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Reliability And Validity Of The Japanese Version Of The Ways Of Savoring Checklist (Woscj), Erika Miyakawa, Paul E. Jose, Fred B. Bryant, Atsushi Kawakubo, Takashi Oguchi

Psychology: Faculty Publications and Other Works

The purpose of this study was to evaluate the reliability and validity of the Japanese version of the Ways of Savoring Checklist (WOSC-J), adapted from the original English version of the Ways of Savoring Checklist (Bryant & Veroff, 2007). We translated and back-translated the WOSC-J, and administered it to 520 Japanese adults using an online survey. Exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses were used to examine the factor structure of the measure. Confirming our hypothesis, a two-factor model (amplifying and dampening) yielded the best goodness-of-fit to the data. Each of the two factors had adequate internal consistency reliability. To assess the …

Animal Suicide: Evolutionary Continuity Or Anthropomorphism?, Antonio Preti

Animal Sentience

Evolutionary processes are characterized by both continuity and discontinuity. Evidence on suicide in nonhuman animals is faint and often rests on the metaphorical or anthropomorphic use of the term. Suicidal behavior might be an evolutionary jump relatively recent in our species: a byproduct of living in groups of people who are not as closely related genetically as in social groups of nonhuman mammals.

Animal Suicide And "Anthropodenial", Ryan Hediger

Animal Sentience

Increasing understanding of the impressive cognitive and social capacities of nonhuman animals suggests the possibility that they may sometimes commit suicide. Such notions tend to be dismissed as “anthropomorphism.” That interpretive hazard, I argue, must be weighed against the opposite hazard of “anthropodenial” — “the a priori rejection of shared characteristics between humans and animals” (de Waal 2006). If animals do commit suicide, how often is it motivated precisely by the impact of humans on animal life?

Continuum And Temporality, Gerard Kuperus

Animal Sentience

I fully support the continuum proposed in the target article and argue along the same lines that we should be suspicious of drawing any strict borders between human and non-human animals. Since we can say very little with absolute certainty about human intentions regarding suicide, we have no certainty about the intentions of non-human animals. Although I am very sympathetic to Peña-Guzmán’s overall argument, I suggest that time could be taken into consideration as well.

Thinking About Thinking Chickens, Lori Marino

Animal Sentience

This response focuses on three major conceptual threads that run through the peer commentary on my target article: (1) how the use of chickens influences our views of them, (2) whether education is effective, and (3) what components of chicken psychology are most relevant to understanding who chickens are.

Gene × Environment Interaction: What Exactly Are We Talking About?, David S. Moore

Pitzer Faculty Publications and Research

An ambiguity exists in how psychological scientists use the word “interaction.” This word can refer to physical interactions between components that constitute the mechanisms in complex systems, but it can also refer to statistical interactions revealed by General Linear Statistical Models (e.g., Analyses of Variance). Statistical interactions indicate that the nature of the relationship between two variables depends on a third variable, but the discovery of such interactions does not constitute evidence of physical interactions between components in a system. Studies conducted using traditional behavioral genetics methods sometimes reveal statistical interactions between genes and environments, but the presence or absence …

Early Contributions To Infants’ Mental Rotation Abilities, Mihaela Constantinescu, David S. Moore, Scott P. Johnson, Melissa Hines

Pitzer Faculty Publications and Research

Some cognitive abilities exhibit reliable gender differences, with females outperforming males in specific aspects of verbal ability, and males showing an advantage on certain spatial tasks. Among these cognitive gender differences, differences in mental rotation are the most robust, and appear to be present even in infants. A large body of animal research suggests that gonadal hormones, particularly testosterone, during early development could contribute to this gender difference in mental rotation. Also, substantial evidence supports an influence of socialization on mental rotation performance. The present study investigated the relationship of two types of factors, early postnatal testosterone exposure and parental …

Prospective Comparison Of The Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory-2 (Mmpi-2) And Mmpi-2-Restructured Form (Mmpi-2-Rf) In Predicting Treatment Outcomes Among Patients With Chronic Low Back Pain, Anthony M. Tarescavage

2018 Faculty Bibliography

The purpose of the current study was to examine the relative utility of the most updated MMPI adult instrument, the Minnesota Multiphasic Personality Inventory-2-Restructured Form (MMPI-2-RF), which was designed to address psychometric limitations of the MMPI-2. To this end, we compared mean scores and correlates of emotional distress treatment outcomes using the Depression Anxiety Stress Scales in a sample of 230 patients (73 males, 157 females) who had completed an interdisciplinary chronic pain rehabilitation program. Structural equation modeling analyses indicated that higher scale scores from all the MMPI-2-RF substantive domains were meaningfully associated with worse emotional distress outcomes, whereas the …

The Signature Of Undetected Change: An Exploratory Electrotomographic Investigation Of Gradual Change Blindness, John E. Kiat, Michael D. Dodd, Robert F. Belli, Jacob E. Cheadle

Department of Psychology: Faculty Publications

Neuroimaging-based investigations of change blindness, a phenomenon in which seemingly obvious changes in visual scenes fail to be detected, have significantly advanced our understanding of visual awareness. The vast majority of prior investigations, however, utilize paradigms involving visual disruptions (e.g., intervening blank screens, saccadic movements, “mudsplashes”), making it difficult to isolate neural responses toward visual changes cleanly. To address this issue in this present study, high-density EEG data (256 channel) were collected from 25 participants using a paradigm in which visual changes were progressively introduced into detailed real-world scenes without the use of visual disruption. Oscillatory activity associated with undetected …

A Generative Model Of Cognitive State From Task And Eye Movements, W. Joseph Macinnes, Amelia R. Hunt, Alasdair D. F. Clarke, Michael D. Dodd

Department of Psychology: Faculty Publications

The early eye tracking studies of Yarbus provided descriptive evidence that an observer’s task influences patterns of eye movements, leading to the tantalizing prospect that an observer’s intentions could be inferred from their saccade behavior. We investigate the predictive value of task and eye movement properties by creating a computational cognitive model of saccade selection based on instructed task and internal cognitive state using a Dynamic Bayesian Network (DBN). Understanding how humans generate saccades under different conditions and cognitive sets links recent work on salience models of low-level vision with higher level cognitive goals. This model provides a Bayesian, cognitive …

The Acculturation Gap: Investigating The Relationship Between Inter-Partner Acculturation Discrepancy And Parenting Quality, Casiana Warfield

Master's Theses and Doctoral Dissertations

Parenting and relational factors have been investigated thoroughly in previous literature. However, considering the proliferation of multiracial individuals in the United States, it is concerning that many cultural components of American families have been neglected, including the impact of acculturation on parenting negotiation. In particular, the acculturation gap describes differences in acculturation and enculturation levels between family members. The acculturation-gap-distress model postulates that when members within a family context acculturate at different rates, to different degrees, or in different ways than other members, this discrepancy results in conflict. The present study evaluated the relationship between inter-partner acculturation discrepancy and perceptions …

An Exploration Of The Relationships Between Mindfulness And Obesity-Related Eating Behaviors, Jennifer Battles

Master's Theses and Doctoral Dissertations

Little research has explored the basic relationships between different components of mindfulness and eating behaviors associated with obesity even though mindfulness-based interventions (MBIs) have been widely utilized to treat eating behaviors. This study explored these relationships in order to inform more effective MBIs for obesity. Participants (N = 533) from a mixed community and undergraduate sample completed an online battery of assessments. All components of mindfulness were related to eating behaviors as would be expected, with the exception of trait mindful awareness. A series of multiple hierarchical regressions showed that mindful eating was a unique predictor of eating behaviors …

Towards A Physio-Cognitive Model Of Slow-Breathing, Chris Dancy

Faculty Conference Papers and Presentations

How may controlled breathing be beneficial, or detrimental to behavior? Computational process models are useful to specify the potential mechanisms that lead to behavioral adaptation during different breathing exercises. We present a physio-cognitive model of slow breathing implemented within a hybrid cognitive architecture, ACT-R/Φ. Comparisons to data from an experiment indicate that the physiological mechanisms are operating in a manner that is consistent with actual human function. The presented computational model provides predictions of ways that controlled breathing interacts with mechanisms of arousal to mediate cognitive behavior. The increasing use of breathing techniques to counteract effects of stressors makes it …

Towards A Physio-Cognitive Model Of The Exploration Exploitation Trade-Off., David M. Schwartz, Christopher L. Dancy

Faculty Conference Papers and Presentations

Managing the exploration vs exploitation trade-off is an important part of our everyday lives. It occurs in minor decisions such as choosing what music to listen to as well as major decisions, such as picking a research direction to pursue. The dilemma is the same despite the context: does one exploit the environment, using current knowledge to acquire a satisfactory solution, or explore other options and potentially find a better answer. An accurate cognitive model must be able to handle this trade-off because of the importance it plays in our lives. We are developing physio-cognitive models to better understand how …

Book: Venture Into A New Realm Of Cross-Cultural Psychology Meditation, Mantric Poetry, And Well-Being: A Qualitative, Cross-Cultural, Cross-Disciplinary Exploration With American Secondary And Japanese Post-Secondary Adolescents, Lunthita M. Duthely, Harashita Y. Sunaoshi, Olga M. Villar-Loubet

Papers from the International Association for Cross-Cultural Psychology Conferences

Higher well-being correlates positively with multiple psychological and social outcomes, including workplace success and better academic outcomes for students. Poetry and meditation, independently, have been demonstrated in prior studies to increase well-being in a variety of contexts, including physical and mental health challenges. To our knowledge, this is the only published cross-cultural study that merged contemplative practices and poetry within the well-being paradigm, particularly among general, non-clinical adolescent populations. The purpose of this exploratory study was to examine the use of meditation and mantric poetry in a cross-cultural, educational context. The materials included The Jewels of Happiness: Inspiration and Wisdom …

Who Cares? Attitudes Of High School Students From Various Countries Towards Global And Domestic Environmental Issues, Kseniya Fomichova, Taku Misonou

Papers from the International Association for Cross-Cultural Psychology Conferences

This study focused on attitudes of 16 year-old students from six countries towards environmental issues on domestic and global scales. Male and female students from China, Guinea, Japan, Malaysia, Ukraine and Vietnam expressed their level of concern about the following in regard to their country and the world: (a) air quality, (b) drinking water quality, (c) pollution caused by atomic power plants, (d) clearing of forests, (e) extinction of plants and animals, (f) climate change and (g) global disaster. This research focused on gender and cultural variability and invariance under diverse conditions of students’ backgrounds.

The most pronounced intercultural regularity …

Overt And Covert Attention In Infants Revealed Using Steady-State Visually Evoked Potentials, Joan Christodoulou, David S. Leland, David S. Moore

Pitzer Faculty Publications and Research

Although looking-time methods have long been used to measure infant attention and investigate aspects of cognitive development, steady-state visually evoked potential (SSVEP) measures may be more sensitive or practical in some contexts. Here, we demonstrate habituation of infants’ SSVEP amplitudes to a flickering checkerboard stimulus, and recovery of attention upon presentation of a novel checkerboard stimulus. This modulation of SSVEP amplitude was more robust than the modulation of looking time. In addition, we provide evidence of enhanced SSVEPs in response to covertly attended checkerboards flickering in peripheral visual fields, even while infants are fixating a central stimulus. These experiments provide …

A New Model Of Wheezing Severity In Young Children Using The Validated Isaac Wheezing Module: A Latent Variable Approach With Validation In Independent Cohorts., Steven M. Brunwasser Phd, Tebeb Gebretsadik, Diane R Gold, Kedir N Turi, Cosby A Stone, Soma Datta, James E Gern, Tina V Hartert

College of Science & Mathematics Departmental Research

BACKGROUND: The International Study of Asthma and Allergies in Children (ISAAC) Wheezing Module is commonly used to characterize pediatric asthma in epidemiological studies, including nearly all airway cohorts participating in the Environmental Influences on Child Health Outcomes (ECHO) consortium. However, there is no consensus model for operationalizing wheezing severity with this instrument in explanatory research studies. Severity is typically measured using coarsely-defined categorical variables, reducing power and potentially underestimating etiological associations. More precise measurement approaches could improve testing of etiological theories of wheezing illness.

METHODS: We evaluated a continuous latent variable model of pediatric wheezing severity based on four ISAAC …

Young Adult Development And Caregiving: Disposition And Involvement In Care, Nicholas James

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Caregivers are a diverse group of individuals with a variety of backgrounds and roles; however, research has widely overlooked young adults in this population. This study investigated young adult caregiver circumstance, burden, and use of support services with the purpose of improving future caregiving research and interventions. Study 1 compared burden and circumstance among young, middle aged, and older adult caregivers (N = 285) in addition to developmental indicators among young adults caregiver and demographically matched non-caregiver peers (n = 225). Study 2 surveyed caregivers from each age group (N = 151) on barriers to care, treatment preferences, and interest …

Understanding The Effects Of Education Through The Lens Of Biology, H Moriah Sokolowski, Daniel Ansari

Brain and Mind Institute Researchers' Publications

Early educational interventions aim to close gaps in achievement levels between children. However, early interventions do not eliminate individual differences in populations and the effects of early interventions often fade-out over time, despite changes of the mean of the population immediately following the intervention. Here, we discuss biological factors that help to better understand why early educational interventions do not eliminate achievement gaps. Children experience and respond to educational interventions differently. These stable individual differences are a consequence of biological mechanisms that support the interplay between genetic predispositions and the embedding of experience into our biology. Accordingly, we argue that …

Does Posture Impact Affective Word Processing? Examining The Role Of Posture Across Adulthood In An Incidental Encoding Task, Lucas John Hamilton

ETD Archive

Research in emotional aging has primarily investigated mechanisms that could explain the age-related increase in positive emotionality despite various age-related losses. Of particular note is the increasing importance of age-related positivity effects and underlying biological influences on affective processes. Despite evidence of weakened mind-body connectivity in older adulthood presented in the maturation dualism framework, research shows age-similarities in subjective and objective reactivity for certain negative emotional states across adulthood. Thus, robust physiological-experiential associations may still exist in later life. Investigations of integrated mind-body connectivity have lead researchers to examine the influence of posture on cognitive outcomes. Prior evidence has observed …

Relationship Between Self-Efficacy And Attitudes Toward Evidence-Based Practice In Psychology, Radinka Jurosevic Samardzic

ETD Archive

As a result of a fierce debate about the most important factors of effective therapy, the American Psychological Association (APA) defined Evidence-Based Practice in Psychology (EBPP) as “an approach to clinical practice which integrates best available research with clinical expertise in context of patient characteristics, culture, and preferences.” (APA, 2006, p. 273). Research suggests that positive attitudes toward EBPP are related to use of EBPP (Nelson & Steele, 2007). This study utilized a social cognitive theory (Bandura, 1986) framework to examine the relationships between counseling self-efficacy, research self-efficacy, past training experiences, knowledge of EBPP, and attitudes toward EBPP. The participants …

Atheism And The Effects Of Mortality Salience And Limited Analytic Processing Ability On Religious Faith And Teleological Thinkin, Brett Jordan Waggoner

ETD Archive

The scenario of the atheist in the proverbial foxhole has been a topic of discussion in religious circles for centuries. Building on prior research utilizing terror management theory (TMT), a dual process model of cognition, and previous work suggesting that humans are intuitively wired for teleological and religious concepts, the researchers set out to examine atheist’s religiosity when confronted with the reality of one’s impermanence. To explore this idea, the present experiment recruited a sample of atheists, manipulated their awareness of mortality, manipulated their ability to employ analytic thinking, and measured various intuitive cognitions (e.g., teleological reasoning) alongside religious belief. …

Recognition Memory Revisited: An Aging And Electrophysiological Investigation, Elliot C. Jardin

ETD Archive

This study provides a better understanding of contributing factors to age differences in human episodic memory. A recurrent finding in recognition memory is that older adults tend to have lower overall accuracy and tend to make fewer false-alarm errors in judging new items, relative miss errors (Coyne, Allen & Wickens, 1986; Danziger, 1980; Poon and Fozard 1980). Two possible causes for decline in these abilities include an age-related decrement in speed of processing (Salthouse 1991) and changes in information processing ability due to entropy (Allen, Kaufman, Smitch, & Propper 1998a; Mallik et al., in preparation). Additionally, age differences may be …

Concordance Of Illness Representations: The Key To Improving Care Of Medically Unexplained Symptoms, Lisa M. Mcandrew, Myrna L. Friedlander, L. Alison Phillips, Susan L. Santos, Drew A. Helmer

Educational & Counseling Psychology Faculty Scholarship

How can effective patient-provider relationships be developed when the underlying cause of the health condition is not well understood and becomes a point of controversy between patient and provider? This problem underlies the difficulty in treating medically unexplained symptoms and syndromes (MUS; e.g., fibromyalgia, chronic fatigue syndrome), which primary care providers consider to be among the most difficult conditions to treat.¹ This difficulty extends to the patient-provider relationship which is characterized by discord over MUS.¹ In this article, we argue that the key to improving the patient provider relationship is for the patient and provider to develop congruent …

The Metamodern Man, Nathan R. Arrowsmith

Master of Liberal Studies Theses

Abstract The first time I heard the term, “Metamodern Age,” I was actively involved in a discussion about the various themes in Mary Shelley’s Frankenstein. The setting was a Master of Liberal Studies class (Rollins College, MLS 604), entitled “Modernity” taught by Dr. Tom Cook. It was October of 2015. Frankenstein, also known as The Modern Prometheus, is a masterpiece and a solid sample from the Modern Era. Following approximately fifty years of Postmodern Era sludge, we are now in what could be identified as the Metamodern Era. Our Modernity class speculated confidently that the current Age of Metamodernism is …

The Impact Of Neonatal Pain And Reduced Maternal Care On Brain And Behavioral Development, Sean Michael Mooney-Leber

Wayne State University Dissertations

In the neonatal intensive care unit (NICU) preterm infants are exposed to a multitude of stressors, which include both neonatal pain and reduced maternal care. Clinical and preclinical research has demonstrated that exposure to neonatal pain and reduced maternal care has a profound negative impact on brain and behavioral development. Currently, the biological mechanism by which both of these stressors impacts brain and behavioral outcomes remains widely unknown. To uncover a potential biological mechanism, the current dissertation project utilized a preclinical model of repetitive needle pokes and developed a novel model of reduced maternal care through tea-ball encapsulation. Briefly, rat …

Family Structure And Family Management Practices: Associations With Positive Aspects Of Youth Well-Being, Jonathon J. Beckmeyer, Luke T. Russell

Faculty Publications - Family and Consumer Sciences

Using data from a national sample of 15-year olds (N = 681) we tested if four family management practices (parental knowledge, behavioral control, parental academic involvement, and unsupervised time with peers) differed between family structures (i.e., biological-parent, stepfather, or single-mother family). We then identified the family management practices associated with positive youth well-being (psychosocial maturity, positive friendship networks, and school bonding) within each family structure. Parental knowledge, academic involvement, and behavioral control were greater in biological-parent than single-mother families. Stepfather families only differed from biological-parent and single-mother families on parental academic involvement. Although family management practices were associated with youth …

Anxiety And Depression During Childhood And Adolescence: Testing Theoretical Models Of Continuity And Discontinuity, Joseph R. Cohen, Arthur R. Andrews, Megan M. Davis, Karen D. Rudolph

Department of Psychology: Faculty Publications

The present study sought to clarify the trajectory (i.e., continuous vs. discontinuous) and expression (i.e., homotypic vs. heterotypic) of anxiety and depressive symptoms across childhood and adolescence. We utilized a state-of-the-science analytic approach to simultaneously test theoretical models that describe the development of internalizing symptoms in youth. In a sample of 636 children (53% female; M age = 7.04; SD age = 0.35) self-report measures of anxiety and depression were completed annually by youth through their freshman year of high school. For both anxiety and depression, a piecewise growth curve model provided the best fit for the data, with symptoms …

Social Contact Patterns Can Buffer Costs Of Forgetting In The Evolution Of Cooperation, Jeffrey R. Stevens, Jan K. Woike, Lael J. Schooler, Stefan Lindner, Thorsten Pachur

Jeffrey Stevens Publications

Analyses of the evolution of cooperation often rely on two simplifying assumptions: (i) individuals interact equally frequently with all social network members and (ii) they accurately remember each partner's past cooperation or defection. Here, we examine how more realistic, skewed patterns of contact—in which individuals interact primarily with only a subset of their network's members—influence cooperation. In addition, we test whether skewed contact patterns can counteract the decrease in cooperation caused by memory errors (i.e. forgetting). Finally, we compare two types of memory error that vary in whether forgotten interactions are replaced with random actions or with actions from previous …