Digital Commons Network^™

Exploring Online Sexually Explicit Material: What Is The Relationship To Sexual Coercion?, Valerie Gonsalves

Department of Psychology: Dissertations, Theses, and Student Research

With the popularity of the Internet, it is easy to access sexually explicit material. Past research has demonstrated that exposure to sexually explicit material in traditional formats (i.e. magazines and videos) may have an influence on male attitudes and behaviors towards females, but these effects appear to be minimal and dissipate over the long term. Though the body of literature examining Internet sexually explicit material is smaller, researchers have found little to no effects on attitudes or aggressive behaviors immediately after exposure. However, research regarding exposure to online sexually explicit material has not included forensically relevant variables.

Previous research has …

The Political Personality Of U.S. President Barack Obama, Aubrey Immelman

Psychology Faculty Publications

This paper presents the results of an indirect assessment of the personality of U.S. president Barack Obama, from the conceptual perspective of personologist Theodore Millon.

Information concerning Obama was collected from biographical sources and media reports and synthesized into a personality profile using the Millon Inventory of Diagnostic Criteria (MIDC), which yields 34 normal and maladaptive personality classifications congruent with Axis II of DSM–IV.

The personality profile yielded by the MIDC was analyzed on the basis of interpretive guidelines provided in the MIDC and Millon Index of Personality Styles manuals. Obama’s primary personality patterns were found to be Ambitious/confident …

Proceedings Of The Sixth International Natural Language Generation Conference (Inlg 2010)., John D. Kelleher, Brian Mac Namee, Ielka Van Der Sluis

Conference papers

No abstract provided.

A Patient-Focused Psychotherapy Quality Assurance System: Meta-Analytic And Multilevel Analytic Review, Kenichi Shimokawa

Theses and Dissertations

Outcome research has documented worsening among a minority of the patient population (5 to 10%). In this study a psychotherapy quality assurance system intended to enhance outcomes in patients at risk of treatment failure was reviewed through the use of meta-analytic, mega-analytic, and multilevel analytic techniques. A pooled dataset from six major studies conducted at a large university counseling center and a hospital outpatient setting (N = 6151, mean age = 23.3 years, female = 63.2%, Caucasian = 85%) were re-analyzed to examine the effects of progress feedback on patient outcome. In this quality assurance system, the Outcome Questionnaire-45 was …

Stanley Mcchrystal, Felix Dzerzhinsky, Jérôme Kerviel: Are We All Ciphers?, Ibpp Editor

International Bulletin of Political Psychology

This article examines the fall of United States (US) Army General Stanley McChrystal, and the concepts of the self and identity.

Malingering Detection Among Accommodation-Seeking University Students, Spencer Paul Clayton

Theses and Dissertations

Universities have increasingly sought to provide accommodative services to students with learning disorders and Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) in recent decades thereby creating a need for diagnostic batteries designed to evaluate cognitive abilities relevant to academic performance. Given that accommodative services (extended time on tests, alternate test forms, etc.) provide incentive to distort impairment steps should be taken to estimate the rate at which students distort impairment and to evaluate the accuracy with which symptom distortion is identified. In order to address these concerns, the Word-Memory Test, Test of Memory Malingering, and Fake Bad Scale (of the MMPI-2) were compared in …

The Peril Of Vehemence, Jefferson A. Singer

Psychology Faculty Publications

No abstract provided.

The Associations Among Computer Mediated Communication, Relationships, And Well-Being, Holly H. Schiffrin, Anna Edelman, Melissa Falkenstern, Cassandra Stewart

Psychological Science Articles

Social support provided by interpersonal relationships is one of the most robust correlates of well-being. Self-disclosure serves as a basic building block of these relationships. With the rapid growth of the internet in recent years, the question remains how self-disclosure, and subsequently relationships and well-being, differ when people communicate over the internet rather than in person. The purpose of this article is to describe current internet usage patterns as well as explore the association of internet usage and well-being. Additionally, it directly compares the perceived benefits of face-to-face communication and computer mediated communication. A questionnaire was administered to 99 undergraduates …

Taking Charge Of Adult Adhd, P. S. Mcmillen

Library Faculty Research

Barkley is one of the leading researchers and most prolific writers on attention deficit/hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) across the life span, having produced materials for mental health professionals and self-help books like this volume.

Investigating Executive Functions In Men Seeking Help For Hypersexual Behavior Using Neuropsychological Testing, Rory C. Reid

Theses and Dissertations

Patients seeking help for hypersexual behavior often exhibit features of impulsivity, cognitive rigidity, poor judgment, deficits in emotion regulation, and excessive preoccupation with sex. Some of these characteristics are also common among patients presenting with neurological pathology associated with executive dysfunction. These observations led to the current investigation in which differences across scores on objective neuropsychological tests of executive functioning were explored in a group of hypersexual male patients (n = 30) compared with a non-hypersexual community sample (n = 30) of men. Using multivariate statistics, differences between the groups were examined yielding significant differences on measures of hypersexuality. However, …

The National Juvenile Online Victimization Study: Methodology Report., Kimberly J. Mitchell, Janis Wolak, David Finkelhor

Crimes Against Children Research Center

The National Juvenile Online Victimization Study (N‐JOV) was conducted by the Crimes against Children Research Center at the University of New Hampshire. Wave 1 of this study was funded by the National Center for Missing & Exploited Children and the Office of Juvenile Justice & Delinquency Prevention, U.S. Department of Justice. Wave 2 of this study was funded through grants from the Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention, U.S. Department of Justice.

Researchers collected information from a national sample of law enforcement agencies about the prevalence of arrests for, and characteristics of, Internet sex crimes against minors in the …

The Relationship Between Empathy In Children And Their Parents, Erin Browne

Psychology and Child Development

No abstract provided.

Subjective Anxiety And Behavioral Avoidance: Gender, Gender Role, And Perceived Confirmability Of Self-Report, Carmen P. Mclean, Debra A. Hope

Department of Psychology: Faculty Publications

Commonly reported gender effects for differential vulnerability for anxiety may relate to gender socialization processes. The present study examined the relationship between gender role and fear under experimental conditions designed to elicit accurate fear reporting. Undergraduate students (N = 119) completed several self-report measures and a behavioral avoidance task (BAT) with a tarantula while wearing a heart rate monitor. Gender roles were operationalized as instrumentality and expressiveness, as measured by the Personal Attributes Questionnaire (Spence, Helmreich, & Stapp, 1975). As expected, women reported greater subjective anxiety and were more avoidant of the tarantula than men. Regardless of gender, low …

Impact Of Dbt Treatment On The Relationship Between Women’S Overall Self-Concept And Body-Image, Rachel Mueller

Doctor of Psychology (PsyD)

Given the connection between self-concept and body-image for women recovering from eating disorders, this study researched the impact of twelve women’s participation in a body- image group in a Dialectical Behavior Therapy Center. The dialectical behavior therapy approach is of particular interest given its emphasis on mindfulness and acceptance, which may aid in decreasing the tension between how women with eating disorders view their ideal versus perceived selves. Quantitatively, this study investigated change in scores on the Total Self- concept Score (TOT) and Conflict Score (CON) of the Tennessee Self-concept Scale – 2. As hypothesized, data analysis revealed a large …

Homeless Youth Services And Their Relation To Children's Day In The Plaza, Leah Nelson

Psychology and Child Development

No abstract provided.

Understanding The Psychological Motives Behind Microblogging, Lin Qiu, Angela K. Y. Leung, Jun Hao Ho, Qi Min Yeung, Kevin Joseph Francis, Pei Fen Chua

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

This research aims to understand the psychological motives behind microblogging. We conducted two studies to investigate if social exclusion and existential anxiety would lead to a high tendency to microblog. Our results show that participants did not use microblogging to satisfy their needs for social connection and affiliation, but highly extraverted participants did use it to relieve their existential anxiety.

Prediction Of Cognitive Sequelae And Ecological Validity In Critically-Ill Adult Patients, Fu Lye Woon

Theses and Dissertations

Survivors of critical illness have a high prevalence of long-term cognitive and psychiatric morbidity and poor quality of life years after hospital discharge. Data are lacking regarding whether cognitive screening tests predict which critically ill patients may be at risk to develop long-term cognitive sequelae and whether cognitive sequelae predict the patients everyday functioning. This study sought to determine whether cognitive screening tests, including the Mini-Mental State Examination (MMSE) and Mini-Cog, predict long-term cognitive sequelae and everyday functioning in survivors of critical illness 6-month post-hospital discharge. A second purpose was to investigate whether cognitive sequelae are associated with poor everyday …

New Well-Being Measures: Short Scales To Assess Flourishing And Positive And Negative Feelings, Ed Diener, Derrick Wirtz, William Tov, Chu Kim-Prieto, Dong-Won Choi, Shigehiro Oishi, Robert Biswas-Diener

Research Collection School of Social Sciences

Measures of well-being were created to assess psychological flourishing and feelings—positive feelings, negative feelings, and the difference between the two. The scales were evaluated in a sample of 689 college students from six locations. The Flourishing Scale is a brief 8-item summary measure of the respondent’s self-perceived success in important areas such as relationships, self-esteem, purpose, and optimism. The scale provides a single psychological well-being score. The measure has good psychometric properties, and is strongly associated with other psychological well-being scales. The Scale of Positive and Negative Experience produces a score for positive feelings (6 items), a score for negative …

Behavior And Behavior Assessment, Christopher Agnew, Janice Kelly

Department of Psychological Sciences Faculty Publications

This chapter addresses the questions of 1) what do we mean by “behavior” in personality and social psychology, and 2) how can we best assess social behavior. We define behavior as being observable and socially meaningful, but also discuss the dimensions on which behavior varies (e.g., intentional vs. habitual, discrete vs. continuous). We also discuss important variabilities in behavior as they relate to issues of measurement (e.g., behavioral frequency or desirability). For behavior assessment, we focus on some of the practical issues involved (e.g., choosing a coding system, selecting an observational setting), as well as how behavior assessment might intersect …

Patterns Of Presenting Problems And Symptom Severity Related To Family Trauma In A Robust Sample Of College Students, Gerilynn Price Vorkink

Theses and Dissertations

Because of the lasting impact that traumatic family events can have on psychological well-being, students who present for services at college counseling centers may be experiencing problems and symptoms associated with earlier trauma. Many college counseling centers utilize the Counseling Concerns Survey developed by the Research Consortium of Counseling and Psychological Services in Higher Education (1991) and the Outcome Questionnaire-45 (OQ-45; Lambert et al., 1996) as intake instruments to assess students who present for counseling. The major components of the Counseling Concerns Survey are the 18-item Family Experiences Questionnaire, which identifies history of family trauma, and the 42-item Presenting Problems …

Creating An Expected Profile For Affinity 2.5 From A Sample Of Non-Pedophilic, Exculsively Heterosexual, College-Age Females, Marie Worsham

Theses and Dissertations

The Affinity, an instrument designed to measure sexual interest using viewing time, has recently been upgraded from version 2.0 to version 2.5. The Affinity presents slides depicting non-pornographic images of people varying by age and gender. The expected Chi square weights established for Affinity 2.0 for non-pedophilic, exclusively heterosexual females may have been impacted by Affinity 2.5's 42.9% increase in the number of slides. There were two purposes to this study. The first was to establish new expected Chi square weights for non-pedophilic, exclusively heterosexual females using Affinity 2.5. The second purpose was to employ a Chi square procedure (in …

The Effect Of Racial Socialization On Parental Stress In A Sample Of African American Parents, Thompson Remy Jones

Theses and Dissertations

The typical duties of parenting may be multiplied when they must be performed within very demanding situations and with limited personal and physical resources. African American families may also be subject to race-related challenges that further complicate child rearing. In an effort to combat the effect of imminent racism, some African American parents have sought to racially socialize their children. Within the racial socialization literature, it has been determined that racially socializing one’s children has positive effects for those children, however, there is some ambiguity regarding the way it is best done. Although racist acts cannot be predicted nor avoided, …

The Impact Of Culture On Self-Objectification And Risky Appearance Management Behaviors In College Females: A Path Analytic Model, Ellyn Leighton-Herrmann

Masters Theses, 2010-2019

According to objectification-theory, females are socialized to think of their bodies as objects. Given the presence of media and social influence in day to day life, these are likely to have an influence on how young adult females view their bodies. The current study specified a path model testing theoretically-based, hypothesized relationships between cultural, self-objectification, and certain appearance management behaviors in college females. As predicted, significant, positive relationships were found between the Internalization of the thin ideal and the Media, Relationship Status, and Family and Peer influence. Only two of the three hypothesized relationships between Internalization the components of McKinley …

Investigating The Functionality Of A Self-Report Instrument To Detect Autistic Traits In A Non-Clinical College Population: Psychometric Properties Of The Short Version Of Autism-Spectrum Quotient (Aq-26), Anna Zilberberg

Masters Theses, 2010-2019

The present study investigated the dimensionality of the short version of Autism-Spectrum Quotient (AQ-26) (Baron-Cohen et al., 2001) via confirmatory factor analysis (CFA) and exploratory factor analysis (EFA). Designed to screen for autistic traits in a non-clinical adult population, the AQ-26 can potentially be a very useful tool both in research and practice. However, evidence pertaining to the structural validity of the AQ-26 is scarce and inconclusive. Competing factor structure models based on previous research were specified and tested using an American college student sample. None of the theoretically specified models provided adequate fit for the data and the focus …

Predicting Police Aggression: Using Theory To Inform Police Selection Assessment, James Robert Koepfler

Masters Theses, 2010-2019

Although incidents of excessive force by police are very rare, they have a significant impact. Instances of excessive force can lead to expensive law suits, wasted resources spent on training and equipping officers, as well as a breakdown of trust between citizens and police departments. Psychologists can help to reduce inappropriate aggressive behavior through careful screening of police officer candidates. Most research has focused on the efficacy of the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory-2 (MMPI-2) in predicting police performance; however, results have been inconclusive regarding its ability to predict police aggression. The purpose of this study was to identify whether the …

Counseling International Students: Presenting Concerns And Implications For The College Mental Health Professional, Anna Khizanishvili

Educational Specialist, 2009-2019

This research project details the presenting concerns of international students studying in American colleges and universities such as: lack of social support, acculturation, anxiety, depression, academic struggles, financial concerns, and language barriers. Despite the numerous significant stressors that they experience while studying in the United States, international students are less likely than American students to use counseling services on U.S. college campuses. A case study of an international student, Deepa, is presented and details her struggles with studying in the United States. Implications and recommendations for mental health professionals working with international college students are presented.

I Pledge Allegiance To The Southern Cross? The Importance Of Multicultural Education In Today’S Schools, Jennifer Kurbel

Educational Specialist, 2009-2019

As schools nation-wide continue to become increasingly diverse, the need for multicultural education curricula is becoming an absolute necessity. Within the school setting, counselors, teachers, administrators and other personnel are in an ideal position to serve as positive role models and to help shape the students into citizens who respect and value the diversity of their society. This project provides a firsthand look into a controversial event at a high school that could have possibly been prevented with a more proactive approach to diversity and multicultural education. The report also provides potentially useful and helpful suggestions, considerations and resources for …

A Qualitative Analysis Of Messages Conveyed In Parent-Adolescent Communication About Substance Use: Variations Along Dimensions Of Maternal And Familial History Of Substance Abuse, Nikola Zaharakis

Theses and Dissertations

Little research has examined the content of parent-adolescent communication about substance use and variables that may influence it. Using a grounded theory approach for secondary data analysis, qualitative data were drawn from a longitudinal study of coping and substance use in a sample of urban African American adolescents (N=132; M= 13.77 years) and their mothers in Richmond, VA. Transcripts of interviews with participants’ mothers regarding their conversations with their adolescent about alcohol, tobacco or other drugs were microanalyzed by two coders in three sets according to the youth participant’s maternal and familial history of substance abuse. Findings revealed considerable similarity …

The Prevalence Of Technology, Greg Townsend

Undergraduate Psychology Research Methods Journal

The current study at hand administered a survey to determine the prevalence of technology and Internet usage in undergraduate college students. The results of a survey administered to 66 participants revealed that just about two-thirds of the students may have or had an excessive problem, which could be related to several aspects such as age, gender, class status, country of origin, and so on. The results did allow the research to support the hypothesis that stated if someone in college were given a technology and Internet addiction survey, then he/she would report that he/she is in fact addicted to the …

Facing The Book Of Reliance: An Analysis Of College Student’S Dependency On Facebook, John R. Gatermann

Undergraduate Psychology Research Methods Journal

No abstract provided.