Psychology Commons^™

Attachment And Adolescent Offending: An Examination Of The Links Between Sexually Abusive Behavior And The Level Of Attachment To Parents And Peers, Lee Anna Knox

Dissertations and Theses

Child sexual abuse (CSA) is recognized as a public health problem with consequences affecting all levels of the ecological model. In recent years it has been recognized that up to 40% of reported sexual offenses occur at the hands of adolescent offenders (Burton, 2000), who are defined as children aged 12-18 years. In recent years, research has suggested that attachment deficits contribute to sexual offending behavior in adolescence. The current study augments the sparse research with adolescent offenders and by exploring of the participant's perceived attachment to important others (mother/mother figures, father/father figures, and peers/friends). Participants included 101 Juvenile sex …

Exploring Emotions Using Invasive Methods: Review Of 60 Years Of Human Intracranial Electrophysiology, Sean A. Guillory, Krzysztof A. Bujarski

Dartmouth Scholarship

Over the past 60 years, human intracranial electrophysiology (HIE) has been used to characterize seizures in patients with epilepsy. Secondary to the clinical objectives, electrodes implanted intracranially have been used to investigate mechanisms of human cognition. In addition to studies of memory and language, HIE methods have been used to investigate emotions. The aim of this review is to outline the contribution of HIE (electrocorticography, single-unit recording and electrical brain stimulation) to our understanding of the neural representations of emotions. We identified 64 papers dating back to the mid-1950s which used HIE techniques to study emotional states. Evidence from HIE …

Communication Behavior Study Of Support In The Arts Using The Situational Theory Of Publics And The Theory Of Reasoned Action, Ashleigh Gallant

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

The Arts in the United States has been a thoroughly studied topic, largely trying to substantiate its value to society, resulting in a plethora of research that positively correlates the arts and a more healthy and successful society. Findings from various studies over the years have shown declines in arts support in the form of funding, advocacy, education, and participation (National Endowment for the Arts, 2009). Additional studies have suggested that millennials are redefining what participation means in the arts, and even the definition of the arts. The primary research question of this study is why are support for the …

Reconceptualizing The Role Of Essentialism In Attitudes Toward Gays And Lesbians: The Intersection Of Gender And Sexual Orientation, Vanessa Hettinger

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Social psychology researchers have become increasingly interested in the role of essentialist beliefs in predicting attitudes toward social groups. However, there is little agreement about what the term actually means, whether it means different things for different groups, what endorsement of essentialism (or its sub-components) means for attitudes, and how much this varies depending on the relevant social context. This underlying lack of clarity helps to explain some of the difficulty in understanding the relationships between essentialist beliefs about sexual orientation and attitudes toward gay men and lesbians. In the current project, I suggest a fundamental shift in the approach …

The New B-Word, Dayna M. Seeger

SURGE

I get all of my career advice from Cosmopolitan magazine.

Okay, maybe not all of it. But sitting in the airport this past weekend, I breezed through articles about Khloé Kardashian and confessions about why guys cheat, and, somewhere in the middle, stumbled on an article called “Like a Boss.” It was written by Sheryl Sandberg, COO of Facebook and author of Lean In, and described an issue I had never really given much thought to: why female leaders are, seemingly more often than male leaders, described as bossy. As a woman with a leadership position on campus, the …

Smoking Related Cancers: A Brief Report On Problem Solving, Distress, And Risk Behaviors In Patients And Caregivers, Joseph J. Trunzo Ph.D., Bernardine M. Pinto Ph.D., Prakash B. Ghougule Md

Psychology Department Faculty Journal Articles

Cancer diagnoses may adversely affect emotional functioning in patients and their caregivers, which in turn may increase risk behaviors, such as tobacco and alcohol use. This study investigates the relationships among problem-solving ability, distress, and risk behaviors in patients with head/neck and lung cancer and their caregivers. The authors hypothesized that patients and caregivers who experienced higher distress would engage in more risk behaviors, but that Social Problem-Solving (SPS) would moderate this effect, in that those who possessed greater SPS ability would engage in fewer risk behaviors. Twenty-one cancer patients and 11 of their caregivers were surveyed shortly after diagnosis. …

Understanding The Role Of Post-Secondary Coaches In High Schools: A Social Capital Analysis, Lynne Haeffele

Theses and Dissertations

The research problem for this study was to understand the role of a new category of institutional agents, post-secondary coaches in high schools, who facilitate students' college readiness. This comparative case study focused on two post-secondary coaches in two high schools participating with a university in a state-funded grant project to improve college readiness. Data collection included structured interviews with coaches, students, and other school and external personnel; written descriptions by coaches of how they do their jobs; observations with field notes taken while shadowing coaches; and relevant documents, websites and artifacts. Data analysis involved both open coding and the …

The Relative Importance Of Parenthood On Parental Daytime Ambulatory Blood Pressure And Average Daily Ambulatory Blood Pressure, Wendy Birmingham, Adam Howard, Dr. Julianne Holt-Lunstad

Journal of Undergraduate Research

Epidemiological research indicates that both the quality and quantity of social relationships significantly protects individuals from various causes of morbidity and mortality. For most adults, marriage and children play a central role in their social lives. Social relationships have been reliably associated with important long-term health outcomes including coronary heart disease (CHD). One pathway by which social relationships may influence health is via ambulatory blood pressure (ABP) during daily life. Research examining marriage alone has found that married individuals fare better psychologically and physiologically; additionally, research including children as a variable has shown that children have an impact on the …

Firefly Song, Lasantha Rodrigo

Theses and Dissertations

Chethiya is a brown, gay, disabled (ultimately), abused young man from Sri Lanka, who comes to the U.S. on a full scholarship. His dream is to be a Broadway star, but after coming out of his first relationship with an emotionally abusive, alcoholic man, he is diagnosed with multiple sclerosis, a chronic, degenerative neurological disease that results in demyelination, causing progressive debilitation. The story is divided into six chapters that narrate his life under various marginalizations he is subjected to, culminating in traumatization. The story, however, ends on a positive note of redemption with the narrator looking forward to his …

Consumer Perceptions Of Starting Regional Pilot Pay Given Additional Qualifications, Scott R. Winter, Stephen Rice, Timothy G. Rosser, Rian Mehta, Ayu Rice

International Journal of Aviation, Aeronautics, and Aerospace

Public Law 111-216, passed in 2010, has drastically increased the required number of flight hours necessary to become a commercial airline pilot from 250 hours to 1,500 hours in the United States. Intended to increase the safety and qualifications of commercial airline pilots, one possible unintended consequence may be fewer pilots pursuing an airline career due to increased training costs, with no apparent increase in starting salary. The purpose of this exploratory study was to examine consumer perceptions of how much additional pay starting first officers should make based on this new law. American participants from Amazon’s ® Mechanical Turk …

Community-Level Interventions For Reconciling Conflicting Religious And Sexual Domains In Identity Incongruity, Renato M. Liboro

Psychology Faculty Research

Two of the most unstable domains involved in identity formation, the religious and sexual domains, come into conflict when vulnerable populations of the lesbian, gay, bisexual and transgender community experience oppression from the indoctrination of religious beliefs that persecute their sexual orientation. This conflict, aptly termed identity incongruity in this article’s discourse, results in a schism that adversely affects these vulnerable populations. This paper investigates the roles of religion, spirituality and available institutional solutions to propose customized, culturally adapted, contextually based and collaborative community-level interventions that would facilitate the reconciliation of the conflicting identity domains.

Assessing Attachment Process Among Early Institutionalized Orphans In Burkina Faso, Africa, Clarisse Barbier

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Abstract

The focus of this thesis is early attachment among institutionalized infant orphans. Previous research has pointed towards attachment problems in dysfunctional institutions, but did not take a comparative approach to understanding attachment. The present research was conducted in an orphanage in Kaya, a little town located in the Center North Region of Burkina Faso, Africa. The 22 children at the institution were aged four months to five years and were mostly from the Mossi ethnicity. Using mixed psychological and anthropological methods such as behaviors checklist, attachment questionnaires, and participant observation, this research indicates that orphans do not display evident …

Intravenous Ghrelin Administration Increases Alcohol Craving In Alcohol-Dependent Heavy Drinkers: A Preliminary Investigation, Lorenzo Leggio, William H. Zywiak, Samuel R. Fricchione, Steven M. Edwards, Suzanne M. De La Monte, Robert M. Swift, George A. Kenna

Department of Psychology: Faculty Publications

Background: There is a need to identify novel pharmacologic targets to treat alcoholism. Animal and human studies suggest a role for ghrelin in the neurobiology of alcohol dependence and craving. Here, we were the first to test the hypothesis that intravenous administration of exogenous ghrelin acutely increases alcohol craving.

Methods: This was a double-blind, placebo-controlled human laboratory proof-of-concept study. Nontreatment-seeking, alcoholdependent, heavy-drinking individuals were randomized to receive intravenous ghrelin 1 mcg/kg, 3 mcg/kg or 0 mcg/kg (placebo), followed by a cue-reactivity procedure, during which participants were exposed to neutral (juice) and alcohol cues. The primary outcome variable was the increase …

A Multi-Method Examination Of Pre-Service Teacher Attitudes Toward Gay And Lesbian Parents, Julie Herbstrith

Theses and Dissertations

An increasing number of children are being raised by gay and lesbian parents, but there is a dearth of literature that examines the challenges they face as they navigate the school system. The negative stigma of homosexuality and the increased visibility of these families suggest that research on teacher attitudes toward homosexual parents is needed. Using implicit, explicit, and behavioral measures, pre-service teacher attitudes toward gay and lesbian parents were assessed. Individual differences that influence the expression of sexual prejudice were also examined. Specifically, this study examined the relation between implicit and explicit measures. Also, implicit and explicit measures were …

P-04 Processing Load And Biopotentials: An Evaluation Of A Consumer Electroencephalogram (Eeg), Kristen Bishop

Honors Scholars & Undergraduate Research Poster Symposium Programs

The general public is extremely interested in mental training and the use of brain imaging to study the mind. One device that combines the two and is currently on the market for consumers is a single channel EEG band produced by NeuroSky which claims to measure concentration. However, the claims that they have developed a single channel measure of concentration and meditation have not been tested. EEG power is related to cognitive memory and performance, which both contribute to concentration. In addition to EEG waves, pupil size is a reliable physiological index of processing load and concentration. The first purpose …

P-05 Visual Cognition While Listening To Stories, Nathalie Borges

Honors Scholars & Undergraduate Research Poster Symposium Programs

Different people have different perceptual patterns in response to language. Different language accents may influence one’s visual cognition by referencing to certain objects when listening to stories. The purpose of this study is to record differences in eye movement patterns while listening to stories by manipulating the auditory stimulus and cognitive load. Using the eye tracker, eye movement patterns will be recorded as subjects look at objects on a screen. I posit that subjects will delay eye movement patterns to target objects while listening to stories in a foreign accent as opposed to an American accent because of increased cognitive …

The Student Augustinian Values Institute: Assessing Its Impact Of Enhancing The Understanding And Experience Of The Augustinian Core Values Of Veritas, Unitas, And Caritas Upon Students In Augustinian Secondary Schools, Stephen M. Curry

Seton Hall University Dissertations and Theses (ETDs)

Educational leadership understands the importance of teaching values in its schools and incorporates this philosophy into the school’s symbolic and structural systems. Roman Catholic Church leaders have always endorsed the teaching of values in its schools and this position was sanctioned at its Second Vatican Council (Vatican Council II, 1962-65). One aspect of the Council emphasized the importance of Catholic education as an essential vehicle for proclaiming the Good News of Jesus Christ. Catholic schools founded and sponsored by religious communities were challenged to reappropriate their founders’ charisms in their educational ministries. The Order of St. Augustine is an example …

Up By Upwest: Is Slope Like North?, Steven M. Weisberg, Daniele Nardi, Nora S. Newcombe, Thomas F. Shipley

Faculty Research and Creative Activity

Terrain slope can be used to encode the location of a goal. However, this directional information may be encoded using a conceptual north (i.e., invariantly with respect to the environment), or in an observer-relative fashion (i.e., varying depending on the direction one faces when learning the goal). This study examines which representation is used, whether the sensory modality in which slope is encoded (visual, kinaesthetic, or both) influences representations, and whether use of slope varies for men and women. In a square room, with a sloped floor explicitly pointed out as the only useful cue, participants encoded the corner in …

Physiological Measures Differentiate Distinct Domains Of Immanent Justice Reasoning, Reino L. Bruner

Master's Theses and Doctoral Dissertations

Just-world theory research investigates how an individual's world-view influences his/her behavior when confronted with injustice. The purpose of the present study was to examine the utility of multiple continual physiological measurements as predictors of just-world motivated behavior such as immanent justice reasoning (IJR) in a replication of Callan, Ellard, and Nicol's (2006) study. Participants (N=109) were assigned to one of two narrative groups - either an adulterous scenario or a non-adulterous scenario. It was hypothesized that levels of IJR would be higher in the justice-threat than the non-threat condition, and that measures of physiological arousal would predict IJR. Results show …

Differences In Anticipated Interaction Drive Own Group Biases In Face Memory, John Paul Wilson, Pirita E. See, Michael J. Bernstein, Kurt Hugenberg, Christopher Chartier

Department of Psychology Faculty Scholarship and Creative Works

According to much research, the Own Group Bias (OGB) in face memory occurs as a consequence of social categorization - ingroup members are more likely than outgroup members to be encoded as individuals and remembered well. The current work is an examination of the role of anticipated future interaction in the OGB. We conducted two studies showing that anticipated interaction influences group-based face memory. In Study 1, we provided correlational evidence that beliefs about the amount and importance of future interaction one will have with racial outgroup members is associated with the OGB, such that people expecting more interaction with …

The Self-Report Version Of The Youth Outcome Questionnaire: Normative Data, Paul M. Rose, Dr. M. Gawwain Wells

Journal of Undergraduate Research

Introduction In the wake of increasing interest and demand from mental health care providers for sophisticated youth outcome measures, Burlingame, Wells and Lambert constructed the Youth Outcome Questionnaire (YOQ) in 1996 (1). To fill the need for an adolescent self-report version of the YOQ, Burlingame, Wells, and Lambert later developed the adolescent self-report version of the YOQ (YOQ2SR) (2). Before the YOQ2SR can be used in mental health practice, normative data must be collected from adolescents who are not in treatment. The present study provided this data.

Who Is Most Vulnerable To Social Rejection? The Toxic Combination Of Low Self-Esteem And Lack Of Negative Emotion Differentiation On Neural Responses To Rejection, Todd B. Kashdan, C. Nathan Dewall, Carrie L. Masten, Richard S. Pond Jr., Caitlin Powell, David Combs, David R. Schurtz, Antonina S. Farmer

Psychology Faculty Publications

People have a fundamental need to belong that, when satisfied, is associated with mental and physical well-being. The current investigation examined what happens when the need to belong is thwarted—and how individual differences in self-esteem and emotion differentiation modulate neural responses to social rejection. We hypothesized that low self-esteem would predict heightened activation in distress-related neural responses during a social rejection manipulation, but that this relationship would be moderated by negative emotion differentiation—defined as adeptness at using discrete negative emotion categories to capture one's felt experience. Combining daily diary and neuroimaging methodologies, the current study showed that low self-esteem and …

Responsible Integration Of Biological And Psychosocial Models: Comments On “Genetic Associations With Intimate Partner Violence In A Sample Of Hazardous Drinking Men In Batterer Intervention Programs”, Antonia Abbey

Psychology Faculty Research Publications

Despite research demonstrating that gene expression differs in response to social environmental circumstances, deterministic views of biology are common. Stuart and colleagues (this issue) encourage readers to think about genetic factors in the same dynamic and probabilistic manner that they consider other causes of intimate partner violence. Given that participants had co-occurring alcohol problems, future studies should evaluate how different genetic polymorphisms uniquely and synergistically contribute to heavy drinking and aggression under different socio-environmental conditions. Psychological expectancies have a powerful impact on behavior, thus extreme caution is required before labeling people as genetically predisposed to violence.

Adolescents And The Social Media: The Coming Storm, Daniel Houlihan, Meghan Houlihan

Psychology Department Publications

In her book Failure to Connect: How computers affect our Children’s Minds, sounded the alarm to the educational community that computers would not impact the intellectual growth of children in the ways that had been anticipated by the Clinton Administration when they started the push to have the world-wide web integrated into American classrooms by passing the Classroom 2000 education initiative. In a speech in April of 2013, Clinton would follow-up by saying that the modern internet has forced a change in what we consider to be forms of good citizenship. The future will redefine how we should act and …

Sustainable Faith: How The Neuroscience Of Emotion Promotes Spiritual Transformation, Christine M. Mutch

Doctor of Ministry

Current research indicates that well-intentioned practices and programs aimed at forming people into the image of Christ are not producing the intended results. One roadblock is the misunderstanding and lack of value placed on the role of emotion in the transformation process. The purpose of this dissertation is to present neuroscience research about the integral role of emotion in one's life, and suggest practical ways to capitalize on emotion to effect transformation.

Chapter one describes the goals of spiritual formation, in contrast to current attitudes and practices of those inside and outside the church. It provides a basic introduction to …

Cochlear Implants, Language Acquisition, And Speech Intelligibility: The Effect Of Age At Implantation, Danielle Becker

Library Research Prize Student Works

A review of the current literature on outcomes of individuals using cochlear implants, especially in the relationship between age at implantation and speech intelligibility was conducted. Literature describing norms for language acquisition and hearing outcomes with the use of other devices (i.e. hearing aids) was also assessed. A clear pattern of normal language acquisition is shown by the literature of this field. Literature assessing the effectiveness of cochlear implants shows that although most cochlear implant users are not able to catch up to hearing age-mates, cochlear implants are significantly more effective than traditional hearing aids in language acquisition. The research …

Student Perspectives On How Trauma Experiences Manifest In The Classroom: Engaging Court-Involved Youth In The Development Of A Trauma-Informed Teaching Curriculum, Shantel D. West, Angelique G. Day, Cheryl L. Somers, Beverly A. Baroni

Social Work Faculty Publications

This study explores how the lived experience of court-involved youth impacts learning and school culture, and solicits youth voice in creating a trauma-informed intervention to improve student educational well-being. Thirty-nine female students, ages 14 to 18, participated in focus groups to describe externalizing behaviors that they have both witnessed and personally struggled with in the classroom, discuss the perceived causes of these behaviors, and their suggestions for improving school culture to reduce these behavior manifestations in the classroom. Two major categories of behavior were identified, including: “anger emotions” and “aggressive actions.” Students described the causes of behavior as, “environmental influences” …

44th Annual Wku Student Research Conference, Scott Lyons, Chair, Student Research Council

Student Research Conference Select Presentations

Abstracts available as a separate download on bottom of page.

Fallow Bucks Attend To Vocal Cues Of Motivation And Fatigue, Benjamin J. Pitcher, Elodie F. Briefer, Elisabetta Vannoni, Alan G. Mcelligott

Sentience Collection

Vocalizations encode a range of information about the caller, and variation in calling behavior and vocal structure may provide listeners with information about the motivation and condition of the caller. Fallow bucks only vocalize during the breeding season and can produce more than 3000 groans per hour. Males modulate their calling rates, calling faster when other calling males and/or females are nearby. Groans also reveal caller fatigue, becoming shorter and higher pitched toward the end of the rut. Thus, fallow deer groans vary both over very short (minute to minute) and longer timescales (the rut). However, no studies have investigated …

Learning And Memory In The Port Jackson Shark, Heterodontus Portusjacksoni, Tristan L. Guttridge, Culum Brown

Sentience Collection

Basic understanding of the fundamental principles and mechanisms involved in learning is lacking for elasmobranch fishes. Our aim in this study was to experimentally investigate the learning and memory capacity of juvenile Port Jackson sharks, Heterodontus portusjacksoni. Sharks (N = 30) were conditioned over a 19-day period to associate an underwater LED light or stream of air-bubbles [conditioned stimulus (CS)] with a food reward [unconditioned stimulus (US)], using three procedures (delay, trace and control). During experiments, the CS signalled at a random time between 180 and 300 s for 30 s (six times per day). For the delay the US …