Psychology Commons^™

Protective-Restoring To Maintain Self Integrity : A Grounded Theory Of The Human Experience Of Dog Relinquishment, Mary Ellen Elizabeth Edwards

Theses: Doctorates and Masters

Dog relinquishment or ‘getting rid of the dog’ is common practice in Australia and other countries where dogs are kept as pets. Each year thousands of dogs are relinquished for a variety of reasons. While losing a pet through death can be as devastating for some people as the death of a loved human, little is known about the human impact of losing a dog through relinquishment. This qualitative study sought to explore the experience of dog relinquishment from the perspectives of a Western Australian sample of 21 relinquishers, 10 adults who had experienced dog relinquishment in childhood and 15 …

Changes In Spirituality Partly Explain Health-Related Quality Of Life Outcomes After Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction., Jeffrey M Greeson, Daniel M Webber, Moria J Smoski, Jeffrey G Brantley, Andrew G Ekblad, Edward C Suarez, Ruth Quillian Wolever

College of Science & Mathematics Departmental Research

Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction is a secular behavioral medicine program that has roots in meditative spiritual practices. Thus, spirituality may partly explain Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction outcomes. Participants (N = 279; M (SD) age = 45(12); 75% women) completed an online survey before and after an 8-week Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction program. Structural equation modeling was used to test the hypothesis that, following Mindfulness-Based Stress Reduction, the relationship between enhanced mindfulness and improved health-related quality of life is mediated by increased daily spiritual experiences. Changes in both spirituality and mindfulness were significantly related to improvement in mental health. Although the initial mediation hypothesis …

The Relationship Of Acculturation And Acculturative Stress In Latina/O Youths’ Psychosocial Functioning, Marsha Tafoya

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

This study was conducted to better understand how acculturation and acculturative stress are related to self-esteem, depression, substance use, and substance use problems in 206 Latina/o youth. Acculturation is the social and psychological process of change that occurs when an individual or group comes in contact with a different culture. The acculturation process can be positive, improving one’s life chances in the new culture, or it could be negative due to the challenging nature of change and adaptation to new cultural and social expectations. This difficulty creates a type of stress, called acculturative stress that has been found to be …

Paradoxical Reversal Learning Enhancement By Stress Or Prefrontal Cortical Damage: Rescue With Bdnf., Carolyn Graybeal, Michael Feyder, Emily Schulman, Lisa M Saksida, Timothy J Bussey, Jonathan L Brigman, Andrew Holmes

Brain and Mind Institute Researchers' Publications

Stress affects various forms of cognition. We found that moderate stress enhanced late reversal learning in a mouse touchscreen-based choice task. Ventromedial prefrontal cortex (vmPFC) lesions mimicked the effect of stress, whereas orbitofrontal and dorsolateral striatal lesions impaired reversal. Stress facilitation of reversal was prevented by BDNF infusion into the vmPFC. These findings suggest a mechanism by which stress-induced vmPFC dysfunction disinhibits learning by alternate (for example, striatal) systems.

Long Term Effects Of Chronic Variable Stress Administered During Different Developmental Stages In Mice, Henry Boeh

Dissertations (1934 -)

A number of studies have suggested that the occurrence of past trauma can increase an individual's chance of developing PTSD from a new traumatic experience later in life. Trauma that occurs during childhood appears to have a particularly strong effect on this risk increase. Furthermore, conditioned fear responses have been shown to incubate over extended periods of time in animal models. To further investigate the role these phenomena play in the development of PTSD, this study exposed juvenile and adult mice to 7 days of chronic variable stress (CVS). One month later, a Pavlovian delay fear conditioning procedure was used …

An Investigation Into The Relationship Between Conscientiousness, Self-Awareness, And Occupational Stress Outcomes In Culinary Chefs, Tanja M. Hinterstoisser

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The purpose of this study was to investigate whether, and to what extent, Conscientiousness, as part of the personality construct, and Self-Awareness, as part of the emotional intelligence construct, influence the occupational stress outcomes of absenteeism and burnout in culinary chefs. The research method and design selected for this study was a quantitative correlation and regression. The researcher selected the Self-Awareness factors from the ECI - 2.0, and the Conscientiousness factors from the NEO-FFI to measure the individual and interactive effect on absenteeism and burnout. The experience of burnout itself was measured the Maslach Burnout Inventory - GS, and absenteeism …

The Effect Of Improvisations And Observations On Standardized Patient Encounters, Subjective Workload And Stress, Elizabeth T. Newlin-Canzone

Psychology Theses & Dissertations

Standardized patients (SPs) are people trained to present a medical case for teaching and assessing medical students and they simultaneously perform several demanding tasks including portraying the patient, assessing the learner, and providing feedback. This study investigated the effect of improvisations and multiple task performance on the ability to observe another's nonverbal (NV) behaviors and rate their communication skills. Subjective reports of mental workload and stress were also obtained. The first study involved undergraduates interviewing for a job. Type of interview (rote and improvisational) and type of observation (passive and active) were manipulated within groups. Based on theories of attention …

Adaptive Significance Of Natural Variations In Maternal Care In Rats: A Translational Perspective, Annaliese K. Beery, Darlene D. Francis

Neuroscience: Faculty Publications

A wealth of data from the last fifty years documents the potency of early life experiences including maternal care on developing offspring. A majority of this research has focused on the developing stress axis and stress-sensitive behaviors in hopes of identifying factors impacting resilience and risk-sensitivity. The power of early life experience to shape later development is profound and has the potential to increase fitness of individuals for their environments. Current findings in a rat maternal care paradigm highlight the complex and dynamic relation between early experiences and a variety of outcomes. In this review we propose adaptive hypotheses for …

Role Of Cortisol In Social And Memory Impairments In Individuals With Velocardiofacial Syndrome (Vcfs), Daniel Jacobson

Master's Theses and Doctoral Dissertations

Velocardiofacial Syndrome (VCFS) is a genetic disorder characterized by numerous physiological and psychological symptoms. Little is known regarding the neuropsychological and hormonal substrates and the social functioning in individuals with VCFS. There is some evidence to suggest that the stress hormone cortisol contributes to social, cognitive, and communication deficits in related populations (Corbett, Schupp, Levine, & Mendoza, 2009). This study investigated the role that cortisol has on the social and cognitive impairments observed in children with VCFS. To this end, 11 children with confirmed VCFS were assessed for baseline cortisol levels and received neuropsychological testing that assessed attention, memory, language, …

What Attracts Older Nurses To Organizations? Psychological Moderators Of The Impact Of Flexible Scheduling And Mentoring Opportunities, Sarah Dubose

All Theses

The current study investigated two psychological moderators (generativity and occupational stress) of the impact of flexible scheduling and mentoring opportunities on the attraction and application intentions of older nurses of bridge employment age. Of the 600 registered nurses who were contacted via postal mail, 101 responded. Participants were randomly assigned to one of six conditions in which a hypothetical job advertisement was manipulated with varying levels each of flexible scheduling (input vs no input into the schedule) and mentoring opportunities (formal, informal, and none). Input was found to have a main effect on organizational attraction, but main effects were not …

Teams And Stress: A Meta-Analysis And Process Analysis, Brandy Brown

All Dissertations

Past teamwork stress literature has experienced contradictory findings. As more reliable models of teamwork emerge, there is still a noticeable lack of information regarding how stress affects teamwork processes. This paper first reviews the current state of the team stress literature, where two types of stress for teams are explored: qualitative and quantitative stress. A meta-analysis examined the current literature on quantitative stress and the impact on team performance and effectiveness. Results from nine independent samples (N = 1,794) indicated that quantitative stress has a negative effect on team outcomes, ῤ = -.41. Second, a lab study sought to discover …

The Effects Of Job Stress On Law Enforcement Marriages And Methods Of Combating The Job Stress, Richard T. Matthews

Senior Honors Theses

The reality of how law enforcement stress affects individuals and marriages will be presented in light of its causes and dangers to officers, as well as how the stress affects officers’ marriages. The marital problems stemming from law enforcement stress can progress from producing less spousal interaction and communication issues, to presenting opportunities for infidelity, and eventually result in divorce. Before countering the impact of job stress upon marriage, officers must first deal with the stress individually. Marriages do not have to end as a result of job stress. By seeking family therapy and by relying on God, law enforcement …

The Stress Coping Skills Of Undergraduate Collegiate Aviators, Jennifer Kirschner

Purdue Polytechnic Masters Theses

An important human factors research interest area is error reduction. Although pilots placed in highly stressful situations have an increased chance of making errors, they use coping skills to lower their stress level and reduce the likelihood of errors. Typically, coping skills are conceptually separated into three different types: active coping skills which attack and change the situation to make it inherently less stressful, emotionfocused coping skills which use discussion or thinking about the situation in a different way to diminish the negative emotional reaction associated with the stressful situation, and avoidant coping skills which allow one to mentally and/or …

Stress And Cataloging Paraprofessionals In Academic And Public Libraries In Florida, Edna Mcclellan

The Southeastern Librarian

Over the years and particularly with the advent of OCLC, more and more tasks once considered the realm of the professional cataloger area being completed by paraprofessionals. This article confines itself to the cataloging paraprofessional, the cataloging record, workload, and training. Who is creating the cataloging record, or, if not responsible for the record in its entirety, who is responsible for parts of it? Does the assuming these higher level tasks, such as creating the call number and subject headings, cause any undue stress for the paraprofessional? What is the stress from workload and pace?

Qualitative Behavioural Assessment And Quantitative Physiological Measurement Of Cattle Naïve And Habituated To Road Transport, C. A. Stockman, T. Collins, A. L. Barnes, D. Miller, S. L. Wickham, D. T. Beatty, D. Blache, F. Wemelsfelder, P. A. Fleming

Veterinary Science and Medicine Collection

The present study examined whether observers could distinguish between cattle that are naïve to road transport and the same cattle after becoming more habituated to transport. The behavioural expression of cattle was assessed through the method of qualitative behavioural assessment (QBA), and these assessments were correlated with various physiological parameters. Fourteen Angus steers were assessed during their first road trip and then again on their ninth trip, 15 days later. Blood samples were collected immediately before and after transport, and heart rate and core body temperature were measured continuously throughout each trip. Video footage recorded during each trip was edited …

The Impact Of Stress On Pain And Daily Living In Fibromyalgia, Meredith Brooke Wessner

ETD Archive

Fibromyalgia (FM) is a condition that is characterized by widespread pain, which occurs in about 2 of the population, and impacts more women than men. This study sought to: 1) determine if stress, pain intensity, and the interference of pain in daily living predict if FM patients are likely to complete the pain rehabilitation program 2) Explore the interrelationship between stress, pain intensity, gender, and the interference of pain in daily living at admission and discharge. This study examined 142 FM patients admitted to the Cleveland Clinic Chronic Pain Rehabilitation Program (CPRP) from January 2007-August 2010 (84.5 female). Logistic regression …

Social Support And Health Outcomes In Adolescents Experiencing Homelessness And Poverty: A Test Of The Main Effect And Stress-Buffering Hypotheses, Danijela Zlatevski

Wayne State University Dissertations

The health benefit and stress-buffering effects of social support were examined. Homeless (N=250) and housed (N=148) adolescents were assessed in adolescence and again in early adulthood, providing longitudinal data to help understand how these social constructs may change and influence health. The study was designed to test Cohen and Wills (1985) main effect and stress-buffering hypotheses. Current findings provide some support for the main effect hypothesis and some more limited support for the stress-buffering effect of perceived social support on mental health. Specifically, a main effect was found at baseline for network social support on number of substance abuse symptoms. …

Ovarian Hormones, Aging And Stress On Hippocampal Synaptic Plasticity, Michael R. Foy

Psychological Science Faculty Works

The ovarian steroid hormones estradiol and progesterone regulate a wide variety of non-reproductive functions in the central nervous system by interacting with molecular and cellular processes. A growing literature from studies using rodent models suggests that 17β-estradiol, the most potent of the biologically relevant estrogens, enhances synaptic transmission and the magnitude of long-term potentiation recorded from in vitro hippocampal slices. In contrast, progesterone has been shown to decrease synaptic transmission and reduce hippocampal long-term potentiation in this model system. Hippocampal long-term depression, another form of synaptic plasticity, occurs more prominently in slices from aged rats. A decrease in long-term potentiation …

Kids Able To Fight Stress Everyday (Kafse): A Stress-Management Program For Children With Medical Diagnoses, Aimee N. Townsend

Browse all Theses and Dissertations

It is estimated that 10-30% of children in the United States are currently diagnosed with a chronic illness. Due to recent medical advances and increased knowledge of disease maintenance, many of these children will live into adulthood. In addition to physical symptoms of chronic illness, recent attention has been drawn to the psychological effects of chronic illness on children and adolescents. Illustrating this fact, researchers have recently called for increased research on children with chronic illness and disease. One psychological symptom that may be considered is that of stress and its effects on this special population. As a result of …

Prenatal Maternal Stress Programs Infant Stress Regulation, Elyssia Poggi Davis, Laura M. Glynn, Feizal Waffarn, Curt A. Sandman

Psychology Faculty Articles and Research

Objective: Prenatal exposure to inappropriate levels of glucocorticoids (GCs) and maternal stress are putative mechanisms for the fetal programming of later health outcomes. The current investigation examined the influence of prenatal maternal cortisol and maternal psychosocial stress on infant physiological and behavioral responses to stress.

Methods: The study sample comprised 116 women and their full term infants. Maternal plasma cortisol and report of stress, anxiety and depression were assessed at 15, 19, 25, 31 and 36 + weeks' gestational age. Infant cortisol and behavioral responses to the painful stress of a heel-stick blood draw were evaluated at 24 hours after …

Information Overload... @Your Library, Louann Blocker

Georgia Library Quarterly

The article deals with information overload. Nicholas Carr in his book "The Shallows: What the Internet is Doing to Our Brains" explains the process of cognitive overload. Carr also explains how Internet, cell phones or electronic mail messages distract people from contemplation. Carr stresses that the current lifestyle is eroding a person's capacity for deep, sustained, perception attention. The term information overload is defined by Kathryn Hensiak. Tips on controlling the information environment are presented.

Social Support And The Reactivity Hypothesis: Conceptual Issues In Examining The Efficacy Of Received Support During Acute Psychological Stress, Wendy C. Birmingham, Bert N. Uchino, Mckenzie Carlisle, Allison A. Vaughn

Faculty Publications

Social support has been reliably related to better physical health outcomes. One influential model suggests that social support is related to lower cardiovascular disease mortality because it reduces the potentially deleterious consequences of cardiovascular reactivity during acute stress. However, received support and perceived support are separable constructs and epidemiological research suggests variability in links between received support and health. This is important because most social support and acute laboratory stress studies are essentially based on the receipt of support. In this paper, we focus on the conceptualization of received support and its implications for understanding links to support laboratory reactivity …

The Influence Of Depressive Symptomatology And Perceived Stress On Plasma And Salivary Oxytocin Before, During And After A Support Enhancement Intervention, Wendy C. Birmingham, Julianne Holt-Lunstad, Kathleen C. Light

Faculty Publications

Oxytocin (OT) activity increases in response to stress as well as to warm social contact. Subclinical depression is associated with higher stress but less reward from social contacts. The present investigation was intended to examine whether husbands and wives with high depressive symptomatology scores have increased plasma and salivary OT that may be mediated partly by higher perceived stress, and also to assess whether an intervention to convey partner support through ‘‘warm touch’’ may reduce effects of depressive symptoms on OT. In this study, 34 healthy married couples (n = 68) ages 20—39 provided self reports of depressive symptoms (CESD) …

Prospective Evaluation Of A Cognitive Vulnerability-Stress Model For Depression: The Interaction Of Schema Self-Structures And Negative Life Events., Pamela M Seeds, David J A Dozois

Psychology Publications

This study tested the diathesis-stress component of Beck's (1967) cognitive theory of depression. Initially, participants completed measures assessing cognitive organization of the self-schema and depressive symptoms. One year later, participants completed measures assessing cognitive organization of the self-schema, depressive symptoms, and negative life events. Hierarchical multiple regression analyses, controlling for initial depression, indicated that more tightly interconnected negative content was associated with greater elevations in depressive symptoms following the occurrence of life events. More diffusely interconnected positive content for interpersonal self-referent information also interacted with life events to predict depressive symptoms. Cognitive organization dimensions showed moderate to high stability across …

The Relation Between Sensation Seeking And Life Satisfaction, Stephanie Stegman

Master's Theses or Doctor of Nursing Practice

The present study examined the relation between sensation seeking and life satisfaction. Participants completed four online surveys. One survey included a number of questions designed to measure personal sensation seeking level (Sensation Seeking Scale Form V). Another asked questions regarding life satisfaction (Satisfaction With Life Scale). A third survey included questions regarding one’s feelings about one’s self (Rosenberg Self-Esteem Scale). The final survey asked questions regarding perceived stress level (Perceived Stress Scale). Results indicated that higher levels of Disinhibition and Boredom Susceptibility were associated with lower levels of life satisfaction. Results also demonstrated that higher levels of Boredom Susceptibility were …

Hours Of Boredom, Moments Of Terror: Temporal Desynchrony In Military And Security Force Operations, Peter A. Hancock, Gerald P. Krueger

Defense and Technology Papers

The authors examine resultant psychological and behavioral implications for combatant and security personnel performance as viewed through application of a traditional human psychological stress model. Inadequate recognition of the implications resulting from long lull periods, combat pulses, and the need to recover from stress can lead to dysfunctional soldiering as well as poor individual and small unit performance.

So Many Choices, So Little Time: Religiosity And The Stress Of Making Decisions, Joshua David Boeke

Undergraduate Honors Thesis Collection

Numerous studies have appeared in the literature demonstrating that religiosity and mental health are positively related. However, although investigators have identified several variables that partially mediate the effects of religiosity on mental health, much of this relationship remains unexplained. The goal of this survey study was to examine to what extent religious individuals experience better mental health outcomes because they experience less stress when making decisions. Specifically, this study evaluated whether religious individuals reduce the number of decision alternatives they consider when making decisions, which in turn should make decision making easier and reduce decision-making stress. Participants were asked to …

Associations Between Mindfulness And Symptoms Of Anxiety., Leisa L. Wells

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

This cross-sectional exploratory study considered the associations between mindfulness and symptoms of anxiety. The participants in this study were 183 undergraduate students at a regional university in the southeastern United States. The general hypothesis was that higher levels of mindfulness would be associated with lower levels of anxiety. Hierarchical multiple regression analyses were used to examine the association between a variety of aspects of mindfulness and symptoms of anxiety while controlling for a variety of demographic and historical variables, including previous experience with meditation. Results suggest that not all aspects of mindfulness were related to anxiety. Of the 12 specific …

The Ability Of The Coping Competence Questionnaire To Predict Resilience Against Learned Helplessness Among Undergraduate College Students: An Experimental Study, Cindy L. Ollis

All Graduate Theses and Dissertations, Spring 1920 to Summer 2023

The Coping Competence Questionnaire (CCQ), based on the reformulated learned helplessness theory, was designed to assess a general stress resistance versus a propensity towards learned helplessness with a brief, 12-item self-report questionnaire. In this study the CCQ was administered to 247 undergraduate students, who were then paired, in groups of around 24 at a time, and then randomly assigned to either success or failure conditions on the computer game TetraVex. Mood was pretested using the Profile of Mood States (POMS) depression subscale; the experimental condition, success or failure at TetraVex was conducted; then outcome measures including 20 five letter anagrams …

Stress Levels And Development: A Phenomenology Of Autistic Children And Their Parents, Tiffany R. Wiggs

Senior Honors Theses

Being a parent means taking on both the joys and struggles that come with it. When a parent discovers that his or her child has been diagnosed with autism spectrum disorder (ASD), the level of stress changes. It could be helpful to discover the severity of change that the stresses involved in parenting a child with ASD brings to the parent/child relationship and what effect this has on a child’s physical, cognitive, emotional, and spiritual development. To attempt to answer these questions, six parents were interviewed. Findings suggested that structure in daily living improves the quality of the child/parent relationship …