Experimental Analysis of Behavior Commons^™

The Effects Of Venlafaxine And Voluntary Exercise On Chronic Unpredictable Stress Induced Anxiety, Marly Mcgowan

Senior Independent Study Theses

Anxiety disorders can impair cognition and emotional control, particularly in the face of novel situations, which is concerning due to the high prevalence of such diagnoses. Exposure to unpredictable chronic stress can provide a way to induce anxiety-like behaviors in rodents by disrupting the stress response systems, including the HPA axis and autonomic nervous system. Pharmacological treatments, including SNRIs like venlafaxine, and voluntary exercise are both anxiolytic treatments that can alleviate the impacts of chronic stress. Using unpredictable chronic stress to mimic the human condition, and exposure to venlafaxine and exercise to mitigate the stress, the open field and elevated …

Social Media Engagement With Transgender Fertility Content, Kajal Verma, Benette K. Sagun, Melody Rasouli, Cindy M. Duke

Department of Obstetrics & Gynecology Faculty Research

Objective: To identify transgender fertility content with the highest online engagement on social media, determine its accuracy and quality, and see how this has changed over a 2-year period. Design: BuzzSumo, a content research tool, was used to identify the top 10 article links related to transgender fertility most interacted with on the social media platforms of Facebook, Twitter, Pinterest, and Reddit. We compared article links from June 2019 to June 2020 and from June 2020 to June 2021. The articles were categorized as accurate or misleading based on the references cited and current research. A qualitative analysis was performed …

The Program To Reduce Implicit Bias In Carroll Hospital Center Using The Implicit Association Test, Katherine E. Traynor

Capstone Showcase

Natural brain processes make all individuals susceptible to unconscious bias; however, stressful, fearful, or anger-evoking situations as well as the negative influence of media and social surroundings increase the risk of holding obstructive bias, and there is a greater risk of being negatively impacted by this phenomenon when belonging to a minority population (Rose & Flores, 2020). As a result, high rates of infant mortality (10.2 deaths per 1,000 live births for the Non-Hispanic Black population compared to 4.1 in the White population) and cardiovascular related diseases (190.0 cases per 1,000 in the Non-Hispanic Black population compared to 161.3 in …

Perceptions Of Female Gender Norm Violations: The Case Of Occupation And Body Hair, Kacie M. Kinkade

Master's Theses and Doctoral Dissertations

Many studies have looked at perceptions or attitudes toward women who violate a single type of gender norm but not the effect of multiple gender norm violations. The purpose of this study was to examine the perception and perceived success of a female who violated either body hair norms and/or occupational norms as part of her online dating profile. Two hundred eighty participants were asked to read one of four online dating profiles where the occupation was either kindergarten teacher or mechanic (e.g., occupational norm maintained or violated) and shaving products were either utilized or not utilized (e.g., body hair …

A Monte Carlo Simulation Of Rat Choice Behavior With Interdependent Outcomes, Michelle A. Frankot

Graduate Theses, Dissertations, and Problem Reports (ETD)

Preclinical behavioral neuroscience often uses choice paradigms to capture psychiatric symptoms. In particular, the subfield of operant research produces nested datasets with many discrete choices in a session. The standard analytic practice is to aggregate choice into a continuous variable and analyze using ANOVA or linear regression. However, choice data often have multiple interdependent outcomes of interest, violating an assumption of general linear models. The aim of the current study was to quantify the accuracy of linear mixed-effects regression (LMER) for analyzing data from a 4-choice operant task called the Rodent Gambling Task (RGT), which measures decision-making in the context …

Covid-19 Vaccine Related Anxiety Partially Mediates The Association Between Covid-19 Related Anxiety And Student Adjustment To College During The Pandemic, Hanh Nguyen

Dissertations and Theses

The COVID-19 pandemic caused severe disruptions to the education of millions of college students, who were forced to adapt to sudden changes in living and learning environments. In this study, we sought to investigate two different dimensions of anxiety that were specific to the pandemic – COVID-19 related anxiety and COVID-19 vaccine anxiety – hoping to pinpoint the relationship between these two variables and students’ ability to adapt to college. Specifically, using cross sectional survey data during three semester waves (Spring 2021, Fall 2021, and Spring 2022) we hypothesized (1) a decreasing trend across time in both COVID-19 related anxiety …

The Relationship Between Social Media Use And Depression And Anxiety Symptoms During Covid-19, Tene'sha L. Crews, Christina Sheerin

UROP Posters

The rise of the coronavirus (COVID-19) pandemic has caused a global surge in exposure to disaster and crisis-related media. Increases in poor mental health outcomes such as anxiety and depression, are associated with increased exposure to such media content (Abbas et al., 2021; Riehm et al., 2020; Zhao & Zhou, 2020). In recent years, social media has become one of the most widely used sources for news; approximately 48% of adult Americans receive their news from social media (Pew Research Center, 2021). During the COVID-19 pandemic, there has been an increase in social media use due to social distancing and …

Role Of Prior Knowledge In Timing Of Computer-Generated Feedback, Julie Faye Shirah

Theses and Dissertations--Psychology

Although often helpful, feedback sometimes has neutral or negative effects on learning (Hattie & Timperley, 2007; Kluger & DeNisi, 1996). For example, Fyfe and colleagues have found that the effects of feedback timing are moderated by students’ prior knowledge such that feedback has been useful for students with low prior knowledge, but has mixed effects on students with high prior knowledge (e.g., Fyfe et al., 2012; Fyfe, 2016). In this study, I extended Fyfe’s work by re-conceptualizing prior knowledge as knowledge of more familiar foundational concepts a learner brings to a learning task (Sidney & Alibali, 2017), which can be …

Data Quality And Study Compliance Among College Students Across 2 Recruitment Sources: Two Study Investigation, Abby L. Braitman, Megan Strowger, Jennifer L. Shipley, Jordan Ortman, Rachel I. Macintyre, Elizabeth A. Bauer

Psychology Faculty Publications

Background: Models of satisficing suggest that study participants may not fully process survey items and provide accurate responses when survey burden is higher and when participant motivation is lower. Participants who do not fully process survey instructions can reduce a study’s power and hinder generalizability. Common concerns among researchers using self-report measures are data quality and participant compliance. Similarly, attrition can hurt the power and generalizability of a study.

Objective: Given that college students comprise most samples in psychological studies, especially examinations of student issues and psychological health, it is critical to understand how college student recruitment sources impact data …

Click-Enter-Send: The Relationship Experiences Of People Who Are Blind Or Visually Impaired In Text-Based Workspaces, Kelly Bleach

Antioch University Dissertations & Theses

Companies have increasingly turned to text-based communications to recruit, hire, and manage a distributed remote workforce. For people who are blind or visually impaired, this movement presents both challenges and opportunities for attaining and retaining employment. Does the potential isolation of telework have a negative effect on workplace relationships for people who are blind or visually impaired? Does participation in text-based workspaces mitigate stereotypes and stigmatization experienced by people with visible disabilities? Using a constructivist grounded theory framework, this study explored how people who are blind or visually impaired experience relationships in text-based workspaces. Building and maintaining social connections and …

Cross-Group Friendships And Skin Tone Perceptions, Jhenifa Parker

EWU Masters Thesis Collection

George Allport (1954) coined the term contact hypothesis to explain the relationship between intragroup friendships/interactions and perceptions toward that group. Allport’s hypothesis had been scrutinized as an intervention for reducing prejudices and biases against groups who collectively experience discrimination. This theory was mainly tested in terms of cross-group friendships between individuals of a different ethnicity, racial group, physical ability, and so on; however, very little research has explored this hypothesis in the context of skin tone perceptions. Colorism has had an historical and pervasive impact on individuals categorized as racial/ethnic minorities. This study attempted to bridge the gaps in research …

The Effect Of Magnitude And Probability On Plea Bargain Decision-Making, Megan L. Small

College of Graduate Studies: Theses & Dissertations

Decision-making is studied in various aspects of life and can be especially vital in the context of the criminal justice system, such as plea bargains. Previous research in this area used a less commonly used task (fill-in-the-blank) in addition to a student sample (Falligant & Pence, 2019). The current study uses probability discounting to study the choice between accepting a plea bargain for a shorter incarceration sentence or risking a trial with a longer sentence on a sample of adults with experience in the criminal justice system. Three sentence durations, or magnitudes, were used (1 year, 5 years, and 25 …

Modeling Document Classification To Automate Mental Health Diagnosis, William M. Tadlock

EWU Masters Thesis Collection

The objective of this study is to determine if diagnosis documents can be used with document classification to automatically diagnose mental health conditions. Document classification allows text documents to be analyzed and organized into their appropriate classes based on the features and words presented in the text. One application of this is within the medical field to automatically classify different patient diagnosis based on medical or patient notes. This research applied mental health diagnosis documents to automatically diagnose a group of patients with a mental health condition based on text-based survey data. This classification was approached through several feature engineering …

Pushing It To The Limit: Determining Asian Elephant (Elephas Maximus) Olfactory Sensitivity And Discrimination Through A Behavioral Choice Task, Matthew S. Rudolph

Theses and Dissertations

Elephants have shown remarkable olfactory capabilities. Their sense of smell impacts their foraging choices, behavior, and ultimately, survival. Being able to detect a target odor can allow elephants to locate specific resources, identify threats, and find receptive conspecifics. Previous studies have shown that elephants can consistently detect target odors, but have not identified the limits of this detection. Thus, to investigate the extent of elephants’ odor detection capabilities, we tested Asian elephants in a two-step odor discrimination task. First, we investigated whether elephants could detect odors at varying levels of dilution after a training procedure, and then whether they could …

Moderate Prenatal Ethanol Exposure, Sex, And Housing Modify Spatial Navigation Behavior And Hippocampal Cell Firing In Adult Rodents, Christy Magcalas

Psychology ETDs

Prenatal alcohol exposure (PAE) is associated with structural and physiological changes that impact the central nervous system and can result in persistent negative consequences in a broad spectrum of cognitive and behavioral domains including deficits in spatial learning and memory and behavioral flexibility. The current study focuses on examining the behavioral and mechanistic consequences of PAE, sex and housing. Rats were tested in the Morris Water Task where they were trained to navigate to a goal location and tested in a pool shift manipulation. There were no significant differences between PAE treatment, sex, or housing groups during training, but there …

The Combined Influences Of Race, Sexuality, And Gender On Perceptions Of Sexual Harassment, Courtney House

Honors Theses

The current research examines the perceptions of sexual harassment based on the influence of the victim’s gender, and the race of both the victim and the perpetrator, and perceiver’s feminist beliefs. By using vignettes (a brief description of an event), we manipulated a) the gender of the victim (man or woman), b) the race of the victim (POC or white), and c) the race of the perpetrator (POC or white). Our hypotheses were as follows: a) vignettes depicting same-sex harassment will be less in line with the definition of sexual harassment; b) vignettes portraying the victim as a woman of …

An Experimental Investigation Into The Impact Of Acute Stress On Alcohol Craving Through Implicit Coping Motives, Douglas J. Glenn

Psychology Theses & Dissertations

Drinking to cope with negative emotions is associated with many negative alcohol-related outcomes such as increased alcohol use, drinking-related problems, and alcohol use disorders. An acute stressor is one example of a stimulus leading to negative emotions that an individual may wish to avoid. Research has shown that acute stress positively relates to drinking. Specifically, previous experimental studies have shown that individuals exposed to a stressor drink more alcohol and have stronger urges to drink than those not exposed to a stressor. Thus, it may be that drinking to cope explains why people experience alcohol cravings after experiencing a stressor. …

The Role Of Ethnicity And Nativity In The Correspondence Between Subjective And Objective Measures Of In-Home Smoking, Vincent Berardi, Georgiana Bostean, Lydia Q. Ong, Britney S. Wong, Bradley N. Collins, Melbourne F. Hovell

Psychology Faculty Articles and Research

Studies are needed to understand the association between self-reported home smoking bans and objective measures of in-home smoking according to smokers’ ethnicity/nativity. Data came from a trial that used air particle monitors to reduce children’s secondhand smoke exposure in smokers’ households (N = 251). Linear regressions modeled (a) full home smoking bans by ethnicity/nativity, and (b) objectively measured in-home smoking events, predicted by main and interaction effects of self-reported home smoking bans and ethnicity/nativity. Among smokers reporting < a full ban, US-born and Foreign-born Latinos had fewer in-home smoking events than US-born Whites (p < 0.001). Participants who reported a full smoking ban had a similar frequency of smoking events regardless of ethnicity/nativity. Results indicate that self-reported home smoking bans can be used as a proxy for in-home smoking. Establishing smoking bans in the households of US-born White smokers has the largest impact on potential exposure compared to other ethnicity/nativity groups.

Homelessness, Dehumanization, And The Role Of Empathy, Christina Esker

Kean Quest

Dehumanization reflects a psychological process that denies individuals and groups the positive traits and attributes that make them human. Those experiencing homelessness are frequently dehumanized and perceived as social outcasts in American society. This study demonstrates the tendency of others to dehumanize individuals that are homeless and how increased empathy changes how this social outgroup is perceived. Results revealed that when exposed to information that humanizes a man experiencing homelessness, participants’ levels of empathy increased, and levels of disgust decreased. However, general attitudes and beliefs of homelessness were unchanged. The implications of increasing empathy levels for this social outgroup are …

The Nature Of Anti-Asian American Xenophobia During The Coronavirus Pandemic: A Preliminary Exploration Into Envy As A Key Motivator Of Hate, Daisuke Akiba

Publications and Research

Background. The current Coronavirus pandemic has been linked to a dramatic increase in anti-Asian American and Pacific Islander (AAPI) hate incidents in the United States. At the time of writing, there does not appear to be any published empirical research examining the mechanisms underlying Asiaphobia during the current pandemic. Based on the stereotype content model, we investigated the idea that ambivalent attitudes toward AAPIs, marked primarily with envy, may be contributing to anti-AAPI xenophobia. Methods. Study 1 (N = 140) explored, through a survey, the link between envious stereotypes toward AAPIs and Asiaphobia. Study 2 (N = 167), …