Dialectic Behavioral Therapy (DBT) is a treatment specifically developed for individuals diagnosed with Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD). DBT has been found to be effective in treating BPD related suicidality, substance use, and eating disorders. The weekly diary cards are one of the most essential components of DBT. Diary cards are a paper based standardized self-monitoring tool that can facilitate therapists in tracking the progress of clients in between therapy sessions. Previous studies have established many advantages of diary cards, such as its higher client retention rate than that of group-based DBT sessions. A typical diary card records the degree of urges for maladaptive behaviors such as self-harming, as well as the DBT coping skills the client has used for each day of the week. This current project strives to examine the potential correlation between weekly mean self-harm urge scores and number of skills used by examining diary cards from multiple previous DBT clients. It is speculated that increased self-harm urge level is related to decreased coping from clients. The result of this correlation study might warrant a full-scale randomized control trial on this subject matter to locate potential causation. This current project also strives to answer whether certain skills are highly related with self-harm urge, as previous studies indicated that some skills were used more than others by DBT clients. Correlation obtained here may serve to develop behavior-specific coping skills.

Empathy can be a hard topic for discussion, especially when it comes to first examining it. Previous research on empathy has highlighted two basic types of empathy; cognitive and emotional empathy. Cognitive empathy refers to taking the perspective of another person and emotional empathy refers to emotional responses to another person that are like those responses the other is experiencing (parallel empathy) or a reaction to the emotional experiences of the other person (reactive empathy). The purpose of this project evolved from previous findings on college student empathy and local campus wide investigations. At the completion of this survey, we discovered current empathy levels on campus and the potential for increasing the perspective taking aspect of empathy. With this knowledge, we hope to explore potential interventions intended to increase perspective taking.  The futuristic goal would be to build a more inclusive and diverse community environment that has the ability to embrace all students.

Irritability is often defined as a temporary state that activates aggression-related memories, physiological responses, and behaviors. Little is known about gender differences in irritability except that irritable females are more likely to report anxiety symptoms than men. Irritability remains an under-study but important facet of psychopathology. The purpose is to examine gender differences in irritability and whether gender moderates the relationship between irritability and mood and anxiety symptoms. Participants ages 18-21 years were recruited. Mood symptoms were assessed via the General Behavior Inventory (GBI). The GBI consists of 73 items measuring depressive and (hypo)manic symptoms. Anxiety was measured via the Irritability, Depression and Anxiety Scale. Irritability was measured via the Irritability Questionnaire. On average, females reported more irritability. Examining individual items, females endorsed higher scores on items related to rumination, impatience under pressure, sensitivity to others, and needing to vent. In contrast, males endorsed being more relaxed, even tempered, and flaring up but recovering more quickly than females. Hierarchical regression indicated that females endorse more symptoms of depression and anxiety than males but not (hypo)manic symptoms even after controlling for irritability. Increases in irritability were associated with increases in depression and anxiety symptoms, even after controlling for gender and other symptoms. Irritability was not associated with (hypo)manic symptoms after controlling for gender, depression and anxiety. There were no significant interactions between gender and irritability in predicting depressive, (hypo)manic, or anxiety symptoms. The relationship between irritability and anxiety, depressive, and (hypo)manic symptoms did not differ by gender. Young adults reporting higher levels of irritability were more likely to also report higher levels of depressive and anxious symptoms. Irritability is both a symptom and a risk factor for mood and anxiety disorders but males and females may experience irritability in mildly unique ways.

Callous-Unemotional (CU) traits, a component of psychological conditions that demonstrate conducts of insensitivity and a lack of empathy and remorse, consistently forecast severe antisocial behaviors and correlate with insufficiencies in recognizing emotions. Attention-Deficit Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) is linked to impairment in social functioning & misinterpretation of social cues. Facial Emotion Recognition (FER) or the ability to understand how facial expressions correspond to an emotion is linked to empathy and emotional development. This study will examine if students high on symptoms of ADHD related behaviors exhibit higher levels of CU traits and lower FER than peers low on ADHD related behaviors and gender differences. Results suggested that there was no correlation between ADHD related behaviors and CU traits but there was a statistically negative correlation between FER and ADHD. Analysis suggests that FER differences are only present for students high in ADHD related behaviors. Lastly, a significant negative relation was found between CU traits, gender, and ethnicity. Analysis suggests that males and ethnic minority students had higher levels of CU traits. Implications of the current findings are discussed.

The proposed study will explore the relationship between temperament and child psychological adjustment in a sample of children during their first year after cancer diagnosis (N = 160, ages 2-18). Multilevel growth modeling will evaluate the longitudinal relationship between three dimensions of temperament (effortful control, extraversion/surgency, negative affect) and trajectories of two psychological adjustment variables (externalizing problems, anxiety/depression scores) across twelve time points. While the primary goal of this study is exploratory, we offer the following predictive hypotheses: (a) psychological adjustment will improve over the course of treatment; (b) negative affect will be associated with higher anxiety/depression and lower externalizing problems; (c) effortful control will be associated with lower externalizing problems; (d) extraversion/surgency will be associated with lower anxiety/depression and higher externalizing problems. The proposed study has numerous advantages over comparable studies in this area of research, such as its relatively large sample size, longitudinal structure with a large number of time points, and measurement of temperament across three specific dimensions. Findings from this study may help health care providers anticipate and mitigate negative psychological outcomes in pediatric cancer patients. Additionally, the findings may inspire future research directions involving temperament and other outcome variables, such as health-related quality of life and family adjustment.

The achievement gap in academic performance of college students is one of the major issues permeating the American education system. Despite decades of curricular and instructional reform efforts, many students continue to underperform academically. Studies suggest that mindfulness-based interventions are effective in helping students improve focus, enhance performance in academic situations, and cope better with various stigma-relevant stressors. Nevertheless, these interventions also raise concerns about the amount of time invested in training the learner and the expense incurred in the professional personnel to conduct the training. This feasibility pilot study examines the impact and acceptability of a novel ultra-brief mindfulness meditation practice in the classroom. The goal is to develop a sustainable college-based mindfulness intervention to raise students’ academic performance and contribute to reducing the achievement gap. Undergraduate college juniors and seniors registered in a Drugs and Behavior course (n=780) completed 60 to 90 seconds of mindfulness meditation before a lecture twice a week over a nine-week period. There were no selection criteria based on age, gender, racial/ethnic, ability, socioeconomic, or matriculation status. Measures included mid-quarter and end-of-quarter surveys to assess perception of focus in class and the acceptability of the mindfulness practice. Participants reported significant enhancement of perception of focus in class (p < .001) and increased preference for the mindfulness meditation practice at the end of the quarter (74%) than in mid-quarter (60%) when first surveyed. Additionally, 87% of the students requested the instructor to continue offering the mindfulness sessions in future quarters, and 57% expressed its application outside the classroom, such as during study time and before other lectures. Findings indicate that an ultra-brief mindfulness meditation practice holds promise as a feasible college-based intervention to raise student academic performance and thus warrants further research.

Sexual assault is a prevalent issue on college campuses in the U.S. today as they invest in implementing sexual assault prevention programs and centers to support survivors. At the center of this work is training of students, faculty, and students who are third parties or bystanders to sexual assault and can be allies in prevention and response. The purpose of this study was to understand how perceptions of campus environment (including a sense of one’s influence on campus and peer norms related to helping) affect bystander behavior to address sexual assault among first year college students. Participants were 948 students at two different universities (one a rural, primarily residential campus and the other an urban, mostly commuter campus) in the northeastern United States. Individuals who had greater confidence, were aware, took responsibility, and did not accept rape myths, were associated with more proactive bystander behavior. Bringing awareness to college communities about sexual violence will ultimately decrease the frequency of sexual assaults.

The purpose of this study was to explore how parent communication about sex with their male children relates to objectification and sexist attitudes toward women measured in late adolescence, as parents may play a key role in the development of sex-related attitudes in their children. I predicted that the more sex communication children received from their parents, the less likely they are to exhibit sexist attitudes and objectify women. One-hundred and twenty-eight undergraduates at the University of Puget Sound responded to electronic surveys containing questions regarding sources of sexual information (parents, friends, school, TV/Movies, and pornography), parent sex communication, sexist attitudes, and objectifying behavior. A one-way repeated measures ANOVA compared the means for sources of sex information including parents, friends, school, TV/Movies, and pornography. The results were statistically significant, F(3.67, 462.4) = 12.42, p < .001. A Tukey’s HSD test revealed that participants were less likely to get sex information from their parents than from friends, school, TV/Movies, or pornography. The amount of sex information gained from friends was also significantly higher than both TV/Movies and school. Contrary to my hypothesis, Pearson’s r correlations found no statistically significant relationships between parent sex communication and sexism or objectification. However, there were significant positive correlations between the body evaluation subscale of the objectification scale (e.g. “How often have you whistled at someone while walking down a street?”) and the amount of information about sex that participants reported getting from friends (r = .40, p < .01), TV/Movies (r = .21, p < .01), and pornography (r = .34, p < .01). There were no significant correlations between sources of sex information and other sexism measures.

Childhood deprivation involves a reduction in the amount and quality of inputs and stimuli for healthy child development, which is common in environments such as low socioeconomic status (LSES), neglect, institutionalization, and homelessness. Though there is a wide spectrum of childhood deprivation, this project aims to focus on cognitive deprivation associated with LSES. Previous research has shown that children deprived of cognitive inputs and stimulation, such as consistent interactions with a caregiver, have significantly less opportunities to practice executive functioning skills, including inhibition, task-shifting, and working memory. In addition, prior research has shown that children who have lower executive functioning ability tend to exhibit more externalizing problems. Therefore, the current study investigates the role of executive functioning as a mediator of the association between childhood deprivation and externalizing psychopathology. I hypothesize that childhood deprivation will negatively influence executive functioning, which in turn increases the likelihood of displaying externalizing problems. LSES was operationalized as childhood deprivation, as prior research suggests that LSES is associated with the absence of many children’s needs, including cognitive inputs and stimulation. Executive functioning was measured by participants’ performance on Arrows Behavioral Task, which assesses inhibition and switching, and parents’ self-reports of children’s executive functioning on the BRIEF. Externalizing problems were assessed by self-reports from Youth Self Report and Child Behavior Checklist from children and parents respectively. After running the multiple linear regression analysis, I expect to find a significant relationship among the childhood deprivation, executive functioning, and externalizing psychopathology. The findings will support that children in deprivation are less likely to show proficiency in executive functioning skills, and will more likely demonstrate externalizing problems.

Cluster analysis is a very popular data analysis technique that groups observations by degree of similarity. The goal is to obtain a small number of clusters that summarize important differences among groups of observations. In this case, cluster membership may be an important and useful summary of a scientific topic. Hierarchical cluster analysis produces cluster solutions ranging from 1 to N, meaning that every observation is their own cluster. A key question about the results of cluster analysis is how scientifically valid are they? Are important clusters identified, or does random variation in a single data set drive the reported results? Much of our understanding of how cluster analysis works in data is based upon simulations. Simulation studies create random data to analyze and then examine how an approach performs over many simulated samples. However, real data often do not behave as well as simulated data. In this work, we examined how cluster analysis performed on repeated subsamples from a larger sample of people. We treated the full data set (N=919) as the population. Hierarchical cluster analysis was performed on this full sample and treated as the population model. We then examined how the results are recovered under different subsampling plans. We used a variety of sampling methods such as convenience and random. We varied the number of observations in the subsample, as well as by equal and unequal subsample selection probabilities. This analysis shows how stable the results across a variety of scientifically plausible situations. Implications for the use of cluster analysis in social and behavioral research will be discussed.
 

Fluid intelligence is defined as the ability to solve reason and solve novel problems independent from previous knowledge. Fluid intelligence is typically tested with Raven’s Progressive Matrices (RPM), a non-verbal test of logical and abstract reasoning. Previous studies have shown that fluid intelligence and performance on the RPM test rely on various brain regions, especially the left inferior parietal lobule (IPL) and the left middle frontal gyrus (MFG). In this study, we tested the hypothesis that artificially increasing the activity of these regions using Transcranial Alternating Current Stimulation (tACS) would improve RPM performance during stimulation. In the experiment, 16 naïve participants were tested with a within-subject design while they solved RPM problems of varying complexity. Each participant was tested under four conditions. In the two experimental conditions, tACS stimulation was applied to either the middle frontal gyrus or the inferior parietal lobule. Stimulation was administered using an HD-tACS system at 0.5 mA and 40 Hz, in a configuration with a central cathode and four surrounding anodes. In the remaining two control conditions, sham stimulation was applied to the same regions. Preliminary analysis suggests that stimulation resulted in a significant decrease in response times, especially for the most difficult problems. The results of this study could pave the way for future applications in cognitive rehabilitation, progression in the understanding of the neural signature of fluid intelligence, and improving cognitive performance.

Foraging behavior in mammals requires the integration of various sensory cues to allow the subject to navigate through the environment. When the search becomes predictable and repetitive, memory can be used to enhance the sensory cues. To model the dynamic interactions between sensory and memory, we performed a comparative analysis on rats and humans by designing a two-stage task paradigm: search and return. The subjects were trained to search for rewards in a confined space with limited sensory cues. After the end of each trial, they were trained to return to the start position. The rat task was performed in an automated arena that allowed the rats to follow the reward’s olfactory cues but prevented visual and hearing cues. Similarly, the human task simulated the paradigm using a computer game that allowed the subjects to search and return in a virtual room with limited visual cues. We predict that sensory cues have a more significant impact on the search strategies compared to the return strategies. If the reward locations are fixated in every trial, we also expect the subjects to increasingly rely on memory for both the search and return strategies. Our research will provide insight on the tracking methods and analysis in studying the roles of sensory and memory in complex foraging behavior.

Contrary to common belief, all vertebrate brains are capable of adult neurogenesis, or the birth of new neurons in the adult brain. Few brains show as an extreme ability to generate and add new neurons as that of the songbird. Songbirds exhibit rapid changes in the rate of neurogenesis, survival of mature neurons, and as a result, total volume of brain regions that contribute to the development and production of song. For example, the songbird Gambel’s white-crowned sparrow (Zonotrichia leucophrys gambelli) is capable of adding more than 68,000 neurons to a region of the brain responsible for song production called HVC, all within four days of transition to breeding conditions. Along with this addition in new neurons, these sparrows also increase song production and song quality. To identify the dynamics between neurogenesis and the addition of new HVC neurons during rapid seasonal growth, we labeled dividing neural stem cells and their progeny, and quantified the incorporation of these progeny into HVC. Throughout the course of the experiment, we recorded individual bird’s song and analyzed the spectral features and stereotypy of whole songs. Ultimately, we aim to correlate improvements in song quality and rate with the cellular changes occurring HVC and the neural stem cell niche during seasonal rapid growth. Such correlations will provide a model for tracking the behavioral progress of the plastic neural circuit as well as for identifying and testing molecular and physiological mechanisms underlying neuronal birth, maturation, and survival.

The environment plays a large role in shaping someone’s future, especially their academic achievement. Children who have access to necessary resources, such as books, quality schools and teachers, have been shown to perform better in many subjects. In this study, we examined the associations between Socioeconomic Status (SES) and academic success in college-aged students. Also, we examined the choices that a student makes, such as amount of time spent in the workplace, and the format of classes taken (i.e., online, hybrid, face-to-face), and how they predict students’ academic success. SES was assessed by parent education and household income. We predicted that students who have a high SES will perform better academically than those who have a lower SES. Students who work full time will be more likely to take classes in an online format, to fit their work schedules. Conversely, students who work part time or not at all will take classes in the standard, face-to-face format. We predicted that students who work part time or not at all will perform better academically as they can dedicate more time and effort to their schooling than students who work full time. To answer our research questions, we examined college students who took a 30 minute online survey assessing SES, types of classes taken, how many hours worked in part-time and/or full-time jobs, and academic achievement (i.e., GPA). Implications of these results may inform colleges of the various needs of support based on types of classes taken to better students’ academic achievement. Future studies should examine additional measures of SES (e.g., Income-to-needs ratio) and how that impacts the associations between SES and academic achievement.

Gender differences exist in science, technology, engineering, and mathematics (STEM) fields, as women are underrepresented in some STEM fields than others and continue to face discrimination even in fields in which women are better represented (Cheryan, 2016). Will using different American ideologies help to explain gender disparities in interest in STEM fields in the U.S.? This study examined this question by exploring differences in expressing interest in engineering careers between men and women. Specifically, we designed a study to investigate whether women are deterred from engineering when advised to “follow their passions.” Eighty undergraduate students completed a questionnaire, in which they are asked how interested they would be in pursuing a career in engineering based on listening to the advice to follow their passions or based on following the advice to do what is practical. We hypothesized that women will report less interest in engineering career when asked to base their decision on the advice of following their passions versus when asked to base their decision on the advice of doing what is practical; the difference for men will be weaker. This study explores how popular American ideologies may contribute to gender gaps in STEM.

Prior research has demonstrated that there is a relationship between sleep and academic performance, yet few studies have assessed the role of stress on these variables. It was hypothesized that stress would act as a mediator between sleep and academic performance. Seventy-six undergraduate students made up the preliminary sample from a public university in Washington. Participants completed an online survey which asked demographic questions, including self-reported GPA. Additionally, students completed the Perceived Stress Scale and the Pittsburgh Sleep Quality Index. The preliminary regression analysis indicated a nonsignificant effect of sleep on GPA, R² = .03, F(1, 74) = 2.13, p = .15. The effect of stress on this relationship was also a nonsignificant effect, R² = .01, F(1, 73) = .84, p = .36. However, a power analysis indicated a minimum of 107 participants is necessary to reach beta of .95, alpha = .05, with an effect size of F² =.15, the number of predictors at 1 for level A and 2 for level B. Correlations show predicted, but nonsignificant, relationships between GPA and sleep (r = -.17, p = .07) and GPA and stress (r = .01, p = .45), with a moderate correlation between stress and sleep (r = .47, p < .01). The current sample is underpowered, making it difficult to confidently draw conclusions. Participants will continue to be recruited but if power is met and results continue to be nonsignificant, it is probable that this is due to GPA failing to have a normal distribution for each level of the independent variable. The lack of heterogeneity in GPA would then raise concern. If the necessary sample size is met and results are significant, this is likely due to poor sleep increasing student’s susceptibility to high levels of stress, which consequently leads to a decline in GPA. 

Despite our society’s growing awareness that transgender people exist, transgender children remain an understudied group that falls victim to huge amount of misunderstanding in both the scientific community and the public sphere. While academic literature is decidedly mixed on how to best support children who express a cross-sex gender identity, a growing number of parents have begun to support their children in social transitioning, a process that allows the child to live as their identified gender in all social contexts. The objective of this study was to understand the impact of social transition on children’s mental health using structured interviews with the parents of socially transitioned transgender children. We focused on parent’s report of how transgender children’s mental health (child’s mood, anxiety symptoms, and externalizing behaviors) changes over time. We recruited 60 parents of transgender children whose child socially transitioned between the age of 3 and 12. To maximize representation and generalizability, we then stratified them into subgroups by age at social transition (3-5; 6-8; 9-12); gender (girls; boys); and race (white; non-white). The interview was structured around three moments in the child’s life: the first sign of gender non-conforming behaviors from the parent’s perspective, the parent’s first realization that the behaviors might signify something more deeply about the child’s stable identity, and the age at which the child socially transitioned. The interviewer asked the same set of questions regarding the child’s mental health condition at the first sign, at first realization, during the year before transitioning, and during the year after (if applicable). Two coders then coded the wellbeing of each child in each of the mental health domains at each time point. Findings of the study will have implications for the developments of research and clinical work as how to best support transgender children regarding their social transition.

Inflammation in the brain, called neuroinflammation, is typically considered a negative response following neuronal injury and damage. However, neuroinflammation can also play a beneficial role in the healthy adult brain. For example, one type of inflammatory cell, microglia, become polarized from the “inactive” surveying (or ramified) state following neuronal loss and promote the classic “negative” inflammatory response. Alternatively, in the healthy brain microglia elicit positive effects through neuronal and synapse pruning to maintain proper neuronal number and connections. To identify the dynamics of microglial responses between healthy and natural degenerative states, we employed the seasonal neuronal regression of avian motor pathways for song production in Gambel’s white crowned sparrow (Zonotrichia leucophrys gambelii). Neuronal number in the song control nucleus HVC (proper name) changes seasonally such that as male sparrows transition from nonbreeding to breeding conditions, HVC neuronal number increases by about 68,000 neurons. Useful for our study, an equal number of HVC neurons die through programed cell death as sparrows transition from breeding to nonbreeding conditions. Using this unique model of natural and rapid neurodegeneration, we quantified the number of ramified and activated microglia in HVC of birds maintained in breeding and nonbreeding conditions using immunohistochemistry. To identify microglial promotion of local neuroinflammation within HVC, we examined the number of ramified and activated microglia in HVC of birds treated with pro- and anti-inflammatory agents. Additionally, we identified and quantified a putative downstream effect of this local inflammation: reactive neurogenesis, or the birth of new neurons following neuronal loss. Our results indicate that microglia promote reactive neurogenesis through local inflammation, and suggest that discrete microglial activity could have therapeutic consequences for various neurological diseases.

Women are underrepresented in STEM (Sciences, Technology, Engineering and Math) fields in U.S. contexts. In this study, I investigate whether the prominence of the “follow your passion” ideology in choosing careers may be one factor that contributes to the gender discrepancy in STEM fields. Passion ideology is the idea that people choose their career mainly according to their idealistic personal interest. Previous research has shown that in terms of career preference, women tend to choose feminine stereotyped careers and are less interested in masculine stereotyped careers, and vice versa for men. STEM fields are masculine stereotyped. Therefore when U.S. society in general advocates for the priority of personal interest in career choice, we hypothesize that passion ideology mediates the relations between gender and interest in STEM fields, where women are less likely to develop interest in STEM. Considering passion ideology is less popular in Asian culture, in the current study, I primed Asian American women with either their American identity or Asian identity by using leading questions. Then I measured how interested participants are in engineering careers and art careers and how much participants agree that people should either follow their passions or be practical when choosing a career using a questionnaire. Following predictions are made: participants primed with American identity will be less interested in engineering careers than those primed with Asian identity, but not for art careers; participants primed with American identity will express stronger beliefs in the passion ideology than those primed with Asian identity; weaker interest in engineering careers when primed with their American identity will be mediated by stronger beliefs in the passion ideology. If these predictions stand, it suggests that, in U.S. context, these culture factors can partially explain the gender discrepancy in STEM fields.

While autonomy values are central to individualistic cultures (e.g. USA/Canada), it can conflict with the family values internalized by individuals from collectivistic cultures (e.g. East Asia). Due to this incompatibility, individuals exposed to both cultures (e.g. Asian-Americans) may be conflicted regarding which path to follow. For instance, does one major in Art because it is one’s personal passion, or Accounting because of the stability it would provide family? To investigate the potential conflict stemming from dual expectations, we presented 120 European-Americans and 117 Asian-Americans with scenarios of different major life decisions, in which personal interest directly conflicts with family interest. For each scenario, participants imagined making the autonomous decision (e.g. major in Art), and the family decision (e.g. major in Accounting), and reported their anticipated distress in making each decision. Results showed that Asian-Americans experienced distress regardless of their decision because upholding one cultural value unavoidably came at the expense of the other. For Asian-Americans, the conflict they experienced occurred in terms of moral distress (e.g. feeling like a bad person) rather than just emotional distress (e.g. feeling angry). In contrast, European-Americans, who are less likely to face such dual expectations, showed distress more clearly in one direction (e.g. giving up autonomy). Finally, greater moral conflict was explained by specific cultural values, such as self-expectations to provide for family in the future. Together, these findings provide important insight into the bicultural experience, and the potential challenges associated with holding dual values. These findings may help explain the greater psychological distress reported among second-generation Asian-Americans. Based on this study, further inquiry can investigate potential solutions for alleviating such conflict, such as focusing on moral concerns, or identifying alternatives that may satisfy both autonomy and family assistance needs.

Over the past few years, marijuana use has been on the rise in colleges, with 5.7% of college students saying that they smoke marijuana daily or almost daily according to a study done by the University of Michigan. Although this shows that daily marijuana use has increased, it does not explore the relationship between living situations and how much marijuana college students smoke. The purpose of this exploratory study is to examine living situations, specifically college students who live in fraternity/sorority housing, in residence halls, or in off-campus apartments/townhouses, and marijuana use among college students during a year. It is hypothesized that students who live in fraternity/sorority houses will have smoked more marijuana than students who live in apartments/townhouses and residence halls, respectively. The sample is comprised of three groups who attend four-year universities: 25 participants were Greek members, 634 participants lived in off-campus housing, and 121 participants lived in residence halls. Study participants were Washington State emerging adults (18-25) who completed the current measures as part of a larger assessment in 2016. A chi-squared test was conducted and it was seen that 44% of the Greek members, 15.77% of off-campus housing members, and 4.96% of residence hall members smoked marijuana at least 2-3 times per month. Preliminary findings support the hypothesis, showing that Greek members smoked the most out of all three groups and further analysis will be done to show whether these findings are significant.

Asian American students are often restricted from accessing academic services that are intended to benefit racial minorities. This may have negative consequences for disadvantaged subgroups within the Asian American umbrella (e.g., Southeast Asians and Pacific Islanders) that would benefit from such services. The existing literature suggests that the racial minority category prototype includes features such as numerical representation and experiences of racial prejudice. While some groups (e.g., African Americans) may be perceived to fit this prototype, other groups (e.g., Asian Americans) may not. However, increasing Asian Americans’ perceived fit with the racial minority prototype may facilitate greater inclusion of Asian Americans in the racial minority category and in minority-targeted academic resources. The current study uses a 2 (prejudice salience) x 2 (target race) factorial design to investigate whether making the perception of Asian Americans’ experiences of prejudice more salient will increase the inclusion of Asian Americans in the racial minority category and in minority-targeted academic resources. White UW student participants are presented with information about either Asian American or African American students at a fictional university who are publicizing their anti-racial harassment campus outreach initiative (prejudice salience condition) or their student club (control condition). We predict that perceiving Asian Americans as experiencing prejudice will make participants more likely to perceive them as a racial minority group and as having more in common with other racial minority groups. We also predict that perceiving Asian Americans as experiencing prejudice will increase support of the inclusion of Asian Americans in minority-targeted educational resources. Furthermore, we predict that these effects will be weaker for African Americans, who are already perceived as fitting the racial minority prototype. This research has implications for increasing the recognition of Asian Americans as a racial minority group and the opportunity for Asian American subgroups to participate in minority-targeted resources.

This study will be presenting participants with either an interpersonal or structural initiative for racial progress and examining whether Whites and people of color differ in their support. We will also look at the experiences of oppression and discrimination as a possible predictor. We expect to see people of color have a preference for structural initiatives due to the fact that the oppression they experience structurally has more consequences than interpersonal relationships. However, Whites will prefer interpersonal initiatives, as structural oppression does not affect them to the same degree. The implications of this study would provide insight into what matters most to people of color, making the move towards progress more intersectional in the sense that it will center around the oppressed for a solution instead of equating the oppressed (people of color) and the oppressor (whites), in their need of interpersonal resolve.

Implicit biases are attitudes or stereotypes that effect understanding, actions, and behaviors outside of individuals’ conscious awareness. They are formed through past experiences that link two ideas together. The disproportionate representation of African American men as criminals in the media creates a subconscious association between “Black” and “criminal. These media stereotypes are frequently used as cognitive shortcuts by viewers to evaluate individuals or groups outside of the media. As individuals’ encounter Blacks on television as criminals, they come to associate Blacks outside of television with criminality. Many of these shortcuts are so engrained that they operate implicitly, outside of individuals’ conscious awareness. While explicit racism has seen a decline in recent decades, racial disparities continue to exist throughout all facets of the country, suggesting that implicit biases are playing a large role. Exposure to stereotypical content in the news is found to influence viewers’ implicit biases, but research has yet to be expanded to entertainment television. Young adults are spending less time watching television news but watching an average of five hours of television per day, suggesting that time is being spent watching other genres of television. This study will assess how exposure to entertainment television depicting African American men as criminals’ effects implicit biases. Effects of exposure to counter-stereotypical content will also be assessed. Participants will be exposed to stereotypic or counter-stereotypic scenes from drama television series and then complete the Race Implicit Association Test. A control group will be used to evaluate baseline IAT scores without exposure to any content. Results are expected to show that exposure to stereotypical content increases negative associations towards African Americans and that exposure to counter-stereotypical content lessens negative associations beyond the baseline. Implications include the importance of implementing full and accurate content of African American men into the media.

The Diagnostic and Statistical Manual of Mental Disorders V (DSM V) characterizes Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD) as impairments across social functioning (e.g., an inadequately developed, unsteady self-image and constant conflict in relationships) and personality traits (e.g., negative affectivity, rejection sensitivity, impulsivity, and hostility). Because of these impairments, people with BPD frequently encounter serious problems such as emotion dysregulation and suicidality. Emotion dysregulation is defined as a lack of emotional comprehension, inability to cope with emotions in adaptive ways, and unacceptance of distress as part of goal accomplishment, and the lack of ability to pursue a goal in distress. Self-injurious behaviors (SIB), which captures both suicide and non-suicidal self-injury (NSSI), is also an issue to note for people diagnosed with BPD, because they are at higher risk for SIB. It is evident that emotional dysregulation and suicidality are clear disturbances to having a balanced, healthy life. The study pertains to investigate the relationship among emotion dysregulation, rejection sensitivity, and SIB across the patients’ treatment timeline. We first hypothesize a direct relationship between emotion dysregulation and SIB; prior research suggests that diagnosis of BPD will increase the likelihood of suffering from emotion dysregulation and SIB respectively. This is crucial, because it tests the theoretical model of the relationship between the two variables. Our second hypothesis aims to take a scope at how rejection sensitivity exerts a mediator effect on the relationship between emotion dysregulation and SIB among individuals diagnosed with BPD. We conjecture that higher rejection sensitivity will strengthen these two relationships. The study recruited 99 females diagnosed with BPD to assess their emotion dysregulation, rejection sensitivity, and SIB. Based on the analyses, we expect to provide an empirical support for the theoretical model and encourage future research to better promote health for individuals diagnosed with BPD.

Weather forecasts often contain some level of uncertainty. Previous studies suggested that probabilistic forecast with percentage probability information usually induces higher trust rates and better decision quality in subjects than does deterministic forecasts. Two recent studies at UW Decision Making with Uncertainty Lab found that the effect of better decision quality or higher trust ratings in probabilistic information was varied due to the existence of a motivational pressure driven by a goal with rewards or preference of a weather scenario. These findings were both unexpected and not part of original hypothesis. The purpose of this study is to find out whether motivational pressure moderates the effect of probabilistic information versus deterministic information on trust. The hypothesis is that the presence of motivational pressure leads to higher trust in probabilistic forecasts than in deterministic ones, while lack of motivation attenuates the difference in trust between probabilistic and deterministic forecasts. This study is designed to be a single-blind between-subject experiment with two distraction sections and one experimental section. In the experimental section the subjects are exposed to a hypothetical scenario where subjects are prompted to prefer high or low temperature or to have no preference, and be given 6 hypothetical temperature forecasts for which they will provide trust ratings. 90 subjects are recruited from Online Research Pool Program so far. The preliminary results indicate no significant preference in promoted temperature information in each condition. There is a trend shows higher trust ratings in deterministic information especially in low temperature condition, however, this result is not statistically significant at this point. It is possible for this result to become significant when a total of 360 subjects are recruited. The potential finding of this study may shed light on the role of motivational pressure in perceiving uncertainty, and facilitate in advancing forecast communication formats.
 

Desirability bias, or wishful thinking, denotes that our desire toward certain outcomes affects perception of predictive information. The effects include altered perception of probability of events and altered trust ratings towards information in line or not in line with the desire. Previous studies found the bias robust in fields such as card drawing, where subjects predicted the probability of the card drawn from a deck. I designed and acted as the sole investigator of this independent study to explore the effect of desirability bias in weather forecasting, a previous untouched area by desirability bias researchers, which in its essence involves uncertainty. This study also strived to detect a potential residual effect in trust on future forecasts. I speculated that the distrust caused by the bias targets the source of information, thus all future forecasts, even those not paired with a desire, are affected. Over 300 subjects recruited from ORPP, a UW program recruiting psychology students as research subjects, participated in a computer based single-blind test where they were exposed to 5 hypothetical weather forecasts predicting snow or no snow on respective days. A prompt was introduced in trial 3 to induce a desire for a certain weather. Trial 4-5 were used to measure residual effects. Trust ratings and probability estimation of weather events and self-reported awareness of the bias were measured. The result revealed a small but significant effect of desirability bias in both trust and probability estimation. However, I found no residual effect. Half of subjects reported aware of the bias. The result also suggested the potential role of motivational pressure as a moderator in the perception of probabilistic information, warranting future studies. This study casted light on the effect of desire in perceiving forecasts and helped us better understand how the public perceive weather forecasts under different circumstances.

It is an open question how similar second-language processing is to native-language processing. One way to measure language processing is through the use of scalp-recorded electroencephalography (EEG). Event-related potentials (ERPs) are specific patterns found in EEG recordings. The P600 is an ERP characterized by a brief increase in voltage 600 ms after a stimulus with an syntactic anomaly like *“He is read his book,” allowing measurement of whether a subject recognizes an error. Learners show native-like P600s quite early, after about 80 hours of classroom instruction. In native speakers, morphologically complex verbs elicit a larger P600 when ungrammatical than monomorphemic verbs. A morphologically complex verb is one made of more than one morpheme, like “eat-ing.” For example *“The sheep should eating,” elicits a larger response than *“The sheep were eat.” Native speakers of Mandarin, unexposed to any other language before age five, will be recruited through the Psychology Subject Pool. They will be presented with English stimuli adapted from a list of 120 sentences in a full 2x2 cross of grammaticality and complexity. Each participant will see one version of each sentence, plus an additional 60 grammatical filler sentences. By averaging across like trials, variance due to possible lexical effects is removed and the effects of grammaticality and complexity are isolated. Presumably, native speakers use the optimal processing strategy, indicated by P600 variability. If learners show variance, it will indicate that their language processing is more native-like. If they don’t, it will indicate that learners at the ability tested do not have access to fully native-like processing. Therefore, I hypothesize that, of the non-native speakers showing P600 responses to verb violations, only the most advanced will show variation, indicating adoption of the optimal processing strategy. Findings will help us understand how new languages are learned, and possibly offer pedagogical suggestions.

In the 1970s, psychologist Mihaly Csikszentmihalyi established the concept of "flow;" a universal experience in which an individual enters a psychological state that allows for optimal performance. When in this state, individuals will experience several specific factors such as intrinsic motivation, task concentration, and perception of abilities that all work together to define "flow." Today, many athletes strive to attain flow in order to achieve excellence in competition. My presentation explores flow within athletics as a promoter of good performance in competition. I examine whether or not flow is responsible for optimal performance or, conversely, if good performance stimulates flow. Through an experiment involving Whitman College athletes, several pre- and post-game surveys, and performance data from a targeted competition, I suggest the overall function of flow in athletics.

Peer victimization is common throughout the adolescent years. Recent research has highlighted increases in psychopathology in adolescence accompanying greater exposure to peer victimization. Furthermore, rates of peer victimization of a relational nature are higher among female adolescents than among males. Research also suggests that females are more likely to be diagnosed with internalizing disorders than males. Given these disparities, it is important to identify the mechanisms behind how peer victimization may play a gender-specific role in the development of internalizing psychopathology. To do so, we examined the relationship between peer rejection and emotion regulation, and the extent to which this relationship is moderated by sex. We hypothesized that females would display worse emotion regulation after experiencing peer rejection than males. We also predicted that worse emotion regulation would be associated with greater internalizing symptoms. Adolescents (N = 287, ages 16 and 17) completed a computerized peer rejection task involving being rated by virtual “peers” as well as emotion regulation tasks measuring persistence on a difficult task (Paced Auditory Serial Addition Task) and automatic emotion regulation (Emotional Stroop Task). They also completed self-report questionnaires which assessed exposure to peer victimization (Peer Victimization Questionnaire) and internalizing psychopathology (Children’s Depression Inventory, Multidimensional Anxiety Scale for Children). A moderation analysis was used to characterize a relationship between peer rejection and emotion regulation based on sex, and a linear regression analysis to examine the association of emotion regulation with internalizing psychopathology. Better understanding the factors that increase risk for internalizing psychopathology among female adolescents could better inform interventions to identify and treat those at risk.

The plainfin midshipman fish, Porichthys notatus, is a species of teleost fish that produces social acoustic signals for intraspecific communication. One social signal used during reproduction is the male advertisement call or “hum”. The hum is essential for courtship and reproduction because females use it to localize males at night during the breeding season. The hum has been implicated in mate selection, because the nocturnal environment prevents visual assessment of males. Here, I aimed to test the hypothesis that the male hum is a condition-dependent or “honest” acoustic signal that provides information related to the quality of the sender. I plan to investigate whether the acoustic properties of the hum are related to size and/or other morphological characteristics of the type I male (i.e., the condition or quality of the sender). We characterized the sound pressure level (SPL) and first five harmonics (H1-H5) of each hum using an oscilloscope and Adobe Audition. Furthermore, we measured standard length (distance from the tip of the snout to the base of the caudal fin), total mass, gonad mass, swim bladder volume, and swim bladder mass to calculate condition factor (K, a measure of body volume that relates to animal condition), gonadosomatic index (GSI, a ratio of gonad mass to body mass), and swim bladder muscle index (SBMI, a ratio of swim bladder muscle mass to body mass). The hum’s harmonics and SPL were statistically analyzed for correlations with the morphometrics. Results indicate that the frequencies of the harmonics (H1-H5) were negatively correlated with male GSI, however our low sample size and statistical power lead us to conclude that further data collection will be needed. The results of this experiment will add key information related to the acoustic communication and behavior of the plainfin midshipman and will provide new directions to future behavioral experiments.
 

Previous research has found substance use disorders (SUDs) to be disproportionately high in HIV positive patients, with lesbian, gay, or bisexual (LGB) status adding another critical dimension of risk in HIV research, resulting in poor HIV-related health outcomes in these two populations.  Given these findings, the present study hypothesized that sexuality and substance use would interact to produce poorer quality of life (QOL) and greater cumulative viral burden in HIV positive persons.  The records of adult patients (n=1653) within three HIV care clinics were obtained from the Center for AIDS Research Network of Clinical Integrated Systems during the period 1/1/1995 to 12/29/2014.  Two parallel analyses of covariance were performed to analyze variations of both viral load and QOL between-groups using self-reported LGB status (absent, present) and SUD status (absent, present) as predictor variables, controlling for 5-year historical enrollment interval and for HIV care clinic.  Cumulative viral burden reflects the computational index of viral load over time, reported as viremia copy-years (VCY), whereas QOL was assessed using a validated self-report instrument (EuroQual).  These analyses indicated: 1) LGB and SUD status predicted differential VCY and QOL with LGB status predicting higher VCY and QOL and SUD presence predicting higher VCY and lower QOL.  2) LGB status and SUD presence interacted such that the poorest QOL was found among heterosexuals with SUD.  3) HIV care clinic and historical enrollment interval both accounted for significant variance in VCY, whereas only HIV care clinic accounted for significant variance in QOL.  These findings strengthen the claim that both constructs are reliable predictors of salient outcomes within HIV care.  Further studies that elucidate why viral load is higher in LGB and substance abusing populations may offer significant public health gains though lowered cumulative viral burden, and greatly improve the QOL of these populations.

Cancer survivors often experience memory and thinking problems after treatment. Cognitive rehabilitation has been shown to improve function in head injury patients. This study examined behavioral and neural responses to a group-based cognitive training intervention in cancer survivors with cognitive symptoms. Gynecologic cancer survivors (n=23) were randomized to treatment group (15) or attention control (8). A subset of participants were eligible for scanning from the treatment (6) and control (5) groups. Both groups attended a 7-session, weekly group-based workshop. The treatment group received education and practice in skills (e.g. method of loci), and the attention control group received only education on cognition and information processing. Prior to and following the 7-session group-based workshops, participants were evaluated with a comprehensive cognitive battery along with an in-scanner verbal memory task where they studied word-pairs (e.g. star–couch) for later recall. During the test phase of the word-pairs task, participants were shown original word-pairs, novel word-pairs, shuffled (old and new) word-pairs, or recombined (two old words not previously paired) word-pairs. Recall during the test phase was assessed at an item level, where responses were yes/no to the query “both old?” or at the relational level, where responses were yes/no to the query “together previously?” Participants in the treatment group showed significant improvement for in-scanner responses in accuracy in the Relational condition, p < .04. Image analysis of group comparison at second level revealed decreased activation in one region in anterior cingulate for the treatment group for item recall. Cognitive training in cancer survivors can improve both attention and verbal memory. Pre to post change in the anterior cingulate for the treatment group suggests additional attention recruitment, consistent with improvements in attention observed with out-of-scanner tasks (e.g. digit span). Overall, cognitive training may be a useful treatment for cancer patients suffering from cognitive symptoms.

Although questionnaires are helpful for identifying employee retention targets in research contexts, such surveys do not benefit employers in small, real-world organizations due to the inevitability of gathering biased data (e.g., due to social desirability or lack of anonymity). The purpose of the current study was to test a tool employers could use to more accurately identify turnover risk and targets for individualized retention strategies. This tool focuses on employee engagement, which research has shown to be related to employee turnover (i.e. high engagement is related to lower employee turnover intentions). This tool enabled us to determine employee level of engagement and predict employee group identification (i.e. long-term retention vs turnover). We hypothesized that higher levels of engagement will predict employee long-term group identity, whereas, low levels of engagement will predict turnover group identity. We conducted a qualitative study using a between-subjects design to compare semistructured phone interviews with 25 community mental health clinicians (13 long-term, 12 turnover), in which we asked clinicians what “ideal changes” they would like to implement in their agency. Using the Q12 Engagement Measurement Model, derived from Maslow’s Hierarchy of Needs, we determined clinician engagement levels, which we then used to predict their group identification. We predict our analyses will reveal that clinicians who suggest more personal-level changes are more likely to be in the turnover group, while clinicians who suggest more altruistic-level changes are more likely to be in the long-term retention group. The literature indicates that employees with higher engagement levels are less likely to turnover; therefore, if we achieve our predicted results, future implications of this study could be that employers could use this tool in their annual review process to more accurately assess employee turnover risk and improve employee retention strategies.

Entering the 2016 presidential election, Hillary Clinton stood poised to become the United States’ first woman president. An electoral win would have assigned Clinton status as a symbolic first, or a figure who comes to represent social change by becoming the first member of a social group to assume some position from which members of this group have been excluded. Drawn from previous literature on symbolic victories for social movements, our initial hypothesis predicted that a Clinton win would influence Americans to be less concerned with gender inequality and to think that future steps to promote equality were less important. Given Clinton’s defeat, however, we modified our hypothesis to be that gender inequality would become more salient and Americans would prioritize reducing this inequality more, compared to before the election. Within-subjects shifts in these attitudes were measured by administering self-report surveys before and after Election Day 2016. While participants’ perceptions of broad societal gender equality conditions did not change, participants’ support for specific policies aimed at remedying inequalities increased following Clinton’s defeat. We offer potential theoretical and contextual explanations for these findings. Additionally, we explore how individual differences contribute to these primary effects. Our findings suggest a window of opportunity to organize collective action around gender equality issues.

Two basic goals for implementation science are to broaden the reach and promote sustainability of Evidence-based Practice (EBP) through effective and efficient dissemination and implementation methods. Research has consistently shown that clinicians need both training and expert consultation or EBP supervision to deliver EBPs. However, often there are only a limited number of EBP expert trainers available. In children’s mental health, a growing body of literature documents the science-to-practice divide, in which few of the many EBPs for children’s mental health are available in public mental health settings, where most children are served. The question guiding this study is whether the Train The Trainer (TTT) model of implementation that is currently being utilized for scale up of EBP is effective. The goal of this study was to analyze trainer candidate ratings under the TTT model and within the context of CBT+. Participants included expert trainers (N=5) as well as trainer candidates (N=7). Surveys were used to compare the performance and trainee perception of trainer candidates. To assess candidate trainer effectiveness, we examined clinicians’ self-report of knowledge gain/competency. Similarly, we assessed whether expert and peer ratings of candidates at the TTT training predicted clinicians’ ratings of the trainer candidates. The results from this study serve to inform further implementation research on how other initiatives can use TTT models to expand EBP reach. This study also provides empirical data that indicates problematic discrepancies between experts and candidate trainers in their CBT+ training.

Ocular dominance columns (ODCs) are neurons that are organized in V1 of the visual cortex to respond to input from either eye preferentially. ODCs create stripes on the surface of V1, which have been shown to be less pronounced when the animal loses visual input before the critical period of ODC formation. It was previously believed that these ODCs did not exist in rodents. ODCs correlate with connections from the corpus callosum, which can be seen as a patchy pattern of callosal connections. When rats were found to have similar patchy callosal connections, it was hypothesized that rats would have ODCs as well. As a result of this, our lab was able to find that Long Evans rats have segregated ocular dominance domains. In our current experiment, we looked at plasticity of ODC formation in rats who are either monocularly deprived or enucleated during the critical period of ODC formation. First, we performed either a monocular deprivation (by suturing the eyelid of the rat shut) or a monocular enucleation (by removing the eye) before the onset of the critical period. We performed anatomical analyses by injection of a label for callosal connections and ODCs in the cortex. V1 of the visual cortex was then removed and examined. Furthermore, we performed physiological tests using electrophysiology. In these experiments, we looked at visually evoked responses of both eyes from the monocularly deprived rats (after the suture was removed). The results of our experiments have shown that monocularly deprived and enucleated rats show less patchiness in ODCs contralateral to the closed/removed eye and less patchiness in callosal connections. Also, we found that there was greater ipsilateral response of the non-damaged eye to visual stimulation in rats. These results show that there is plasticity in rats deprived/enucleated before the critical period. 

Previous research has shown that Implicit Association Test (IAT) scores on a suicide-relevant IAT significantly predict future suicidal behavior. Additionally, evidence suggests that social exclusion may be a significant risk factor for eventual suicide; however, given that previous studies have been mostly correlational in nature, inferences regarding the causal relationship between previously identified theorized risk factors and suicidal behavior remain elusive. This study sought to address this gap in literature by experimentally manipulating experiences of social exclusion and looking at its impact on both implicit and explicit measures of suicidality. Participants were 42 undergraduate students who were asked to play Cyberball, a virtual ball-throwing activity in which the participant was randomized either to be included or excluded by virtual players whom the participant believes to be real. Afterwards, participants filled out The Survival and Coping Beliefs Scale (SCBS), an explicit measure that has been shown to prospectively predict one’s future suicidal behavior, and they then performed a behavioral assessment of implicit suicide cognition using the death/suicide Implicit Association Test (d/s IAT). An independent sample's t-tests found no evidence for a statistically significant difference between experimental conditions in average SCBS scores regarding their self-reports of expectations for the future following the Cyberball task. However, participants in exclusion conditions scored significantly higher on d/s IAT compared to their counterparts, which suggests socially excluded groups identified more strongly to suicide than the inclusion conditions following the Cyberball task. This study provides proof-of-principle findings that this type of methodology may be able to be applied to other research questions investigating the link between established risk factors and suicide-related constructs. From these findings, we infer that there may be a causal impact of social exclusion on one’s relationship to suicide and death on implicit levels that may not correspond with explicit reports.

The hippocampus, a brain area traditionally thought to play a key role in memory consolidation, has been shown to be involved in encoding contextual information during reward-motivated decision-making tasks. Projections to and from the hippocampus connect it with structures known to be involved in decision-making behavior and encoding cost/benefit values, making it well situated to contribute to the circuitry processing choice selection. Inactivation of hippocampal areas in rats have been shown to increase variability of choice preference between large rewards with an associated delay, and small rewards received immediately. To elucidate the role of the hippocampus in encoding economic factors of rewards, we recorded from place cells in a hippocampal subregion known to be necessary for spatial coding of salient objects and events, called CA1, during a delay-discounting maze-based task. The task was designed on an elevated T-maze to have three blocks during each daily recording session. During each block the rat chooses several times between a large reward (4 sugar pellets) with a long delay specific to that block (10, 20, or 40 seconds) and a small reward (1 sugar pellet) with a short delay of 3 seconds across all blocks. The rats were familiarized with the delays at the beginning of each block by undergoing 5 forced trials on each side. Behavior measured over 10 free choice trials then completed the block. As expected, preference for the large reward was maximal during 10-second blocks and declined as the delay increased. Preliminary analysis of place fields shows remapping between different delay conditions indicating spatial encoding of reward costs by hippocampus. Remapping was also observed between free and forced trials. These results imply that the place field representation of maze areas reflects contextual spatial information that includes the expected cost of rewards.

Lai et al. tested nine interventions to reduce implicit racial biases. Although all interventions immediately reduced biases, the effects produced did not last for long with duration of a couple of hours. Kirby and Greenwald made a discovery, termed "mental ownership", whereby active rehearsal of novel stimuli increases implicit liking for the stimuli and identification of it with self. Inspired by this finding, we conducted a series of experiments in attempt to test if a procedure developed from "mental ownership" could be effective in terms of mitigating implicit biases. We randomly assigned University of Washington undergraduate students to complete mental rehearsal procedures of one out of two complementary categories; they actively rehearsed and memorize exemplars of either insects or flowers. To measure their implicit biases, subjects then completed Implicit Association Tests. D scores, measuring their performances on the tests, were used to assess the effects of the mental rehearsal procedures. We expect for the procedure to produce a significant effect, and we should see an increase in subjects' implicit liking for the category from which exemplars have been rehearsed. If our hypothesis is correct, more studies will be conducted to test the duration of the effect and compare it to that of the traditional nine interventions.

Developed in the 1990s, the Implicit Association Test (IAT) is one of the most widely used measurements for implicit attitudes. Previous research has found that mental rehearsal of unfamiliar stimuli can increase both implicit liking and association with self. The present study further explored the mental rehearsal procedure and its potential mitigating effects on bias in implicit attitudes and identities. Subjects learned and remembered faces and names of either African American or European American jazz musicians. They then completed two types of IAT, the race attitude and the identification IAT. The race attitude IAT measures one’s implicit preference for one group of people over the other; the identification IAT measures whether one identifies with one group over the other. Three experiments were conducted and varied the difficulty of the rehearsal task. Face picture stimuli in IATs were either those rehearsed in the experiment or those used in the standard race attitude IAT. We hypothesize that the mental rehearsal procedure can reduce implicit bias for both attitude and identification IATs. The IAT and self-report results of this study allow an evaluation of the possible use of the mental rehearsal procedure to reduce implicit biases.

The idea of gender as binary effectively classifies gender into two distinct categories and implicitly emphasizes that the two should be different from each other. Transgender individuals, whose biological sex does not correspond to their current gender identity, expand the traditional binary gender construct. The current study examines how adults attribute gendered characteristics to the author of a written vignette when the author is identified as cisgender or transgender. It is hypothesized that adults will identify different gender related attributes to the author depending on the identified gender of the author. Participants will be randomly assigned to one of five vignettes that each displays the same short story with a different gender identified for the author: a trans-man author, a trans-woman, a man, a woman, or a control (no author specified). Participants will then proceed to the same questionnaire (a Likert-type scale), where they will be asked about their impression of the author. One-way ANOVAS will be conducted to compare the global scores and subscale scores across each of the five authorship conditions. It is expected that there will be a significant difference in the global score of the Gender Attribute Scale, whereby the cisgender female author is attributed more traditionally feminine characteristics and the cisgender male author is attributed more traditionally masculine characteristics. Given the paucity of research in transgender attributions, we do not have a prediction on the direction of difference for the transgender woman and transgender man authors. The new area of inquiry in this study is the gendered attributions adults make about transwomen and transmen. Should we find differences in the ratings of femininity and masculinity between the cisgender and transgender identified authors, we might use the finding to interpret how steadfast the notion of a gender binary is.

Suicide is one of the leading causes of death in the United States and in the world. Suicide has a profound economic, psychological, and social impact. Unfortunately, many of those who experience suicidal thoughts and behavior are not in touch with traditional mental health treatment. One method to reduce the structural and attitudinal barriers for suicidal individuals not enrolled in treatment is the use of technology. In this study, we recruit approximately 800 college student age 18 to 24 from University of Washington psychology subject pool. Subjects fill out surveys on demographics, suicidal ideation (Beck Scale of Suicide Ideation; Beck, Kovacs, Weissman, 1979), help-seeking preference (Rickwood, Deane, Wilson & Ciarrochi, 2005), stigma (Internalized Stigma of Mental Illness Inventory; Ritsher, Otilingam, & Grajales, 2003), self-concealment (Self-Concealment Scale; Larson and Chastain, 1990), interpersonal relationship (Inventory of Interpersonal Problems), and cultural values (Culture Orientation Scale; Triandis & Gelfand, 1998). First, we examine whether one’s level of suicide ideation predict one’s treatment preference (face-to-face vs online) using a multinomial logistic regression with three groups (individuals unlikely to seek help either online or face-to-face; individuals likely to seek help online only; and individuals likely to seek help face-to-face). In the second phase of analyses, we investigate potential mediators of the relationship between suicidality and help-seeking preference with mediation using bootstrapping, a method based on repetition and resampling with replacement. The results can be used to direct the development of future interventions to better fit suicidal individuals’ needs according to their preferences of being helped.

Accumulating evidence supports the idea that stress and emotion are crucial in appraisal of situations and in deciding coping processes. Additionally, negative moods have been shown to increase the likelihood of engaging in self-defeating behavior such as impulsive acts. Despite the breadth of research into psychological stress responses and impulse control as a facet of personality, limited attention has been given to a possible link between the two constructs. As a connection between stress and impulsivity may have adaptational consequences, it has prompted new research questions about the role of stress and emotion and how they implicate coping responses. Evidence for impulsivity as a possible coping response is supported by a ‘priority shift’ theorized by researchers, in which an individual chooses to engage in impulsive behavior to attain immediate gratification, thereby shifting their attention from long-term to short-term goal pursuit. This coping response may be motivated by a demand for mood repair. A 10-day Ecological Momentary Assessment (EMA) style survey is used in conjunction with a baseline questionnaire to assess college students’ responses to stressors and negative mood. Data are from a sample of 100 UW students aged 18-20. Participants answer three surveys a day including items from the Perceived Stress Scale and the UPPS Impulsive Behavior Scale. In analysis, we test the relationship between stress levels and levels of impulsivity, and examine negative affect as a possible mediating variable. We have also hypothesized a threshold relationship in which stress will only predict impulsivity if it is exceeds a sufficient level, and will structure statistical analyses accordingly.

An object's color is composed of three dimensions: hue, brightness, and saturation. According to Opponent Process Theory, hue is determined by two opposed chromatic color mechanisms (red versus green, and blue versus yellow). The red-green and blue-yellow balances of an object are determined by the activity of the three retinal cone-photoreceptors: S-, M-, and L-cones which have peak activations at short, medium, and long wavelengths of light. S- and L-cones are responsible for the perception of red and oppose M-cones which signal green, and M- and L-cones the perception of yellow and oppose S-cones which signal blue. Previous research has shown how achieving a red-green balance can be influenced by various brightness effects. This current study demonstrates how these same stimuli are influenced by manipulating saturation. We displayed a variety of colored stimuli that varied in their saturation and red-green balance. Saturation was manipulated by the experimenter by adding blue phosphor to a colored stimulus composed primarily of red and green phosphor on a CRT monitor in order to create 6 different experimental conditions. Participants were asked to set a colored stimulus on the screen to a red-green balance by varying the amount of red and green phosphor with a keyboard, with the blue phosphor levels being held constant. Results show that as more S-cone activating blue phosphor was added to the stimulus participants adjusted the stimulus more toward the direction of M-cone activation (green). This is the predicted direction of Opponent Process Theory since L- and S-cone activity add together to signal redness. We conclude that as you reduce the saturation of a red-green balanced stimulus by adding blue, the stimulus will appear redder. Psychophysical researh like this can help guide ideas to design safety signs, materials for people working in low-light environments, or other real-world physiological investigations.

The medial geniculate body (MGB) is part of the auditory thalamus and is critical to the processing of sound. It receives input from the inferior colliculus (IC), projects to the auditory cortex (AC), then receives extensive descending projections from the AC, forming a feedback loop. Some evidence suggests that the MGB may remain plastic longer than other parts of the subcortical auditory pathway, and may play a role in learning and experience-dependent plasticity. To further understand the development of the MGB, we measured the volume of the MGB in the Big Brown Bat (Eptesicus fuscus) relative to the rest of the brainstem from prenatal ages through adulthood and found that its relative size did increase postnatally. To look for causes of volume expansion, we measured neuron size and cell density. We found an increase in neuron size and a decrease in cell density. This suggests that not only are neurons becoming larger, there is also a proliferation of connections as evidenced by greater volume of neuropil. These findings are consistent with the idea that new connections are forming as young bats learn. As the next step in our study, we are currently working on collecting the same data for the IC.