Developmental Psychology Commons^™

Harlem's Superhero: Social Interaction, Heterogeneity Of Thought, And The Superhero Mission In Marvel's Luke Cage, Justin Martin

Psychology Faculty Scholarship

The essay extends previous Luke Cage scholarship by analyzing him through a discipline rarely utilized in superhero scholarship: developmental psychology. Using the Luke Cage television series, the author centers Luke Cage's relationship to Harlem. In doing so, the author explores how the relationship can elucidate both the conceptual foundations of morally-relevant decision-making and the ways these concepts may be applied in varied and complex social interactions -- features of social life relevant to everyday persons as well as superheroes working within a fictionalized neighborhood.

Racial Disparities In Policing: Psychological Consequences Over The Lifespan, Kelly C. Burke, Cynthia J. Najdowski, Margaret C. Stevenson

Psychology Faculty Scholarship

We review the psychological consequences of racialized policing for people of color over the course of their lives, organizing our review within Bronfrenbrenner’s (1979) social-ecological model and emerging science on racial, legal, and racial-legal socialization. First, we consider the broader social climate that criminalizes and punishes people of color, and thereby generates racialized policing (macrosystem). Then, we turn to the institution and practice of policing and how this influences the way people of color come to think about their relationships with police (exosystem). Next, we examine how vicarious experiences with police shape attitudes toward police (mesosystem), and how direct experiences …

Incorporating A Developmental Perspective Into Gene Identification Models For Alcohol Use Behaviors, Nathaniel S. Thomas

Theses and Dissertations

Frequent alcohol use can lead to alcohol use disorder, which accounts for three million deaths and over 133 million life years lost to disability and death worldwide per year. Alcohol use behaviors unfold across development, beginning with initiation of drinking and progressing through various escalating stages of use. Alcohol use behaviors are also under genetic influence. Genome-wide association represents the state-of-the-science statistical methodology for identifying genes associated with alcohol use outcomes. However, contemporary genome-wide association study (GWAS) methods typically do not account for variability in genetic effects throughout development. In this project, I applied novel multivariate genomic methods to combine …

A Close Look At The Connections Between Mental-State Talk, Theory Of Mind, And Source Monitoring During Parent-Child Reminiscing Of Emotional Events, Mallory Earnshaw

Theses and Dissertations (Comprehensive)

Autobiographical memories play a critical role in shaping personal identity, regulating emotions, and guiding future behaviour. Reminiscing about these memories can be particularly beneficial for coping with negative experiences. This study investigated the connections between mental-state talk, theory of mind, and source monitoring in parent-child reminiscing, and how it can be influenced by remembering enjoyable versus frustrating events. This study involved children ages 3-8 (N = 50) and consisted of two sessions. In the first session, the child reminisced with their parent about an enjoyable and frustrating event and completed two source-monitoring tasks. In the second session, the child …

Context-Specific Conceptualizations Of Death In Early Childhood, Spencer Hart Winter

Capstone Projects and Master's Theses

Despite cultural myths and social taboos, young children are capable of understanding death and death concepts. Previous research has demonstrated that children have a varied and complex understanding of death that is influenced by their age, family culture, and previous experience. This study aims to differentiate children’s death concept depending on context, including children’s magical thinking, namely the difference between the deaths of a human, an animal, and an electronic toy. Using a modified version of the Death Concept Questionnaire, preschool-aged (3 to 5 years old) children (n=7) were presented with short video clips of a human, a dog, and …

Moderating Factors In The Relationship Between Bully Victimization And Psychosomatic Symptoms, Tonya Paulson

Theses and Graduate Projects

The purpose of this study was to investigate the relationship between bully victimization and psychosomatic symptoms, and to examine the protective influence of perceived parent and peer support across developmental age groups. Bully victimization frequency, somatic symptom severity, perceived parent support, and perceived peer support were assessed using archival data from 7,304 youth who participated in the 2009-2010 Health Behavior in School-Aged Children (HBSC) U.S. survey, excluding perpetrators of bullying. Bully victimization and somatic symptoms were significantly positively correlated. Older adolescents consistently reported more severe somatic symptoms, but age did not moderate the relationship between bullying and somatic symptoms. Higher …

The Front Lines Of Student Success: A Phenomenography Exploring The Background And Knowledge Of Primary Role Academic Advisors In Higher Education, Alicia N. Abney

Electronic Theses and Dissertations

The purpose of this qualitative, phenomenographic study was to understand the experiences, backgrounds, and perspectives of new, primary role academic advisors at four-year public institutions in the United States. Research on advising has provided insight into advising best practices and the student perceptions of academic advising; however, there is little research illustrating current primary role academic advisors and their experience, or perhaps lack thereof.

To receive highly coveted federal and state funding, higher education institutions must show growth in student success. Academic advisors are on the front lines of student success because they are tasked with the responsibility of retaining …

On The Catholic Identity Of Students And Schools: Value Propositions For Catholic Education, Daniel Lapsley, Katheryn Kelley

Journal of Catholic Education

The Catholic school sector is under significant stress with declining enrollments and schools closing in virtually every diocese in the United States. This paper examines two value propositions for Catholic education. One is its role in providing foundational support for the development of personal spiritual identity in emerging adulthood and across the lifecourse. The second is the contribution of Catholic education to moral-character formation. Both propositions are relatively underdeveloped. The question of students’ personal spiritual identity is overshadowed by the understandable concern with the Catholic identity of schools. The question of moral-character formation is subsumed by catechesis and liturgy but …

The Fable Of Neuroplastic Lyra, Ricardo Twumasi

Ought: The Journal of Autistic Culture

This paper tells a folktale of two tribes and the neurodivergence that brought them together, through language and the patterns of the sounds that surrounded the tribes.

Acknowledgements:

Thank you to Alex Higson for editing an early version of this article. Thanks to Maximin Lange, Lewis Burton, Juliet Foster, Sukhi Shergill and Oliver Runswick for your comments.

Early Mathematical Abilities Of 48-Month-Old Children With Williams Syndrome., Jenna N. Tinnell

College of Arts & Sciences Senior Theses

Williams syndrome (WS) is a genetic neurodevelopmental disorder associated with relative strengths in concrete vocabulary, nonverbal reasoning, and verbal short-term memory and considerable weaknesses in visuospatial construction and relational language. While the cognitive profile of WS has been studied extensively, there have been few studies of the early mathematical abilities of children with WS and the cognitive predictors of these abilities. The purpose of this study was to describe the early mathematical abilities of 48-month-olds with WS and determine the concurrent cognitive predictors of these abilities. The Differential Ability Scales–second edition (DAS-II) was used to determine cognitive and mathematical abilities …

How Deep Do We Have To Go To Rehabilitate Evolutionary Psychology? Reply To Bjorklund, Ellis, & Geary (2022), David S. Moore, David C. Witherington, Darcia Narvaez, Timothy I. Vandiver, Robert Lickliter

Pitzer Faculty Publications and Research

Disciplines like evolutionary-developmental psychology admirably focus on trying to rehabilitate Narrow Evolutionary Psychology (NEP) from within, by adding a developmental focus to NEP’s tenets of adaptationism and computationalism. We argue, however, that these tenets are fundamentally incompatible with taking psychology and its development seriously, and that the kinds of modifications introduced by evolutionary-developmental psychologists do not go deep enough to qualitatively change the non-developmental outlook of NEP.

Infant Motor Development Predicts The Dynamics Of Movement During Sleep, Aaron Demasi, Melissa N. Horger, Anat Scher, Sarah E. Berger

Publications and Research

The characteristics of infant sleep change over the first year. Generally, infants wake and move less at night as they grow older. However, acquisition of new motor skills leads to temporary increases in night waking and movement at night. Indeed, sleep-dependent movement at night is important for sensorimotor development. Nevertheless, little is known about how movement during sleep changes as infants accrue locomotor experience. The current study investigated whether infant sleep and movement during sleep were predicted by infants' walking experience. Seventy-eight infants wore an actigraph to measure physical activity during sleep. Parents reported when their infants first walked across …

Multiple Approaches To Auditory Rhythm: Development Of Sustained Musical Beat And The Relation To Language, Development Of Rhythmic Categories Via Iterated Production, And A Meta-Analytic Study Of Neural Entrainment To Beat, Karli Marie Nave

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Rhythm is ubiquitous to human communication, coordination, and experience of music. In this dissertation, I address three empirical questions through three different methodologies, all of which contribute to the growing body of literature on human auditory rhythm processing. In Chapter 2, I present a registered report detailing the results of independent conceptual replications of Nozaradan, Peretz, Missal, & Mouraux (2011), all using the same vetted protocol. Listeners performed the same tasks as in Nozaradan et al. (2011), with the addition of behavioral measures of perception. In neuroscience, neural correlates to musical beat perception have been identified, yet little to no …

Exploring How Interpersonal Childhood Trauma Impacts Emotional Development, Kathleen Hobbs

Educational Specialist, 2020-current

Our earliest interactions in life lay the foundation of how we relate to ourselves and others throughout adulthood. When a child experiences abuse and neglect that is relational in nature, referred to as interpersonal childhood trauma, research shows that they are at a much higher risk to display emotional difficulties that have been found to contribute to extensive health consequences throughout the lifespan. Less has been documented however regarding exactly how this kind of trauma influences emotional development. The purpose of this paper is to explore the current research that exists on the relationship between interpersonal childhood trauma and emotional …

Psychology Of Adolescence, Brent Maximin

Open Educational Resources

No abstract provided.

The Effects Of And Interventions For Trauma On Child And Adolescent Development, Jenna Clark

Senior Honors Theses

Trauma is generally defined as an event that causes a lasting impact on an individual, ranging from a natural disaster or medical trauma to abuse. Traumatic events greatly impact development, especially when experienced during childhood and adolescence. These first eighteen years of a child’s life can be divided into three main stages using Erikson’s psychosocial theory and Piaget’s cognitive development theory as these theories provide comprehensive insight into the development of a child. Because of the differences in traumatic experiences and the age of the child, the effects and manifestations of a trauma’s influence will vary between these three different …

Oppositional Behavior Parallels In Toddlers And Teens And Parent’S Response, Michele Dimmett

Walden Dissertations and Doctoral Studies

Parents seem to manage oppositional conduct of toddlers but struggle emotionally and physically with oppositional conduct of teenagers, despite similarities in the behaviors. Self-efficacy theory, psychological theory of development, and theory of mind guided the conceptualization of how parents perceive and respond to these two sensitive periods of development. This contrasted group quantitative study pursued measurable similarities in the experience of first-time parents of children aged 18-36 months and 14-15 years of age. Establishing parents’ confidence level in their parenting skills and how they perceive and respond to their child's oppositional behavior was also a factor. One hundred and seventy-five …

Adolescence & Emerging Adulthood, Lisa Babel

Open Educational Resources

No abstract provided.

Musical Meter: Examining Hierarchical Temporal Perception In Complex Musical Stimuli Across Human Development, Sensory Modalities, And Expertise, Jessica Erin Nave-Blodgett

UNLV Theses, Dissertations, Professional Papers, and Capstones

Performing, listening, and moving to music are universal human behaviors. Most music in the world is organized temporally with faster periodicities nested within slower periodicities, creating a perceptual hierarchy of repeating stronger (downbeat) and weaker (upbeat) events. This perceptual organization is theorized to aid our abilities to synchronize our behaviors with music and other individuals, but there is scant empirical evidence that listeners actively perceive these multiple levels of temporal periodicities simultaneously. Furthermore, there is conflicting evidence about when, and how, the ability to perceive the beat in music emerges during development. It is also unclear if this hierarchical organization …

A New Perspective To Measuring Employee Growth: Developing A Successful Aging At Work Scale, Stanimira K. Taneva, Georgi P. Yankov

Personnel Assessment and Decisions

The aging of the world’s population has become a grand societal challenge, which requires an urgent response from researchers, professionals, and the wider society. One way to respond to this challenge is by supporting individuals in sustaining longer and healthier working lives, that is, age successfully. Although the advantages of promoting and enabling successful aging at work have been widely acknowledged, no single instrument for measuring this construct has been published so far. We develop and test in three consecutive samples a two-dimensional successful aging at work scale. This novel instrument is rooted conceptually in the most recent theoretical developments …

1990s Grunge And Its Effect On Adolescents, Bailey Gomes

Conspectus Borealis

No abstract provided.

Play's Role In The Development Of Antisocial Behavior, Cheyenne Vazquez

Williams Honors College, Honors Research Projects

This paper is a literature review which examines the relationship between play and prosocial behavior. More specifically, it examines its inverse, questioning whether a lack of play in early childhood may be correlated to the development of antisocial behavior later in life. Comparing research from an abundance of psychologists, criminologists, and sociologists, this paper answers various questions pertaining to play and prosocial behavior: What happens if play is inhibited in childhood? Would different reasons for play to be inhibited result in different results (i.e. abusive childhoods, desperate situations such as homelessness and poverty, chronic illness, etc.)? Is a lack of …

Becoming Gatekeepers: A Constructivist Model Of Gatekeeper Development In Counselor Education, Natasha Joy Salier Schnell

Graduate Research Theses & Dissertations

The need for diligent gatekeeping practices in counselor education is well documented in professional literature, ethical guidelines, and standards of practice; although much has been written about gatekeeping, an extensive examination of the literature did not reveal any studies on how and where counselor educators are learning to be gatekeepers. Therefore, this study sought to ascertain what counselor educators identify as meaningful learning experiences and critical incidents that facilitated their sense of efficacy and preparedness as gatekeepers and to examine how counselor educators acquire and develop the competence to become proficient gatekeepers in the counseling profession. Phenomenological interviewing and analysis …

The Role Of Receptive Reasoning In The Development Of Intellectual Humility, Cathryn Richmond

Theses and Dissertations

Intellectual humility (IH) develops throughout childhood and adolescence and is critically important for effective learning, particularly with regard to science; however, the research examining the development of IH in children is quite limited. As such, this study utilized an exploratory, mixed methods, community-engaged research design with children ages three to 10 (n = 60; M_age = 5.98; 69.6% female) and their parents/guardians recruited from a public children’s museum.. As the construct of IH is intended to describe adult cognition, I operationalized the set of components that may lead to the development of IH in preschool children as Receptive …

The Role Of Gamma Oscillations And Cortical Inhibition In The Development Of Working Memory In Adolescence, Christopher P. Walker

Dissertations and Theses (Open Access)

Adolescence is a dynamic period of social, cognitive, and biological changes. In particular, working memory, the ability to actively encode and maintain information over a short period of time, develops early in childhood and gradually increases in capacity and stability during adolescence. The precise neurophysiological mechanism by which working memory capacity increases during adolescence is unclear. The objective of this investigation was to evaluate the role of cortical gamma-band (> 30 Hz) oscillations—which are associated with working memory in adults—for the development of working memory capacity in adolescents, and to identify the extent to which the temporal profile of gamma-aminobutyric …

Across Continents And Demographics, Unpredictable Maternal Signals Are Associated With Children's Cognitive Function, Elysia Poggi Davis, Riikka Korja, Linnea Karlsson, Laura M. Glynn, Curt A. Sandman, Brian Vegetabile, Eeva-Leena Kataja, Saara Nolvi, Eija Sinervä, Juho Pelto, Hasse Karlsson, Hal S. Stern, Tallie Z. Baram

Psychology: Faculty Scholarship

Background

Early life experiences have persisting influence on brain function throughout life. Maternal signals constitute a primary source of early life experiences, and their quantity and quality during sensitive developmental periods exert enduring effects on cognitive function and emotional and social behaviors. Here we examined if, in addition to established qualitative dimensions of maternal behavior during her interactions with her infant and child, patterns of maternal signals may contribute to the maturation of children's executive functions. We focused primarily on effortful control, a potent predictor of mental health outcomes later in life.

Methods

In two independent prospective cohorts in Turku, …

Infant Emotion Regulation With Mothers And Fathers: The Roles Of Infant Temperament And Parent Psychopathology, Ashley Quigley

Masters Theses & Specialist Projects

The ability to regulate emotions is a key part of infants’ social and emotional development, but this ability may differ due to different factors internal and external to the infant. The current study examined the association between infant temperament and parent psychopathology to predict emotion regulation strategies in a sample of 4-montholds using the diathesis-stress model (Monroe & Simons, 1991). Parent-report questionnaires were used to measure infant temperament (the Infant-Behavior Questionnaire-Revised, IBQ-R; Gartstein & Rothbart, 2003) and parental psychopathology (Inventory of Depression and Anxiety, IDAS; Watson et al., 2007). Infants’ use of parent-focused, attentional distraction, and self-soothing strategies were rated …

Awareness Of Emotions Leads To Self-Efficacy Among College Students, Amy Lee, Emily M. Delacruz

Publications and Research

Self-efficacy is one’s belief in their own ability to succeed in a particular situation or accomplish a task (Bandura, 1977). Previous research has shown that the effort one puts into achieving goals, coping abilities, and behavior in the face of opposition are all heavily influenced by efficacy beliefs. Self reflection and knowledge of inner feelings, areas in which one excel, areas in which one do poorly, and areas in which one need to improve aid in the establishment of goals (Bandura, 1977 & Cervone, 2004). Inner feelings are bound to occur when one make sense of what one can and …

First Thirty Days Of Life: Examining Calf Behavioral Development In Beluga Whales (Delphinapterus Leucas) And Pacific White-Sided Dolphins (Lagenorhyncus Obliquidens) At One Zoological Facility, Kendal Smith

Master's Theses

Cetacean development is important for general comparative understanding and the implementation of informed husbandry policies. Due to the inaccessibility of many of these species in the wild, researchers can study managed care populations to better understand basic developmental patterns of cetaceans, as well as to improve husbandry policies for facility animals. However, no previous studies have attempted to observe the behavioral development of Pacific white-sided dolphins (Lagenorhyncus obliquidens). Eight beluga whale calves and four Pacific white-sided dolphin calves were observed for the first 30 days of life to determine the developmental trajectory of several typically monitored behaviors. The …

Lectures And Test Bank For Human Growth And Development (Gsw), Ellen Cotter

Psychology, Sociology, Anthropology, and Social Work Ancillary Materials

This set of lecture slides and test banks for Human Growth and Development was created through an ALG Round Eleven Mini-Grant for Ancillary Materials Creation and Revision. The materials are intended to support Lifespan Development by Martha Lally and Suzanne Valentine-French.

Topics covered include:

• Heredity, Prenatal Development, and Birth
• Infancy
• Early Childhood
• Adolescence
• Adulthood
• Death and Dying