9th Annual Southeastern Idaho Psi Chi Conference
Friday, April 23, 2021 at 1:00 pm
The 9th Annual SEIPCC 2021 is virtual and synchronous-asynchronous hybrid presentation.
To attend any of the events listed below, please join our Conference Meeting Room on Zoom using the Meeting ID: 859 7781 2469 and the Passcode: 83209.
Keynote Speaker kicks off the conference off at 1:00pm
Stacey Gordon, LMSW, Program Director, Next Phase Adult Caregiving and Retirement, NYU Society of Retired Faculty
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Changing the Narrative Around Age
Research indicates that younger and older people experience ageism, which affects how we think, feel, and act towards ourselves and others. It impedes the development of healthy aging, often intersects with racism, sexism, and ableism, and creates barriers and conflict between generations and in families. And it’s important to note that ageism has significant negative consequences on the health and well-being of people of all ages.
In this introduction to the concept of ageism, gerontologist Stacey Gordon, LMSW, Work Life’s Program Director of Next Phase Adult Caregiving and Retirement, and doctoral student at NYU Silver, will describe the structural basis of ageism and how it manifests in institutions and between individuals, and offer practical tools for encouraging a more compassionate community.
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Student Research Presentations
An Exploration of the Impact of Music on Meaning in Life.
Johnson, B., Madison, E., & Fulton, E.
Q & A at 2:00 p.m.
Music is nearly ubiquitous in human life, and serves a complex variety of functions, such as the regulation of mood and arousal, achieving self-awareness, and the expression of social relatedness. Given that music can influence constructs associated with well-being, can music be utilized to increase meaning in life? Meaning in life is positively associated with multiple positive life outcomes, acting as a buffer to mitigate the effects of stress and serving as an essential part of recovery from mental illness. Thus, music may be a simple solution to increase well-being. For the current study, it was hypothesized that attending a concert would lead to significant changes in meaning in life, social connectedness, and affect. These constructs were measured using the life regard index, social connectedness scale, and the positive and negative affect schedule, respectively. Thirty-six participants completed these measures before and after a concert. Changes in each variable were analyzed using repeated measures t-tests. Researchers found no significant differences for any variable; however, the increase in positive affect approached significance. Thus, researchers concluded that a single concert probably cannot significantly affect meaning in life across an entire group of people, at least in accordance with these methods. However, many factors could have influenced the results, such as live music compared to studio recorded music,genre of music, and even prior associations with the chosen songs. Future research could explore these factors to uncover whether concerts can impact meaning in life.
Food Insecurity in Women Predicts Impulsive and Risky Choice for Food and Money
Baca-Zeff, S., Alvarado, A., & Rasmussen, E. B.
Q & A 2:30 pm.
Food insecurity refers to an inconsistent access to food that meets basic nutritional needs. Women from food-insecure households tend to show higher rates of obesity than food-secure women. Obese individuals show stronger preferences for smaller sooner food and money outcomes over larger, delayed ones, as measured by delay discounting. Probability discounting, a related process, measures preference for smaller, more certain (risk-averse) outcomes over those that are larger and less certain (i.e., riskier) The purpose of this study was to determine the extent to which delay and probability discounting for food and money differed between food-secure and food-insecure individuals. Ninety-two women were recruited from Southeastern Idaho. Food security status was measured by the USDA Food Security Module. Participants also completed delay and probability discounting tasks for both hypothetical money and food rewards. Results showed that food-insecure women had higher delay discounting rates for both food and money compared to food-secure women. However, probability discounting rates did not differ between food-secure and food-insecure individuals. These results show that food-insecure women may be more impulsive for food and money than food-secure women; however, sensitivity to risk may be unaffected by food insecurity.
Instagram and Twitter profiles can be used to form accurate judgments of personality and political ideology
Pederson, C., Camillo, C., Gibson, J. R, & Letzring, T. D.
Q & A at p.m. 3:00 p.m.
As of April 2019, 69% of adults use social networking sites (SNSs), with 91% of adults under 30 using at least one SNS (Pew Research Center, 2019). The ways in which people use SNSs to form accurate judgements of the personalities and politics of others is important when considering the roles these platforms play in our daily lives. The present study explored the accuracy of judgments of personality traits, political ideology, and political party affiliation made based on viewing two popular SNSs: Instagram and Twitter. 268 judges viewed profiles and provided ratings of SNS profiles of 150 targets. The main hypothesis, which stated that judges would achieve significant accuracy for personality traits on both SNSs, was supported[TL1] . Interesting, Instagram profiles provided for higher levels of accuracy than Twitter profiles. Exploratory research questions were also examined and revealed differences between SNSs for accuracy of judgments of individual personality traits, and significant accuracy for judgements of political ideology and affiliation.
Adverse Childhood Experiences and Resilience: The Mediating and Moderating Role of Sleep
Hillebrant-Openshaw, M. J., & Wong, M. M.
Q & A at 3:30 p.m.
Adults exposed to adverse childhood experiences (ACEs) are at an elevated risk for negative outcomes. As this relationship had been well documented in the current literature, it is important for researchers to expand current knowledge on what variables may help explain these relationships, and what variables may promote an individual to be resilient in spite of these adversities. For example, insomnia symptoms have been shown to relate to both ACEs and resilience outcomes, and positive sleep paraments have been shown to benefit resilience outcomes. Therefore, the aim of the current study was to determine if insomnia symptoms could partially explain the relationship between ACEs and resilience. Additionally, the study aimed to determine if positive sleep parameters could serve to protect against potential negative outcomes due to ACEs. Young adult participants were recruited via Mechanical Turk and the Idaho State University SONA student research pool. Participants completed two online effortful control tasks, as well as online questionnaires to measure ACEs, parameters of sleep, and resilience. Results showed that insomnia symptoms significantly mediated the relationship between ACEs and psychological wellbeing, social wellbeing, life satisfaction and subjective measures of inhibition. Additionally, sleep quality moderated the relationship between ACEs and effortful Control. The results of this study provide important information about how sleep may help explain why individuals with ACEs tend to have more negative outcomes than those without ACEs, and how future research should examine how sleep variables may impact the relationship between ACEs and resilience outcomes.
Effects of Visual Cues on Conditioned Salivation in Overweight and Healthy-Weight Women
Musquez, M., Alvarado, A., Fregoso, B., & Rasmussen, E. B.
Q & A at 4:00 p.m.
Societal changes such as increased portion sizes, food advertisements, and access to readily available high fat, high sugar foods have produced an obesogenic environment. Given the high prevalence of obesity, research regarding the effects of conditioned food cues on food cue reactivity – individual differences to physiological and motivational responses to food that affect food consumption – is needed. This study aimed to establish conditioned food cues in women and sequentially extinguish them while comparing food cue responses in overweight/obese participants vs healthy-weight participants. 23 overweight/obese and 26 healthy-weight participants underwent Pavlovian conditioning with a neutral visual cue paired with a chocolate (M&Ms) reward (CS+) during three intervals: baseline, acquisition, and post-extinction. During the testing phase, acquisition was determined by the participants swallowing responses to the CS+ during the first block of the extinction trial, and extinction was determined by the participants swallowing responses to the CS+ during the final block of the extinction trial. Results show that conditioned responses of swallowing (CR+) were significantly higher for both overweight/obese and healthy-weight participants during acquisition compared to baseline but showed no differences in the strength of the CS+ between groups. Additionally, the CRs+ did not extinguish in either group during post-extinction. Lastly, there was no main effect of group, or an interaction. Conclusion: We established conditioned responses with humans, but more trials may be needed to see extinction effects.