Oral Session IV: 8:30-9:30AM
Abstract Volume and Quick Reference Guide
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AF 209A
Psychology
8:30am-8:50am
Childhood Illness Experiences and Well-Being in Adulthood
Presenter(s): Claire Mikami
Advisor(s): Dr. Desiree Crevecoeur-MacPhail, Dr. Tara Gruenewald
Chronic illnesses afflict 1 out of 4 children in the United States, according to the National Center for Chronic Disease Prevention and Health Promotion (2020), that will impact their families and personal lives for years after childhood. Prior research has found that there is a positive correlation between the presence of a chronic illness during childhood and the child's level of anxiety symptomatology, level of resilience, participation in risky behaviors, and a negative correlation with one's self-efficacy during childhood. Chronic illnesses are becoming increasingly prevalent during childhood; however, there is a gap within the field of research that addresses the long-term impacts of having a chronic illness during childhood on one's social development in adulthood. Using Erik Erikson's eight stages of psychosocial development as a supporting foundation, this study focused on individuals who had a chronic illness during childhood and examined how it impacted the individual's mental health, resilience, self-efficacy, and participation in risky behaviors later in adulthood. This study compared Chapman University undergraduate students who indicated that they were diagnosed with a chronic illness during childhood to those who indicated that they were not diagnosed with a chronic illness and analyzed the mean scores from four scales to determine if any correlations existed. It is expected that individuals diagnosed with a chronic illness during childhood would have lower levels of self-efficacy and higher levels of anxiety symptomatology, resilience, and participation in risky behaviors compared to individuals who did not have a chronic illness diagnosis during childhood. If the data gathered is found to be statistically significant, it could help inform and guide future policies, practices, and treatments for children with chronic illnesses to ensure those individuals are less likely to develop correlated anxiety symptomology, reduce participation in risky behaviors, and increase resilience and self-efficacy later in adulthood.
8:50am-9:10am
How the Big Five Personality Traits and Empathy Associate to Political Behaviors
Presenter(s): Gia Roberts
Advisor(s): Dr. Desiree Crevecoeur-MacPhail, Dr. Tara Gruenewald
From the start of the COVID-19 pandemic, the political atmosphere in the United States increasingly became more divided and volatile due to differing political beliefs. Personality is connected to many different attitudes and outcomes in our everyday lives, as well as political behaviors. The purpose of this study is to determine how individual differences such as empathy, and the Big Five Traits of personality are related to political behaviors. The Big Five Theory states that all personalities can be simplified down to five core factors: openness to experience, conscientiousness, extroversion, agreeableness, and neuroticism, also known as O.C.E.A.N. (Ehrler et al., 1999). Additionally, the specific political behaviors that were evaluated included voting participation, an individual’s political ideology, political trust in one’s government, and an individual’s level of political activity (if they were aware of elections they were eligible to vote in, if they were registered to vote, and if they actively vote). The predictor variables included the Big Five traits and empathy, and the outcome variable was the political behaviors. The current study used a survey, and a positive correlation is expected between people that are high in agreeableness and liberalism, and those who are high in conscientiousness and conservatism. Additionally, a positive correlation is expected between those who are high in openness to experience and those who are more likely to vote in elections, and a positive correlation between those who are high in openness experience and conscientiousness and political trust. Lastly, a positive correlation is expected between those who rate low in empathy and low political activity. In the future, this research may be important to better understand how personality is important in decreasing the political polarization in the world. Also, this research may aid political campaigns to better understand how to attract and engage more voters.
9:10am-9:30am
Intimacy Comfortability and Love Languages in Bisexual Individuals
Presenter(s): Alexis Singleton
Advisor(s): Dr. Desiree Crevecoeur-MacPhail, Dr. Tara Gruenewald
This study examined various relationship factors of individuals attracted to more than one gender. Previous studies in the realm of sexuality focused primarily on heterosexual experiences with less on same sex relationships. However, there has been very little research on sexual identities outside of the binary. Individuals with LGBTQ+ identities are more likely to experience minority stress and face a particular difficulty navigating romantic relationships in a heteronormative society (Guschlbauer et al. 2019). This study involved a survey with questions on participants’ intimacy-comfortability, dominant love language, home life growing up, sexual-identity security, relationship satisfaction and their parents’ predominant love language style. It included questions from the Fear-of-Intimacy Scale (Descutner & Thelen, 1991), Measure of Sexual Identity Exploration and Commitment (MOSIEC) (Worthington et al. 2008), Five Love Languages Scale (Egbert & Polk, 2006) and Relationship Satisfaction Scale (RAS) (Henrick 1998).The results of this study are expected to indicate that there is a correlation between sexual identity security, if a participants grew up in a single parent household, relationship satisfaction and intimacy comfortability and a correlation between a participant’s gender specific love language and that of their parents. The results of this study could be used to inform counseling programs, crisis intervention, education curriculums and therapeutic techniques to reduce identity stress and confusion in bisexual individuals and improve their overall quality of life.
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AF 209B
Psychology
8:30am-8:50am
No Planet B: Perceptions of Climate Change
Presenter(s): Catherine LaCascia
Advisor(s): Dr. Desiree Crevecoeur-MacPhail, Dr. Tara Gruenewald
Climate change is a growing problem in the United States. Likewise, concerns surrounding the effect of climate change on one’s mental health is especially of concern amongst experts and the public. Thus, this study explored the effects of climate change on depression and anxiety, as well as the effects of climate change on the mental health of folks of different racial and socioeconomic backgrounds. An online, anonymous survey was administered to various participants of various genders and racial backgrounds via the SONA participant portal at Chapman University. Results are expected to indicate that individuals who report higher levels of climate change anxiety will likewise report a higher level of depressive symptoms, individuals who report higher levels of perceived climate change anxiety will report higher levels of anxiety, BIPOC individuals will report higher levels of perceived climate change anxiety in comparison to their white counterparts, and individuals of higher socioeconomic status will report lower levels of climate change anxiety. If statistically significant, these results will indicate a correlation between climate change anxiety and depression, anxiety, and will likewise have a grander implication in its effects on BIPOC individuals and folks of different socioeconomic statuses. Moreover, if statistically significant, these results will suggest that climate change has a differential and cognitive impact on different groups. Thus, this would indicate the need for greater education surrounding climate change and support for these disproportionately affected groups.
8:50am-9:10am
Childhood Bullying Experiences
Presenter(s): Liliana Day
Advisor(s): Dr. Desiree Crevecoeur-MacPhail, Dr. Tara Gruenewald
Bullying is prevalent in schools and understanding the long-term impact of bullying can motivate people to implement early prevention of this type of childhood trauma. According to the CDC, about 1 in every 5 high school students reported an incident of bullying (2019). There is a large number of studies that examine the detrimental effects that bullying can have on childhood mental health. There are far fewer studies that examine the potential connection between childhood bullying experiences and adult mental health. This study aims to explore possible connections between childhood bullying experiences and increased substance use, anxiety, and depression symptoms in adulthood. Additionally, this study aims to understand if there is a connection between childhood bullying and the formation of anxious attachment in adult relationships. Undergraduate students from Chapman University were selected from the undergraduate psychology participant pool to participate in this study. The participants completed an online survey and the results from each different section of questions will be compared to identify possible correlations. The results are expected to show a positive correlation between adverse childhood bullying experiences and increased substance use, anxiety symptoms, and depressive symptoms. Furthermore, the results of the study are expected to show a positive correlation between childhood bullying experiences and the onset of anxious attachment in adult relationships. By understanding the connection between childhood bullying and adult mental health issues, society can begin to address severe problems caused by adult depression, substance abuse, and relationship difficulties. Society can focus resources on a root cause--bullying--at an early age to reverse recent trends and improve the lives of millions of adults.
9:10am-9:30am
Alcohol as a Social Lubricant: The Motivation for Drinking Alcohol
Presenter(s): Daniel Mejia
Advisor(s): Dr. Tara Gruenewald, Dr. Desiree Crevecoeur-MacPhail
The reasoning for adolescent social drinking has not been clearly defined, yet the reduction of social anxiety and promotion of sociality are believed to be key factors to this behavior. The Alcohol Myopia Theory describes the adverse effect alcohol has on cognition, most specifically regarding attention and processing (Steele & Josephs, 1990; Monahan & Lannutti, 2000; Carey et al., 2018; Fillmore, Carscadden, & Vogel-Sprott, 1998). As alcohol inhibits attention, only stronger or more provocative cues are paid attention to, and previously inhibited thoughts or behaviors become present. Relating this to the Cognitive Bandwidth model, the two models bolster each other as they describe the same occurrence: the reduction of cognitive functioning allows for less being paid attention to and therefore previously inhibited thoughts or behaviors become present under the influence of alcohol (Mulainathan & Shafir, 2013). The aim of this study was to identify key motivators of drinking behaviors in college students. Students enrolled in college above the age of 21 completed the initial survey either through Chapman SONA or through a link on social media. The survey asked the participants demographic questions, a question about their drinking habits, and the Comprehensive Effects of Alcohol (CEOA) survey (Fromme, Stroot, & Kaplan, 1993). If the participant indicated that they drink at least once a week they completed a second survey of the CEOA after they had consumed two drinks. The beliefs and scores before and after the drinking behavior were compared and this data was compared to participants who do not drink at least once a week. It is expected that students will be more confident, more social, less stressed, and more cognitively impaired under the influence of alcohol than sober.
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AF 209C
Electrical Engineering
8:30am-8:50am
Implementing Genetic Algorithm for Optical Metasurface Design
Presenter(s): Tyler Woo
Advisor(s): Dr. Nasim Estakhri
In this project we use computational optimization techniques to design photonic metasurfaces for arbitrary wave bending (i.e., changing the direction of the propagation of the wave). A photonic metasurface is an extremely thin structure composed of various materials ranging from metals (such as gold and silver) to dielectrics (such as silicon and silicon dioxide) at the length scale of nanometers (one billionth of a meter). The primary advantage of metasurfaces compared to traditional optical elements (such as prisms) is the extremely compact profile which allows for easier integration and lower loss. Simultaneously, metasurfaces provide a rich design platform where the output can be controlled by different physical parameters such as the length, width, height, and material properties of the surface elements. Here we report multiple dielectric and plasmonic metasurface designs, where the surface successfully modifies the direction of the incident wave from 0 degrees all the way to near grazing angles (i.e., 90 degrees). All our designs demonstrate more than 90% efficiency, verified by full wave simulations in COMSOL software. We use Genetic Algorithm Optimization to estimate the best parameters for each metasurface. Genetic Algorithm is inspired by natural selection to generate the most suitable “offspring” at each step, and thus moving toward the global optimum for the solution. In addition, we report metasurface beam splitters where the incident beam is divided between two oblique waves. The reported metasurfaces are part of an ultrathin interferometer design which will be briefly discussed.
Psychology
8:50am-9:10am
Examining the Long-Term Effects of Parental Divorce on Children's Interpersonal Relationships
Presenter(s): Amanda Cruz
Advisor(s): Dr. Desiree Crevecoeur-MacPhail, Dr. Tara Gruenewald
In the United States, almost 50% of marriages end in divorce, putting many children at risk of witnessing their parents’ separation (CDC, 2019). Enduring an adverse childhood experience, such as parental divorce, can be detrimental to children’s development. Thus, the purpose of this research study was to examine the long-lasting effects of parental divorce on children, specifically regarding their interpersonal relationships in adulthood. Based on previous research establishing a positive correlation between experiencing parental divorce and insecure attachment styles, the current study argued that parental divorce will have harmful effects on interpersonal outcomes in adulthood. Specifically, experiencing parental divorce in childhood (i.e., 1-17 years old) will result in lower levels of emotional support and social networking, and higher levels of loneliness and negative communication skills in mature adulthood (i.e., 25 years and older). By examining a population of individuals 25 years and older, this research contributed a greater understanding of how childhood events affect adulthood functioning. Additionally, this research highlighted the need for updated intervention plans to assist children throughout their lifespan in order to overcome potentially harmful and long-term psychological and social outcomes associated with parental divorce.
