Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®

Social and Behavioral Sciences Commons

Open Access. Powered by Scholars. Published by Universities.®

Articles 1 - 10 of 10

Full-Text Articles in Social and Behavioral Sciences

Determining The Psychosocial Needs Of The Nurses Of Covid-19 Patients, Allison Stevens Dec 2021

Determining The Psychosocial Needs Of The Nurses Of Covid-19 Patients, Allison Stevens

ATU Theses and Dissertations 2021 - Present

Nurses are a vital element of the COVID-19 healthcare crisis and have been since the beginning of the COVID-19 response. The professional strain put on nurses included, but is not limited to: changing professional roles, rapidly changing policies and procedures, an influx of patients—particularly of high acuity, and change in workplace morale. However, nurses also had to carry the burdens of living as a member of society, family member, friend, community member, and above all, simply as a person surviving a pandemic themselves. With all of the stressors nurses have endured, it stands to reason that their psychosocial needs have …


Neural Substrates Of Fear Generalization And Its Associations With Anxiety And Intolerance Of Uncertainty, Ashley Ann Huggins Aug 2021

Neural Substrates Of Fear Generalization And Its Associations With Anxiety And Intolerance Of Uncertainty, Ashley Ann Huggins

Theses and Dissertations

Fear generalization - the tendency to interpret ambiguous stimuli as threatening due to perceptual similarity to a learned threat – is an adaptive process. Overgeneralization, however, is maladaptive and has been implicated in a number of anxiety disorders. Neuroimaging research has indicated several regions sensitive to effects of generalization, including regions involved in fear excitation (e.g., amygdala, insula) and inhibition (e.g., ventromedial prefrontal cortex). Research has suggested several other small brain regions may play an important role in this process (e.g., hippocampal subfields, bed nucleus of the stria terminalis [BNST], habenula), but, to date, these regions have not been examined …


Cerebellum-Seeded Functional Connectivity Changes In Trait-Anxious Individuals Undergoing Attention Bias Modification Training, Katherine Elwell Jul 2021

Cerebellum-Seeded Functional Connectivity Changes In Trait-Anxious Individuals Undergoing Attention Bias Modification Training, Katherine Elwell

All NMU Master's Theses

Anxiety and anxiety related disorders are increasing at a drastic rate in the past decade, with the NIMH reporting that 31.1% of U.S. adults will experience an anxiety disorder at some point in their lives. Anxiety is commonly characterized by increased attention bias to threat. Attention Bias Modification (ABM) is a new treatment used to reduce individual’s attention bias towards threat. The extent to which ABM leads to underlying neural changes is still unknown. The cerebellum is a neglected brain structure, with new research provides evidence that cerebellum’s functional connectivity and shared networks with threat processing regions has a direct …


Learning To Feel Safe: A Translational Study Of The Influence Of Safety Learning On Anxiety-Related Overgeneralized Fear, Hyein Cho Jun 2021

Learning To Feel Safe: A Translational Study Of The Influence Of Safety Learning On Anxiety-Related Overgeneralized Fear, Hyein Cho

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Anxiety disorders are among the most common mental health diagnoses, affecting about a third of the population in their lifetime. However, approximately a third of individuals with anxiety do not respond to current treatment approaches, highlighting the need to identify additional potential therapeutic mechanisms. Safety learning is one such mechanism, but methodological challenges and a dearth of research have prevented the field from advancing the understanding of the role of safety learning in the etiology and remediation of anxiety disorders. Animal research, using single-cued safety learning paradigms, has yielded promising early findings, demonstrating that safety learning directly reduces anxiety-related behaviors …


Psychological Impact Of Novel Coronavirus Covid-19 Across The Globe-A Review, Sadaf Shaheen, Iram Asim, Rida Zainab, Humaira Yasmeen May 2021

Psychological Impact Of Novel Coronavirus Covid-19 Across The Globe-A Review, Sadaf Shaheen, Iram Asim, Rida Zainab, Humaira Yasmeen

Journal of Bioresource Management

The recent outbreaks of novel coronavirus disease have unprecedent impact on mental health of patients, front-line healthcare workers and local population. However, the impact is not fully documented. This review explores stress-driven factors, stress-vulnerable groups and stress management interventions. Repetitive exposure to mass media and inappropriate health protective measures has heightened stress responses. Fear of not getting recovered from COVID-19 and disaffection has profound impact of infected individuals and their families. They may experience fear, anxiety, anger, sleep deprives and anorexia which may weakens their immune system thus making them vulnerable to COVID-19. The COVID-19 pandemic has underscored potential gaps …


The Disproportionate Impact Of Covid-19 On Women, Ava Stallone May 2021

The Disproportionate Impact Of Covid-19 On Women, Ava Stallone

Honors Scholar Theses

The impact of COVID-19 is placing a large strain on women. This can be seen through reports of mental health and financial concerns. Women are more vulnerable to COVID-19 related economic effects due to existing gender inequalities, which in turn may also have a negative effect on mental health. Through this study gender disproportion is looked at between mental health and COVID-19 financial concerns among women and men. The aim is to asses how COVID-19 financial concerns may be contributing to stress, anxiety, and depression. It is hypothesized that; women will report worse mental health and greater economic concerns than …


Exploring The Usefulness Of Mindfulness Practices Through Zoom Meetings In Reducing Anxiety And/Or Stress Of Adults With Learning And Developmental Disabilities During The Covid-19 Pandemic, Thatiane Abra May 2021

Exploring The Usefulness Of Mindfulness Practices Through Zoom Meetings In Reducing Anxiety And/Or Stress Of Adults With Learning And Developmental Disabilities During The Covid-19 Pandemic, Thatiane Abra

Expressive Therapies Capstone Theses

This thesis explored which mindfulness meditations or mindfulness practices could be beneficial in the online sessions, the extent to which adults with learning and developmental disabilities could learn the practices remotely, and how stress and anxiety disorders could be reduced through online mindfulness interventions. Furthermore, it was also necessary to address the online sessions as the only mental health treatment possibility during the Coronavirus pandemic for the clients observed and the benefits and limitations of these interventions. Additionally, the importance of structure and routine for this population, the multi-modal structure of the interventions, and how attunement plays an important role …


Behavioral, Physiological, And Molecular Characterization Of Long-Term Administration Of A Novel Estrogen Receptor Beta Agonist In A Mouse Model Of Menopause, Aaron William Fleischer May 2021

Behavioral, Physiological, And Molecular Characterization Of Long-Term Administration Of A Novel Estrogen Receptor Beta Agonist In A Mouse Model Of Menopause, Aaron William Fleischer

Theses and Dissertations

The menopausal loss of circulating hormones, including estrogens, is associated with negative symptoms, such as hot flashes, anxiety and depression, cognitive decline, and weight gain. Although estrogenic hormone therapies (HT) prevent many of the negative symptoms related to the menopausal transition, these same therapies are associated with increased health risks, such as the development of breast and ovarian cancers, which is mediated by the activation of the a (ERa), but not b (ERb), estrogen receptor isoform. Furthermore, ERb agonism has previously been shown to reduce preclinical indices of hot flashes, memory decline, anxiety, and depression. As most ERb agonists are …


Neural Correlates Underlying The Interactions Between Anxiety And Cannabis Use In Predicting Motor Response Inhibition, Richard Ward May 2021

Neural Correlates Underlying The Interactions Between Anxiety And Cannabis Use In Predicting Motor Response Inhibition, Richard Ward

Theses and Dissertations

The ability to effectively withhold an inappropriate response is a critical feature of cognitive control. Prior research indicates alterations in neural processes required for motor response inhibition in anxious individuals, including those with posttraumatic stress disorder (PTSD), and those who engage in regular cannabis use. However, thus far most research has examined how anxiety-related symptoms and cannabis use influence response inhibition in isolation of one another. The current study examined the interactions between anxious symptomology and recent cannabis use in a sample that recently experienced a traumatic event using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) during the completion of a Stop-Signal …


Maternal Cannabis Use Is Associated With Suppression Of Immune Gene Networks In Placenta And Increased Anxiety Phenotypes In Offspring, Gregory Rompala, Yoko Nomura, Yasmin L. Hurd Jan 2021

Maternal Cannabis Use Is Associated With Suppression Of Immune Gene Networks In Placenta And Increased Anxiety Phenotypes In Offspring, Gregory Rompala, Yoko Nomura, Yasmin L. Hurd

Publications and Research

While cannabis is among the most used recreational drugs during pregnancy, the impact of maternal cannabis use (mCB) on fetal and child development remains unclear. Here, we assessed the effects of mCB on psychosocial and physiological measures in young children along with the potential relevance of the in-utero environment reflected in the placental transcriptome. Children (~3-6 years) were assessed for hair hormone levels, neurobehavioral traits on the behavioral assessment system for children (BASC-2) survey, and heart rate variability (HRV) at rest and during auditory startle. For a subset of children with behavioral assessments, placental specimens collected at birth were processed …