Dr. Powell’s Interpersonal Relationships course discusses family, peer, and romantic relationships. Delving into the science of relationships, students read an empirical article related to the day’s topic and then discuss the article, as well as other research, on the day’s topic in class. Throughout the semester, students are assisted in the development of an infographic on a topic of their choosing. A sampling of the infographics completed by the students this past fall semester are shared below!
Christopher Resendiz’ Infographic, “Online Dating: Deception and Modality Switching”
Sydney Wagner’s Infographic, “Debunking the Myth that ‘Opposites Attract'”
Jenna Santos’ Infographic, “FOMO In Social Media & Relationships”
Interested in graduate school? If so, the APA Education Directorate has announced that they will be hosting a Virtual Psychology Graduate School Fair on Wednesday, April 17th from 12pm-4pm! This may be 3 months away, but save your spot by registering today! Registration for all prospective psychology graduate students is FREE through this link.
Students who register will have the opportunity to meet virtually with recruiters from any of the participating programs during the event hours. Individuals can come for a short time and meet with a select few recruiters or stay for the whole event and meet with everyone, depending on their schedule and interest. Similarly, participating graduate schools will be able to contact registered student both before and after the event to distribute information about their program or to arrange meetings with prospects at the event.
Goals of The Event:
APA intends to virtually connect graduate psychology programs with a diverse group of students seeking to further their education beyond their current degree. The APA Psychology Graduate School Fair is open to all graduate psychology degree (MA/MS/PsyD/PhD/EdD/Other) granting institutions in the U.S. and Canada, and all areas of psychology are encouraged to participate, including health service psychology, scientific and applied psychology, and general psychology programs.
Recent Roanoke College graduate, Maryam Nishtar, was recently published based on research that she completed during Summer Scholars and for her Honors in the Major! Her and Dr. Nichols had worked on this research through her time at Roanoke, but she has been working on it independently since her graduation last spring. What an achievement this is for you, Maryam! Find the full article published here, and the abstract below.
Abstract:
Alzheimer’s Disease (AD) is a progressive, neurodegenerative disorder where two-thirds of the affected population are women. Along with cognitive impairments, AD is associated with behavioral changes such as aggression towards caretakers. The limbic system consists of various brain structures that play a role in emotions and behavioral reactions. Some of the limbic system- related areas are the amygdala, hippocampus, thalamus, corpus collosum (CC), and white matter (WM). Cognitive changes with AD can be measured using the clinical dementia rating (CDR) scale. Physical changes in living patients require brain imaging tools, such as Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI). As there is currently sparse research present for these areas relating to the female brain, we used clinical data and FreeSurfer-processed imaging data from an open-access database, OASIS-3, to explore the associations between dementia severity and the volume of the limbic system-related brain components in women. A control group consisted of participants with no dementia and multiple brain scans while comparison groups consisted of participants with a single brain scan and 1) no dementia 2) mild dementia or 3) moderate/severe dementia. Hemisphere differences with increasing CDR were found for the thalamus as well as simple hemisphere differences for the hippocampus, thalamus, and WM. When using age-matched controls and normalized volume data, the amygdala, hippocampus, thalamus, and CC volumes for subjects with AD were different than those in the control group, with the amygdala and hippocampus also showing statistically significant volume loss with increasing dementia severity. As the areas included in this study are related to the limbic system, this provides insight into the physical changes occurring in the brain of women with increasing AD, who often show changes in emotions. This can be an area to longitudinally explore whether there are associated behavioral changes as physical changes at the individual level occur over time.
Our very own Roanoke alum and now professor, Dr. Kennedy-Metz, has been published! Her collaborative work entitled “Behavioral sciences applied to acute care teams: a research agenda for the years ahead by a European research network” was released by the BMC Health Services Research journal. Congratulations, Dr. Kennedy-Metz, on this wonderful accomplishment! Please read the abstract below, or view the article here.
Abstract:
Background: Multi‑disciplinary behavioral research on acute care teams has focused on understanding how teams work and on identifying behaviors characteristic of efficient and effective team performance. We aimed to define important knowledge gaps and establish a research agenda for the years ahead of prioritized research questions in this field of applied health research.
Methods: In the first step, high‑priority research questions were generated by a small highly specialized group of 29 experts in the field, recruited from the multinational and multidisciplinary “Behavioral Sciences applied to Acute care teams and Surgery (BSAS)” research network – a cross‑European, interdisciplinary network of researchers from social sciences as well as from the medical field committed to understanding the role of behavioral sciences in the con‑text of acute care teams. A consolidated list of 59 research questions was established. In the second step, 19 experts attending the 2020 BSAS annual conference quantitatively rated the importance of each research question based on four criteria – usefulness, answerability, effectiveness, and translation into practice. In the third step, during half a day of the BSAS conference, the same group of 19 experts discussed the prioritization of the research questions in three online focus group meetings and established recommendations.
Results: Research priorities identified were categorized into six topics: (1) interventions to improve team process; (2) dealing with and implementing new technologies; (3) understanding and measuring team processes; (4) organizational aspects impacting teamwork; (5) training and health professions education; and (6) organizational and patient safety culture in the healthcare domain. Experts rated the first three topics as particularly relevant in terms of research priorities; the focus groups identified specific research needs within each topic.
Conclusions: Based on research priorities within the BSAS community and the broader field of applied health sciences identified through this work, we advocate for the prioritization for funding in these areas.
