Psychology Commons^™

Posttraumatic Stress Disorder In Maltreated Multiracial Youth, Harpreet Kaur

UNLV Theses/Dissertations/Professional Papers/Capstones

Lemos-Miller and Kearney (2006) first identified depression as a meditator of (1) dissociation and posttraumatic cognitions and (2) PTSD in maltreated children. In addition, they found that African American status weakened the mediating relationship, whereas multiracial status strengthened the mediating relationship. Multiracial youth in Lemos-Miller and Kearney's study experienced a stronger relationship between depression and PTSD than other ethnic groups.

The present study evaluated the Lemos-Miller and Kearney (2006) model of PTSD among a larger sample of multiracial youth. The present study sought to identify whether the Lemos-Miller and Kearney (2006) finding regarding multiracial youth could be replicated. The ...

The Influence Of Task Demands And Experience On Diagnostic Accuracy: Investigating The Assumptions Of A Default Interventionist Dual Systems Model, Sandra D. Monteiro

Open Access Dissertations and Theses

There are various dual process models of human cognition. While many models of cognitive control propose processes that are selected exclusively or in combination, a default-interventionist model of reasoning assumes that processing occurs in serial stages. System 1 processes are believed to recruit unconscious memory retrieval processes by default and precede System 2 processes (Evans & Stanovich, 2013; Kahneman, 2011). System 1 processes are also considered to be overly sensitive to the automatic influences of the environment and thereby also to various cognitive biases and errors; hence System 1 is inferior. On the other hand System 2, which represent conscious logic and normative ...

Context And Salience: The Role Of Dopamine In Reward Learning And Neuropsychiatric Disorders, Trent M. Toulouse

Open Access Dissertations and Theses

Evidence suggests that a change in the firing rate of dopamine (DA) cells is a major neurobiological correlate of learning. The Temporal Difference (TD) learning algorithm provides a popular account of the DA signal as conveying the error between expected and actual rewards. Other accounts have attempted to code the DA firing pattern as conveying surprise or salience. The DA mediated cells have also been implicated in several neuropsychological disorders such as obsessive compulsive disorder and schizophrenia. Compelling neuropsychological explanations of the DA signal also frame it as conveying salience. A model-based reinforcement learning algorithm using a salience signal analogous ...

Startrek (Sic) Illusions Demonstrate General Object Constancy, Jiehui Qian

Psychology Dissertations

Size constancy is a well-known example of perceptual stabilization accounting for the effect of viewing distance on retinal image size. In a recent study (Qian & Petrov, 2012), we demonstrated a similar stabilization mechanism for contrast perception and suggested that the brain accounts for effects of perceived distance on various other object features in a similar way, a hypothesis that we called General Object Constancy. Here we report new illusions of depth further supporting this hypothesis. Pairs of disks moved across the screen in a pattern of radial optic flow. A pair comprised either a small black disk floating in front of a large white disk, creating the percept of a pencil tip viewed head on (thus called the `pencil' stimulus), or a white disk floating upper left to a black disk, creating the percept of a white disk casting a shadow (thus called the `shadowed disk' stimulus). For the `pencil' stimulus, as the `pencils' moved away they appeared to grow in contrast, in diameter, and to be getting sharper; for the `shadowed disk' stimulus, as the disks moved away they also appeared to grow in contrast, and to be separating farther away both laterally (size illusion) and in depth. The contrast and size illusions replicated our previous findings, while the depth gradient (sharpness) illusion and the depth separation illusion manifested a depth constancy phenomenon. We discovered that depth and the size constancies were related, e.g., the size illusion and the depth gradient/separation ...

Stereotype Threat, Mental Arithmetic, And The Mere Effort Account, Allison E. Seitchik

Psychology Dissertations

Stereotype threat (i.e., the concern that is experienced when one feels "at risk of confirming, as self-characteristic, a negative stereotype about one's group" (Steele & Aronson, 1995, abstract)) has been shown to negatively impact performance. A working memory interference account for this effect suggests that cognitive resources that could be devoted to task performance are instead expended on processing the information resulting from the activation of the negative stereotype. It is this reduction in working memory capacity that produces the performance debilitation. More specifically, Beilock et al. (2007) suggest that these worries occupy the phonological loop of Baddeley's (1986; 2000; Baddeley & Logie, 1999) multicomponent model of working memory. According to Trbovich and LeFevre (2003), participants solving mental arithmetic problems in a horizontal format rely on the phonological loop to keep track of intermediate values. Thus, Beilock et al. suggests that when threatened participants are presented with horizontal mental arithmetic problems that involve borrowing (e.g., 57 - 28), performance should be debilitated. To test this hypothesis, females completed horizontal or vertical modular arithmetic problems (subtracting the second number from the first, dividing by the mod, and then reporting, true or false, whether the result was a whole number) under threat and no threat. Consistent with the prediction, the performance of threatened females was debilitated on horizontal problems.

Although Beilock et al.'s (2007) findings support the working memory account, they do not rule out the possibility of a motivational explanation: the mere effort account (Harkins, 2006). The mere effort account argues that stereotype threat motivates stigmatized participants to want to perform well, potentiating the prepotent response on the given task (Jamieson & Harkins, 2007; 2009). If the prepotent response is correct, stereotype threat facilitates performance for stigmatized individuals. If the prepotent response is incorrect and participants do not know, or lack the knowledge or time required for correction, performance is debilitated.

In the current studies, I examined how working memory and mere effort contribute to stereotype threat's effects on horizontal arithmetic. In Experiment 1, replicating Beilock et al. (2007) in a paradigm sensitive to motivational ...

Is Performance Variability Necessary? A Qualitative Study On Cognitive Resilience In Forestry Work, Jennifer M. Colman, Heather K. Kahle, Eder Henriqson

Journal of Human Performance in Extreme Environments

In forestry work, conditions exist and develop that are complex, unpredictable, and highly consequential and therefore cannot be handled entirely by following static work procedures. Cognitive adjustments are necessary. The objective of this research was to determine whether performance (cognitive) variability is actually necessary to safely fell trees in the coastal region of British Columbia, Canada. In this paper two perspectives were contrasted: the traditional view of safety and the resilience perspective. A collection of empirical evidence established that while safe work procedures provide a good foundation, it is individual performance variability shaped by experience and ‘‘know-how’’ that guides the ...

Robust Resilience: Metaphor And Meaning In Assessing System Performance Ranges, Barrett S. Caldwell

Journal of Human Performance in Extreme Environments

The current emphasis on Resilience Week and the International Symposium on Resilient Cognitive Systems highlights a growing awareness of the importance of designing and operating engineering systems under a variety of environmental conditions and in response to dynamic events. Although there has been considerable confusion and drift in the use of the term, ‘‘resilience’’ as a concept dates back to dynamic systems study of complex ecological systems in the 1970s. This original definition relates clearly to quantitative metrics that link also to statistical process control techniques describing system performance as affected by external, ‘‘assignable’’ causes. This paper discusses important elements ...

Robust Flight Deck Systems: Harnessing The Synergistic Power Of The Crew, Michael J. Stasio

Journal of Human Performance in Extreme Environments

Robust flight decks are possible in both normal and novel operations. Existing crew resource and error management programs can improve team-centered resilience with Oshry’s organization development (OD) principles. The need on the flight deck is to diminish the invisible behavioral gap between espoused theory and theory-in-use by balancing Oshry’s four basic elements that make up robust human systems—differentiation, homogenization, integration, and individuation. This low-cost OD vision is offered as a guide for organizations to tailor existing aircrew recurrent training modules. Assessment and diagnosis measures are recommended for continuous improvement, so this OD framework includes adaptive feedback interventions ...

Introducing Target Into Singapore, Yealim Ko

Senior Honors Papers

The global business trends point to international expansions with corporations increasingly turning to emerging markets for new opportunities to grow and create new sources of revenues. While the BRIC countries including Brazil, Russia, India, and China remain at the center of attention from global industries, the surrounding countries in Asia including Japan, South Korea, Malaysia, and Singapore emerge as potential markets because although smaller in size, the surrounding countries with fast growing economy and consumer demand for foreign goods suggest large profit potentials. Considering the increasing trend of going abroad in the retail industry (S&P, 2013), the paper is an analysis of the potential of Singapore as a desirable market for U.S. retail industry by conducting a feasibility analysis of implementing the Target store brand into Singapore. The analysis includes cultural analysis, economic analysis, and market audit as well as competitive market analysis which will, in turn, provide deeper understanding of the existing markets in Singapore; therefore, provided basis for potential ...

Environmental- And Ethanol-Induced Effects On Reference And Short-Term Memory In The Rat, Kimberly Ramos

Dissertations and Theses

Environmental enrichment (EE) is a combination of complex physical and social stimulation beyond that which would be received in standard or isolated laboratory housing. Continuous enrichment paradigms have been shown, among other influences, to increase neurogenesis and dendritic branching, and enhance learning and memory. Recently, the preventative effects of enrichment have been considered, specifically relating to drugs of abuse (Solinas, Thiret, Chauvet, & Jaber 2010; Stairs & Bardo 2009). This series of studies examined the effects of daily EE on reference memory and short-term memory, as assessed in the radial arm water maze (RAWM) and Morris water maze (MWM). Sprague-Dawley rats (N=18) were exposed to either EE or isolation for 4 hours/day for 4 weeks prior to and during the experiments. Animals were first trained and tested with non-spatial cues located at the entrance of the maze alleys in the RAWM (Experiment 1); but, they were unable to successfully learn the task. In Experiment 2, distal spatial cues were added to the maze. The rats learned the task, as evident in their reduced rates of errors. They were then trained ...

Effects Of Trauma Induced Stress On Attention, Executive Functioning, Processing Speed, And Resilience In Urban Children, Antoinette Welsh

Dissertations and Theses

Brain development, and particularly structures involved in executive functioning, occurs at different rates in children, leading to differential performance in school. Due to neuroanatomical changes secondary to the stress response, children who have experienced stress as a result of poverty and traumatic events may be at increased risk for cognitive difficulties, including attention, executive functioning, and processing speed (Blair, Granger, & Razza, 2005; DeBellis, Hooper, & Sapia, 2005). Prevalence rates among urban children suggest that 70-100% have been exposed to trauma (Dempsey, Overstreet, & Moely, 2000; Macy, Baryry, & Noam, 2003). Some of these children develop posttraumatic stress disorder and some do not, raising the question of resilience (Bonanno & Mancini, 2008). Difficulties with cognitive functioning, as well as the role of protective factors have major ...

The Relationship Between Perceived Servant Leadership Constructs And Collective Self-Esteem, Leann D. Howell

Dissertations

Following Greenleaf’s (1977) seminal work in servant leadership, much has been written on the definition of servant leadership, but very little written on what it does. At the center of this research is a focus on how followers perceive servant leadership constructs/attributes, and the relationship between that perception and collective selfesteem as it relates to organizational membership. The central question guiding this research is: “Is there a relationship between perceived servant leadership constructs and collective self-esteem?” Followers’ perceptions of servant leadership constructs as defined by Patterson (2003) were investigated utilizing the Servant Leadership Assessment Instrument (SLAI) developed by ...

Relationship Among Adverse Childhood Experiences, History Of Active Military Service, And Adult Outcomes: Homelessness, Mental Health And Physical Health, Ann Elizabeth Montgomery, J J. Cutuli, Michelle Evans-Chase, Dan Treglia, Dennis P. Culhane

Dennis P. Culhane

Objectives. We determined whether a report of adverse childhood experiences predicts adult outcomes related to homelessness, mental health, and physical health and whether participation in active military service influences the relationship between childhood and adult adversity.

Methods. Using data from the 2010 Washington State Behavioral Risk Factor Surveillance System, we tested by means of logistic regression the relationship between adverse childhood experiences and 3 adult outcomes—homelessness, mental health, and physical health—as well as differences among those with a history of active military service.

Results. Adverse childhood experiences separately predicted increased odds of experiencing homelessness as an adult and ...

Homelessness Research: Shaping Policy And Practice, Now And Into The Future, Dennis P. Culhane, Vince R. Kane, Mark Johnston

Dennis P. Culhane

As this special issue of the journal well reflects, much progress has been made in homelessness research. That progress has been matched with advances in homelessness policy and programming, nearly all of it informed by the contributions of the research community. While the imperatives of policy-making have required decisions to be made with imperfect knowledge, a substantial enough convergence of theory and evidence has enabled policymakers to shift homelessness policy and practice in important ways. Those shifts have also prefigured some of policymakers’ needs from the research community in the future.

Risk Factors For Becoming Homeless Among A Cohort Of Veterans Who Served In The Era Of The Iraq And Afghanistan Conflicts, Stephen Metraux, Limin X. Clegg, John D. Daigh, Dennis P. Culhane, Vincent R. Kane

Dennis P. Culhane

Objectives. In this population-based cohort study, we assessed baseline risk factors for homelessness, including the role of service in the Iraq or Afghanistan conflicts, among a large cohort of recent veterans.

Methods. Data for this study came from administrative records for 310 685 veterans who separated from active military duty from July 1, 2005, to September 30, 2006. We used survival analysis methods to determine incidence rates and risk factors for homelessness, based on baseline data for military factors, demographic characteristics, and diagnoses of behavioral health disorders and traumatic brain injury.

Results. Service in Iraq or Afghanistan and, more specifically ...

Community-Level Characteristics Associated With Variations In Rates Of Homelessness Among Families And Single Adults, Jamison D. Fargo, Ellen A. Munley, Thomas H. Byrne, Ann Elizabeth Montgomery, Dennis P. Culhane

Dennis P. Culhane

Objectives. We modeled rates of family and single-adult homelessness in the United States in metropolitan and nonmetropolitan regions and as a function of community-level demographic, behavioral, health, economic, and safety net characteristics.

Methods. We entered community-level characteristics and US Department of Housing and Urban Development point-in-time counts for a single night in January 2009 into separate mixed-effects statistical analyses that modeled homelessness rates for 4 subpopulations: families and single adults inmetropolitan and nonmetropolitan regions.

Results. Community-level factors accounted for 25% to 50% of the variance in homelessness rates across models. In metropolitan regions, alcohol consumption, social support, and several economic ...

Universal Screening For Homelessness And Risk For Homelessness In The Veterans Health Administration, Ann Elizabeth Montgomery, Jamison D. Fargo, Thomas H. Byrne, Vincent R. Kane, Dennis P. Culhane

Dennis P. Culhane

We examined data for all veteranswho completed the Veterans Health Administration’s national homelessness screening instrument between October 1, 2012, and January 10, 2013. Among veterans who were not engaged with the US Department of Veterans Affairs homeless system and presented for primary care services, the prevalence of recent housing instability or homelessness was 0.9% and homelessness risk was 1.2%. Future research will refine outreach strategies, targeting of prevention resources, and development of novel interventions.

Perceived Satisfaction Of Equine-Assisted Therapy: A Qualitative Study Of Family Narratives, Morgan N. Carriker

Senior Honors Papers

The present research represents the satisfaction that parents feel with equine-assisted therapy. Equine-assisted therapy is, according to Funk and Smith (2000), the use of horses as a therapy technique that improves the well-being of individuals in all of the following areas: social, cognitive, psychosocial, and physical (2000). Themes were coded from publicized material that contained accounts of parents whose children participated in a specific equine-assisted therapy program in North Carolina. Each testimony was coded for themes that were similar in nature to those that were represented in other accounts as well. Themes that were found were organized into categories and ...

Suicide-Related Imagining And Acquired Capability: Investigating The Role Of Imagery In Self-Harm Behaviors, Tara C. Holaday

Masters Theses & Specialist Projects

The purpose of this investigation was to examine the role of suicide-related mental imagery in suicidal behavior. It was hypothesized that engagement (frequency, emotional impact, vividness, realism) with suicidal imagery would be related to suicidality, with greater engagement with imagery associated with more suicidal behaviors. Acquired capability for suicide was expected to be a mediator of this relationship. These hypotheses were tested by surveying 237 undergraduate university students (59% female; mean age = 20). Students completed a packet of self-report measures: The Modified Suicidal Cognitions Interview, The Acquired Capability for Suicide Scale, and the Self-Harm Behavior Questionnaire. Results suggested that engagement ...

Experiences Of Crisis Pregnancy Among Irish And Non-Irish Adults Living In Ireland: Findings From The Irish Contraception And Crisis Pregnancy Survey 2010 (Iccp-2010)., K Yogalingam, Caroline Kelleher, Ashling B. Bourke, Daniel Boduszek, Hannah Mcgee, Karen Morgan

Psychology Articles

BACKGROUND: Using nationally representative data, this paper investigates the experience of crisis pregnancy (CP) among Irish and non-Irish adults living in Ireland in 2010.

AIMS: To generate a detailed profile of Irish and non-Irish adults living in Ireland who have had an experience of CP and to investigate the differences in the experiences of CP between Irish and non-Irish adults.

METHOD: A national cross-sectional telephone survey methodology recruited 3,002 adult (18-45 years) participants (69 % response). Descriptive statistics and Chi-square analysis were used to compare the differences between the Irish (n = 334) and non-Irish sample (n = 57) with an experience ...