Psychology Commons^™

Examining The Relations Among Trauma, Distress, Resilience, And Physical Health, Kathryn Elizabeth Chaisson

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

This study examined the role of traumatic distress as a mediator in the relation between trauma exposure and somatic malaise and healthcare utilization. Resilience was examined as a moderator between trauma exposure and somatic malaise and healthcare utilization, then between trauma exposure and traumatic distress. A total of 206 female participants recruited from an obstetrics and gynecology specialty practice completed measures of trauma exposure, traumatic distress, resilience, somatic malaise, and healthcare utilization. Multiple hierarchical regressions were performed to test the hypothesized relations. Results indicated that trauma exposure was a significant predictor of traumatic distress and resilience, and of somatic malaise …

Using Behavioral Incentives To Promote Exercise Compliance In Women With Cocaine Dependence, Leila Islam

Theses and Dissertations

To date, low rates of patient compliance have made it impractical to study whether regular exercise can contribute to positive outcomes in women with substance use disorders (SUD). One robust strategy for promoting and maintaining behavior change is contingency management (CM). CM has been used successfully to reinforce drug abstinence, treatment attendance, and other pro-social behaviors. CM delivers incentives (prizes) contingent upon target behaviors, though can be expensive. To reduce costs, CM is often delivered with an escalating variable-ratio schedule, first tested by Petry and colleagues (2005). As a Stage Ib behavioral therapies development project (Rounsaville et al., 2001), the …

The Impact Of Sexual Arousal On The Category Specificity Of Women's Visual Attention To Erotic Stimuli, Sarah Jones

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Research has shown that women have a much less category-specific pattern of visual attention to erotic stimuli than do men. That is, when simultaneously presented with male and female erotic stimuli, heterosexual women attend much more evenly to both male and female erotic stimuli than do heterosexual men, who attend almost exclusively to female stimuli. The present study investigated one proposed explanation for women's more diffuse visual attention patterns - that erotic female images have arousal value for heterosexual women. To test this hypothesis, heterosexual women were presented with either a 12-minute neutral, non-arousing video (n = 19) or a …

Raising Daughters To Become Leaders, Susan R. Madsen

Susan R. Madsen

The purpose of this six-minute message is to share, in an engaging way, some key highlights from a variety of studies on how high profile women were raised to become leaders. It will focus on what influencers (e.g., parents, siblings, and relatives) did to rear their daughters, granddaughters, nieces, etc. to become the influential women they are today.

Social Affiliation: A Model Of Anxious Avoidance In Women, Milena Stoyanova

Department of Psychology: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

There is substantial evidence demonstrating that women experience greater anxiety and fear compared to men. However, our understanding of specific factors accounting for women’s greater vulnerability remains rather limited. Taylor and colleagues (2000) proposed that women may have a different biobehavioral response to stress, which has evolved to protect and nurture offspring. The tend-and-befriend model provides new opportunities to explore underlying processes that may contribute to women’s greater anxiety and fear.

The present study examined women’s stress response combined with the absence of positive social contact as it relates to the presentation of fear and anxiety. One hundred and seven …

Power, Likeability, And Perception: Evaluating Men And Women In High And Low Power Positions, Daria A. Bakina

Psychology - Dissertations

When asked, it is relatively easy to come up with an example of a position of high power (e.g., president) or low power (e.g., intern). One can imagine the types of tasks or behaviors each of those positions entails. The theories of social power detail how power is attained, the behaviors of individuals in power, and the consequences of those behaviors (e.g., French & Raven, 1959; Fiske & Depret, 1996; Keltner, Gruenfeld, & Anderson, 2003). Most of the studies on behaviors of high power individuals have found that no differences exist between the behaviors of high power men and women. …

Cognitive Conceptualizations And Schemata As Predictors Of Distress In Female Rape Victims, Tiffany Maria Artime

Dissertations

Rape is strikingly prevalent among undergraduate women, and victims show significant variability in their reactions to sexual victimization. The aim of this longitudinal study was to examine two cognitive processing factors that have been theorized to impact a woman’s levels of distress after being raped. One cognitive factor, rape conceptualization, broadly refers to the way a woman comes to understand and interpret the event as identified by her attributions of blame and perceptions of severity, wantedness, and consent. Schemata—or global, enduring beliefs about the self and world—represent the other cognitive factor examined in this study. Participants included 189 undergraduate women …

The Relationship Of Shame In The Treatment Of Antepartum Depression, Pennie F. Wilson

Doctor of Psychology (PsyD)

The purpose of this pilot study was to determine the relationship between shame, Antepartum Depression, and treatment seeking. Research shows that shame plays a role in Major Depression and other disorders. For the present study, the first hypothesis was that shame is positively correlated with Antepartum Depression as measured by the Edinburgh Postnatal Depression Scale. The second hypothesis was that shame would be negatively correlated with treatment seeking behaviors. The third hypothesis was that psychoeducation about Antepartum Depression could lower the level of shame and increase treatment seeking behavior. This study consisted of using the Edinburgh Postnatal Depression Scale to …

Vascular Depression: An Early Indicator Of Decline, Daniel Lee Paulson

Wayne State University Dissertations

Women over the age of 80 represent a rapidly growing demographic group. While older women live longer than men, they do so with more years of disability and frailty. The emergence of geriatric disorders such as vascular disease, depression, frailty and cognitive decline in the aging US population place additional strain and expense on the already over-burdened public health care system. Meanwhile, integrated models of care are associated with preserved functional independence, reduced medical costs, and greater satisfaction for both health care providers and patients. Implementation of integrated care demands process-models of disease that contextualize symptoms within broader patterns of …

The Effect Of Experience On Infants’ Visual Preferences, Jennifer Bolick, Jennifer L. Rennels

McNair Poster Presentations

Research has shown that 3 to 4-month-olds with female primary caregivers show visual preferences for female relative to male faces (Quinn, Yahr, Kuhn, Slater, & Pascalis, 2002). Facial experience is likely an important influence on these preferences. From birth, infants’ experiences guide face processing skills. This processing ability influences the development of efficient face recognition later in life. The following study investigated (1) How visual pref­erences are influenced by real world experience with males and females, and (2) How experi­ence affects older infants’ visual preferences (i.e., 10-month-olds).

The Relation Between Self-Compassion, Body Image, And Mood: How Do Women Internalize Weight-Related Feedback?, Nicole Helverson

PCOM Psychology Dissertations

Objective: Body dissatisfaction has been identified as a risk factor for depression and eating pathology, whereas, self-compassion has been associated with higher quality of life. This study sought to examine the relationship between negative body image and self-compassion as risk or protective factors for weight and body composition related feedback mood changes.

Method: This deception study used a true-experimental, pre- and post-test design in a sample of 117 female graduate and medical students and college staff, aged 18 to 45 years; women diagnosed with eating disorders were excluded. After completing baseline questionnaires (including mood, body image, and self-compassion), …

The Influence Of Gender And Alcohol Use On Depressive Symptoms Among Men And Women, Elizabeth Anne Peters

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This study investigated the extent to which gender influences self-reported prototypical and masculine-specific symptoms of depression in men and women and whether or not alcohol mediates this relationship. Secondly, this study evaluated the effectiveness of the Denver Comprehensive Depression Inventory (DCDI), in measuring prototypical and masculine-specific depressive symptoms in clinical and non-clinical samples of men and women.

This paper summarizes the literature on gender differences in depression and the assessment of depression and gender, and outlines the current research on masculine-specific depression. It is argued that current assessment instruments identify prototypical symptoms of depression, as outlined in the DSM-IV-TR, but …

Everyday Confrontation Of Discrimination: The Well-Being Costs And Benefits To Women Over Time., Mindi D. Foster

Psychology Faculty Publications

Taking action against discrimination has positive consequences for well-being (e.g., Cocking & Drury, 2004) but most of this research has focused on collective actions and has used methodologies assessing one point in time. This study therefore used a diary methodology to examine how women’s everyday confrontations of discrimination would affect measures of subjective and psychological well-being, and how these relationships would change over time. In a 28-day online diary study, women indicated their daily experience of discrimination, described their response, and completed measures of well-being. Results showed that at the beginning of the study, using indirect confrontation predicted greater well-being …

Why Don't I Look Like Her? The Impact Of Social Media On Female Body Image, Kendyl M. Klein

CMC Senior Theses

The purpose of this paper is to understand and criticize the role of social media in the development and/or encouragement of eating disorders, disordered eating, and body dissatisfaction in college-aged women. College women are exceptionally vulnerable to the impact that social media can have on their body image as they develop an outlook on their bodies and accept the developmental changes that occurred during puberty. This paper provides evidence that there is a relationship between the recent surge in disordered eating and high consumption of social media. I examine the ways in which traditional advertising has portrayed women throughout history, …

Generations Apart: A Mixed Methods Study Of Black Women’S Attitudes About Race And Social Activism, Carolyn D. Love

Antioch University Full-Text Dissertations & Theses

Since the beginning of slavery in the United States, Black women have been actively involved in the creation and formation of Black civil society. The abolitionist, Black women’s club, and civil rights movements challenged White supremacy and created institutions that fought for political, social, and economic justice. Historically, Black women have engaged in the struggle for group survival while at the same time fighting for institutional transformation to eliminate or change discriminatory policies, practices, and procedures. With each passing generation, Black women have led efforts of resistance against racial discrimination, gender bias, and class exploitation. However, with each passing generation, …

Women Who Study: Balancing The Dual Roles Of Postgraduate Student And Mother, Bailey Bosch

Theses: Doctorates and Masters

Although the value of educating mothers has been established in the previous research, little is known about the experiences of mothers who participate in higher education. What is known supports a largely negative portrayal of the experience; it seems that it is a difficult journey, filled with tension. This thesis reports on an exploration of the experiences of mothers who are postgraduate students in Australia. The research comprised of two phases: the first phase was a narrative study of the experiences of 14 Australian postgraduate student mothers. The second phase comprised of a Q-method study of 75 postgraduate student mothers, …

The Psycho-Social Impact Of Colorism Among African American Women: Crossing The Divide, Lauren A. Fultz

Browse all Theses and Dissertations

This study was designed to examine how skin tone discrimination affects African American women. The phenomenon of colorism is not exclusive to African American women, but the manifestations on this group are diverse, and the effects are unique. Previous research has shown that the experience of colorism is pervasive within the Black community and that most African American women have been, either culturally or personally, affected by intra-racial discrimination. This body of work used a focus group to investigate the experiences of African American women who were categorized according to their self ascribed skin tone group. It specifically explored skin …