Psychology Commons^™

Origins Of Fear Of Intimacy: The Effects Of Parental Involvement And Attachment Style, Victoria M. Perez

Honors Undergraduate Theses

The present study explores the origins of fear of intimacy, specifically assessing parental involvement and attachment style. Correlations between each variable were analyzed and a mediation model was explored as well. Participants in this study (N = 372; mean age = 25.78; 86% female) completed scales to measure parental care, parental overprotection, attachment avoidance, attachment anxiety, and fear of intimacy. Data was analyzed to reveal correlational results that support the hypotheses. Negative correlations were found between parental care and attachment avoidance, attachment anxiety, and fear of intimacy. Parental overprotection was positively correlated with attachment avoidance, attachment anxiety, and fear of …

Impacts Of The Covid-19 Pandemic On College Student Brain Health, Asia Alegre

Honors Undergraduate Theses

The intent of this study was to investigate the impact of the COVID-19 pandemic on the well-being and subjective cognition in college students. The purpose of this study as well was to investigate if those who had tested positive for COVID-19 in the past had lower levels of subjective cognitive health and if students who were affected more during the pandemic experienced more disruptions to their wellbeing. Participants (N = 105) were recruited online via the Prolific platform and took part in an online survey administered on Qualtrics. A correlational analysis was performed to examine the effects of the pandemic, …

Let It Go: Cognitive Strategy Use Selectively Changes Temporal Context Effects In Risky Monetary Decision-Making, Hayley R. Brooks

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

Some of the most influential modern theories of risky monetary decision-making assume that choices result from stable, trait-like preferences, invariant to contextual influences such as recent events. Recent research has challenged this assumption, demonstrating that decisions under risk, even when values and their probabilities are explicit and known, are contextually sensitive, affected by recent events on multiple timescales, including immediate (previous monetary outcomes), neighborhood (recently encountered values), and global (cumulative earnings relative to dynamic expectations) events. Such temporal context-dependencies are perplexing, because relying on recent events at any timescale is inconsistent with the assumed goal of risky monetary decision-making: to …

Investigating The Multi-Faceted Nature Of Cyberloafing Based On Job Features, Alexandria Bohn

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After COVID-19, organizations have had to shift the nature of the workplace leading to increased access to personal devices and internet with remote and hybrid work environments. Over the past several years, technological advancements have allowed for employees to partake in cyberloafing behaviors. Cyberloafing is a tool in which an employee uses the internet for personal reasons during the workday. There has been a divide in the literature regarding the auspicious versus detrimental effects of cyberloafing on employee outcomes. Primarily, researchers have focused on the harm of cyberloafing, the money it costs organizations, and proper ways to reduce this employee …

Process Depletion In Emotion Regulation, Christian Capistrano Boeckner

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The ability to regulate emotions via reappraisal is considered an important skill that is associated with greater well-being. However, the effectiveness of emotion regulation is impacted by individual differences, and its adaptiveness may vary depending on context. For example individuals from vulnerable populations such as children and mothers in the context of poverty often demonstrate less optimal reappraisal, that is in turn associated with maladaptive behaviors. Given its consequence on mental health, it is critical to understand mechanisms that influence reappraisal to maximize its adaptive consequences. The current study explored conditions that could either facilitate or impair reappraisal success. We …

Introduction To Psychology, Gail Hayes

Open Educational Resources

Introduction to Psychology is a modified version of Psychology 2e - OpenStax.

Modelling The Relationship Between Personality Traits And Basic Emotions: A Multi-Modal And Affective Computing Approach, Brendan Ryan Donovan

Theses

In the field of Psychology, it has long been assumed that one’s personality traits are linked to one’s emotional states. Yet there is a scarce amount of research that has directly quantified the relationships between basic emotional states and Big Five personality traits. Most empirical research has investigated how attributes of emotional states map to a narrow selection of personality traits (Extraversion and Neuroticism) via a single modality (questionnaires). This narrow focus restricts the field’s understanding of the relationship between emotional states and personality traits.

In this research, the Personality Emotion Mapping (PEM) model was developed to map the relationships …

Social Anxiety And Substance Use In College Students: Understanding The Potential Role Of Substance Use Expectancies And Fear Of Evaluation, Devangi Pant

Masters Theses

The relationship between social anxiety and substance use among college students has been researched extensively, but it is difficult to understand this relationship due to the uncertainty imposed by mixed findings. However, most studies have found a positive link between social anxiety and alcohol use, as mediated by positive alcohol use expectancies. This study reviewed the literature on social anxiety and alcohol use expectancies and proposed a model that evaluated the predictive ability of social anxiety and alcohol use expectancies on alcohol use. Results indicated that social anxiety does not predict alcohol use and only negative alcohol use expectancies were …

“By That Daughter’S Most Devoted Affection”: Anxious And Avoidant Attachments In Opie’S Adeline Mowbray, Meghan E. Hodges

Comparative Woman

Attachment theory, or the theory that one’s personality and social development is informed greatly by the infant-parent bond, largely arises in the 1950s with the work of John Bowlby. Although the phenomenon was only then beginning to be scientifically evaluated, it has long been observed that the relationship one has with one’s parents is a determinant factor in one’s development. This work investigates the impact of the failure to heal the insecure attachment Amelie Opie’s Adeline Mowbray (1808). Adeline, having grown up in her distant mother’s intellectual shadow, develops a neurotic attachment to her mother which causes romantic maladjustment in …

You Don’T Know Me, But I Love You: Parasocial Relationships And Their Impacts, Joy Weru

Emerging Writers

From alphabet and numerical melodies to High School Musical songs. From platforms like Facebook and MySpace to TikTok, Twitter, Instagram, and YouTube. Today’s younger generations have grown up on technology and social media, but like numerous things in life, there is a good and a bad to this constant consumption of social media and exposure of each other. Social media has and continues to offer a space for people to connect with their friends and loved ones when distance tries to pull them apart, but it can also drive a wedge between people online and in real life. Social …

Wylder And Wynona: A Graphic Novel Retelling Of The Grimm's Fairy Tale "The Little Brother And Sister", Abigail W. Pannell

Children's Book Writing and Illustrating (MFA) Theses

This thesis provides insight on the psychoanalysis of fairy tales, namely the Grimm fairy tale, “The Little Brother and Sister.” The critical analysis defines theories about the human mind popularized by Sigmund Freud and especially Carl Jung. Modern psychologist Paul Moxnes applies Jung’s theories about character archetypes in fairy tales to his modern study about “deep roles” which solidifies the important relationship between human psychology, fairy tales, and fairy tale retellings. With a deeper understanding of the psychological implications of character archetypes, the creative retelling portion of this thesis rewrites the old version of the brother and sister characters from …

Strong Little Minds: A Children's Introduction To Mental Illness, Teresa Irene Vick

Undergraduate Theses, Professional Papers, and Capstone Artifacts

No abstract provided.

Smartphones And Emotional Transfer : An Investigation Of Smartphone-To-Human Emotional Contagion, Stanislav Zavoyskiy

Legacy Theses & Dissertations (2009 - 2024)

ABSTRACT

Observing The Relationship Between Physical Activity, Overall Health, Anxiety, And Sleep, Brianna Chicas

Honors Undergraduate Theses

College students' mental health has been researched for some time. In particular, the correlation between physical activity and mental health symptoms has been researched. The study examines the relationship between physical activity and anxiety, sleep, and overall health. College undergraduate students at the University of Central Florida took an online survey that measured all of these variables. A Pearson's correlation coefficient was used to assess correlations. Positive correlations were found between anxiety and sleep, anxiety and social desirability, sleep and social desirability, and strength training and vigorous physical activity. Negative correlations were found between overall health and physical activity, overall …

Biological Versus Social Factors Of Juvenile Sex Offenders: A Meta-Analysis, Katherine M. Phillips

Honors Undergraduate Theses

Juvenile sex offending is not a new phenomenon but is one of limited research, with only a slight increase in research in the past decade. This meta-analysis used 5 articles to determine which holds a greater influence on juvenile sex offenders, biological or social factors. Biological factors were divided into impulsiveness, psychosis/mental health diagnosis (excluding paraphilic disorders), and sexual deviance/paraphilia. Social factors were divided into antisocial behavior, prior criminal activity, prior exposure to sexual activities/pornography, and history of being sexually abused. This meta-analysis found that biological factors have a slightly greater effect on Juvenile sex offenders, but it was not …

Attention, Working Memory, And Adaptive Functioning In Emerging Young Adults With Psychometrically-Defined Schizotypy, Parth Nakirikanti

Honors Undergraduate Theses

Schizotypy, a complex construct linked to schizophrenia-related traits, encompasses positive, negative, and disorganized symptoms. This study offers a review of the concept of schizotypy, including its historical evolution, tracing it from Bleuler's early mention in 1911 to Meehl's continuum model. Embracing a dimensional perspective, this research underscores the interplay of biological, psychological, and social factors in understanding schizotypy. Deficits in sustained attention and working memory within schizotypy remain underexplored, with prior studies yielding inconsistent results. Adaptive functioning deficits in individuals with schizotypy are also inadequately understood. Examining a college student population, this investigation utilized scores on the Schizotypal Personality Questionnaire …

Covid-19, Mental Health, Technology Use, And Job Satisfaction Among School Psychology Trainers, Joel O. Bocanegra, Jennifer Gallup, Minghui Hou, Aaron A. Gubi, Chung-Hau Fan, Nai-Jiin Yang, Celal Perihan

Educational Leadership & Workforce Development Faculty Publications

The COVID-19 pandemic threatens to exacerbate the school psychology personnel crisis. There is a dearth of knowledge regarding how the pandemic has impacted school psychology trainers and course delivery. In this national study, 92 school psychology trainers completed an online questionnaire regarding technological instructional changes, job satisfaction, and their own mental health well-being during the pandemic. Findings suggest that during the portion of the pandemic assessed most trainers reported that they: (a) switched from in-person instruction to primarily online instruction, (b) were mostly satisfied with their jobs, and (c) generally experienced a positive sense of well-being. Furthermore, a sizable portion …

Growing With Our Heroes: Utilizing Hero Narratives In Therapy To Foster Psychological Resilience And Posttraumatic Growth, Reagan Overby

Psychology Doctoral Specialization Projects

With the rise of positive psychology, clinical psychologists and other helping-professionals have rightly begun to emphasize the importance of psychological factors that predict human flourishing rather than studying risk factors and psychopathology alone. This new emphasis has largely driven research into constructs such as psychological resilience and posttraumatic growth (PTG); both manifestations of the human ability to survive or grow following experiences with extreme adversity that are often traumatic. The current standards of care for those who have experienced a trauma include asking these individuals to voluntarily discuss and confront their traumatic experiences; a task made challenging by nature of …

Identification With All Of Humanity, Uncertainty, And Beliefs Toward Animals, Andrea Michelle Wilson

Cal Poly Humboldt theses and projects

The current study aims to expand on the human-animal relations literature through a social identity lens, using 231 participants recruited from Amazon’s Mechanical Turk. Americans consume large amounts of meat, yet many people feel morally conflicted by enjoying meat, yet killing animals. These feelings can be tied to one’s identity, through identifying as a vegetarian, meat-eater, or animal lover. Humans tend to attach themselves to a social group, act on behalf of that group’s norms and values, and use their groups to reduce feelings of uncertainty by adopting group normative attitudes and behaviors. People who identify strongly with all of …

Human Connection As A Treatment For Addiction, Andrea D. Clements, Human-Friedrich Unterrainer, Christopher C.H. Cook

ETSU Authors Bookshelf

Research supports that social connection is important in both humans and animals. In humans, having a cohesive support/social network system and healthy attachments in childhood predict low risk of later addiction (i.e. substance use disorder), as does perceived support from a religious or other cohesive community. Moreover, personal characteristics such as identifying as religious or spiritual can predict low risk for addiction, but little is known about the intersection of neuroscience and religion/spirituality in this regard. Conversely, adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) have repeatedly been shown to predict later addiction. However, the role of the body’s neuro-hormonal responses, such as the …

A Qualitative Functional Analysis Of Academic Procrastination Among Irish Undergraduate Students, Gráinne Carthy

Masters

Academic procrastination involves the needless postponement of academic tasks at the expense of one’s academic goals. Informed by the principles of Acceptance Commitment Therapy, this study explored students’ experiences of academic procrastination in an Irish undergraduate sample. Over two studies, semi structured interviews were used to explore the common scenarios in which students tended to procrastinate, and also the scenarios which by contrast tended to motivate relatively immediate academic engagement. Study 1 involved interviewing twelve participants who had been recruited from online lectures. After noting the potential for self-selection bias in this recruitment strategy, study 2 specifically recruited seven participants …

A Systematic Review Of Training Programs For Mental Health Professionals Who Are Treating Eating Disorders, Shir Zion

Theses and Dissertations

Eating disorders are among the most dangerous mental health disorders, and the prevalence rates for them are on the rise. However, the literature is lacking when it comes to quantitative training recommendations for mental health professionals who wish to learn how to screen for, prevent, and treat individuals with eating disorders. This systematic review identified, reviewed, and synthesized the findings from studies (n = 14) concerning the impact of various training modalities on professionals and students who specialize in eating disorder prevention, screening, and treatment, on their knowledge, attitudes/beliefs, and skills. The aim was to identify training recommendations, across various …

The Evolution Of Stereotypes About Alcohol Dependency In Film: Gender, Family, And Treatment, Jordan Sweenie

Psychology Theses

When watching films, people seek reflections and depictions of themselves and their experiences, something that they can understand and relate to. Movies are often looked at to decide, either subconsciously or consciously, how we view society, widespread issues, and one another—Oscar Wilde wrote that “Life imitates Art far more than Art imitates Life” (Wilde, 1891). This is particularly true in how we as a society view mental illness, and what kinds of stigma are reinforced or rejected through the film industry. Accurately portraying any form of mental illness in film can be difficult, as experiences are subjective and no two …

Establishing Roots Before Branching Out: Parameter Recovery In Item Response Tree Models, Tyler Ryan

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Item Response Trees are a type of item response model that incorporates information about conditional responding to items using a rooted tree graph structure. Researchers have used item response trees for common measurement tasks and for testing novel hypotheses. Previous simulation studies investigating item response trees either lack generalizability to the broad domain of their use or lack thorough investigation and reporting of the results. I conducted a simulation study to explore how sample size, test length, item characteristics, and tree structure affect both item and person parameter recovery for 1PL and 2PL models. The results suggested that, as with …

Autonomy :A Modern Perspective, Riley Schwanz

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Organizational leaders want to retain employees who are healthy and motivated. Physical and mental health issues are on the rise in America for younger and older generations. Researchers have found that higher levels of autonomy relate to improved mental health, physical health, job satisfaction, performance, and the list goes on. However, a gap in the literature is a lack of understanding of the complex relationships between autonomy and outcomes, both functional and dysfunctional. I found that intrinsic motivation and autonomy support can compensate for lower levels of autonomy in one’s work. These new findings provide researchers and organizational leaders with …

Development And Validation Of A Norm Violation Sexual Harassment Scale, Krista N. Harris

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Sexual harassment continues to be an important area of study. However, there’s a dearth of research regarding sexual harassment towards others that considers sex, gender, and sexual orientation. Previous research has suggested that gender harassment and heterosexist harassment are intertwined (Leskinen & Cortina, 2014), but little research has examined how the empirical and conceptual overlap of gender harassment and heterosexist harassment could allude to a more general construct, norm violation sexual harassment. Norm violation sexual harassment is an overarching construct focusing on norm violations rather than sex, gender, or sexual orientation specifically. Using two samples, my study demonstrates evidence for …

Leadership And Secure Base, Bincy Davis

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Research on Attachment theory has established the need for secure base in adulthood (e.g., Hazan & Shaver, 1990). However, few researchers have explored the importance of secure base in a work setting. The purpose of my study was to examine the relevance of secure base in the leadership process. Results from pilot research (N = 272) showed that 13 leader behaviors were positively associated with secure base. Confirmatory factor analyses revealed that 5 factors underlay these 13 leader behaviors. Results from structural equation modeling provided support for a secure base model of leader behaviors in Study 1 (N = 272 …

Pragmatically Appropriate Abstractive Summarization Of Jtac Radio Conversations, Spencer M. Seals

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In this work, I explore the development of computational methods for automatically creating after-action reports of JTAC radio conversations. Prior research has investigated related issues of sentence compression, text summarization, and conversation summarization (Banerjee, Mitra, & Sugiyama, 2015; Clarke & Lapata, 2008; L. Wang & Cardie, 2012; Raffel et al., 2020). However, this work makes limiting assumptions about what features are relevant to a summary and what sources of information should be included. I propose methods that combine knowledge from linguistic, procedural, and domain sources to address these limitations. Results indicate that the proposed model performs better than some of …

Short-Term Learning For Long-Term Retention : Dynamic Associative Memory, Joseph James Glavan Iv

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Instead of characterizing transfer from short-term memory to long-term memory as the relocation of information from one structural system to another, I propose a theory that conceives of transfer as the learning processes that act on and transform the representations of the information itself. Dynamic Associative Memory posits that recently encoded memories are supported by active maintenance and the relevance of the current context. Over time, the current context becomes less relevant; therefore, the brain must learn contextually invariant associations between memories so that they may support themselves. I instantiated my theory in the ACT-R cognitive architecture and created a …

Psychology And Criminology Students' Attribution Of Factors Contributing To Criminal Behaviors, Ava Marie Leahy

Senior Honors Theses and Projects

The purpose of this study was to investigate the differences in the attribution of contributing factors to criminal behaviors between psychology and criminology majors. To gauge participant perception, a carefully crafted vignette was presented to participants accompanied by questions asking participants to what extent eight variables (conformation to labels, hostile attribution bias, rational choice based on circumstances, poor attachments, mental illness, upbringing, insufficient deterrence, and learned behavior through observation) contributed to the perpetrator’s criminal behavior and for participants to rank-order these same variables from the largest contributors to the least. Participants were also asked to provide a sentencing recommendation for …