Other Psychology Commons^™

The Effects Of Pet Ownership On Anxiety And Depression Among Trauma-Exposed College Students, Dung N. Nguyentran, Marlene A. Michniak, James J. Jung, Christine Q. Do

UROP Posters

Rates of anxiety and depression are prevalent in college students and can be attributed in part to stress and trauma-related events. However, studies suggest that pet ownership has the possibility of alleviating symptoms of anxiety, depression, negative emotions, and suicide. The purpose of this study was to determine the relationship between pet ownership and levels of anxiety and depression among those who have experienced a traumatic event. The sample was comprised of five hundred and forty-seven VCU students who completed an online survey from Spit for Science during their junior year. Linear regressions were performed to determine the nature and …

The Relationship Between Elevation, Connectedness, And Compassionate Love In Meaningful Films, Sophie Janicke, Mary Beth Oliver

Communication Faculty Articles and Research

Expanding on the research of meaningful entertainment media and its effects, this study investigated the relationship between experiences related to elevation responses to film. Whereas research thus far has focused primarily on portrayals of altruism to elicit elevation, the results of this study show that portrayals of connectedness, love, and kindness in meaningful films are also able to elicit feelings of elevation. Moreover, elevation mediated the relationship between meaningful films and feelings of connectedness towards the transcendent, close others and toward one’s family; compassionate love towards close others; and compassionate motivation to love and be good to humanity. The study …

Epistemic Violence In The Process Of Othering: Real-World Applications And Moving Forward, Allie J. Bunch

Scholarly Undergraduate Research Journal at Clark (SURJ)

From the work of Pierre Bourdieu on symbolic violence came the study of epistemic violence, which is at the core of the process of othering marginalized groups. Epistemological scholars including Kristie Dotson, Miranda Fricker, Cynthia Townley, and Gayatri Spivak have done extensive work on the theory of the phenomenon; it is necessary to analyze the classifications of epistemic violence through their application in empirical settings. Addressing three case studies of “othering” highlights the importance of greater integration of marginalized groups into the education system as the necessary first step towards eliminating othering by targeting epistemic violence at a base level.

Evaluating A Collaborative Ipad Game's Impact On Social Relationships For Children With Autism Spectrum Disorder, Louanne E. Boyd, Kathryn E. Ringland, Oliver L. Haimson, Helen Fernandez, Maria Bistarkey, Gillian R. Hayes

Engineering Faculty Articles and Research

This article describes how collaborative assistive technologies, housed on off-the-shelf, low-cost platforms such as the iPad, can be used to facilitate social relationships in children with autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Through an empirical study of the use of a collaborative iPad game, Zody, we explore how assistive technologies can be used to support social relationships, even without intervention from adults. We discuss how specific design choices can encourage three levels of social relationship: membership, partnership, and friendship. This work contributes to research on both assistive technologies and collaborative gaming through a framework that describes how specific in-game elements can foster …

Guilty Stereotypes: The Social Psychology Of Race And Suspicion In Police Interviews And Interrogations, Sara C. Appleby

Dissertations, Theses, and Capstone Projects

Over 300 people have been exonerated by post conviction DNA testing, unequivocally proving their innocence. Nearly 70% of these post conviction DNA exonerees are members of minority groups, and approximately 69% of those convicted as a result of false confessions are racial/ethnic minorities (www.innocenceproject.org). To date, there is little research on the role of race in police interviews and interrogations. The present research had two goals. First, we examined Black and White participants' experiences during a mock crime interview. Second, using the interviews from Study 1, we evaluated the role suspect race plays in police officers' veracity judgments. Using a …

The Potential Impact Of Rape Culture On Juror Decision Making: Implications For Wrongful Acquittals In Sexual Assault Trials., Meagen M. Hildebrand, Cynthia J. Najdowski

Psychology Faculty Scholarship

Feminist writers contend that Americans live in a culture that supports sexualized aggression and violence against women. This “rape culture” is reflected in our society by the pervasive endorsement of rape myths and sexual objectification of women, both of which are legitimized by everyday media. One potential consequence of living in a rape culture is that individuals may themselves come to endorse rape myths and sexually objectify women, and, in turn, perceive certain forms of sexual violence against women as defensible. This is concerning considering the significant role that laypeople play in administering justice in sexual assault cases, but research …

The Ripple Effects Of Stranger Harassment On Objectification Of Self And Others, Meghan Davidson, Sarah Gervais, Lindsey W. Sherd

Department of Educational Psychology: Faculty Publications

Despite the frequency and negative consequences of stranger harassment, only a scant number of studies have explicitly examined stranger harassment and its consequences through the lens of objectification theory. The current study introduced and tested a mediation model in which women’s experiences of stranger harassment may lead to self-objectification, which in turn may lead to objectification of other people. To examine this model, undergraduate women (N = 501) completed measures of stranger harassment (including the verbal harassment and sexual pressure subscales of the Stranger Harassment Index), body surveillance, and objectification of other women and men. Consistent with hypotheses, significant positive …

Factors That Influence Perceptions Of Others: An Emphasis On Down Syndrome, Briana J. Walls

Undergraduate Theses and Capstone Projects

The current study examined how physical characteristics influence perceptions others have of people with Down syndrome (DS). Participants were shown one of four pictures, which were an adult male with Down syndrome facial characteristics, an adult male without Down syndrome facial characteristic, a male child with Down syndrome facial characteristic and a male child without Down syndrome facial characteristics. After viewing one of the four pictures with a description of likes and dislikes of the person in the picture, the participants completed a questionnaire examining perceptions of cognitive-behavioral competence, emotional distance- discomfort, and occupational ability. The hypothesis of this study …

Can You Please Put Your Phone Away? Examining How The Fomo Phenomenon And Mobile Phone Addiction Affect Human Relationships, Laila A. Chaudhry

UROP Posters

This study attempts to identify how attachment to social media as well as attachment to other forms of communication technology can lead to addiction to mobile devices and affect non-virtual interpersonal communication. I examined the phenomenon known as the fear of missing out, or FOMO, which can be defined as apprehension that others might be having rewarding experiences from which one is absent. Experiencing FOMO can lead to overuse of and even addiction to social media, another category I examined, because addicted individuals want to stay more up-to-date with social networks and social media is the most efficient way to …

Development Of A Personal Visioning Guidance System, Mariano Tosso

Creativity and Change Leadership Graduate Student Master's Projects

The primary intent of this project was to formulate a novel guidance system to help individuals gain clarity and understanding of their "inner vision" of a desired future state. My secondary goal was to enrich the palette of resources and tools available for coaching individuals in their discovery and crafting of personal and/or professional visions. Initially, I conducted an extensive literature review that inspired my approach. Then, I followed a process for assessing existing visioning tools and then imagining new opportunities to create, conceptualize, and craft at least five novel visioning tools.

The project outcome includes a Personal Visioning Guidance …

Possible Psychosocial Benefits Of Having A Sibling With A Disability, Jenna M. Talbott

Senior Honors Theses

Possible psychosocial benefits resulting from exposure to siblings with disabilities are investigated in the current study. Previous literature has generally overlooked the possibility of psychosocial benefits by exclusively focusing on the negative effects of having a sibling with disabilities. Contact theory suggests that the increased exposure to individuals with disabilities should increase positive attitude toward those who are struggling with disadvantages. This investigation hypothesized that this tendency would be manifested as elevated empathy and compassion in individuals who have siblings with disabilities, and that these traits would be influenced by certain demographic variables. A survey was distributed, and the responses …

Juvenile Diversion Programs: High-Risk Youth And Their Effect On Offense Targeting, Chelsey R. Warner

Political Science Theses and Capstones

One of the largest problems that plague the juvenile justice system today is how to better handle juvenile crime without causing the juvenile to revert back to that behavior, but still helping them understand and acknowledge the crime they have committed. The state of Minnesota has created juvenile diversion programs as an attempt to aid in that endeavor. These programs however are under researched. The goal of this article is to shed some light on what those programs look like and how some counties programs vary from other programs on other counties; specifically focusing on the variation between offense-targeting for …

Interactions Between African Americans And Police Officers: How Cultural Stereotypes Create A Wrongful Conviction Pipeline For African Americans, Cynthia J. Najdowski

Psychology Faculty Scholarship

Erroneous convictions are not as rare as one might expect and when they occur, the wrongfully accused are more often African American than White: Of those who were wrongfully convicted and later exonerated in the last quarter century, 47% were African American (The National Registry of Exonerations, 2013), even though only 13% of the U.S. population is (Rastogi, Johnson, Hoeffel, & Drewery, 2011). Yet Gould, Carrano, Leo, and Young’s (2013) recent analysis of miscarriages of justice indicated that race does not reliably differentiate between cases in which innocent defendants are wrongfully convicted as opposed to rightfully acquitted. They suggested that, …

Friend Or Foe: The Effect Of Shared Group Status On Aggressiveness And Testosterone In Response To Provocation, Eric William Fuller

Wayne State University Dissertations

Previous research has found that individuals display behavioral and hormonal differences when engaged in competition with natural and experimental ingroup and outgroup members. The current work expands on this line of research by examining the impact of shared group status on reactive aggression in response to provocation. Using a previously validated measure of reactive aggression, participants were provoked by and given a chance to aggress on to either a racial ingroup or outgroup member. Participants also provided saliva samples to allow for monitoring changes in testosterone. It was hypothesized that behavioral aggression would be predicted by changes in testosterone and …

It’S Not Just A Gay Male Thing: Sexual Minority Women And Men Are Equally Attracted To Consensual Non-Monogamy, Amy C. Moors, Jennifer D. Rubin, Jes L. Matsick, Ali Ziegler, Terri D. Conley

Psychology Faculty Articles and Research

Concerned with the invisibility of non-gay male interests in alternatives to monogamy, the present study empirically examines three questions: Are there differences between female and male sexual minorities in a) attitudes toward consensual non-monogamy, and b) desire to engage in different types of consensual non-monogamy (e.g., sexual and romantic/polyamory versus sexual only/swinging), and c) schemas for love? An online community sample of lesbian, gay, and bisexual individuals (n = 111) were recruited for a study about attitudes toward relationships. Results show that sexual minority men and women hold similar attitudes toward CNM and similar levels of desire to engage in …

Does Monogamy Harm Women? Deconstructing Monogamy With A Feminist Lens, Ali Ziegler, Jes L. Matsick, Amy C. Moors, Jennifer D. Rubin, Terri D. Conley

Psychology Faculty Articles and Research

In this paper, we utilize a critical feminist lens to analyze the advantages and disadvantages found within two different romantic relationship configurations: monogamy and polyamory. While visibility of polyamorous relationships has increased in recent years, there is still a lack of information and a plethora of misinformation concerning non-monogamous romantic relationship dynamics (Conley, Moors, Matsick, & Ziegler, 2012; Conley, Ziegler, Moors, Matsick, & Valentine, 2012). One such notion is that polyamory is differentially damaging to women vis-à-vis men. From a phenomenological perspective, sociocultural values dictate that women, unlike men, are prescribed to be dependent upon monogamy in order to define …

On The Margins: Considering Diversity Among Consensually Non-Monogamous Relationships, Jennifer D. Rubin, Amy C. Moors, Jes L. Matsick, Ali Ziegler, Terri D. Conley

Psychology Faculty Articles and Research

Consensual non-monogamy (CNM) encompasses romantic relationships in which all partners agree that engaging in sexual and/or romantic relationships with other people is allowed and part of their relationship arrangement (Conley, Moors, Matsick & Ziegler, 2012). Previous research indicates that individuals who participate in CNM relationships are demographically homogenous (Sheff & Hammers, 2010; Sheff, 2005); however, we argue that this may be an artifact of community-based recruitment strategies that have created an inaccurate reflection of people who engage in CNM. To achieve a more nuanced understanding of the identities of individuals engaged in departures from monogamy, the present study provides a …

Juror Bias In Perceptions Of Lesbian Intimate Partner Violence, Nesa Elizabeth Wasarhaley

Theses and Dissertations--Psychology

Homophobic attitudes pervade our society and specifically our justice system, which negatively impact legal protection for lesbian victims of intimate partner violence (IPV). Juror stereotypes about IPV victims and perpetrators as well as their biases based on sexual orientation may be a hindrance to IPV cases being reported and successfully prosecuted. The primary goal of this study was to investigate the impact that mock jurors’ attitudes toward homosexuals and gender roles, and their acceptance of myths about domestic violence had on their perceptions of lesbian IPV. Heterosexual undergraduate students (N = 259) read a trial summary in which the defendant …

Correlates Of Help-Seeking Following Stalking Victimization: A Study Of College Women, Saige E. Jutras, Katie Edwards, Kateryna Sylaska

Honors Theses and Capstones

The current study explored factors related to college women’s coping processes associated with stalking using an online survey methodology. Results (N= 305 college women reporting stalking victimization within the last three years) showed that 85% of women disclosed their stalking experiences most commonly to female friends. Additionally, women used a variety of coping mechanisms in response to their stalking victimization; although avoiding thinking about or acting on the stalking experience were the most common strategies, victims rated direct forms of coping as more effective in deterring the stalking behavior. Women’s coping responses to stalking were related to a …

Genre, Birth Cohort, And Product Perception: Responses To Background Music In Commercial Advertising, Cassidy R. Cavanah

Scripps Senior Theses

Research shows that music transmits both embodied (universally perceptible) and referential (culturally specific) meanings. The present study sought to explore the persuasive power of music in commercial advertising, and the complex ties that exist between music, life experience and perception. The study looked at how the perception of a product could be altered in accordance with specific embodied and referential meanings. With a focus on the effects of music genre and birth cohort on product perception, embodied meanings were expected to produce similar results across birth cohorts, and referential meanings were expected to produce significantly different results. A total of …

An Examination Of Summer Bridge Programs For First-Generation College Students, Emily Christine Otewalt

Psychology and Child Development

During the last fifty years, nearly half of all students who entered a two- or four-year university withdrew without obtaining a degree. Students from low socioeconomic backgrounds, ethnic minority students, and students who were the first in their family to attend college were particularly vulnerable to this attrition. The following senior project examines current research on the backgrounds and attrition rates of first-generation college students, how "Summer Bridge Programs" aim to assist these students, and where shortcoming exist in current "Summer Bridge Program" assessments.

The Enemy Within: Sexual Assault And Rape In The Us Armed Forces, Dahlia D'Arge

Lewis Honors College Capstone Collection

This paper follows my personal journey in learning about this problem, its legal repercussions for individual soldiers, its history within the United States, the actions which are being taken to remedy it, and its cost to the US military as a whole. By taking a more personal approach and by using my personal experience as an intern as a US Army Judge Advocate Corps office, this paper intends to educate the wider college populace about this issue and its current handling by the US Army from the perspective of an insider.

The Big-5 And The Perceived Effectiveness Of Love Acts, T. Joel Wade

Faculty Journal Articles

!e present research was implemented in order to determine whether or not the Big-5 personality dimensions relate to the perceived effectiveness of love acts discovered in prior research. An internet based questionnaire was utilized and college undergraduates and as well as non-college students were included in the sample. !e Big-5 dimensions of Agreeableness, Openness to Experience, and Emotional Stability were expected to be related to the perceived effectiveness of the Love acts. Additionally, men and women were expected to rate Love acts signaling commitment and exclusivity as most effective. !e results obtained were consistent with the hypotheses and are discussed …

Letter Of Purpose Of The Feminist Evolutionary Psychology Society, T. Joel Wade

Faculty Journal Articles

It has been almost five years since the formation of the Feminist Evolutionary Psychology Society (FEPS), which was created with the hopes of drawing attention to issues that influence women’s role in evolution. In those years, FEPS has changed into a more structured society with clear aims. In this letter, we review the rationale for creating FEPS, as well as how we structured FEPS to be an effective organization. The majority of the letter pertains to four distinct goals of FEPS that we will continue to address in the future. These goals are to investigate the active role of women …

The Influence Of Case-Specific Expert Testimony On Juror Sensitivity To Confession Evidence, Skye Alani Woestehoff

Open Access Theses & Dissertations

Research on the effect of expert testimony has resulted in incongruent findings. Expert testimony has been shown to lead to sensitivity, by educating participants about the evidence and facilitating the application of this knowledge, and skepticism, by causing jurors to distrust the evidence regardless of its quality. The current study explored the role of expert testimony in improving participants' evaluation of confession evidence. Data were collected from 352 students and 281 community members. Participants read a trial transcript that included a low-pressure, medium-pressure, or high-pressure interrogation. Participants also read expert testimony that was general, case-specific, or no testimony at all. …

Why Don't I Look Like Her? The Impact Of Social Media On Female Body Image, Kendyl M. Klein

CMC Senior Theses

The purpose of this paper is to understand and criticize the role of social media in the development and/or encouragement of eating disorders, disordered eating, and body dissatisfaction in college-aged women. College women are exceptionally vulnerable to the impact that social media can have on their body image as they develop an outlook on their bodies and accept the developmental changes that occurred during puberty. This paper provides evidence that there is a relationship between the recent surge in disordered eating and high consumption of social media. I examine the ways in which traditional advertising has portrayed women throughout history, …

Friendship As A Relationship Infiltration Tactic During Human Mate Poaching, T. Joel Wade

Faculty Journal Articles

Previous research has characterized human mate poaching as a prevalent alternative mating strategy that entails risks and costs typically not present during general romantic courtship and attraction. This study is the first to experimentally investigate friendship between a poacher and his/her target as a risk mitigation tactic. Participants (N = 382) read a vignette that differed by whether the poacher was male/female and whether the poacher and poached were friends/acquaintances. Participants assessed the likelihood of the poacher being successful and incurring costs. They also rated the poacher and poached on several personality and mate characteristics. Results revealed that friendship increased …

The Effect Of Hostile And Benevolent Sexism On Women's Cardiovascular Reactivity To And Recovery From A Laboratory Stressor, Kaleena Dennielle Burgess

USF Tampa Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Hostile sexism is the antipathetic expression of sexism, in which men are antagonistic towards women who threaten their superiority. Benevolent sexism is the patriarchal expression of sexism, where men express protective, yet restrictive, attitudes towards women. Both forms of sexism originate from the view that women are inferior, frail, and only suited for nurturing or domestic responsibilities. Benevolent sexism may be more harmful to women because coping is thwarted by observers' underestimation of its effects (Bosson, Pinel, & Vandello, 2009). The present study aimed to examine women's responses to and recovery from hostile and benevolent sexism utilizing measures of cardiovascular …

Creativity Across Cultures: A Comparison Of Cognitive Creativity To Creative Achievement Between The United States And India, Smit Shah

UNF Graduate Theses and Dissertations

Creativity is a topic that is relevant to everyday life. Research in this area has mainly focused on comparing creativity in work contexts and between Eastern and Western conceptualizations. The current study was designed to measure differences in creativity between students in the United States and India by comparing a measure of cognitive creativity, the Abbreviated Torrance Test for Adults, to a measure of creative achievement, the Creative Achievement Questionnaire. The results from a linear regression showed that the Abbreviated Torrance Test for Adults was predictive of the Creative Achievement Questionnaire in the United States, but not in India. Results …

Cross-Cultural Cannibalism Throughout Human History, Melissa Cochran

Social Sciences

No abstract provided.