Psychology Commons^™

Exploring The Buffering Effects Of Holding Behaviors On The Negative Consequences Of Workplace Discrimination For People Of Color, Heather A. Kohlman Olsen

Industrial-Organizational Psychology Dissertations

Previous research suggests that discrimination is still a prevalent problem within organizations even with the current laws and policies in place in the United States to ensure equality of opportunity for minority groups. Therefore, people of color continue to report experiencing inequality and exclusion in the workplace. The broad purpose of the current investigation is to provide guidance to organizations regarding proactive strategies for mollifying the deleterious consequences that people of color often experience as a result of enduring numerous incidences of subtle discrimination in the workplace. Specifically, I proposed that when people of color report having trusting, supportive relationships …

An Exploratory Study Of The Relationship Between Community Involvement And Lgb Identity, Jenna Collins

Williams Honors College, Honors Research Projects

Found families are common within the LGBT community, and many models of LGB identity development include contact with other same-sex attracted individuals, or involvement in the LGBT community as important to identity development. However there has been little research investigating the connection between community involvement and identity development or acceptance. This exploratory study will compare LGB identity, measured with the Lesbian Gay Bisexual Identity Survey, to respondents’ answers to open-ended questions about their LGB community involvement. Open-ended questions will be coded by the researcher using content analysis to find commonalities between responses. Comparisons will look for any relationships between stages …

The Buffering Role Of Character Virtues On The Relationship Between Burnout And Its Antecedents, Allison Bachmann

Williams Honors College, Honors Research Projects

This project explores the relationship between character virtues and burnout among student employees. It reviews and elaborates on the previous research findings in positive psychology and uses existing research on human virtues in order to further study their relationship with burnout. In exchange for extra course credit, students completed an online survey comprised of a demographic questionnaire and measures of character virtues, burnout, job control, and work overload. Analysis of the results focused on the specific virtues of courage and transcendence and the burnout antecedents of work overload, and lack of control. A multiple regression analysis was used to determine …

Manipulating Belief Bias Across The Lifespan, William D. Carney

Williams Honors College, Honors Research Projects

In today’s political climate, when basic facts and reasoning are seemingly up for debate, it is increasingly important to be able to identify well-reasoned arguments, regardless of one’s political leanings, and to retain this skill throughout the lifespan. Research has shown, however, a persistent belief bias—a tendency to judge an argument’s validity based on its conclusion’s agreement with one’s beliefs, rather than its logical quality. Other findings suggest that belief bias can be reduced by instruction to avoid belief bias. The current project seeks to explore whether older adults, believed to be more prone to biased reasoning, respond differently to …

Antecedents Of Voice: The Moderating Role Of Proactive Personality, Alice Pyclik

Browse all Theses and Dissertations

When employees are dissatisfied, they can choose a destructive solution such as quitting, or they can use voice to effect organizational change. A sample of 277 full-time employees in the United States responded to an online survey of voice, ethical leadership, core self-evaluation, proactive personality, affective commitment, and several control variables. Results from simple, multiple, and hierarchical regression analyses indicated that ethical leadership, core self-evaluation, and proactive personality have positive relationships with voice. In addition, ethical leadership facilitates voice through the path of affective commitment. Proactive personality compensates for low levels of affective commitment. Thus, managers can increase voice among …

An Exploratory Study Of The Impact Of Stigma And Acculturation On The Perception Of Mental Illness In The Black Community, Louis Appiah-Kubi

Browse all Theses and Dissertations

Mental health stigma serves as a chronic barrier to help-seeking and in some cases exacerbates mental health conditions (SAMHSA, 2013). Researchers and clinicians have tried many different methods to reduce these negative attitudes. A popular and usually successful method is education on what mental illness is, its causes, prognosis, and the availability and effectiveness of treatment. Large scale educational efforts have not been adequate in addressing these issues. Therefore, studies are being tailored to find stereotypes within specific communities so as to come up with matching educational protocols (Corrigan & Penn, 2015). The current study explored attitudes among African Americans …

Stop What You’Re Doing, Right Now! Effects Of Interactive Messages On Careless Responding, Anthony Gibson

Browse all Theses and Dissertations

Careless responding (CR) can negatively affect the quality of self-report data and thus the resulting conclusions researchers draw from the data. The purpose of the current study was to investigate whether interactive warnings, which alert careless respondents in real time, reduce CR more than traditional, non-interactive warnings. I used a 4 x 4 mixed factorial design to examine these relationships. The between group factor was the type of warning used, which consisted of four levels (i.e., a control, no warning group, a traditional, non-interactive warning, an interactive threatening warning message, and an interactive encouraging message), and the within person factor …

Attitudes On Legal Insanity And The Impact Of Race, Jerie J. Bolin

Browse all Theses and Dissertations

Jurors, representatives of the communities from which they are selected, are tasked with the responsibility of reaching a verdict in an impartial, unbiased manner. Previous research has found that bias and negative attitudes impact juror decision-making, despite practices that are in place to dismiss potentially biased jurors, such as voir dire. Studies have found a correlation between racial biases and juror verdicts. Additionally, a correlation has also been found between insanity defense attitudes and a juror’s propensity to favor (or not favor) a Not Guilty by Reason of Insanity (NGRI) acquittal. However, there has been limited examination of the impact …

Gauging Human Performance With An Automated Aid In Low Prevalence Conditions, Cara M. Zinn

Browse all Theses and Dissertations

When receiving assistance from an automated aid, human operators do not necessarily perform better than without the automated aid. The current work explored the impact of integrating the automated aid with the task information in low prevalence conditions. Specifically, this work compares displays where the automated aid was integrated with task information in general or with more meaningful task information. Subjects performed a speeded judgment task with the assistance of an automated aid, varying in display type, difficulty, and prevalence. Results indicated that there was no effect of display type or prevalence on human temporal performance, and that the effect …

Identifying Diversity Of Thought On Social Media, Beth Bullemer

Browse all Theses and Dissertations

This dissertation considers what it means to think differently, using naturalistic verbal evidence. This problem is inspired by a gap within the Wisdom of the Crowd (WoC) literature, but relevant to the study of language processes, mental models, and the vast emerging resource of social media data. I propose a methodological framework to characterize diversity of thought through the quantification of social media data. Four stages of research considered: a) the properties of a sample domain, b) how to identify and select diagnostic content using classification methods, c) how to quantify qualitative content in order to categorize and compare individuals, …

Empirical Support For Multidimensional Treatment Foster Care (Mtfc): A Critical Review, Jennifer Marie Ladner-Graham

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Multidimensional Treatment Foster Care (MTFC), initially intended as a treatment for chronic juvenile offenders (adolescents having multiple contacts with the juvenile justice system), was designed as an alternative to placement within group facilities. MTFC allows the adolescent to remain in the community while receiving individual and family-based interventions. These interventions are dedicated to decreasing risk factors associated with offending (e.g., poor parental supervision, association with delinquent peers, poor academic performance) and increasing protective factors (e.g., effective parenting practices, healthy relationships with supportive peers, increased school involvement). MTFC has been utilized to meet the needs of a variety of populations (e.g., …

Validating Military Culture: The Factor Analysis Of A Military-Related Adaptation Of Acculturation, Mathew A. Tkachuck

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The concept of acculturation has a long history, and measures of the construct attempt to assess the degree to which attitudes and behaviors reflect the interaction between different cultures. Berry’s acculturation framework (1997) is arguably the most empirically-supported and well-known model of acculturation. Berry’s model posits that an individual may have difficulty appropriately adapting to a culture different than his or her own depending on how much they are oriented to either culture. Moreover, Searle and Ward (1990) hypothesized that an individual’s acculturation orientation, in addition to how different the dominant and non-dominant cultures are from one another, impacts psychological …

Nonmedical Use Of Prescription Drugs Among Young Adults: An Examination Of Anxiety Sensitivity, Distress Tolerance, And Emotion-Driven Impulse Control Difficulties, Sara Michelle Witcraft

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Individuals with anxiety disorders are significantly more likely to develop substance use disorders than those without anxiety disorders (Kessler & Greenberg, 2002). Despite a sizeable body of literature focused on etiological and maintenance factors underlying the co-occurrence of substance use and anxiety pathology, this relationship remains poorly understood. Transdiagnostic factors, specifically distress tolerance, anxiety sensitivity, and emotion-driven impulse control difficulties, have been posited to contribute to the relationship of anxiety and substance abuse, and in particular, nonmedical use of prescription drugs (NMUPD; Dennhardt & Murphy, 2013; Wolitzky-Taylor et al., 2015). The current study examined group differences among the aforementioned transdiagnostic …

On The Relationship Between Resilience, Meaning, And Hardiness: A Bi-Factor Exploratory And Confirmatory Analysis, Lauren Weathers

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Meaning in life, resilience, and hardiness have been conceptualized in a variety of ways. Some researchers theorize that these constructs share significant overlap. The goal of the current study was to examine how much overlap exists between these concepts. Three thousand and ten participants from a university in the Midwest and a university in the South completed measures of meaning in life, resilience, and hardiness. It was hypothesized that some items from these measures would create a unidimensional model while some items would create multidimensionality. Hypotheses that incorporated both models were important as there is disagreement within the literature with …

Moral Agency: A Philosophical Inquiry Into Its Scientific Foundations, Makensey Sanders

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

There is a longstanding discussion of what the criteria are to distinguish science from non-science. In section one of this paper, I will focus on four demarcating criteria of a scientific theory: (1) value neutrality; (2) verifiability; (3) falsifiability; and (4) reproducibility. Keeping these criteria in mind, I will turn to the notion of moral agency (focusing on psychopathy, autism, and personal identity) and the question of whether the current way we conceptualize and research it can be deemed as scientific according to the four criteria.

In section two, I will discuss the role psychopathy and autism play in understanding …

The Efficacy And Feasibility Of Neuropsychological Services In A Primary Care Setting, Danielle Herring

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Integrated primary care assimilates psychologists into the primary care setting, thus improving health outcomes and physician satisfaction. Neuropsychology has also begun to assimilate into primary care, as neurocognitive impairment is a correlate of many medical disorders. Subjective cognitive decline (SCD), a common complaint among older adults, is an increasingly recognized warning sign of non-normative cognitive aging. These patients typically present first to their primary care providers who may play a critical role in the early detection of cognitive impairment. Given the growing awareness about cognitive health and disability, the importance of neuropsychological assessment as a standard component of integrated care …

Visual Gender Cues Guide Crossmodal Selective Attending To A Gender-Congruent Voice During Dichotic Listening: Supplemental Materials, Ralph R. Miller, Cody W. Polack, Zekiel Z. Factor

Psychology Faculty Scholarship

These are the supplementary materials for Factor, Polack, & Miller, Visual gender cues guide crossmodal selective attending to a gender-congruent voice during dichotic listening. They include raw data as well as materials and procedures.

Flipped: The Lives Of Those With Mental Disorders, Teresa K. Hoskins

Undergraduate Theses, Professional Papers, and Capstone Artifacts

This collection of four short stories focus on how society perceives those with mental disorders, the stigma associated with those disorders, and how both of these affect the people who have mental disorders. The stories are designed to give a general audience insight into the lives of those with various mental disorders. In everyday settings, these stories revolve around ordinary actions of the characters, with and without mental disorders. Each story will contain two parts, the first part is a record of the incident from the perspective of a person without a mental health diagnosis and who is unrelated to …

How We See Race: Using Eye Tracking Technology To Explore Racial Perception, Alex Haynes

Summer Community of Scholars Posters (RCEU and HCR Combined Programs)

No abstract provided.

Relative Wealth, Subjective Social Status, And Their Associations With Depression: Cross-Sectional, Population-Based Study In Rural Uganda, Meghan L. Smith, Bernard Kakuhikire, C. Baguma, Justin D. Rasmussen, David Bangsberg, Multiple Additional Authors

OHSU-PSU School of Public Health Faculty Publications and Presentations

Depression is a leading cause of disability worldwide, and has been found to be a consistent correlate of socioeconomic status (SES). The relative deprivation hypothesis proposes that one mechanism linking SES to health involves social comparisons, suggesting that relative SES rather than absolute SES is of primary importance in determining health status. Using data from a whole-population sample of 1,620 participants residing in rural southwestern Uganda, we estimated the independent associations between objective and subjective relative wealth and probable depression, as measured by the depression subscale of the Hopkins Symptom Checklist (HSCLD). Objective relative wealth was measured by an asset …

Microaggressions And Ally Support Among Undergraduate Minority Students, Caitlin Phillips

Williams Honors College, Honors Research Projects

The purpose of this project is to provide a way to distribute important information to a group of undergraduates that might otherwise not receive it. This project was to create a resource/handout that would educate individuals who have not personally experienced discrimination and do not know how to be an ally. It is common for individuals to not consider the full effects of their thoughts, feelings, or actions on others if they believe they are not acting in an overly aggressive or ill-intentioned manner. There are a lot of resources that discourage extreme, overtly discriminatory, and offensive behavior, but there …

Sexual Satisfaction And Functioning In Women With Histories Of Sexual Victimization, Kerri Anne Guadagni

Theses and Dissertations

The present study evaluated the relationship between a history of sexual abuse and adult sexual satisfaction and functioning. This included examining psychological symptomology, revictimization, and the degree of sexual functioning and sexual satisfaction of women who reported childhood, adolescent, and/or adult sexual traumas. This study contributes to the limited research on the sexual functioning of women with childhood sexual trauma histories. Sexual satisfaction and sexual functioning were found to be related, yet separate areas in which women with sexual abuse histories may experience difficulties. There was evidence of an association between psychological distress and trauma history in that the presence …

Self-Reported Malingering: Prevalence, Strategies, And Decision Making, Bethany Linn Hall Wellman

Theses and Dissertations

Objective: Malingering is intentional fabrication or exaggeration of physical or mental symptoms for the purpose of gaining an external incentive, whether it be for a reward or a gain of some sort or avoidance of an unwanted outcome (Gorman, 1982). Understanding malingering behaviors for accurate identification is of vital importance due to both the economic burden on health care corporations, workers compensation and disability services when malingering goes unidentified, as well as the harm caused to individuals with genuine symptoms falsely suspected of malingering. Greater understanding of malingering practices to help improve resources for correct identification is an area within …

Investigating The Response Criteria Shift Account For The Verbal Overshadowing Effect, Matthew C. Dean

Honors Theses

The present study investigated the impact of response criteria shift effects within the verbal overshadowing effect (VOE). Participants watched a video recording of a burglary and were then given one of two tasks: either 1.) a recall task or 2.) a non- recall task (Tetris). Participants were then shown a two-person lineup and forced to identify the burglar. The results of the experiment indicated that participants who engage in the recall task demonstrate verbal overshadowing, despite being forced to identify from a lineup. Essentially, verbal overshadowing occurs without a shift in response criteria.

Caribbean Students' Experience Of Readiness For The Secondary Education Certificate Exam, Cleon Pauline Athill

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

While there is general agreement about its importance, the construct of educational readiness is nebulous with much debate about what constitutes readiness. Readiness has been found to be a multidimensional psychological construct from a psychometric perspective. However, there is a growing awareness that this psychometric focus is lopsided, and that readiness does not only reside in the child. Further, there is an accompanying appreciation that readiness research may need to focus more on the subjective experience of individuals within the context of their environment. This phenomenological study, using Bronfenbrenner's social-ecological model, explored how Antigua and Barbudan students experienced readiness as …

Adverse Childhood Experiences Indirectly Affect Child Telomere Length Through Self-Regulation, David Sosnowski

Theses and Dissertations

The goals of present study were: (a) to examine associations between adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) and telomere length during childhood using ACE composite scores both with and without “new” adversities (i.e., parental death and poverty), and (b) to determine if ACEs indirectly affect telomere length through children’s self-regulatory abilities (i.e., effortful control and self-control). The analytic sample consisted of national data from teachers, biological parents, and their children (N = 2,527; M_age = 9.35, SD = .36 years; 52% male; 45% Black). Results from linear regression analyses revealed a statistically significant main effect of updated (but not traditional) …

Associations Between Ethnic-Racial Identity, Family Factors And Alcohol Problems Among Diverse Emerging Adults, Chloe Walker

Theses and Dissertations

The current study examined how multiple dimensions of ethnic-racial identity (ERI) were associated with alcohol use and alcohol use disorder (AUD) symptoms and how these relations varied by individuals’ ethnic-racial group among 1850 diverse emerging adults (M = 18.46, SD = .38). Further, measurement invariance of the Ethnic Identity Scale-Brief (EIS-B) was tested across Latinx, White, Black, Asian, and Multiracial students. Additionally, alternative models were examined that tested whether family factors (i.e., parent education and family history of alcohol problems) moderated the relations between ERI and alcohol problems to further examine nuances in these relations. Results indicated that the …

Self-Care Practices And Therapist Beliefs Among Home-Based Mental Health Professionals In Relation To Burnout, Heidi C. Myers

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

In 2012, research suggested that 21% to 67% of mental health professionals experience burnout. Burnout is described as a negative experience resulting in workplace stress that produces psychological, emotional, physical, and somatic symptoms. The purpose of this study was to examine a quantitative, correlational relationship between self-care practices and therapist beliefs in relation to burnout among home-based mental health therapists. The research question concerned whether there is a relationship between therapist beliefs, self-care, and burnout among home-based therapists. Equity theory was the base theory used for this project, indicating that reciprocity between therapist and client or therapist and supervisor may …

The Impact Of Prison-Based Therapeutic Community Programs On Motivation For Treatment, Jessica Tabor

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

The sentencing and use of mandated treatment policies throughout the country have heightened the number of inmates incarcerated for drug related offenses. The purpose of this quasi-experimental, archival, correlational descriptive study was to determine whether motivation changes during therapeutic community (TC) treatment among a group of incarcerated adult male offenders, as measured by differences in pre and post levels of motivation. The hypothesis that was tested was that there would be significant differences between levels of motivation as measured upon entry and discharge from treatment. The theoretical framework that guided the study was the stages of change theory. Data were …

Attention Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder And Psychopathy In The General Adult Population, Kathryn Richelle Wilson

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

Attention deficit hyperactivity disorder (ADHD) is one of the fastest growing mental disorders in the United States. More children are being diagnosed than ever before, and many of these individuals are finding that at least one other emotional, behavioral, or mental disorder often accompanies ADHD (including psychopathy). The number of individuals in the prison population with both ADHD and psychopathy is on the rise. Because of these increases, including what is being seen in the prison population, this study aimed to identify if there was a relationship between ADHD and psychopathy in the general population, and if there were specific …