Cognitive Psychology Commons^™

The Relationship Between Object-Based Judgments And Judgments Of Relative Direction As Measures Of Spatial Memory, Zachary Carpenter, Tressa Molinar, Herbert A. Colle

Celebration of Undergraduate & Graduate Research, Scholarship, and Creative Activities Materials

There are frequently two different conceptions used to describe what people store in their memory for environmental layouts. The SOLAR (Straight-Line Object-Based, Local Angular Relations) model and the quasi-Euclidean Framework model. The Framework model assumes that people store coordinated points in their layout of spatial memory. This grid-like representation of points is then used to remember layouts. A common, natural judgment that is used within the Framework model are called judgments of relative direction (JRDs). The SOLAR model, on the other hand, assumes people remember and store information about 3D objects, so characteristics such as fronts can be used as …

The Effects Of Interruption Relevance And Complexity On Primary Task Resumption And Mental Demand, Brandon Allan Fluegel

Psychology Theses & Dissertations

In the present study, undergraduate students viewed patient charts and entered numerical values from these charts into a medical record database. They were unexpectedly interrupted by secondary tasks that differed in relevance and complexity. The secondary tasks varied by whether they facilitated or inhibited (i.e., relevant or irrelevant) rehearsal of the suspended task and whether they placed a demand on working memory (i.e., high complexity or low complexity). The primary measures of interest were the duration of time needed to resume the primary task and perceived mental demand. The Memory for Goals model (Altmann & Trafton, 2002) predicts that task …

Measuring The Additive Effects Of Multimedia Social Cue Principles On Learners’ Cognitive Load, Emotions, Attitude, And Learning Outcomes, Smruti J. Shah

STEMPS Theses & Dissertations

Multimedia principles are developed and employed to design effective multimedia instructions that foster learning. Specifically, multimedia principles such as personalization, voice, and embodiment principles are developed based on social cues to promote deep learning. Most researchers in the past have investigated the individual effects of these principles on learning. The goal of the present study was to investigate the additive effects of these abovementioned principles on learners’ perceived cognitive load, emotions, attitude, and learning outcomes (i.e. retention and transfer of knowledge). Sixty college students participated in this study. Participants were asked to complete two short instructional modules and a short …

Development And Evaluation Of The Nebraska Assessment Of Computing Knowledge, Markeya S. Peteranetz, Anthony D. Albano

Department of Educational Psychology: Faculty Publications

One way to increase the quality of computing education research is to increase the quality of the measurement tools that are available to researchers, especially measures of students’ knowledge and skills. This paper represents a step toward increasing the number of available thoroughly-evaluated tests that can be used in computing education research by evaluating the psychometric properties of a multiple-choice test designed to differentiate undergraduate students in terms of their mastery of foundational computing concepts. Classical test theory and item response theory analyses are reported and indicate that the test is a reliable, psychometrically-sound instrument suitable for research with undergraduate …

Public Opinions Of Unmanned Aerial Technologies In 2014 To 2019: A Technical And Descriptive Report, Lisa M. Pytlikzillig, Janell C. Walther, Carrick Detweiler, Sebastian Elbaum, Adam Houston

Lisa PytlikZillig Publications

The primary purpose of this report is to provide a descriptive and technical summary of the results from similar surveys administered in fall 2014 (n = 576), 2015 (n = 301), 2016 (ns = 1946 and 2089), and 2018 (n = 1050) and summer 2019 (n = 1300). In order to explore a variety of factors that may impact public perceptions of unmanned aerial technologies (UATs), we conducted survey experiments over time. These experiments randomly varied the terminology (drone, aerial robot, unmanned aerial vehicle (UAV), unmanned aerial system (UAS)) used to describe the technology, the purposes of the technology (for …

Cognitive Reappraisal And Expressive Suppression: An Examination Of Their Associations With Seeking Social Support, Well-Being And Academic Performance, Khalid Abdulazem Mohamed Ahmed

Theses

This thesis examined individual differences regarding two prominent emotion regulation processes - cognitive reappraisal and expressive suppression - and their associations with social functioning, psychological well-being, and academic performance. Six hypotheses were proposed. It was hypothesized that frequent use of cognitive reappraisal is positively correlated with seeking social support, psychological well-being, and academic performance, while the chronic use of expressive suppression is negatively associated with the three factors. Additionally, the differences between high reappraisers and low reappraisers, and between high suppressors and low suppressors, were investigated to confirm the results following the correlational analyses. An online survey was conducted …

Out Of Sight, Out Of Mind: Edgar Allan Poe's Use Of Concealment, Alyssa Hubbard

Scholars Week

In his short stories “The Cask of Amontillado,” “The Black Cat,” and “The Tell-Tale Heart,” Edgar Allan Poe uses the act and outcomes of concealment as a way to deal with guilt and introduce consequence. By examining each of these examples, we can see that how and where Poe's narrators hide the bodies of their victims directly impacts their mental health and how quickly their crimes are discovered.

Font Size And Presentation Rate's Influence On Participants' Jols And Memory Performance, Katlyn Mullins, Michele Tjarks, Payne Winston, Matt May, Michael Huber, Michael Duthie

Research Horizons Day Posters

No abstract provided.

Examining The Role Of Auditory Fluency In Participant's Jol's And Memory Performance, Michelle Tjarks, Kaitlyn Mullins, Michael Duthie, Payne Winston, Matt May, Hannah Hilton, Ariel Debardelaben, Dj Summerville

Research Horizons Day Posters

No abstract provided.

Leveling The Viewing Field: The Impact Of Target Prevalence On Searcher's Functional Viewing Field, Juan D. Guevara Pinto

LSU Doctoral Dissertations

It is well known that target prevalence impacts various cognitive processes. In visual search, rare search targets are more difficult to detect than common targets. The present research investigated novel questions about target prevalence, focusing on observers’ functional viewing field (FVF) during passive search tasks. The FVF is the area in a display where attention is focused and item processing is enhanced. According the FVF framework (Hulleman & Olivers, 2017), the size of the FVF is modulated by the ease of target detections, such that visual search involving difficult target detection reduces the FVF. Although this would suggest that low …

Redefining Resiliency Using Principles Of Social Cognitive Theories To Address The Gap In Training And Assessing Resiliency For Air Carrier Operations, Jessica K. Cruit Ph.D., Patricia Bockelman Ph.D., Peter Hancock D.Sc, Ph.D.

National Training Aircraft Symposium (NTAS)

Air carrier flight operations continue to be highly proceduralized events, which have contributed to the overall safety and performance efficiency of the National Airspace System (NAS). However, existing and envisionable procedures do not, and may never completely cover all operational situations. At times, there is not a procedure for a situation or adequate time to complete a known procedure. More specifically, the current use of procedures does not adequately address unexpected events. In the instances when procedures are non-existent, the flight crew needs to have the ability to demonstrate resilience or to adapt and respond appropriately to the changing environment …

Adversity: Its Affect On The Resilience Of Female Pilots, Linda M. Pittenger D.Mgt., Stephanie Douglas Ph.D.

National Training Aircraft Symposium (NTAS)

Women are one of the solutions to alleviating the pending pilot shortage. Becoming a pilot needs to appeal to women. Resilience plays an important role in determining whether women in male-dominated career fields will pursue or abandon their careers. The pilot profession is dominated by masculine beliefs, values and perceptions creating an organizational culture adverse and challenging to women.

The study objective was to explore the influence of adversity on female pilots and its effect on resiliency. In our sample of 1,499 female pilots, we found lower resiliency levels as compared to a general U.S. sample. Additionally, statistically significant differences …

The Role Of Numerical Processing And Working Memory Capacity On The Relationship Between Math Anxiety And Math Performance, Pilar Olid

Electronic Theses, Projects, and Dissertations

Math anxiety refers to a negative emotional response to math-related stimuli. Studies have found a negative correlation between math anxiety and math performance—as math anxiety increases, math performance decreases. According to Attentional Control Theory (Eysenck et al., 2007), anxiety impairs executive functions via depletion of working memory (WM) resources. Therefore, math anxiety affects math performance by consuming WM resources. Additionally, poor math performance is attributed to poor numerical processing (NP), which is the ability to estimate quantities. Recent research suggested that math anxiety affects arithmetic indirectly through working memory capacity (WMC) and NP, and that math anxiety affects numeracy—ratios, fractions, …

Distality Of Attentional Focus And Its Role In Postural Balance Control, Christian Kupper, Karen Roemer, Elizabeth Jusko, Karen Zentgraf

All Faculty Scholarship for the College of Education and Professional Studies

The role of attentional focusing in motor tasks has been highlighted frequently. The “internal–external” dimension has emerged, but also the spatial distance between body and attended location. In two experiments, an extended attentional focus paradigm was introduced to investigate distality effects of attentional foci on balance performance. First, the distality of the coordinates of the point of focus was varied between a proximal and distal position on an artificial tool attached to the body. Second, the distance of the displayed effect on the wall was varied between a 2.5 and 5 m condition. Subjects were instructed to focus on controlling …

The Project Talent Twin And Sibling Study: Zygosity And New Data Collection, Carol A. Prescott, Ellen E. Walters, Thalida Em Arpawong, Catalina Zavala, Tara L. Gruenewald, Margaret Gatz

Psychology Faculty Articles and Research

The Project Talent Twin and Sibling (PTTS) study includes 4481 multiples and their 522 nontwin siblings from 2233 families. The sample was drawn from Project Talent, a U.S. national longitudinal study of 377,000 individuals born 1942–1946, first assessed in 1960 and representative of U.S. students in secondary school (Grades 9–12). In addition to the twins and triplets, the 1960 dataset includes 84,000 siblings from 40,000 other families. This design is both genetically informative and unique in facilitating separation of the ‘common’ environment into three sources of variation: shared by all siblings within a family, specific to twin-pairs, and associated with …

Evaluation Of Unm's Parental Leave Policy, Julia Fulghum, Karlyn A. Edwards, Charlie Christian, Steven Verney, Lisa A. Marchiondo, Teagan Mullins

ADVANCE Reports

Experiences with UNM’s parental leave policy C215 have been evaluated using the ADVANCE 2018 Main Campus Faculty Climate Survey, a series of junior faculty interviews, and concerns brought to the ADVANCE leadership. Key findings are:

• Women and STEM faculty are more hesitant to use family-leave policies, and perceive greater disadvantage in using them than men and non-STEM faculty
• Sharing of information about, and implementation of, parental leave varies significantly between units
• The attitude of the department chair and senior faculty strongly influence the experience of faculty who use parental leave
• Appropriately implemented, the parental leave policy contributes to faculty recruitment …

Applying A Metacognitive Framework In The Neuropsychological Assessment Of Subjective Cognitive Decline And Mild Cognitive Impairment, Susan Y. Chi

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

The characterization of the earliest stages of Alzheimer's disease (AD) is a topic of major research interest because it is critical for early diagnosis and emerging interventions. Metamemory, or knowledge about memory, including awareness of one’s own memory functions, has been investigated in AD especially in relation to how impairment in memory and executive functions contribute to unawareness of cognitive deficits, termed anosognosia. Previous research, however, has not systematically investigated metamemory functioning in older adults with prodromal dementia conditions. Therefore, we investigated metamemory accuracy in cognitively healthy older adults (HC) and those with subjective cognitive decline but intact neuropsychological test …

Defining An Adult Screener For Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorder: A Study Of Court Populations, Allison Mushlitz

Doctor of Psychology (PsyD)

Very little information is known about Fetal Alcohol Spectrum Disorders (FASD) within corrections populations, yet research suggests higher prevalence rates among these populations compared to the general population (Burd, Selfridge, Klug, & Bakko, 2004). In order to evaluate FASD within a corrections population, an established behavioral screener, FAS BeST (Robins & Andrews, 2009), was adapted for adults along with a selected protocol of cognitive and neuropsychological testing. The study aimed to identify testing performance and response patterns unique to individuals with an FASD in order to develop a cognitive and behavioral profile, and to evaluate the Self-Report and Adult Other …

Beyond Exposure: Markers Of English Proficiency In School-Aged French–English Bilinguals, Erin Quirk

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Bilingual children show more variation in their language development than monolingual children, a fact that has been linked to their experience with their languages. Bilingual language experience also varies more than monolingual children's, both in terms of how much they hear the language spoken around them (exposure) and how much they speak the language themselves (production). This dissertation investigates the following aspects of the relationship between bilinguals’ language experience and development which are not well-understood: how children’s language production relates to their proficiency in that language, how children’s language exposure relates to receptive versus expressive and lexical versus grammatical skill, …

Cross-Cultural Work In Music Cognition: Challenges, Insights, And Recommendations, Nori Jacoby, Elizabeth Hellmuth Margulis, Martin Clayton, Erin Hannon, Henkjan Honing, John Iversen, Tobias Robert Klein, Samuel A. Mehr, Lara Pearson, Isabelle Peretz, Marc Pearlman, Rainer Polak, Andrea Ravignani, Patrick E. Savage, Gavin Steingo, Catherine J. Stevens, Laurel Trainor, Sandra Trehub, Michael Veal, Melanie Wald-Fuhrmann

Psychology Faculty Research

Many foundational questions in the psychology of music require cross-cultural approaches, yet the vast majority of work in the field to date has been conducted with Western participants and Western music. For cross-cultural research to thrive, it will require collaboration between people from different disciplinary backgrounds, as well as strategies for overcoming differences in assumptions, methods, and terminology. This position paper surveys the current state of the field and offers a number of concrete recommendations focused on issues involving ethics, empirical methods, and definitions of “music” and “culture.”

Personality Factors That Influence Truthfulness And Deception, Khrista E. Neville, Jonathan S. Gore, Adam Lawson

Kentucky Journal of Undergraduate Scholarship

Identifying personality traits that coincide with everyday deception is crucial to understanding how individual differences relate to antisocial tendencies. The current study tested the hypothesis that sensation seeking and psychopathy can predict everyday deception. Seventy-nine undergraduate students participated in an online study to assess these personality traits. A linear regression analysis found disinhibition psychopathy to be a strong predictor of everyday deception, with impulsive sensation seeking as the only other significant predictor.

The Development Of Mental Rotation Ability Across The First Year After Birth, David S. Moore, Scott P. Johnson

Pitzer Faculty Publications and Research

Mental rotation (MR) is the ability to imagine the appearance of an object from a different perspective. This ability is involved in many human cognitive and behavioral activities. We discuss studies that have examined MR in infants and its development across the first year after birth. Despite some conflicting findings across these studies, several conclusions can be reached. First, MR may be available to human infants as young as 3 months of age. Second, MR processes in infancy may be similar or identical to MR processes later in life. Third, there may be sex differences in MR performance, in general …

Processing Of Musical Pitch, Time, And Emotion In Older Adults, Andrea R. Halpern

Faculty Contributions to Books

No abstract provided.

The Impact Of The Covid Populations In The United States: A Research Agenda, Neeta Kantamneni

Department of Educational Psychology: Faculty Publications

International and national crises often highlight inequalities in the labor market that disproportionately affect individuals from marginalized backgrounds. The COVID-19 pandemic, and the resulting changes in society due to social distancing measures, has showcased inequities in access to decent work and experiences of discrimination resulting in many of the vulnerable populations in the United States experiencing a much harsher impact on economic and work-related factors. The purpose of this essay is to describe how the COVID-19 pandemic may differentially affect workers of color, individuals from low-income backgrounds, and women in complex ways. First, this essay will discuss disproportionate representation of …

Are All Perspective Taking Tasks Created Equal? The Relationship Between Performance On Perspective Taking Tasks In Children, Pearl Christine Mcgee, Melissa Anne Czarnogursky, Yingying Jennifer Yang

Student Research Symposium

Spatial abilities assist in manipulating, constructing, and navigating the physical world (Newcombe & Shipley, 1992; Montello, 2001). In this study, a variety of tasks were utilized to measure various constructs of spatial abilities. One of the constructs measured was perspective taking which consists of the ability to understand and recognize situations at different points of view. This allows individuals to relate to others, understand spatial relations, and view objects in different spaces (Newcombe & Huttenlocker, 1992). Two tasks were employed to measure perspective taking: Piaget’s Three Mountains task and a task modeled after a study by Newcombe and Huttenlocher (1992). …

How Going With The Flow Could Aid Factor Learning In Mathematics, Aaron M. Beuoy

Murray State Theses and Dissertations

This quasi-experimental study examined the effectiveness of elaborative processing and knowledge maps for learning the steps to factor polynomials with various numbers of terms when math anxiety was accounted for. The study took place in a college classroom during an eight day period when students were learning to factor polynomials. On Day 2, students studied the factoring steps using a list of steps or a flowchart and then engaged in free- and cued-recall tests. Day 3 was similar except that students did not complete a free recall test. Another set of cued recall tests were administered on Day 5, and …

Can Metacognitive Monitoring Ability Be Trained?, Erica Abed

CGU Theses & Dissertations

Low performers tend to greatly overestimate their performance on a task, but high

performers slightly underestimate their performance; the unskilled-unaware effect (Kruger & Dunning, 1999). Because assessment of one’s own skill (monitoring) impacts future decisions, such as selecting information to re-study (control), low performers may be disadvantaged in both what they know and what they are likely to learn. Although most research has attempted to reduce metacognitive errors in low performers by training cognitive ability (e.g., teaching them to perform better on a task), training metacognitive ability may be both more efficient and more likely to transfer to other tasks. …

Policy And Procedure Recommendations For The Collection And Preservation Of Eyewitness Identification Evidence, Gary L. Wells, Margaret Bull Kovera, Amy Bradfield Douglass, Neil Brewer, Christian A. Meissner, John T. Wixted

Publications and Research

Objective: The Executive Committee of the American Psychology-Law Society (Division 41 of the American Psychological Association) appointed a subcommittee to update the influential 1998 scientific review paper on guidelines for eyewitness identification procedures. Method: This was a collaborative effort by six senior eyewitness researchers, who all participated in the writing process. Feedback from members of AP-LS and the legal communities was solicited over an 18-month period. Results: The results yielded nine recommendations for planning, designing, and conducting eyewitness identification procedures. Four of the recommendations were from the 1998 article and concerned the selection of lineup fillers, prelineup …

The Effect Of Familiarity On Truthiness Judgement, Karina M. Carlson

Undergraduate Theses, Professional Papers, and Capstone Artifacts

Judgments on whether a statement is true are influenced by various factors. For example, Newman et al. (2012) found participants rated a statement as true if it was presented with a related photo, even if the photo did not provide any evidence that the statement is true. This phenomenon is known as the truthiness effect. Despite a large number of existing studies, little has been known about the mechanism underlies the truthiness effect. In the memory literature, previous studies demonstrated that simply repeating an item, such as a word, makes it more memorable (Jacoby & Whitehouse, 1989), suggesting that mere …

It’S Fun!” Using Students’ Voices To Understand The Impact Of School Digital Technology Integration On Their Well-Being, Daniel James Mourlam, Daniel Decino, Lisa Newland, Gabrielle Strouse

School of Education Faculty Publications

The purpose of this phenomenological study was to better understand children’s perception of their school-based educational technology use and its role in their well-being. Children (N = 23) from the Midwestern U.S. completed an interview and mapping exercise focused on the contexts and factors that impact their well-being, including schools and teachers. Phenomenological analyses of interview transcripts focused on children’s perceptions of 1) school educational technology use, and 2) the impact of school educational technology use on their well-being. Children described a variety of school educational technology experiences, which they perceived as having both positive and negative effects on their …