Psychology Commons^™

Examining The Effects Of Noise And Task Dependent Performance In Prosody Perception In Autistic Individuals, Zehranur Sasal

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

ABSTRACT

Objective: It is known that autistic individuals have enhanced abilities in pitch discrimination and tend to excel in low-level tasks requiring lower cognitive processing. On the other hand, noise is a distracting factor in many areas of life, including prosody perception. The studies presented in this thesis aimed to understand prosody perception through different levels of cognitive tasks and under the influence of speech background noise.

Methods: In total, 256 non-autistic and 39 high-functioning autistic adults participated in these studies. In the first study, participants were asked to listen to brief utterances conveying one of six universally accepted emotions …

The Long-Term Effects Of Cannabis On Attention To Motion, Rachel Mccaig

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

The purpose of the following study was to investigate the long-term effects of cannabis use on attention to motion.

Methods: Cannabis users, who varied in age of onset of use, were compared to control participants after abstaining from cannabis for at least 24 hours. One-hundred and ninety-seven participants engaged in a cognitive assessment followed by a motion discrimination task and an attention to motion task. The assessment consisted of a series of standard tasks that measured a range of cognitive processes such as attention, memory, and executive functioning. The motion discrimination task assessed the participants’ abilities in discriminating between various …

Agents At Work: Modeling How Space Can Influence People In The Workplace, Jovan Poposki

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

People interact with space in ways that are important to consider when designing an office. Not considering this relationship has led to the dissatisfaction of employees post-occupancy. In this thesis, I present an agent-based model that incorporates several characteristics of agents, such as work ethic and sociability, and explores their behaviours and social interactions in the workplace. The model is first tested on a commercial workspace, varying agent parameters to see how they change the behaviour of the model. I find that agents with extreme personalities are happiest, and show a bimodality in the distribution of time spent in various …

Visual Perception And Action In Reaching During Upper Limb Obstacle Avoidance, Nondon Chakraborty

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

During everyday activities, people reach to specific objects with their hands and avoid obstacles. For people to move successfully through an obstacle gap, it is necessary to be able to accurately perceive the actions that the surroundings afford and adjust hand movements accordingly. Reaching behaviours, including planning (perception) and execution (action), depend on visual information. This study aimed to understand and detect the differences between perceptual judgment and actual performance of both hands during a reaching task at the time of obstacle avoidance by using a hand-scaled approach. Participants were young adults (male (n=7) and female (n=10) aged 18 to …

Investigating The Inhibition Of The Return Of Attention In The Tactile Domain, Robert Plax

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

Purpose: The time-course needed to elicit tactile inhibition of return (IOR) has not been well-defined due to the paucity of research in this area especially studies investigating spatial discrimination. Reportedly tactile IOR uses higher-order mental representations to orient attention spatially yet the properties of low-level dermatomal maps may better account for how IOR orients tactile attention in space although its contribution is unclear. The present study sought to establish a time-course that evokes IOR in a unimodal tactile spatial discrimination task and decouples the contribution of the dermatome from higher-order representations. Methods: Two conditions containing distinct tactile cue-target paradigms designed …

Manipulating Sensory Information: Obstacle Clearance Strategies Between Middle-Aged Children And Young Adults, Victoria Rapos

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

Individuals constantly navigate through a complex environment, stepping over and around obstacles in order to reach an end goal. Successful adaptive locomotion involves the integration of information from the three primary sensory systems: vision, somatosensory, and vestibular, in order to successfully reach an end goal. Obstacle crossing is a form of adaptive locomotion that demonstrates a clear relationship between perception and action integration, ensuring proper foot placement, step length, and walking speed. Moreover, the addition of a second obstacle within 1m from the first obstacle requires proper motor planning and anticipatory strategies in order to be successful. Previous research has …

The Influence Of Real-Time Visual Feedback Training On Vocal Control, Justeena N. Zaki-Azat

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

Trained singers have better vocal control when compared to singers without vocal training. The development of precise vocal control, like any motor skill, requires practice with some form of feedback, such as auditory feedback. In addition to auditory feedback, singing training programs use online visual feedback to improve performance accuracy. The purpose of this thesis is to investigate the recent body of literature concerning the cognitive processing of vocal control, and apply this knowledge practically to develop an effective real-time visual feedback training program that enhances vocal control. In the first of two studies, non-singers and singers were randomly assigned …

The Influence Of Freedom And Choice In Action Selection And The Valence Of Action-Outcomes On The Sense Of Agency, Zeynep Barlas Wilfrid Laurier University

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

Sense of agency (SoA) refers to the subjective experience that one is the author of their actions and the ensuing outcomes of these actions. Previous research have suggested that both sensorimotor processes and high level inferences can contribute to the SoA. In five experiments, the present thesis examined the effects of action selection processes and the valence of action-outcomes on the SoA. The majority of these experiments measured the SoA by obtaining both subjective feeling of control (FoC) judgments over the action-outcomes, and assessing the size of intentional binding. Intentional binding refers to the perceived temporal attraction between actions and …

An Examination Of The Factors That Dictate The Relative Weighting Of Feedback And Feedforward Input For Speech Motor Control, Nichole E. Scheerer

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

Speech is arguably the most important form of human communication. Fluent speech production relies on auditory feedback for the planning, execution, and monitoring of speech movements. Auditory feedback is particularly important during the acquisition of speech, however, it has been suggested that over time speakers rely less on auditory feedback as they develop robust sensorimotor representations that allow speech motor commands to be executed in a feedforward manner. The studies reported in this thesis recorded speaker’s vocal and neural responses to altered auditory feedback in order to explore the factors that dictate the relative importance of auditory feedback for speech …

An Investigation Of The Increased Reliance On Familiarity In Associative Recognition Of Unitized Compound Word Pairs, Fahad Naveed Ahmad

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

Unitization refers to when two components are integrated or combined into a single unit. So the whole is more familiar than the parts (Graf & Schacter, 1989). Previous researchers have shown unitization of unrelated word pairs can occur by the use of compound definition. As support, they have found unitization to increase reliance on familiarity in associative recognition. The purpose of this PhD dissertation was to examine the effects of unitization of preexperimental associations on associative recognition. The effects of associative recognition of unitized compound word (CW) pairs can serve as a useful benchmark to compare to that of other …

A Heart-Based Sufi Mindfulness Spiritual Practice Employing Self-Journeying, Faruk Arslan

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

Spiritual Psychology is the study and practice of the art and science of the human evolution of consciousness. The heart occupies an important place in Sufism and is considered to contain the divine spark that leads to spiritual realization. Fethullah Gülen’s action-oriented Sufi methods described in his book series “The Emerald Hills of the Heart” provides the basis for a heart-based therapeutic intervention through self-journeying, which is the objective of this thesis. These self-purification and mindfulness-related transpersonal methods generate a form of treatment that is culturally sensitive. Through my reflections in this research, I transformed my personal experiences into …

Minimizing A Potential Threat: The Effects Of Closeness On Perceptions Of Teasing, Glen Gorman

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

Recent research has shown that when teasing occurs between two people, the intentions of the teaser are not always known, or appreciated by the recipient of the tease, thus creating a rift between the teaser and the target (Kruger et al, 2006). Targets of teasing tended to rate the tease and the intentions of the teaser more negatively than did the teaser. The purpose of the present research was to examine perceptions of teasing within the context of close relationships. Although teasing may be perceived as a threatening situation, members of a close interpersonal relationship may be motivated to lessen …

Audiovisual Speech Perception: A Speech Production Approach, Michelle A. Jarick

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

The purpose of these studies was to test the main assumptions outlined in the Motor Theory of speech perception that (1) speech perception is linked to speech production, (2) audiovisual integration of speech occurs automatically and after the motor commands are activated, and (3) we perceive the intended gestures, which are extracted by a specialized ‘phonetic module’ in the brain. In Experiment 1, we used a Stroop-like paradigm, where participants viewed and listened to a speaker producing speech syllables (/aba/ or /aga/) in three conditions: audio-only, visual-only, and audiovisual. Participants were asked to ignore irrelevant speech stimuli, and to identify …

Visualizing The Future: Can 'She' Predict Project Completion More Accurately Than 'I' Can?, Jenny Deslauriers

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

Although people often make overly optimistic predictions of when their own projects will be completed, neutral observers tend to be more realistic. Study 1 examined whether people would make more accurate predictions for their own projects by adopting the visual perspective of an observer. Participants identified a personal project that they hoped to complete in the next two weeks, and predicted when it would be finished. To vary visual perspective, participants were instructed either to visualize the project through their own eyes as if it was actually occurring (first person perspective), to picture themselves and their surroundings as an observer …

Looking Forward To Fitness: The Effects Of Time Perception On Exercise Behaviour, Lianne Mclellan

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

Previous research has shown that people induced with a future-oriented time perspective were more likely to adhere to an exercise program because they were focused on the benefits of exercise and therefore better able to overcome short-term (ST) costs. The current research aimed to extend these findings by examining time perception—how close or distant the future benefits of exercise subjectively feel. Three studies examined participants’ perceptions of the ST and long-term (LT) benefits of exercise on their motivation to be physically active and their subsequent exercise behaviour. Study l found that having a future time perspective was related to higher …

The Effects Of Misleading Information And Group Discussion On Eyewitness Testimony, Matthew A. Cook

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

The purpose of the present studies was to assess the separate and interactive effects of misinformation and group discussion on eyewitness testimony. In Experiments 1and 2, participants viewed a short video of a simulated robbery and shooting, and were then presented with either neutral or misleading information that was embedded in forced-choice questionnaires in a recognition test. Participants were subsequently randomly assigned to a group-recognition or individual-recognition condition. Groups were instructed to answer questions about details of the video (in Experiment 1 they were instructed to try to reach consensus), while individuals completed the recognition task on their own. Finally, …

Psychological Mechanisms Responsible For The Moderating Effects Of Need For Cognition On Attractiveness Stereotyping, Samantha D. Hansen

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

This thesis focuses on the psychological mechanisms responsible for the moderating role of need for cognition (NFC) in attractiveness stereotyping. Attractiveness stereotyping refers to the tendency to attribute more positive characteristics to attractive than to unattractive individuals. Recent research has found that people high in NFC show less of this attractiveness bias. The present research used two approaches to test the hypothesis that NFC moderates the bias because persons higher in NFC have greater motivation and ability to engage in systematic thought processes. First it included measures to assess the types of thoughts that participants high and low in NFC …

A Voice For Our Future: High-Risk Adolescents' Perceptions And Experiences About Help And Healing Interventions, Cameron Dale Norman

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

This critical ethnography examines the perceptions of adolescents at-risk with respect to their experiences of help, both formal and informal. Ten (10) adolescents who had been involved with the Bridges psychoeducational program, an interagency partnership intervention for high-risk youth in the Waterloo region, were interviewed about their experience with the programs and people who attempt to support them. Placing great importance on using the adolescent’s words to speak to their own needs and experiences, this study's main findings suggest that adolescents are not given voice by many helpers; most help agents fail to truly help these adolescents in a meaningful …

The List-Strength Effect And Categorical Frequency Memory: Tests Of Availability, Joanne Bonanno

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

The availability view of memory mantains that the retrieval of categorical frequency information is a function of recall of category exemplars. The List-Strength Effect (LSE), which is evidenced when increasing the strength of competing items in a list reduces memory for the other items, has been found to be a characteristic of recall, but not recognition, performance. The present study was designed to (a) further examine the relationship between cued recall and frequency judgments of category exemplars by testing for the presence of a LSE in categorical frequency estimation; and (b) to examine the role that estimation strategies may play …

Development And Validation Of A Tool To Measure Temporal Orientation, Yolanda Martins

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

Individuals are thought to differ in the extent to which their day-to-day thoughts, feelings, and fantasies focus on the past or future (i.e., temporal orientation). This thesis describes the continued development of a multidimensional measure of temporal orientation that includes the following four subscales: (1) negative future orientation, (2) positive future orientation, (3) negative past orientation, and (4) positive past orientation. Two studies were conducted. In study one, 921 introductory psychology students completed the thirty-item Temporal Orientation Scale (TOS). Based on analyses of the 30-item initial version of the scale, a refined 21-item version of the TOS was developed. In …

An Ounce Of Prevention: The Life Stories And Perceptions Of Men Who Sexually Offended Against Children, Christiane Sadeler

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

The purpose of this study is to modify primary prevention models in child sexual abuse by incorporating the perceptions of men who sexually offended against children. In open-ended, conversational style interviews I asked 10 men, who are/were involved in self-help community based treatment groups at Community Justice Initiatives (CJI), Waterloo Region, to convey their understanding of how sexual abuse could have been prevented in their own lives, and can be prevented in our communities. The participants shared their views about prevention based on their experiences, and their interpretations of these experiences. I based the research results on the stories I …

Changing Authoritarians' Attitudes: The Role Of Authority Legitimacy, Bruce Allen Parker

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

This study investigated the tendency of right-wing authoritarians (RWAs) to yield to established and legitimate authorities. University students enrolled in an Introductory Psychology course read two persuasive passages. One passage concerned whether homosexuals should be allowed to become schoolteachers, while the other discussed whether an aggressive proselytizing religious group should be allowed to recruit students on university campuses. Some of the participants were informed that the passage was written by a highly established and legitimate authority; others were told the passage came from a less established and legitimate authority. In addition, the passages were manipulated so that half supported and …

Planting The Seeds Of Hope: Research And Action On Body Image Of University Students, Michelle Poechman Fisher

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

A number of researchers have expressed concern regarding the growing prevalence of body dissatisfaction, especially among North American women. Such body dissatisfaction is often linked to dieting, weight concerns, excessive exercise, poor nutrition, and eating disorders. In order to expand our awareness and understanding of university students’ needs with regards to issues concerning body image, a needs assessment was conducted in two universities located in southwestem Ontario. In focus groups and individual interviews, students were asked directly about the issues they find most troublesome, their experiences in the recovery process, and their needs for supportive and preventive interventions. In order …

A Developmental Evaluation Of Frequency Information In Lists, Scripts, And Stories, Deborah Ann Connolly

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

In three experiments, the age-invariance hypothesis of frequency memory of Hasher and Zacks was tested. Children and adults listened to atypical actions presented in lists, or embedded in stories that described activities that are scripted, or in stories that described unfamiliar activities. Results from the list-conditions supported the age-invariance hypothesis. Age differences were found in the story conditions; however, they appeared at high, not at low, presented frequencies. The findings are discussed in terms of a developmental change in ability to retrieve the information needed to accurately judge frequency. The results are also discussed in relation to the Script-Pointer—Plus-Tag theory …

Base Rates, Individuating Information, Expertise, And Transfer Of Knowledge In Judgment Under Uncertainty, Owen Helmkay

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

Numerous studies suggest that in judging an individual’s category membership, people largely ignore the population frequency membership in the category (base rate information) in favour of the individuating information about that particular individual (more commonly referred to as the “Base Rate Fallcy”: Bar-Hillel, 1980). One particularly interesting strategy that has been shown to increase the use of base rate information is what Ginossar and Trope (1987) refer to as the Prior Activation Assumption. The purpose of this thesis was to extend the boundaries of Ginossar and Trope’s (1987) findings by enhancing participants’ use of base rate information through the manipulation …

Assessment Of Visual/Orthographic Awareness In Beginning Readers, Hope Elizabeth Lemoine

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

Various models reading development (Frith, 1985; Gough & Hillenger, 1980; Marsh, Friedman, Welch, & Desberg, 1981) have suggested that word shape is of critical important to early readers when recognizing words they know. As children progress through the early stages of reading, critical features such as first letter then become the important definers of word recognitions among early readers until they are at a much more advanced stage (Frith, 1985). More generally, advanced orthographic awareness among early readers is not considered to play an important role until children are older and have established a more advanced reading vocabulary. The purpose …

Sex Differences In Empathic Processing As Related To Moral Reasoning Patterns In Hypothetical And Real-Life Moral Dilemmas, Sheree Anne Bradford

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

Some sex and empathy differences have been found in moral reasoning patterns in adults (e.g., Pratt, Golding, and Kerig, in press; Walker and DeVries, 1985). However, until recently the area of moral judgment was severely restricted by an exclusive focus on the measures of a few researchers such as Kohlberg (1969, 1976, 1981, 1984). Gilligan (1977, 1982) has been primarily responsible for the upsurge of interest and resultant diversification of measures in this area of individual differences. The present paper examined in detail how sex differences and level of empathy affect moral reasoning patterns in individuals between 18 and 25 …

The Effect Of Priming, Christian Orthodox Beliefs, And Training On Critical Thinking, Cheryl Norry

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

This study investigated the extent to which pro and antireligious individuals responded objectively and critically to religious and nonreligious material. Proreligious (n=72) and antireligious (n=72) individuals, as determined by Fullerton and Hunsberger’s (1982) Christian Orthodoxy Scale, were selected from 507 introductory psychology students. They judged the logical soundness of 30 syllogisms (10 proreligious, 10 antireligious, and 10 neutral) following a priming task (critical, religious, or neutral). Prior to the analysis of the syllogisms, half of the subjects were given logic training, while the other half did not receive any instruction in logic. Dependent variables included critical ability (i.e., the number …

The Relationship Between Long-Term Psychiatric Clients’ Psychological Well-Being And Their Perceptions Of Housing And Social Support, Mary E. Earls

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

The present research examined whether quality of housing and quality/quantity of social support were related to long-term psychiatric clients’ perceptions of psychological well-being. The participants were 89 persons between the ages of 18 to 65, who had been hospitalized for psychiatric problems at least twice and who had been diagnosed as schizophrenic, chronic depressive, or manic-depressive. A structured interview schedule was used which incorporated measures of each of the variables. Results indicated that quality of housing was inversely correlated with Negative Affect, but unrelated to Positive Affect. Support satisfaction was negatively correlated with Negative Affect, and frequency of support was …

The Effects Of Training On The Quantification Of Uncertainty, Stephen P. Claxton-Oldfield

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

The use of intuitive heuristics has been put forward as an explanation for people’s assessment of probabilities (Kahneman & Tversky, 1972, 1973; Tversky & Kahneman, 1971, 1974). This phenomenon is seen as robust since “experts” (professional psychologists) make use of the same heuristics as “novices” (laypeople), despite having “had extensive training in statistics” (Tversky & Kahneman, 1974, p. 1130). However, replacing probability calculus with heuristics can lead to systematic errors and biases in probabilistic judgments. This study was designed to investigate the effects of statistical training on how people think about probabilistic judgments. Subjects’ knowledge base of probabilistic concepts, as …