Communication Commons^™

The Toolkit For Social Support And Social Anxiety: S*A*S*S*, Cynthia E. Kmety

Masters Theses

The purpose of this study was to create a toolkit for social support and social anxiety using the Communal Coping method. There was background research conducted on social anxiety and social support, COVID impact, Communal Coping, and resilience and skill building. Before constructing the toolkit, a survey was conducted with 29 Eastern Illinois University students to measure their assessment of their social anxiety and social support. The results of this survey found that students have a need for social support and are affected by their anxiety. Once the toolkit: the workbook and the facilitator’s manual, were completed, a pilot class …

The Influences Of Social Media: Depression, Anxiety, And Self-Concept, Emily Baker

Masters Theses

The current study examined correlations between social media use and its effects on depression, anxiety, and changes in self-concept through quantitative and qualitative data. Variables included in the analysis of Study 1 were depression, anxiety, time spent using social media, number of platforms used, perception of addiction, and type of use. Study 1 showed no significant correlations between social media used and depression or anxiety, however observational analyses of correlation tables revealed a relationship between time spent using and number of platforms used; time spent using and perception of addiction; time spent using and perception of addiction; time spent using …

The Relationship Between Resilience, Coping, And Social Media, Lillian N. Hurley

Masters Theses

This study was designed to explore relationships between measures of resilience, coping strategies, social media usage, and depression. Resilience refers to one's ability to endure and recover from adversity. Many theories about what contributes to the development resilience have been explored without a clear consensus. Taormina (2015) argued that adult personal resilience is comprised of four dimensions - determination, endurance, adapatability, and recuperability. Coping, a construct related to resilience, is the process of regulating emotions, cognition, behavior, physiological responses, and the environment in response to stressful events. Past research indicated those with poorer mental health have the tendency to use …

Students Perspective Of Healthy Living In College, Andrea Coxey

Masters Theses

Using qualitative methodology, the researcher studied what participants definition of a healthy lifestyle as compared to how they actually live. Through conducting six one on one interviews with participants, it was found that physical health was the most widely recognized aspect of health, and that each participant had a unique definition of health. Mental health was not initially recognized by participants but was shown to be an important connection to all aspects of health including physical health, emotional health, sleep and nutrition. Participants recognized the importance of involvement and their transition to college as impacting their definition of health and …

Why A Negative Body Image? A Study On Gender, Social Media, And Mass Media, Taryn Bland Teeters

Masters Theses

This study was designed to identify the contributors to body image (BI) dissatisfaction. The factors affecting the adult body image and the extent of their consequences were examined. This study attempted to determine the extent to which these individual's peers, the mass media, and social media affect their BI, body shaming, and the individual's shame of others.

An anonymous online questionnaire was utilized and sent to participants by snowballing through the use of Facebook and email. Participants were asked to identify their age, gender, pleasing and displeasing body parts, their use of social media, and an overall rating of their …

On Solid Ground I Stand: Narratives On Disclosure, Resilience, And Faith Amidst Recognition Of Childhood Sexual Abuse, Wade Rhodes Dundee

Masters Theses

Childhood sexual abuse seems to be a hidden secret in American society; one of the famous, "If we don't talk about it, it won't happen" narratives. However, we know this is not true. Both the National Sexual Violence Resource Center (2012) and Center for Disease Control and Prevention (2005) state one in four girls and one in six boys will fall victim to sexual abuse before they celebrate their 18th birthday. There is a high probability that because of the alarming lack of disclosure of male survivors, these statistics could be incorrect and could hinder creating or allowing for conversations …

"My Tattoos Make Me, Me": Constructing Personal Identities Through Tattoos, Ryan Howard

Masters Theses

The following thesis consists of a research project that seeks to understand how individuals construct personal identities through tattoos. The thesis contains background information on why the author has a personal connection and interest with the subject. The thesis also includes a review of the literature that informs the readers about the origins of tattoos, historicization of tattoos, cultural appropriation and commodification, motivations for tattooing, tattoos and the body, and identity construction. There is also a methods section that explains how the author utilized the interviewing process to gather and conduct research in the field to answer the research question: …

The Impact Of Social Media On The Grieving Process, Resa Ware

Masters Theses

In 2015 the Pew Research Center reported that 72% of adult Internet users are on Facebook and it continues to be the most used social networking site in the world (Duggan, 2015). Facebook is a source of social expression, connections, and support for others. It is becoming much easier to express feelings such as grief in an online setting. In fact, the online expression of grief has been found to empower individuals who feel that traditional grieving practices are ineffective (Carroll & Landry, 2010). The purpose of the current study was to explore the impact of social media (i.e. Facebook) …

Dysfunctional Text Messaging As Related To Social Anxiety, Self-Esteem, Emotional Intelligence, And Attentional Control, Sean E. Nelson

Masters Theses

Despite the widespread and increasing use and popularity of text messaging since the mid 1990's, the extent of the psychological literature regarding this technology is scarce. Chief amongst these underexplored areas is the relationship that text messaging, as a mode of Nonverbal Asynchronous Communication, has with Verbal Synchronous Communication abilities. For this study, these abilities have been operationalized as social anxiety, self-esteem, emotional intelligence, and attentional control. The available research implies a relationship between these concepts. Despite mostly theoretical links in the literature, no study had attempted to measure many of these relationships empirically. This study examined the relationship between …

"I'M Very Much Myself": The Construction And Communication Of Asmrtist Identities, Victoria S. Weinberg

Masters Theses

YouTube is an online space where people can form a self-presentation strategy and construct an identity through a personal channel. The Autonomous Sensory Meridian Response (ASMR) is a physiological response that has been described as "tingles." Individuals on YouTube have created a multitude of ASMR videos to induce these feelings. In these videos, the creators tend to whisper into the microphone, softly touch the camera with their hands or props, or act out a particularly relaxing situation, such as a massage or haircut. This study examines ASMR videos and ASMR content creators as they construct and communicate their identities through …

Facebook Addiction And Impulsive Decision-Making, Daniel Delaney

Masters Theses

This study examined the relationship between Facebook "addiction" and impulsive decision-making. Impulsive decision-making as measured by the delay discounting task is associated with a number of addictions and other problem behaviors. We gave 152 students a paper-based packet including the Bergen Facebook Addiction Scale to measure problematic Facebook use and a delay discounting task to assess impulsivity. 16 Facebook "addicted" participants were matched to 16 control participants on demographic data to compare differences in impulsivity. Likewise, we explored whether a correlational relationship between Facebook addiction scores and impulsivity existed. We found that Facebook "addicts" discounted delayed rewards more quickly than …

The Nonverbal Communication Of Pain As Recognized By Alternative Health Care Providers, Jodi L. Pope

Masters Theses

Recognizing nonverbal messages of pain in a health care setting is essential. The nonverbal communication of pain is a communication aspect typically overlooked in modern health care environments. This research surveyed alternative health care providers to determine what nonverbal behaviors they recognize as pain indicators and how they react to those behaviors. Massage therapists and chiropractors from a Midwest county filled out surveys and participated in a focus group. Fifty nonverbal pain indicators, such as guarding body parts, postural inequalities, gait, and clenched fists, among others, were charted. Several other topics such as learning how to determine nonverbal pain indicators, …

The Effects Of Sex Guilt And Communication On Condom Use, Renée M. Souva

Masters Theses

The purpose of this study was to determine whether sex guilt and communication were related to condom use. Past research has examined variables that affect condom use and has found that individuals who communicate more about sexual matters, and individuals who have low sex guilt, have been found to use condoms/contraceptives more consistently. This study examined sex guilt and communication and how they predict condom use. The participants were 80 female undergraduates recruited from psychology classes at Eastern Illinois University. Mosher's revised Sex Guilt Inventory and Catania's Health Protective Communication Scale were administered along with a question that assessed condom …

Young Children's Talk At Play: Orientation To Self And Orientation To The Joint Exigencies Of Conversation, Paige K. Parker

Masters Theses

This study employed a conversation analytic approach to determine how children in naturally constructed play episodes use language as an object of play and how children in their naturally occurring talk display orientation to their own individual activities and others' social actions. The participants were thirty-nine kindergarten and first grade students at South Elementary School in Marshall, Illinois. The study is based upon fifteen hours of conversation collected during recess periods. Relevant segments from the corpus were transcribed according to an adapted version of Jefferson's Transcript Notation System (1984). The findings suggested that (1) the groups of children used language …

Explanatory Style And Perception Of Negative And Positive Daily Events, Amy K. Jester

Masters Theses

This study investigated explanatory style and people's perceptions of negative and positive daily events. Explanatory style can be measured by rating causal explanations that people give on three dimensions; internality, stability, and globality. College students wrote stories in response to pictures, using the Thematic Apperceptive Test (TAT), and also completed a 28-day Daily Event Log Questionnaire. It was expected that how people explain good and bad events that happen to them, would be the same whether someone was explaining a personal daily event or explaining a story written in response to a picture. To prove this, it was expected that …

Gratification Changes Among Country Music Radio Listeners, Larry E. Oathout

Masters Theses

Several past studies explore the gratifications received by mass media users. However, no former research focuses on radio as a single medium and investigates how gratifications change over a person's lifespan. This study utilized an altered version of Elliott and Quattlebaum's (1979) ten media gratification list and questioned a 14 to 60 year old sample group about the gratifications they receive from country music radio. The researcher selected country music because it is the most popular radio format today and because it provided the wide age parameters needed for the study. Two hundred and thirty-nine users of an Internet country …

Mbti Personality Types And Preferred Relationship Disengagement Strategies In Intimate Situations, Jeffery Joe Davis

Masters Theses

This thesis poses two research questions that focus on MBTI personality types and specific strategies used to disengage romantic intimate heterosexual relationships. 1) Would one specific MBTI personality type prefer to use one dominate strategy to disengage a relationship? 2) Would any relationship situation yield one dominate strategy to disengage a relationship? A total of 116 college students were surveyed at a small Midwestern university. Age ranged from 18 years to 55 years with a mean age of 23.6 years. The experimental method consisted of administering Form G of the MBTI and an additional questionnaire measuring relationship strategies. The t-test …

What's On Tv? A Demonstration Of The Utility Of Contextualism And Content Analysis In Mass Media Research, Craig P. Gaumer

Masters Theses

The purpose of this thesis has been to develop, test and utilize a reliable method to quantify the prevalence of pro- and anti-social behavior on children's television as assessed from a contextualist perspective. Many previous studies in the area of television have arbitrarily assigned either pro- or anti-social labels to television programs without the benefit of analyzing the content of these programs

The few studies that have attempted to analyze the pro- and anti-social content of children's television have used only physical parameters to define pro- or anti-social behavior. Through the development of a reliable method of analyzing the contextually …

Analogic Communication As A Method Of Facilitating Change, Patricia Ann Tennery-Williams

Masters Theses

This thesis focused on nonverbal communication and the ways in which it may be employed to facilitate change in the context of psychotherapy. The anthropological, psychological, and medical literature was reviewed, and an overview presented of the relevant research on nonverbal communication. Nonverbal communication forms a critical dimension in the overall communication in the psychotherapeutic interaction. The importance of the therapist’s recognition of nonverbal behaviors characteristic of particular personality structures as well as the functions of nonverbal messages was examined. The utilization of meaningful nonverbal behavior by the therapist can greatly facilitate the client's change into more healthy and constructive …

A Study Of The Relationship Between Locus Of Control And The Use Of "I-Statements", Patricia Taglione

Masters Theses

Gestalt therapy theory considers speech to be a reflection of one's personality, and consequently psychological adjustment or maladjustment is expected to be manifested in one's speech habits (Levitsky & Perls, 1970; Passons, 1975). The use of personal pronouns is an indicator of the psychological distance taken from one's own feelings and actions. Healthy speech, or speech that is integrated with one's feelings and actions, involves the use of the first person singular when referring to self. Working with people to change speech patterns (changing "it-statements" and "you-statements" to "I-statements") may help an individual integrate his speech with his feelings and …

A Survey Of Sex Typing On Prime Time Television, Patricia Sue Henry

Masters Theses

According to former FCC Commissioner Nicholas Johnson, the average child will spend nearly 25,000 hours in front of a television before he or she is eighteen years old. With this fact in mind, I wondered what America's children learn from watching prime time television regarding sex-typing, or the characteristics which are considered appropriately masculine or feminine.

A review of related literature showed that critics in the early 70s pointed out that women portrayed on television were less numerous than men, less intelligent, brave, and adventuresome. In short, women were stereotyped as supportive underlings.

To find out if women fared any …

Videotape Feedback And Its Effects On Two Communicational Modalities, John Joseph Benda

Masters Theses

The present study was concerned with the applicability of various videotape feedback procedures on two communication modalities. The communication modalities studied dealt with the visual and auditory orientation of 80 college students.

The vast and, for the most part, positive findings associated with videotape feedback have fascinated therapists for the last couple of years. However, for the most part, videotape feedback has been used with individuals without taking into consideration the different ways these individuals communicate and/or learn. The purpose of the present experiment was to analyze the various aspects in which individuals communicate. Once their communicational modality was established …

Effects Of Distance And Sex On Verbal Productivity And Anxiety, Peter Lindsay Rogers

Masters Theses

The present study was designed to determine whether physical distance between male and female interviewees and a female interviewer affected verbal productivity and anxiety level when interviewees discussed academic, social, and personal topics. The interview was conceptualized as an information-gathering interview. Crucial variables in such interviews are client participation and information flow. Client verbal productivity appears to be directly related to these variables, and was used as one dependent variable to measure the impact of distance on interviewee verbal behavior. A self-report measure of anxiety, the Fear Thermometer was used as a second dependent variable.

The experimental distances used in …

The Body Language Of Self-Disclosure, Duane Connett

Masters Theses

A study was conducted to investigate the relationship of the Jourard Self-disclosure Inventory (JSDI) to 1) nonverbal behavior and 2) actual disclosure (validation of the JSDI) as measured by the number of words and speaking time. Latency was also involved. From 120 students completing the inventory 30 students scoring in the upper 30% (high-disclosers) and 30 from the lower 30% (low-disclosers) were chosen to participate in an interview. The interview consisted of 30 topics of varying intimacy about which Ss disclosed. The high-discloser group and low-discloser group were compared by a rating scale for “open” behaviors “closed” behaviors during the …

The Effects Of Self-Concept Instruction As Part Of The Basic Speech Course, Gayle Lynn Davenport

Masters Theses

No abstract provided.

A Study Into The Effects Of Knowledge Of Peer Group Evaluation Upon Self-Concept Change, Janice Marie Beyer

Masters Theses

No abstract provided.

A Study On The Simultaneous Transmission Of Incongruent Information, Dennis Keith Smeltzer

Masters Theses

No abstract provided by author.

A Comparison Of The Classical And Modern Concepts Of Memory With Suggestions For Further Study, Kathleen Oros Reed

Masters Theses

No abstract provided.

The Effects Of Ego-Involvement And Fear Appeals Upon Task Performance, Stephen Steinmetz

Masters Theses

Researchers and scholars in the fear appeal area have been unable to determine what factor or factors make fear appeals effective. Two studies, Hewgill and Miller (1965) and Powell (1965), suggest that the personal involvement of the audience with who or what is threatened is the factor which causes fear appeals to be effective. If ego-involvement is the personal involvement factor indicated by these studies, then it would appear to be the key to fear appeal effectiveness. Therefore, the present investigation was designed to experimentally compare the effects of ego-involvement and fear appeals upon task performance.

Sixty nine undergraduates enrolled …