses, Dissertations and Culminating Projects

Despite its popular use in the U.S. legal system, research on plea bargaining and the factors that affect plea bargain decision-making is limited. Although it has been argued that plea bargaining is necessary to the efficiency of the courts (Williams-Fisher, 2005), critics of the practice argue that offers of leniency relative to the threat of the trial penalty may be coercive, so much so that even innocent defendants can be compelled to plead guilty (Bibas, 2004; Givelber, 1996). Others have argued that defendants are at a disadvantage in the negotiations because they are rarely privy to the evidence held by …

The Effect Of Temporal Gap On The Combination Of Auditory Information, Patrick Dwyer

Theses, Dissertations and Culminating Projects

Past research has indicated different models of combination may be activated when an individual perceives information as coming from the same source (Treisman, 1998; Ernst, 2004). Moreover, auditory perception research has indicated that a temporal window of integration exists around sounds that are separated by 160 ms or less (Yabe et al, 1998). The current experiment investigated if predictions from an independent decisions model would hold when multiple sounds were played with a gap more or less than 150 ms. We hypothesized that when the gap between cues was 150 ms, the independent decisions model prediction would differ significantly from …

Who Participates? Who Leads? What Are The Outcomes For College Students In Co-Curricular Activities?, Nicole Ashley Alonso

Theses, Dissertations and Culminating Projects

Sessa and London's learning model (Sessa & London 2006, London & Sessa, 2006) was used to generate hypotheses suggesting that readiness to learn predicts which college students chose to respond to learning triggers in the institutional context of a university (i.e. co- or extra-curricular activities, take on leader roles) and that participation leads to such learning outcomes as higher GP A, psycho-social development, and flourishing/wellbeing. One-hundred and sixty-eight students who varied in their participation levels (no participation beyond the classroom, participation in co-curricular activities, clubs, sports, etc., and involved in leader roles) filled out an online survey. Results partially support …

The Relationship Between Depressive Symptomology, Motivational Deficits And Striatal Activity In Traumatic Brain Injury (Tbi), Angela Spirou

Theses, Dissertations and Culminating Projects

Individuals with traumatic brain injury (TBI) have been shown to have high prevalence rates of depression. Reward processing and motivational deficits have been shown to be associated with depression, since both constructs rely on the ffonto-striatal network. In this study, we examined depressive symptomology, motivational tendencies and striatal activation during wins and losses in individuals with TBI. Participants (TBI and healthy controls [HC]) completed a gambling task composed of wins and losses in an MRI scanner. Depressive symptomology was assessed with the Chicago Multiscale Depression Inventory (CMDI), while motivational tendencies were assessed with the Behavioral Inhibition/Behavioral Activation (BIS/BAS) scale. Significant …