Psychology Commons^™

The Other Race Effect : The Role Of Experience And Social Attiudes On Face Recognition, Emily Wheat

Master's Theses

The ORE is phenomenon whereby recognition for own race faces is better than recognition of other race faces. This study examines how non-perceptual factors—social context, attitudes, and experience—impact the ORE. Participants from three different racial groups (Caucasian, Black, Asian) completed a face recognition task screening faces for status-specific targets (baseline, perpetrator, victim), self-report measures of explicit bias and experience with members from other races and a measure of implicit bias. Results indicated that non-perceptual factors impact the ORE. Specifically, Caucasian participants revealed a reduced ORE for other race perpetrators in comparison to victims. Black participants revealed a reduced ORE for …

Shared Features And Similarity : Implications For Category Specificity And Normal Recognition, Daniel Kinka

Master's Theses

Patients with category-specific visual agnosia (CSVA) often exhibit a disproportionate difficulty recognizing objects from biological categories due (in part) to the fact that exemplars from biological categories tend to be visually and conceptually more similar. Similarity is often conceived of as a pairwise property (i.e., in terms of distance in a psychological space matrix), but may be more accurately conceived of as a setwise property (i.e., in terms of shared features). The purpose of this study is to examine the effect of shared features on similarity in normal observers, while controlling for distance in structural space. Behavioral and electrophysiological results …

Do We Know What We Know? Self- Assessment Across The Lifespan, Courtney Clare Lee

Master's Theses

Self-knowledge can play a critical role in navigating physical, cognitive, and social changes in late life. To protect and preserve one's sense of self against these changes, individuals may engage in self-enhancing and self-serving biases in areas important to self-esteem. The importance attached to these areas may change with age, and self-knowledge of these psychological processes may vary with age. We investigated self-enhancing biases and metacognitive awareness of abilities in adulthood. Participants ranging in age from 20 to 80 completed a series of tests assessing the better than average effect across a variety of age-relevant domains as well as objective …

The Quest Of A Lifetime : How The First Year Of University Of Richmond Life Affects Student's Spirituality And Religiosity, Melanie Martin

Honors Theses

First year university students’ religious and spiritual beliefs and attitudes were investigated over the course of the year. The survey used was largely made up of a subset of questions from the CSBV survey created by HERI and adapted and administered via Survey Monkey software to 153 first year students in the Fall Semester and 74 first year students in the Spring Semester at the University of Richmond. Students pray less and self-reflect more, are more likely to agree that the universe arose by chance, less likely to believe that ‘only religion can truly explain existence’, less likely to find …

Especially In This Economy : The Effect Of Personal And Situational Factors On Charitable Intentions And Attitudes Toward The Homeless, Eric M. Vanepps

Honors Theses

In response to tough economic times and difficulty meeting the need of homeless populations, many charities could use an improved understanding of what predicts and contributes to charitable intentions. The current studies sought to empirically address this issue. Study 1 results revealed that positive attitudes toward the homeless and charitable intentions predicted actual donation behavior. Study 2 results suggested that morality dimensions focused on fairness and harm predicted positive attitudes and charitable intentions. Additionally, a combination of moral commitment and interdependent self-construal predicted higher donation intentions. Study 3 examined how political affiliations and media coverage regarding the current state of …

What Counts? : Legitimizing Female Role Models, Audrey N. Innella

Honors Theses

The effect of exposure to female role models with gender specific attributes was examined in two studies. In Study 1 both women and men were presented with one of eight stimuli (role model gender: male or female; role model legitimacy attributes: organizational high, organizational low, social high, or social low). Results demonstrated women’s higher preference for female role models and vis‐à‐vis. Regression analyses demonstrated women’s preference for role models in general while men only preferred socially legitimate role models. In Study 2 both participants and role model exposure were limited to only women. Additionally a stereotype threat manipulation was added. …

Support Groups, Donelson R. Forsyth

Jepson School of Leadership Studies articles, book chapters and other publications

When people experience traumas, crises, or catastrophes, when they encounter medical or interpersonal difficulties that they cannot cope with by themselves, or if they simply need to find a sympathetic audience who will listen to their problems, they often turn to support groups: groups of people who meet to exchange social support about a problem or situation that they all have experienced. Support groups, which are also known as self-help groups, exist for nearly every major medical, psychological, or stress-related problem. Each one is likely to be unique in some respects, but most such groups are practical in focus …

The Impact Of Blatant Stereotype Activation And Group Sex-Composition On Female Leaders, Crystal L. Hoyt, Stefanie K. Johnson, Susan Elaine Murphy, Kerry Hogue Skinnell

Jepson School of Leadership Studies articles, book chapters and other publications

The individual and combined impact of blatant stereotype activation and solo status or mixed-sex groups on the self-appraisals, performance, and anxiety of female leaders was examined across three laboratory studies. The first study utilized a two-condition, two-stage design in which female leaders were exposed to a blatant stereotype threat or control condition after which they completed a leadership task. In the second stage, the threatened leaders received a solo status manipulation (leading a group of men) while the control condition did not. In the second study a 2 (blatant threat, no blatant threat) by 2 (solo status, all-female group) fully …

Group Processes And Group Psychotherapy: Social Psychological Foundations Of Change In Therapeutic Groups, Donelson R. Forsyth

Jepson School of Leadership Studies articles, book chapters and other publications

Social psychology and clinical psychology share an interest in change. Rather than assuming that people are static and that psychological systems are immutable, social psychologists track the shifts in social attitudes, actions, values, and beliefs that result from individuals' everyday interactions in their social worlds. Similarly, clinical psychologists examine changes in adjustment, well-being, and dysfunction that are evidenced as people develop psychologically and physically, confront new life circumstances, or react effectively or less adaptively to daily life events.

Why Does This Always Happen To Us? An Examination Of Co-Rumination In The Same Sex Friendships Of Emerging Adults, Teresa Michelle Preddy

Master's Theses

Co-rumination, which has been defined as a passive, repetitive form of problem discussion, has been linked to both benefits in terms of positive friendship quality and maladaptive outcomes such as internalizing distress. This study explored the trade-offs associated with co-rumination in emerging adult same-sex friendships both concurrently and longitudinally through the use of self-report questionnaires. Co-rumination was associated with concurrent positive friendship quality. Additionally, co-rumination partially mediated the link between gender and positive friendship quality, and was a marginal predictor of increases in positive friendship quality over time. Although co-rumination was associated with depression, co-rumination did not predict depressive symptoms …

Adult Attention-Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder, Laura E. Knouse, Steven A. Safren

Psychology Faculty Publications

Attention-Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) in adults is a valid and impairing disorder for which psychopharmacological and psychosocial treatments are recommended. Self-report ratings scales for adult ADHD can serve several functions in clinical work with this population including screening, providing information, in a comprehensive assessment, and tracking treatment-related change. The use of two symptom-based ratings scales for screening and tracking treatment progress- the Current Symptoms Scale (CSS) [5] and the Adult ADHD Self-Report Scale (ASRS) [6] - is outlined for the practicing clinician. Key issues in the assessment of adult ADHD are briefly discussed, highlighting the role of rating scales within …

Biography And The Social Cognition Of Leadership, George R. Goethals

Jepson School of Leadership Studies articles, book chapters and other publications

In this chapter, we'll discuss why we have a penchant for the depiction of leadership through the stories of individual leaders and why that tendency poses serious challenges to understanding leadership. One of the key distinctions in this collection of essays is the one between leaders and leadership. Following James MacGregor Burns, Richard Couto has tried to focus scholars and practitioners on the dynamics of leadership rather than on the lives of leaders. It may well be a losing battle. We'll try to explain why.

Our discussion proceeds as follows. First, we will discuss the ways human wiring leads us …

Leadership And The More-Important-Than-Average Effect: Overestimation Of Group Goals And The Justification Of Unethical Behavior, Crystal L. Hoyt, Terry L. Price, Alyson E. Emrick

Jepson School of Leadership Studies articles, book chapters and other publications

This research investigates the empirical assumptions behind the claim that leaders exaggerate the importance of their group’s goals more so than non-leaders and that they may use these beliefs to justify deviating from generally accepted moral requirements when doing so is necessary for goal achievement. We tested these biased thought processes across three studies. The results from these three studies established the more-important-than-average effect, both for real and illusory groups. Participants claimed that their group goals are more important than the goals of others, and this effect was stronger for leaders than for non-leading group members. In Study 3, …

Groups And Teams, Crystal L. Hoyt, Donelson R. Forsyth

Jepson School of Leadership Studies articles, book chapters and other publications

To understand leaders and leadership, one must understand groups and their dynamics. This chapter describes group-centered leadership, leading change in groups, leaders in groups, decision-making and leadership and social influence and leadership.

Therapy Groups, Donelson R. Forsyth

Jepson School of Leadership Studies articles, book chapters and other publications

Therapy groups are designed to promote the health and adjustment of their members. Initially used when the demand for services outstripped available health care providers, therapists discovered that group approaches offered unique benefits over more individualistic therapies. Some of these benefits include a reduced sense of isolation and uniqueness, mutual support, exposure to positive models, and the opportunity to develop coping skills by interacting with others. Therapists now use groups to address a variety of psychological and physical maladies, and their methods are as varied as those used in individual approaches. Even though the idea of having people suffering from …

Group Processes, Donelson R. Forsyth, Jeni Burnette

Jepson School of Leadership Studies articles, book chapters and other publications

Social behavior is often group behavior. People are in many respects individuals seeking their personal, private objectives, yet they are also members of social collectives that bind members to one another. The tendency to join with others is perhaps the most important single characteristic of humans. The processes that take place within these groups influence, in fundamental ways, their members and society-at-large. Just as the dynamic processes that occur in groups--such as the exchange of information among members, leading and following, pressures put on members to adhere to the group's standards, shifts in friendship alliances, and conflict and collaboration-change the …

The Nature And Significance Of Groups, Donelson R. Forsyth

Jepson School of Leadership Studies articles, book chapters and other publications

An understanding of group counseling requires an understanding of groups themselves, their basic nature and processes. Given that human beings are a social species and spend their lives in groups rather than alone, an individual-level analysis of adjustment, well-being, and treatment, with its focus on internal, psychological processes, should be supplemented by a group-level analysis. The defining features of a group are relationships linking a substantial number of members, boundaries, interdependence, structure, cohesion, and entitativity (perceived groupness): and groups with more of these features are more Influential than other forms of association, such as social networks. The chapter reviews a …

Groups And Teams, Crystal L. Hoyt, Donelson R. Forsyth

Jepson School of Leadership Studies articles, book chapters and other publications

To understand leaders and leadership, one must understand groups and their dynamics. Leadership can occur across great distances, as when a leader influences followers who are distributed across differing contexts, but in many cases leadership occurs in an intact group that exists in a specific locale: Teams, boards, advisory councils, and classrooms arc all examples of groups that work toward shared goals with, in many cases, the help and guidance of a leader. Leadership can be considered a set of personality traits or a specific set of behaviors enacted by an individual, but an interpersonal, group-level conceptualization considers Ieadership to …

Delphi Therapy, Donelson R. Forsyth

Jepson School of Leadership Studies articles, book chapters and other publications

The Delphi technique is a structured forecasting and decision-making method that assesses and summarizes the individually held opinions and judgments of group members with little or no discussion or deliberation among the members. Named for the legendary Delphic oracle, this method involves surveying members repeatedly, with the results of each round of surveys informing the framing of the questions for subsequent rounds. The Delphi technique avoids some of the limitations of traditional group decision-making procedures and is particularly useful when the group members are so widely divided on issues that a face-to-face discussion will not be productive.