Social Sciences & Education (SSE) Division Submission Information
John Humrichhouse
Psychology Seeing Feelings: Emotional Expressivity in Newlyweds
Imagine a world without laughter, crying, or smiles, where we only communicate through verbal content. Compared to verbal content, nonverbal behaviors have been estimated to convey nearly twice as much meaning in interpersonal interactions. Emotional expressivity is the tendency (i.e., trait level) to spontaneously express one s affective states through nonverbal means. As part of the Couples Assessment Project, 202 newlywed couples completed self- and spouse-ratings of the Berkeley Expressivity Questionnaire (BEQ; Gross & John, 1995). Compared to husbands, wives reported greater levels of emotional expressivity. Newlywed couples were fairly accurate at rating their spouse s level of emotional expressivity and newlywed couples were not very similar and did not assume similarity on emotional expressivity. Structural analyses of the BEQ did not support the three-factor hierarchical model consisting of impulse strength, positive and negative expressivity. Instead, preliminary support was found for a two-correlated factors model consisting of positive and negative expressivity.
Jason Rose
Psychology Cultural Differences in Unrealistic Optimism and Pessimism: The Roles of Egocentrism and Measurement
Unrealistic optimism is the tendency for people to believe negative events (e.g., cancer) are less likely to happen to the self than to others. Recent research has raised questions regarding the consistency of unrealistic optimism, both within cultures and across cultures. A study of U.S. and Japanese participants tested whether the method used to assess unrealistic optimism produces different cross-cultural patterns. With the direct method (i.e., a single comparison judgment between self and peers), cognitive biases, such as egocentrism, heavily influenced comparative judgments. Japanese and U. S. participants were unrealistically optimistic about infrequent/negative events, but pessimistic about frequent/negative events. With the indirect method (i.e., separate self and peer judgments), motivational biases influenced comparative judgments. U. S. participants were more unrealistically optimistic than Japanese participants. The author discusses how these findings might influence the interpretation of previous research concerning cross-cultural differences in self-enhancement (e.g., unrealistic optimism).
Benjamin Knoll
Political Science And Who is My Neighbor? Religion and Attitudes toward Immigration Policy
This study explores immigration reform as a possible new "moral" issue on which American religious elites and organizations take public stances. It is argued that religion is a key independent variable necessary for understanding the determinants of attitudes toward immigration policy. Theoretical expectations are formed from the ethnoreligious, religious restructuralism, and minority marginalization frameworks. Qualitative and quantitative evidence is then presented demonstrates that those who attend religious services more frequently are more likely to internalize the teachings of their religious leaders, who support liberal immigration reform policies. Members of minority religions, notably Jews and Latter-day Saints, are also more likely to empathize with the plight of undocumented immigrants and support liberal immigration reform measures.
Grace White
Psychology Predicting Relationship Satisfaction: The Effect of Social Comparison and Personality
People's feelings about their relationships have a larger impact on their overall satisfaction with their lives than do their job, income, community, or even physical health (Harvey, 2002). Discussing a relationship with friends is a common occurrence and few individuals can escape these interactions without engaging in comparisons of their own and others relationships. The present study presents a novel examination of social, temporal, and relational comparisons along with personality variables like exchange orientation and neuroticism, which may also be associated with both the comparison process and self-reported satisfaction. Using a sample 110 dating individuals links between comparisons and relationship satisfaction are examined. Findings indicate that comparisons are predictive of levels of relationship satisfaction and should continue to be explored as a possible coping mechanism within relationships.
La Shawn Brown
Counselor Education and Supervision How do faculty members influence a counseling student s formulation of a theoretical orientation?
The purpose of this paper is to determine what influence a faculty member has on a counseling student s selection of a counseling theory. In this paper I provide from the literature, several ways that students select a counseling theory. Personal background, personality, programs of study, and the clinical populations the students desire to work with all help to formulate a counseling student s theoretical orientation. However, this paper will focus specifically on faculty members influence on counseling students formulation of theoretical orientation, as it relates to those areas.
Melissa Buttner
Psychology A Prospective Study of Women's Mood during the Early Postpartum Period
Postpartum blues is a common phenomenon specific to childbirth that may offer insight into the etiology of women s mood disorders. Currently, a significant methodological limitation in research on the blues is its ill-defined construct. Thus, this study examined the course of mood over 10 days postpartum to better understand the pattern of symptom change during the early postpartum period. Postpartum women (n = 140) were recruited to complete a daily mood questionnaire for 10 consecutive days following childbirth. A clinical assessment of the blues was conducted at 2 weeks postpartum. Results indicate a peak in intensity of negative mood on day three postpartum. Moreover, a significant difference in the pattern of negative mood over time was found with those women in the blues group, compared to those in the no blues group. Theoretical implications for a biological investigation of women assessed with the blues at 2 weeks postpartum are discussed.
Victoria Tumanova
Speech Pathology and Audiology Investigation of Articulatory Rate of Children Who Stutter and its Relation to Disfluency Types and Temperament
The purpose of this study was to examine the relationship between the articulatory rate, average duration of disfluencies of different types, frequency of their occurrence in speech, and temperament of preschool children who stutter. Spontaneous speech samples of 18 children, ages 34-70 months, were analyzed using computer software for acoustic analysis. We measured the articulatory rate in fluent speech, and duration of disfluencies of the following types: (a) sound prolongations; (b) sound/syllable repetitions; (c) single syllable whole word repetitions; (d) clusters. Temperament was assessed with Children Behavior Questionnaire. Results show that there is a significant negative correlation (p=0.01) between the articulatory rate and average duration of sound prolongations. No other relationships proved statistically significant. It is suggested that average duration of sound prolongations is an important criterion for subtyping childhood stuttering.
Dana Figlock
Psychology Ventromedial Prefrontal Cortical Functioning of Binge Drinking College Students
Impaired decision making is a feature of chronic alcohol use; the ventromedial prefrontal cortex (VMPC) has been implicated as the brain structure that contributes to this impairment. Studies using the Iowa Gambling Task (IGT), which is a behavioral measure of VMPC functioning, have demonstrated that substance dependent individuals make more errors on the gambling task than non-substance dependent individuals. However, little research has considered IGT performance in non-clinical populations. Given the negative health and behavioral consequences experienced by frequent binge drinking college students, it is relevant to consider VMPC functioning in this population. The present study addressed this issue by obtaining a sample of undergraduates comprised of (non) binge drinkers and comparing performance on the IGT. MANOVA was used to examine whether drinking significantly predicted performance across trial blocks on the IGT; the results indicated that performance differed as a function of drinking status and age of regular drinking.
Matt Gibson
Computer Science A Stochastic Knapsack Problem with Competitor-Induced Uncertainty
The knapsack problem is a classical optimization problem in which the objective is to select a group of items from a given set in order to maximize the total reward subject to constraints on knapsack capacity. We consider a variant of the knapsack problem in which several players take turns selecting items from the set each trying to maximize the value in their own knapsack. We solve this problem using a stochastic search heuristic and illustrate the computational effectiveness of our approach on instances motivated by a sports league draft.
Choonghee Han
Journalism and Mass Communication A Stochastic Knapsack Problem with Competitor-Induced Uncertainty
This paper is about how reporters in a newsroom learn shared meanings in their interactions amongst each other and what significance the interactions bear on the news content they produce. Personal Construct Theory is the framework with which this study will explore personal interactions in newsroom. This study conceptualizes a newsroom as a place of personal interactions. A journalist in a newsroom continuously predicts and controls own and others identities in his interactions with other colleagues (Kelly, 1969) while he knows that he is required to follow social norms of the newsroom. This paper argues that examining journalists interactions in newsroom could produce a meaningful understanding about why news they produce turn out like it does (Berkowitz, 1997).
Kelsie Forbush
Psychology Where does Eating Pathology Belong in the Diagnostic Taxonomy
Quantitative models of mental disorder offer advantages over categorical nosologies. However, many disorders are not included in existing quantitative models, so it is important to conduct more comprehensive structural analyses of psychopathology. The goals of this study were to locate disordered eating attitudes and behaviors within structural models of psychopathology and to examine whether individual categories of disordered eating were predicted differentially from latent Internalizing and Externalizing factors. Participants were female adolescent twins (N=1,225) who participated in the Minnesota Twin Family Study. The best-fitting model was one in which disordered eating attitudes and behaviors were indicators of Internalizing, rather than Eating pathology per se or Externalizing. Body dissatisfaction, binge eating, and weight preoccupation were better predicted by Internalizing, whereas compensatory behaviors were better predicted by Externalizing. Results suggest that eating disorders may be best conceptualized as part of the Internalizing spectrum. Nevertheless, because not all types of disordered eating were best predicted by Internalizing, future research should examine whether diagnosable eating disorders characterized by purging belong in the Externalizing spectrum.
Derek Stiles
Speech Pathology and Audiology Directional Microphones Reduce Access to Rear-Azimuth Speech
One in 1,000 children born in the United States has some form of permanent hearing loss. In most cases, these children will receive hearing aids. Hearing aid technology is often released to the public based on adult trials. Negative consequences in the pediatric population may be missed. Directional microphone technology has been shown to improve the signal to noise ratio of speech for adults and children in ideal situations. The goal of this research was to determine how directional microphones may change how children perceive speech in a less ideal situation, namely when the signal is positioned behind their head. Word recognition performance was found to be significantly worse with a directional microphone than an omnidirectional microphone, but the ability to learn new words was unaffected. Teachers should be aware of their location in relation to children with hearing loss if optimal word recognition is necessary for the lesson.
Jonathan Beard
Psychology and Quantitative Foundations An Empirical Investigation of Vertical Scaling with Item Response Theory Using Adaptive Forms
This study assessed the effects of using adaptive forms in the establishment of vertical scales using Item Response Theory (IRT) methods. Multiple datasets were simulated to assess variations in sample size, mean ability growth, and variation in ability on parameter recovery, ability recovery, bias, and differences in growth trajectory. Three testing modes will be simulated, and within each mode, ability growth trajectory, ability variability, and sample size will be manipulated. The testing modes are: a single form given across all three testing occasions, an adaptive form framework, and all items in a pool will be taken. The trajectories of ability growth are: steady increase, early jump, and late jump. The variability across testing occasions are: equal variances, increasing variances, and decreasing variances. Replicate datasets within each condition will be produced. A better understanding of how changes in ability growth and variability influence the construction of vertical scales will be produced by assessing the quality of parameter recovery. The results of the ANOVA will provide an overall test of the influence of different plausible ability characteristics.
John Eicher
History Suspicious Minds: Fundamentalism and Academia in the General Conference 1923-1943
At the beginning of the twentieth century the General Conference Mennonite Church was faced with questions of how to engage religious Modernism and Fundamentalism as well as the proper place of academia within the church. These issues coalesced during the late-1920s in a theological confrontation between the large First Mennonite Church of Berne, Indiana and the Conference s newly established school, Bluffton College. Representing a conservative constituency of over 1,200 people, two pastors from this church, P.R. Schroeder and C.H. Suckau, changed this church s relationship to both the General Conference and Bluffton College. Over the course of their combined pastorates from 1912-1943, First Mennonite shifted from Schroeder s denominational Mennonite fundamentalism to Suckau s nondenominational Protestant Fundamentalism. This shift serves as an example of how Fundamentalist influences penetrated many conservative Mennonite churches during the early twentieth century and how contrasting ideas of church-based education allowed Fundamentalism to weaken denominational ties.
M. Bryant Howren
Psychology Depression is Primarily Responsible for Inflated Reports of Physical Symptoms
The relationship between trait neuroticism and physical symptom reporting has been widely examined. However, little research has looked beyond neuroticism as an amplifier of symptom reports. Two studies investigated associations among depression, neuroticism, and somatic complaints. In study 1, undergraduates (N = 144) reported the occurrence and severity of 15 typical physical symptoms during the previous week; measures of depression and neuroticism were also completed. In study 2, community residents (N = 109) completed concurrent symptom reports for 21 consecutive days; a retrospective account of their collective symptom experience followed. Measures of depression and neuroticism were completed at baseline. In both studies, multiple regression analyses demonstrated that depression, not neuroticism, was primarily responsible for inflated symptom reports. Results suggest that depression, rather than the broad construct of neuroticism, is most responsible for the over-reporting of physical symptoms. Cognitive biases associated with memory and self-focus in depression are implicated and discussed.
Rebecca Bowman
Higher Education Higher Education Policy in Kyrgyzstan
Higher Education Policy in the former Soviet Union has varied based on the different state approaches. Kyrgyzstan has chosen to adopt Western models in allowing an American university, Turkish universities, and a Russian university. This research will look at the impact of these varying models of higher education.
Allison Bean
Speech Pathology and Audiology Children's Use of Intention to Name Drawings
An intention is the purpose behind an action. Social-pragmatic theorists posit that viewing others as having intentions and understanding those intentions is the key social-cognitive ability underlying word learning. We hypothesize that the understanding of intention also affects how children use the words that exist in their lexicon (word selection). In this study we examined the use of intention for naming. Children ages 24-37 months (n=30), drew, colored, and named pairs of similar objects (e.g., balloon, spoon). Older children (30-37 months) performed better than younger children (24-29 months). Performance improved when the pairs were drawn in different, rather than the same, colors. Intention remained a strong cue for naming even when the examiner placed the cue into conflict, by misnaming the drawing. Improved performance with the presence of perceptual cues (color and representational quality of the drawing) suggests that perceptual cues may be necessary to remember an intention.
Zachary Greene
Political Science Changing the Platform: An analysis of Mainstream Party Reactions to Social Movement Issues
Following from Political Opportunity theory, I develop hypotheses to evaluate the conditions under which mainstream political parties adopt or reject social movement issues. Using a discrete event history analysis of ecological and radical right movements across 17 European countries from 1970-2003, I use mainstream political party issues positions derived from the Comparative Manifestos Project to evaluate under what conditions mainstream political parties change their policy positions or preferences positively and negatively in response to social movement issues or demands. Similar to Meguid (2005), results suggest mainstream party support follows public support for movement issues and niche party electoral success. This paper adds to the literature on the relationship between social movements, niche parties, and mainstream parties by incorporating the role of social movement activities and issue salience.
Megan Schwalm-Bell
Educational Policy and Leadership Studies Country School Teachers of the Late Nineteenth through Early Twentieth Century: Shapers of Minds and Communities
Country schoolteachers of the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries have been described by historians of education as schoolmarms who believed their role in life was to be self-sacrificing and self-abnegating. Schoolteachers from larger cities, such as Chicago, have been given credit for forming social networks and for being strong social activists, whereas rural schoolteachers were thought to have done little to shape both their own lives and the world around them. Based on data complied from newspaper clippings, rural schoolteachers diaries, scrapbooks, and writings from rural schoolteachers in Iowa in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries, teachers in rural Iowa communities were, indeed, shaping their own histories and playing an active role in working towards social change. This case study examines the role that two rural, Iowa schoolteachers, Cordelia Cole and Sarah Huftalen, played to bring about change in the world around them.
Margaret Andersen
History Depopulation from a Colonial Perspective: Dr. Ravelonahina's Medical Thesis
On May 3, 1902, a medical student in Montpellier, France defended a thesis on the subject of depopulation in Madagascar and France. The topics that he explored in this thesis were by no means unusual during this period; demographic concerns in both the metropole and empire plagued patriotic French people and colonial officials alike. What made this thesis unusual was the fact that it was not written by a French citizen; rather, its author was a colonial subject from Madagascar named Ravelonahina. As this paper demonstrates, Dr. Ravelonahina s medical thesis offers the historian a rare opportunity to consider how a colonial subject might have understood the causes of depopulation, a topic that was largely subjective despite the purportedly scientific conclusions it elicited. It was with this thesis that Dr. Ravelonahina entered the French depopulation debate underway in the metropole, contesting French explanations and offering alternative interpretations.
Contact Division Head
Donna Lancianese
Social Sciences & Education Division
Sociology
donna-lancianese@uiowa.edu
