Psychology Commons^™

Speaking From Places: A Phenomenological Deconstructive Study Of Children’S Places, Child-Centric Methods, And Politics., Sugandh Dixit

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation adopts an innovative phenomenological and deconstructive methodology to create a child-centric research process sensitive to facilitating, integrating, and representing children’s voices in designing their school playground. The study developed and employed two novel child-centric methods, an Embedded Walk and a Communal Child-Map Project in order to integrate parents’ and children’s experiences of the school spaces the authorities planned to renovate. Both methods reveal and complicate the socio-political dynamics that structure children’s, parents’, and researchers’ stances towards children’s places and worlds. During the Embedded Walk, children led their parents through their play spaces and they collaboratively documented the childrens’ …

Gaze Patterns Of Social And Nonsocial Stimuli: A Possible Early Marker For Autism Spectrum Disorder, Ashley Rose Doll

Dissertations, Theses, and Projects

The push for early identification and diagnosis of Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) has led to new developments in this area of research. Eye tracking is a promising behavioral screening measure that has been heavily investigated for over a decade. Differences in eye gaze between typically developing (TD) children and children with ASD when viewing social and nonsocial videos have been observed, but only within videos of children playing as social stimuli and with geometric shapes as nonsocial stimuli (Pierce et al., 2016; Shaffer et al., 2017). In addition to social stimuli and geometric shapes, the current study expanded on previous …

Prenatal Risk For Autism Spectrum Disorder (Asd): Fetal Cortisol Exposure Predicts Child Asd Symptoms, Sheena Ram, Mariann A. Howland, Curt A. Sandman, Elyssia Poggi Davis, Laura M. Glynn

Psychology Faculty Articles and Research

The etiology of autism spectrum disorder (ASD) is multifactorial, complex, and likely involves interactions among genetic, epigenetic, and environmental factors. With respect to environmental influences, a growing literature implicates intrauterine experiences in the origin of this pervasive developmental disorder. In this prospective longitudinal study, we examined the hypothesis that fetal exposure to maternal cortisol may confer ASD risk. In addition, because ASD is four times more prevalent in males than in females, and because sexually dimorphic responses to intrauterine experiences are commonly observed, we examined whether or not any associations differ by fetal sex. Maternal plasma cortisol was measured at …

Syndemics Of Severity And Frequency Of Elder Abuse: A Cross-Sectional Study In Mexican Older Females, Mireya Vilar-Compte, Pablo Gaitán-Rossi

Department of Public Health Scholarship and Creative Works

Background: Elder abuse is a common phenomenon with important effects on the health and well-being of older adults. There are important gaps in elder abuse measurement, as it is usually reported as the absence or presence of elder abuse, disregarding its severity and frequency.

Objectives: Identify different ways of measuring severity and frequency of elder abuse and assess whether different experiences of severity and frequency suggest syndemic relationships.

Methods: Through a sample of 534 non-institutionalized Mexican older women, we assessed how severity (i.e., number of abusive experiences and number of types of abuses) and frequency (i.e., if abusive experiences had …

Conversational Movement Dynamics And Nonverbal Indicators Of Second Language Development: A Microgenetic Approach, Kristine Marie Bragg

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

This dissertation study extends on current understandings of gesture and embodied interaction with the eco-social environment in second language development (SLD) while introducing new aspects of movement analysis through dynamical modeling. To understand the role of embodiment during learning activities, a second language learning task has been selected. Dyads consisting of a non-native English-speaking student and a native English-speaking tutor were video recorded during writing consultations centered on class assignments provided by the student. Cross-recurrence quantification analysis was used to measure interactional movement synchrony between the members of each dyad. Results indicate that students with varied English proficiency levels synchronize …

Maternal Immune Activation (Mia) In Mice: A Study To Phenotype Asd-Related Communication Behaviors And Analyze Maternal Health Outcomes In The Us, Komalpreet Gulati

Honors Scholar Theses

Core symptoms of Autism Spectrum Disorders (ASD) include deficits in social/communicative behaviors, and repetitive/stereotyped behaviors. Mouse models are a highly established paradigm used to study the phenotypic deficits that result from various inducible genotypic or environmental risk factors for ASD. Previous studies have demonstrated a link between maternal immune activation (MIA) and ASD-like behaviors in mouse models. In this model, the maternal immune system is activated during pregnancy by injecting the viral mimic poly(I:C). The resulting offspring are phenotyped and analyzed with regards to their communicative behaviors.

Previous studies have demonstrated that male pups born to dams with immune activation …

Wellness And Prevention Program Sustainability Design For Clark University Athletics Department, Emily Corbett

International Development, Community and Environment (IDCE)

The purpose of this work is to design a wellness based prevention program that is tailored to fit the campus community within Clark University, Worcester, MA, called the Peer Athletes Advocating for Wellness (PAAW) initiative. This paper first presents the current research on wellness related issues within a college campus, specifically surrounding sexual violence. It then outlines the current sexual violence prevention programming that takes place yearly for incoming first year students at Clark University, as well as a one-time initiative during which student athletes participated in the sexual violence prevention programming. There is a review of the current most …

Early Childhood Teacher Turnover In Nebraska, Amy M. Roberts, Kathleen C. Gallagher, Susan Sarver, Alexandra Daro

Buffet Early Childhood Institute Reports and Publications

Teacher turnover is a serious challenge across early childhood settings. Turnover can be expensive for early childhood programs, burdensome to staff, and harmful to children throughout the nation. Nebraska is no exception. This research brief describes teacher turnover in the state’s early care and education settings, including licensed child care, state-funded PreK, and Kindergarten through Grade 3.

Research Questions The following research questions were asked across early childhood programs (licensed child care, state-funded PreK, and K-3): 1. What was the average rate of annual teacher turnover? 2. According to administrators, what was the most common reason teachers left their employment? …

The Effects Of Emotion Socialization On Internalizing Behaviors In Young Adults, Cristina Ramirez

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

Parents play a significant role in how children learn to express their emotions as well as their child’s overall emotional well-being. The purpose of this study was to examine the impact of positive and negative emotion socialization experiences on internalizing disorders in young adult males and females. One-hundred and forty-two young adults between the ages of 18-28 years from a southwestern university participated in the current study. It was hypothesized that early negative emotion socialization experiences would be related to higher levels of anxiety and depression in young adulthood (and, conversely, early positive emotion socialization experiences would be related to …

Broad Autism Phenotypic Traits And The Relationship To Sexual Orientation And Sexual Behavior, Lydia R. Qualls, Kathrin Hartmann, James F. Paulson

Psychology Faculty Publications

Individuals with higher levels of the broad autism phenotype (BAP) have some symptoms of autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Like individuals with ASD, people with higher-BAP may have fewer sexual experiences and may experience more same-sex attraction. This study measured BAP traits, sexual experiences, and sexual orientation in typically developing (TD) individuals to see if patterns of sexual behavior and sexual orientation in higher-BAP resemble those in ASD. Although BAP characteristics did not predict sexual experiences, one BAP measure significantly predicted sexual orientation, β = 0.22, t = 2.72, p = .007, controlling for demographic variables (R² change = …

The Role Of Dialect Words In Children’S Social Decisions, Madison Rose Myers-Burg

Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Recent research suggests that young children are capable of distinguishing between phonetically dissimilar spoken accents, yet have difficulty distinguishing between phonetically similar accents (Wagner, Clopper, & Pate, 2013). The present study aimed to determine whether the presence of dialect-specific vocabulary enhances young children’s ability to categorize speakers. Participants completed four training trials in which they were familiarized with photos of two children: one of whom used American English labels for test objects and one of whom used British English labels. After training trials, participants completed eight test trials in which they were asked to infer which target child would use …

Measuring Novel Antecedents Of Mental Illness: The Questionnaire Of Unpredictability In Childhood, Laura M. Glynn, Hal S. Stern, Mariann A. Howland, Victoria B. Risbrough, Dewleen G. Baker, Caroline M. Nievergelt, Tallie Z. Baram, Elysia P. Davis

Psychology Faculty Articles and Research

Increasing evidence indicates that, in addition to poverty, maternal depression, and other well-established factors, unpredictability of maternal and environmental signals early in life influences trajectories of brain development, determining risk for subsequent mental illness. However, whereas most risk factors for later vulnerability to mental illness are readily measured using existing, clinically available tools, there are no similar measures for assessing early-life unpredictability. Here we validate the Questionnaire of Unpredictability in Childhood (QUIC) and examine its associations with mental health in the context of other indicators of childhood adversity (e.g., traumatic life events, socioeconomic status, and parenting quality). The QUIC was …

Language Counts: Early Language Mediates The Relationship Between Parent Education And Children's Math Ability, Emily Slusser, Andrew Ribner, Anna Shusterman

Faculty Publications

Children's early math skills have been hailed as a powerful predictor of academic success. Disparities in socioeconomic context, however, also have dramatic consequences on children's learning. It is therefore critical to investigate both of these distinct contributors in order to better understand the early foundations of children's academic outcomes. This study tests an integrated model of children's developing math ability so as to (1) identify the specific skills and abilities most clearly linked to early math achievement and (2) measure the influence of children's socioeconomic context on each of these skills. We first evaluated the early vocabulary, number word knowledge …

Early Childhood Stressors And Negative Personality Behaviors, Kyler Joachim

Scholars Week

Early Childhood Stressors and Negative Personality Behaviors

Research is moving away from static to contextual models of understanding personality development, making it imperative to consider daily occurrences, not just biology or significant traumatic events, in personality formation. Temperament has long been considered the innate source of behaviors that later solidify into personality, but behaviors themselves and the conditions that produce and reinforce them are shaped by the daily environment. This behavior-environment interaction is especially important for children experiencing childhood stressors like poverty, food insecurity, and parental aggravation. Non-clinical personality related behaviors may arise from these stressors, which can lead to …

A Multidimensional Examination Of Parent Involvement Across Child And Parent Characteristics, S. Andrew Garbacz, Philippa S. Mcdowall, Elizabeth Schaughency, Susan M. Sheridan, Greg W. Welch

Department of Educational Psychology: Faculty Publications

The purpose of this study was to clarify equivocal findings in the parent-involvement literature and examine novel interactions in a New Zealand context. Specifically, this study tested direct effects of school year, parent education, family structure, and child gender on parent involvement in elementary school. In addition, interactions between parent, family, and child characteristics were explored as moderators on the relation of school year and parent involvement. Participants were 421 primary caregivers of children attending their first through final years of elementary school on New Zealand’s South Island. Structural equation models were used to detect direct and interaction effects. Findings …

Fathers’ Cortisol And Testosterone In The Days Around Infants’ Births Predict Later Paternal Involvement, Patty X. Kuo, Julia M. Braungart-Rieker, Jennifer E. Burke Lefever, Mallika S. Sarma, Molly O'Neill, Lee T. Gettler

Department of Child, Youth, and Family Studies: Faculty Publications

Human paternal behavior is multidimensional, and extant research has yet to delineate how hormone patterns may be related to different dimensions of fathering. Further, although studies vary in their measurement of hormones (i.e., basal or reactivity), it remains unclear whether basal and/or reactivity measures are predictive of different aspects of men’s parenting. We examined whether men’s testosterone and cortisol predicted fathers’ involvement in childcare and play with infants and whether fathers’ testosterone and cortisol changed during fathers’ first interaction with their newborn. Participants were 298 fathers whose partners gave birth in a UNICEF-designated “baby-friendly” hospital, which encourages fathers to hold …

Fatherhood And Psychobiology In The Philippines: Perspectives On Joint Profiles And Longitudinal Changes Of Fathers’ Estradiol And Testosterone, Lee T. Gettler, Patty X. Kuo, Sonny Agustin Bechayda

Department of Child, Youth, and Family Studies: Faculty Publications

Objectives: Research on the psychobiology of partnering and fathering has focused on testosterone (T), oxytocin, and prolactin (PRL) as mechanisms that potentially mediate life history trade-offs related to those roles. Less is known about other hormones that might be responsive to life history transitions and implicated in fathering, such as estradiol (E2). We examined how E2 changed during the transition to marriage and fatherhood, its correlation with fathers’ caregiving, and its joint within-individual production with other hormones (T, PRL). Methods: Data were collected from a total of 913 Filipino men (aged 25.9 years ± 0.3 SD at follow-up) enrolled in …

Are Different Actions Mediated By Distinct Systems Of Knowledge In Infancy?, Peter Vishton

Peter Vishton

Predictors Of Parent Engagement Based On Child Care Providers’ Perspectives, Aileen Garcia, Dipti A. Dev, Virginia C. Stage

Aileen Garcia

Objective: Determine the predictors of child care providers’ parent engagement regarding child nutrition in child care centers (CCCs) and family child care homes (FCCHs).

Design: Cross-sectional. Setting: Child care centers and FCCHs. Participants: Child care center directors (n = 337) and FCCH providers (n = 1,153) completed a self-administered survey.

Main outcome measures: Fifteen variables were examined as predictors for parent engagement: providers’ perceived barriers to communication, participation in Go Nutrition and Physical Self-Assessment in Child Care, National Association for the Education of Young Children accreditation, participation in Quality Ratings and Improvement Systems, feeding practices, and professional …

Impact Of An Extension Social Media Tool Kit On Audience Engagement, Aileen Garcia, Dipti A. Dev, Colin M. Mcginnis, Tyler Thomas

Aileen Garcia

Extension professionals can improve their use of social media as channels for extending programmatic efforts by maximizing target audience reach and engagement. We describe how implementation of a tool kit highlighting best practices for using social media improved Extension professionals' efforts to engage target audience members via social media. Specifically, we found that after having access to the tool kit, Extension professionals were able to prompt greater participation and engagement from the applicable target audience across three online platforms— Facebook, Twitter, and Pinterest. Our findings indicate that Extension professionals can benefit from learning how to use social media more purposefully …

Improving The Nutrition And Screen Time Environment Through Self-Assessment In Family Childcare Homes In Nebraska, Dipti A. Dev, Natalie A. Williams, Iheoma Iruka, Aileen S. Garcia, Yage Guo, Irina Patwardhan, Katrina Cummings, Zainab Rida, Emily Hulse, Ami Sedani

Aileen Garcia

Objective: To determine if family childcare homes (FCCH) in Nebraska meet best practices for nutrition and screen time, and if focusing on nutrition and screen time policies and practices improves the FCCH environment.

Design: A pre–post evaluation was conducted using the Go Nutrition and Physical Activity Self-Assessment for Childcare (Go NAP SACC).

Setting: FCCH in Nebraska, USA.

Subjects: FCCH enrolled in the Child and Adult Care Food Program (CACFP; n 208) participated in a pre–post evaluation using Go NAP SACC.

Results: At baseline, all FCCH met the minimum childcare standards for fifty-four of fifty-six practices …

P-06 Faith, Hope And Love: An Integrated Conceptual Framework For Examining Religious Outcomes In A Global Church, Karl G. D. Bailey, Duane C. Mcbride, Shannon M. Trecartin

Celebration of Research and Creative Scholarship

The 2017-18 Global Church Member Survey conducted by the General Conference of the Seventh-day Adventist Church is designed to assess the quinquennial Church Strategic Plan (2015-2020). In designing this survey, we considered a variety of theoretical frameworks that could explain relationships between the target outcomes in the Strategic Plan. The resulting novel theoretical framework is based on Biblical principles and an integration of a number of frameworks in the social sciences: motivation (Deci & Ryan, 2008; Greenberg, Solomon, & Arndt, 2008; Koole, Greenberg, & Pyszczynski, 2006; Pyszczynski, Greenberg, & Goldenberg, 2003; Ryan & Deci, 2000) and hope (Bernardo, 2010; Snyder, …

Home Learning In The New Mobile Age: Parent-Child Interactions During Joint Play With Educational Apps, Shayl Griffith

Doctoral Dissertations

The rapidly increasing popularity of touch screen mobile devices, and accompanying educational applications (“apps”) targeted towards preschool children, calls for a new look at parent-child interactions around educational media. Research has shown that parental involvement in children’s educational media exposure can improve engagement and learning outcomes. However, to date little information is available on how parents navigate their children’s use of educational mobile technology, or how similar or different these interactions are to more commonly studied parent-child interactions, such as around shared reading. This study described, using observational data, parent-child interactions around educational apps and mobile devices in a sample …

Conceptualization And Measurement Of Adolescent Prosocial Behavior: A Two-Study Mixed Methods Investigation, Shereen El Mallah

Doctoral Dissertations

Prosocial behavior is a multifaceted construct that may be expressed and received in a myriad of ways, thereby posing several challenges in measurement. Undoubtedly, significant advancements in the measurement of prosocial behavior have been made since the construct first found its way onto the research stage; however, a few fundamental problems persist with regard to: 1) the absence of a universally employed definition, 2) substantial variation in operationalization and measurement of the construct, and 3) inconsistent reports regarding the nature of prosocial development during the transition between adolescence and young adulthood. These issues are further compounded under conditions of adversity …

The Effects Of Reward And Risk Level Associated With Speeded Actions: Evidence From Behavior And Electroencephalography, Xingjie Chen

Masters Theses

Choosing a course of action in our daily lives requires an accurate assessment of the associated risks as well as the potential rewards. The present two studies investigated the mechanism of how reward and risk level influence the motor decisions of speeded actions (Chapter 2) and its neural dynamics (Chapter 3) by focusing on the beta band (15-30 Hz) oscillation patterns reflected in the EEG signals. Participants performed a modified version of the Go-NoGo task, in which they earned reward points based on the speed and accuracy of response. On each trial, the reward points at stake (120 vs. 6) …

Influence Of Household Chaos On Associations Between Physiology And Behavior, Sarah Mccormick

Masters Theses

Internalizing behaviors, or behaviors related to behavioral inhibition and the tendency to withdraw from novelty or uncertainty, are stable over time. There is substantial evidence indicating the association between greater resting right lateralized frontal EEG alpha asymmetry and negative affect as well as internalizing behaviors (Coan & Allen, 2003; Henderson, Fox, & Rubin, 2001; Fox, 1991). Further, right frontal asymmetry has been shown to be a stable marker of the presence of psychosocial risk (e.g. child maltreatment; see Peltola, Bakermans-Kranenburg, Alink, Huffmeijer, Biro, & van IJzendoorn, 2014 for meta-analyses). However, little is known about the influences of the home and …

A Predictive Model For Tck Identity Development: What Role Do Faith Development And Religious Motivation Play?, Amanda Rockinson-Szapkiw, Lorene R. Heuvelman-Hutchinson

Journal of Counseling and Psychology

This study examines the predictive association of 86 Third Culture Kids’ (TCK) faith development, religious commitment, and identity development statuses. TCKs’ low levels of faith development and religious motivation were associated with lower levels of identity statuses while TCKs’ achieved identity statuses were associated with high levels of faith development and religious motivation. The results of the direct logistical regression revealed that the full model containing the two predictor variables (intrinsic religious motivation and faith stage) significantly predicted identity achievement status. The model accounted for between 18.7% and 29.2% of the variance in identity status. It correctly classified 83.7% of …

64. Effects Of The Putative Confession Instruction On Perceptions Of Children’S True And False Statements, Jennifer Gongola, Nicholas Scurich, Thomas D. Lyon

Thomas D. Lyon

Grup Ortamlarindaki̇ Oyunun Değerlendi̇ri̇lmesi̇ (Good) Gözlem Formunun Geçerli̇k Ve Güveni̇rli̇k Çalişmasi / Validity And Reliability Study Of The Play Assessment For Group Settings (Pags), Emine Ahmetoğlu, Manolya Aşik Öztürk, İbrahim Hakkı Acar

Department of Child, Youth, and Family Studies: Faculty Publications

Amaç: Bu araştırmanın amacı Lautamo (2012) tarafından geliştirilen "PAGS; Play Assessment for Group Settings (GOOD-Grup Ortamlarındaki Oyunun Değerlendirilmesi)" Gözlem Formunun Türkçeye uyarlanması, geçerlik ve güvenirlik analizlerinin yapılmasıdır. Gereç-Yöntem: İki-sekiz yaş arasındaki çocukların doğal grup ortamlarındaki oyun performanslarını ölçmek amacı ile tasarlanan GOOD Gözlem Formu dörtlü Likert tipinde puanlanan 38 maddeden oluşmaktadır. Araştırma verileri Edirne İl Merkezinde bulunan 13 okul öncesi kurumda görev yapan 46 öğretmen ve yaşları 36 ile 73 ay arasında değişen (M=54,6 ay, SS=0.99) toplam 149 çocuktan toplanmıştır. Araştırmada veri toplama aracı olarak araştırmacılar tarafından geliştirilen Genel Bilgi Formu, GOOD Gözlem Formu ve öğretmenlerin sınıflarındaki çocukların duygusal durumu …

The Longitudinal Impact Of Screen Time On Adolescent Development: Moderation By Respiratory Sinus Arrhythmia, Wesley Sanders, Justin Parent, Jamie L. Abaied, Rex Forehand, Sarah M. Coyne, W. Justin Dyer

Faculty Publications

Purpose: To date, little is known about underlying psychophysiological contributions to the impact of media content and overall screen time on adolescent psychological functioning. In the present study we examine respiratory sinus arrhythmia (RSA) as a moderator of the link between specific types of media content use, overall media exposure, and the development of internalizing and aggressive symptoms in youth.

Methods: A sample of 374 adolescents (mean age = 15) reported on their media use, internalizing behavior, and aggressive behavior at time 1 (2011) and 1-year follow-up (2012). RSA reactivity was gathered during a challenging laboratory task. Path analyses were …