Digital Commons Network^™

Parental Response To Children’S Negative Emotions As A Mediator Between Parental Coping Strategies And Children’S Symptoms Of Psychopathology, Brooke Vitulli

Psychology Student Scholarship

Major: Psychology
Faculty Mentor: Dr. Kelly A. Warmuth, Psychology

Effect Of Neurosteroid Levels, Genetic Linkages, And Pre-Deployment Virtualreality Resilience Training On Ptsd Severity, Kathryn Fama

Psychology Student Scholarship

Majors: Biology
Faculty Mentor: Dr. Victoria Templer, Psychology

Though Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD) is a common problem among soldiers, current military programs focus on treating PTSD after combat deployment instead of preventing it. The aim of this project was to examine the neurosteroids allopregnanolone and pregnanolone (together known as ALLO), the SNP rs717947, and pre-deployment virtual-reality resilience training (VRRT) to identify effective PTSD prevention methods. Pre-deployment, a Brigade Combat Team (N=3000) of active-duty US Army soldiers was divided into two groups, a VRRT group and an online tactical training sessions (control) group. Soldiers’ blood plasma levels of ALLO were also …

Biased Perceptions Of Women In The Music Industry, Samantha E. Matzerath

Psychology Student Scholarship

Major: Psychology and Sociology
Faculty Mentor: Dr. Saaid Mendoza, Psychology

The Effects Of Imagined Contact With Intersectional Identities, Alexandra L. Baker

Psychology Student Scholarship

Major: Psychology and Women and Gender Studies
Faculty Mentor: Dr. Saaid Mendoza, Psychology

Our present research examined whether imagined intergroup contact could reduce bias towards Black women. We predicted that this established strategy would be most effective when imagining interactions with the targeted intersectional identity compared to the broader gender and racial groups. We found that imagining an interaction with a woman was significantly more beneficial to reducing intergroup anxiety and increasing behavioral intentions toward Black women compared to thinking about the intersectional identity. These findings suggest that direct and indirect imagined contact can operate similarly and that their effects …

What Is An Adult?: A Prototype Analysis Of Attributes Of Adulthood, Katie Russell, Allie Walter, Paris Green

Linfield University Student Symposium: A Celebration of Scholarship and Creative Achievement

Emerging adulthood is described by Arnett (2000) as a recent developmental period, between the stages of adolescence and young adulthood. To understand the transition into adulthood, it is necessary to understand the definition of what an adult is, from the perspective of the general public. In the current study, a bottom-up approach is used to understand people’s perceptions of adulthood through a prototype analysis, a procedure modeled from Kearns and Fincham (2004). 122 participants were recruited through snowball sampling on social media sites and classroom advertisements. Participants ranged from 18-62 years old. They completed an online questionnaire asking: “What is …

Activities In A Long-Term Care Facility Amidst A Global Pandemic, Kayla Valente

Honors Projects

This paper focuses on the lives of individuals in Wood Haven Health Care in Bowling Green, Ohio during the COVID-19 global pandemic. Living in a long-term care facility can be difficult any time, but since the lockdown began life has been especially challenging for the individuals in nursing facilities. I worked directly with the residents at Wood Haven during my internship with the activities department. With this position, I was tasked with creating fun and engaging activities that also kept residents safe. I will be discussing different research about activities in long-term care facilities, specifics about activities during the COVID-19 …

Language Acquisition Intervention: A Prototype In Supplemental Children's Education Through Media, Kelly A. Vidovic

Honors Capstones

The purpose of this project is to design a game which will help narrow the divide in child development between households and improve vocabulary skills. It has been found that there is a positive correlation between parent’s speaking with their children and the child’s educational development, particularly in language (Fernald, Marchman, & Weisleder, 2013). This is thought to be a result of the child being exposed to more words more often, which aids in their language development and continues to assist in their educational development over time. Further studies have also indicated that early life interventions’, such as educational tv …

When Does Substance Use Become Abuse? Psy 275, Julia Lovett

Library Impact Statements

No abstract provided.

Moving Morality Beyond The In-Group: Liberals And Conservatives Show Differences On Group-Framed Moral Foundations And These Differences Mediate The Relationships To Perceived Bias And Threat., Brandon D. Stewart Phd, David S. M. Morris

Faculty Publications

Moral foundations research suggests that liberals care about moral values related to individual rights such as harm and fairness, while conservatives care about those foundations in addition to caring more about group rights such as loyalty, authority, and purity. However, the question remains about how conservatives and liberals differ in relation to group-level moral principles. We used two versions of the moral foundations questionnaire with the target group being either abstract or specific ingroups or outgroups. Across three studies, we observed that liberals showed more endorsement of Individualizing foundations (Harm and Fairness foundations) with an outgroup target, while conservatives showed …

Stress To Success: A Children's Book About Handling Stressful Situations, Marina Pennycuff

Honors Projects

For this project, I investigated the importance of bibliotherapy with school-aged children through the construction of my own children’s book that is focused around social-emotional aspects that are important for development. In particular, this children’s book was focused around different stressful events that can occur in a child’s life. This project allowed me to have a hands-on approach in researching this central topic. Another major goal for this project was that it granted me the ability to create a physical copy of a book that I will be able to use as a tool in my future career working with …

Regulation Of Self-Love, Kruti Surti

Dissertations

While the concept of self-love is well-known in today’s society, it remains unknown how self-love can be increased. Increasing self-love may help individuals decrease stress and promote well-being. The current study tested how self-love and pleasantness can be increased and whether anxiety levels and personality traits such as neuroticism and conscientiousness are associated with self-love increase. In this study, participants (N = 108; 86 women, 20 men, 1 gender queer, 1 other (not specified)) completed questionnaires related to self-compassion, self-efficacy, anxiety, and personality. Then, participants completed an online self-love regulation task in which they read prompts that encouraged them …

Leveraging Institutional Support To Build An Integrated Multidisciplinary Care Model In Pediatric Inflammatory Bowel Disease., Jennifer Verrill Schurman, Craig A. Friesen

Manuscripts, Articles, Book Chapters and Other Papers

While the biopsychosocial nature of inflammatory bowel disease (IBD) is now well accepted by clinicians, the need for integrated multidisciplinary care is not always clear to institutional administrators who serve as decision makers regarding resources provided to clinical programs. In this commentary, we draw on our own experience in building successful integrated care models within a division of pediatric gastroenterology (GI) to highlight key considerations in garnering initial approval, as well as methods to maintain institutional support over time. Specifically, we discuss the importance of making a strong case for the inclusion of a psychologist in pediatric IBD care, justifying …

Inner Monologue: Relationship To Personality And Psychopathology, Sara J. Conley

Undergraduate Distinction Papers

The purpose of this study is to investigate the function of internal monologue and investigate its relation to personality and psychopathology. Internal monologue or self-talk are habits of private speech that may serve to internally guide, comfort, and criticize (Brintahupt 2019; Morin, Duhnych and Racy, 2018). We explored the relationship of self-talk to the factor of extraversion, how self-talk impacts the relationship with self, and if mental disorders such as anxiety and depression impacted the way in which one engages in self-talk. 96 college-age participants completed a survey consisting of quantitative and qualitative measures that asked about self-talk. Findings showed …

Waves: An Exploration Of Emotions, Aminatta Mbow

Honors College Theses

Emotions are at the core of every human being. They can dictate the decisions we make whether we are aware of it or not, and can be shown in many ways. For my honors thesis, I created a magazine that explores emotions. I utilized my skills and knowledge in portrait photography to showcase the complexities of happiness, sadness, anger, and anxiety. I also employed my skills in design to not only present these feelings but evoke that specific emotion in my audience with ideas such as color theory and photographic psychology. Color theory encompasses a multitude of practices on how …

Sociocognitive Development Through A Comparative Developmental Lens, Alyssa Mcsherry Arre

Yale Graduate School of Arts and Sciences Dissertations

Early human life is marked by robust developmental shifts in sociocognitive abilities. While we know a lot about these developmental patterns in human primates, we know relatively little about whether nonhuman primates share these early life trajectories. In this dissertation, I identify and explore three open questions using this comparative developmental psychology method. In Chapter 2 (Arre, Clark, and Santos, 2020), I compare the developmental trajectory of an early emerging theory of mind ability— the capacity to represent what others see— in a primate species to the existing established trajectory in human infants. In Chapter 3 (Arre, Stumph, & Santos, …

A Domain-General Perspective On Deviancy: People’S Sensitivity To Deviancy And Its Social Consequences, Anton Gollwitzer

Yale Graduate School of Arts and Sciences Dissertations

In this dissertation, I propose that people’s sensitivity to deviancy is a domain-general phenomenon—an aspect of the individual experience that manifests across distinct domains. Supporting this possibility, across a multi-faceted approach (cross-cultural, developmental, nonconscious processes), I document that people’s responses to deviancy—their evaluative and affective responses to distortions in regularities and patterns—overlap across highly divergent domains (e.g., nonsocial stimuli, social actions, physical characteristics, nonvisual stimuli, visual stimuli). Additionally, in line with this broad conceptualization of deviancy, I find that people’s domain-general responding towards deviancy is largely negative in affect, emerges at a young age, exists cross-culturally, and may even causally …

The Emotional Effects Of Mindfulness, Meditation, And Worldview, Jason Katz

Honors Projects in Applied Psychology

Much research on mindfulness and meditation investigates the relationship between mindfulness practices and health in physiological, psychological, and neurological contexts and organizations have implemented mindfulness training programs, possibly after learning of the apparent benefits. Researchers should use caution when assessing the practice’s benefits and consider extraneous variables such as the possibility that meditators tend towards spirituality; theologians argue that underlying beliefs might contribute to mindfulness practitioners’ reactions to the physical and psychological changes that result from mindfulness practices. This study investigates if and how religious beliefs modify mindfulness’s emotional outcomes for Bryant University students. The findings suggest that mindfulness and …

Internships: Does Length Of Time Impact Student Confidence In Key Skills?, Hayley Bobok

Honors Projects in Applied Psychology

The purpose of this thesis is to determine if length of time spent on an internship has an impact on student’s confidence levels in information systems proficiency, interpersonal communication, and self-efficacy in the workplace. Applying for and selecting an internship can be a challenging process for college students and understanding from this study if the number of weeks or hours has an impact on learning is designed to make that process easier. This study was conducted through a thorough research analysis of the current literature related to internships and their impacts on a student’s education. A survey was then distributed …

Analysis Of Concussion Experiences And Awareness In College Athletics At Bryant And Beyond, Juliana Cappola

Honors Projects in Applied Psychology

The purpose of this thesis is to examine concussion experiences, awareness and education through a literature review and study of Bryant students. The study assessed concussion awareness and experiences through a questionnaire sent out to club and division 1 athletes at Bryant through email and social media channels. The study yielded 98 responses, but after filtering out responses with insufficient information 62 usable responses remained. These responses consisted of 62% female and 34% male athletes on 13 different teams. Of the 62 participants, 34 (roughly half) reported being diagnosed with a concussion in their lifetime, and 18 athletes reported having …

Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (Mbsr) For School-Based Professionals, Tessa Carley

Psychology

For many years, United States educators have been experiencing an increased amount of stress due to continuously changing education policies, increased school accountability, and additional personal life stressors (e.g., finances, illness, etc.). Increased levels of educator stress has been highly correlated to low job satisfaction ratings, high burn-out rates, and overall negative consequences for teachers, students and school climate (Reiser et al., 2016). Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction (MBSR) intervention programs have exhibited promising results in reducing stress and increasing job satisfaction among a variety of populations (Reisner et al., 2016). This is a proposal outlining the implementation and effectiveness of an …

Infant Fmri: A Model System For Cognitive Neuroscience, Cameron Thomas Ellis

Yale Graduate School of Arts and Sciences Dissertations

Studying the infant mind and brain promises to benefit three distinct fields of science in critical ways. In developmental science, understanding infancy is necessary for appreciating the foundations of the human life and determining what changes with development. In cognitive science, revelations about infant cognitive capacities can constrain theories by limiting the possible explanations of how those capacities emerge. In neuroscience, infants offer the unique possibility to study large-scale neural change in humans, while also revealing principles that underlie the optimization of neural circuitry. Yet, there are limits on the kinds of questions that can be asked by the methods …

Phonological And Semantic False Memories Across Memory Systems, Elizabeth Marsh

Psychology

This study aimed to compare false memories in short and long-term tests for semantic and phonological lists. The purpose of this study was to replicate our previous results with shorter lists in the short-term memory condition. Both the past and current study used 36 DeeseRoediger-McDermott (DRM, Roediger & McDermott, 1995) lists for the creation of simple false memories. The lists varied in their association to a nonstudied critical lure item: There were 18 semantic and 18 phonological lists. The first study used 6-item DRM lists, whereas the current study used 4-item DRM lists to ensure list length did not exceed …

A Comprehensive Literature Review Of Instructional Consultation Within Schools Settings, Nina Orlando, Berenice Contreras

Psychology

Instructional Consultation (IC) is a collaborative stage-based process that focuses on academic and behavioral concerns from an ecological perspective (Rosenfield, 2002). School psychologist and teachers work together to assess the academic and behavioral concerns of children. Addressing these concerns allow for new learning conditions to be developed, thus allowing academic achievement to be improved within the classroom. Knotek et al. (2003) indicated that by understanding student’s problems as a result of the environment rather than an internal problem is a main goal within IC to alter how teachers view student’s school problems. The present study aims to systematically discover IC …

Improvements In Cardinal, Ordinal, And Spatial Language In Young Children, Rebecca Bove, Lucy Okrasinski, Jacqueline Diaz, Ella Metzger, Olivia Mangini

Psychology

Language is an important aspect of child development. Cardinal number words such as one, two, and three emerge before ordinal number words such as first, second, and third, though both increase with age in early childhood (Colomé & Noel, 2012). Children first learn verbal lists of number words, then they are able to give those words meaning (Slusser, Ditta, & Sarnecka, 2013). The more number words children know, the greater their ordinal comprehension (Brannon & Van de Walle, 2001). When children are less familiar with ordinal labels, it can negatively impact problem solving (Miller, Marcovitch, Boseovski, & Lewowicz, 2015). Spatial …

Youth May Protect Themselves By Seeking Less Committed Relationships, Which They Describe As "Talking.", Christina Michaels

Psychology

The way that youth label their romantic relationships may provide important insight into interpersonal and intrapersonal processes that influence how they navigate their first romantic encounters. The present study found that “talking” relationships involved less exclusivity, different modes of and amounts of communication, and served different purposes than romantic relationships.

Effects Of Delays And Reminders On Time-Based Prospective Memory, Lauren Black, Mackenize Kelleher

Psychology

Recent research has focused on event- and time-based prospective memory (PM) studied in lab settings. The current study focuses on scarcely studied naturalistic time-based PM tasks. Time-based PM is defined as remembering to carry out a task at a specific time in the future (Einstein & McDaniel, 1990, 2005). Two experiments were performed to compare the effects of various delays and types of reminders on time-based PM. In the first experiment, participants underwent a time-based PM task at a 1-, 3-, or 6-day delay in a naturalistic setting. Half of the participants were asked to repeat the delay and half …

Parental Roles And Cultural Identity On Academic Resiliency, Vanessa Diaz

Psychology

This study looked into the impacts of parental roles and cultural identity on adolescent academic resiliency. Parents (mothers and fathers separately) who were less involved in a student’s academic life as well as students who had lower levels of cultural identity demonstrated an overall lower level of academic resilience. This suggests that parent roles of students may vary by youths’ cultural identity which impact students’ academic resiliency. Data was collected from two sources, 1) a Qualtrics survey of Latino students who did not attend college and 2) a generalized population of ISU students through SONA data collection software for a …

Dangerous Or Misunderstood?: Attributes Ascribed To Individuals With Mental Illness And Their Effects On Perceived Dangerousness, Sydni Neal

Psychology

Individuals with mental illness may be considered rather common within the United States—as of 2017 roughly 1 in 5 U.S. adults experienced a mental illness and 1 in 25 experienced a severe mental illness (NAMI, 2019). Despite these prevalence rates, there are many misconceptions about individuals with mental illness. For example individuals with mental illness are perceived as dangerous (Angermeyer & Matschinger, 2003), unpredictable (Magliano et al., 2004), and aggressive (Adewuya & Makanjuola, 2008), despite research that suggests they are not more likely to be violent and/or dangerous (Monahan et al., 2017). These negative perceptions can lead to higher unemployment …

Effects Of Attention At Encoding And Retrieval On Short And Long-Term False Memories For Emotional Stimuli, Grace Shine, Elizabeth Marsh

Psychology

The proposed study will examine the effects of attention at encoding and retrieval on short- and long-term false memory for emotional stimuli using the Desse–Roediger–McDermott (DRM, Roediger & McDermott, 1995) paradigm. DRM research has shown that there are differences in false memory for stimuli that are emotionally valenced and that emotional information is often better recalled than neutral information. Prior research has also shown different effects of attention on emotional stimuli and suggests that negatively valenced stimuli are processed differently than positive and neutral stimuli. In the present study, this phenomenon is further investigated across two experiments; attention is manipulated …

Anxiety Level As A Factor In Emotionally Expressive Facial Recognition, Amanda Devore

Psychology

Accurate recognition of the people we encounter is important for successful navigation of many aspects of life, as faces are often the primary source for social cues. Yet, research on emotionally expressive facial recognition memory in specific has revealed mixed results. Some studies have found that happy faces are more accurately recognized than angry faces, whereas others have found the opposite. Pazderski and McBride (2018) provided evidence of delay length contributing to a happy face recognition advantage in some past studies (i.e., longer delays) versus an angry face recognition advantage in others (i.e., shorter delays). However, the root of the …