The purpose of this study was to examine the effects of three academic interventions on behavioral problems in preschool children. The 363 children who participated in this study were randomly assigned to one of four intervention groups or a control group. ANCOVA was used to determine the effectiveness of the academic interventions on both early reading skills and behavior. All three academic interventions were effective in improving their respective emergent literacy skills. Analyses of the interventions' effects on behavioral problems yielded no significant effect on inattention, hyperactivity/impulsivity, or oppositional behavior. The lack of change in behavior indicates that behavioral problems may not be altered by participation in an effective academic intervention. However, these findings are limited to the period immediately following the intervention, which may not allow sufficient time for changes to develop. Implications for future research regarding these findings are discussed. / A Thesis submitted to the Department of Psychology in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Science. / Degree Awarded: Summer Semester, 2007. / Date of Defense: June 28, 2007. / Intervention, Emergent Literacy Skills, Reading, Behavior, Inattention / Includes bibliographical references. / Christopher J. Lonigan, Professor Directing Thesis; Bryan Loney, Committee Member; Frank Johnson, Committee Member.

The influence of sex and ethnic differences on the accuracy and bias in children's perceived acceptance is an area of research that has generally been overlooked and is important to investigate because such differences may help determine how children will function when interacting with others. Additionally, the way in which children interpret these interactions may in turn impact their mental well-being. The purpose of this study was to examine the influence of sex and ethnic differences on the accuracy and bias of children's perceived acceptance as perceivers (male/female; African American/Caucasian) predicting their social standing among a reference group (same-sex/other-sex; same-ethnicity/other-ethnicity). Archival data of sociometric ratings received from children in grades 3 through 5 (n=923) was used to form measures of dyadic accuracy, dyadic perceptual bias and general perceptual bias. This study revealed the following main findings: 1) children are more accurate in determining their peer acceptance among reference groups of similar sex and ethnicity, 2) girls have overly positive whereas boys have overly negative perceptions of their peer acceptance among same-sex peers at the dyadic level, and 3) African American children tend to overestimate peer acceptance whereas Caucasian children are likely to underestimate their peer acceptance, although the pattern of results differed slightly for dyadic and general bias. This investigation has extended prior research by identifying the sex and ethnicity of children whose self-perceptions are not in line with their actual level of peer acceptance as well as the composition of those peer groups who pose the greatest challenge for them when making decisions regarding their peer acceptance. / A Thesis submitted to the Department of Psychology in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Science. / Degree Awarded: Fall Semester, 2007. / Date of Defense: July 13, 2007. / Children's Self-Perceptions, Peer Relationships / Includes bibliographical references. / Janet A. Kistner, Professor Directing Thesis; Bryan R. Loney, Committee Member; Ashby Plant, Committee Member.

Fluency is the ease of processing information, and is commonly seen as a component of familiarity. The major evidence that fluency is a basis for familiarity is a paradigm where fluency is manipulated by briefly priming participants with an item before asking them if they have previously encountered it, based on Jacoby and Whitehouse (1989). Four experiments were run to see if this effect occurs for pictures as well as words. Experiments 1 and 2 show that priming can increase judgments that an item was recently studied for obscure symbols and line drawings of common objects, respectively. Experiment 3 failed to show priming for pictures of faces. Finally, Experiment 4 manipulated study time and asked participants to make a Remember/Know judgment. Perceptual fluency is used as a basis for picture memory when participants are unable to use recollective cues. / A Thesis submitted to the Department of Psychology in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Science. / Degree Awarded: Fall Semester, 2010. / Date of Defense: October 25, 2010. / Memory, Fluency, Perceptual Fluency, Dual Process / Includes bibliographical references. / Colleen Kelley, Professor Directing Thesis; Ashby Plant, Committee Member; Michael Kaschak, Committee Member.

Prior research suggests praise increases motivation. The present research tested pride and humility as mediators of the effect of praise on motivation. I hypothesized that pride may contribute to motivation because it is pleasant to experience and boosts perceived competence. Humility may contribute to motivation by facilitating less inflated self-assessment and greater awareness of one's room for improvement. In Studies 1a and 1b, participants recalled experiences of receiving praise or non-praise experiences and reported how proud, humble, and motivated they had felt. Participants recalled feeling more proud, humble, and motivated after praise than after non-praise experiences. Both pride and humility mediated the effect of praise on motivation. Study 2 was conducted to develop better ways of assessing humility for use in Study 3. In Study 2, participants watched a video intended to induce humility or a neutral video. Participants who watched the humility induction video compared to participants who watched the neutral video self-reported greater humility and made less inflated self-evaluations. Narcissism correlated negatively with self-reported humility and correlated positively with inflation of self-evaluations. In Study 3, participants received praise versus no feedback from a friend and an expert on an essay they had written. Participants provided self-report measures of pride, humility, and motivation, as well as behavioral measures of effort/motivation. Results were consistent with hypotheses that praise increases pride, humility, and motivation. Study 3 produced no evidence of simple mediation. However, humility showed a marginal pattern of interactional mediation, such that, after receiving praise humility was associated with greater motivation, but after receiving no feedback humility was associated with less motivation. Differences in the praise situation, including the meaningfulness and unexpectedness of the praise, may have produced the divergent findings across studies. Study 3 yielded suggestive evidence that praise may be more motivating for people with high than with low self-esteem. Humility was positively associated with gratitude across studies and tended to be negatively associated with inflated self-evaluations in Studies 2 and 3. / A Dissertation submitted to the Department of Psychology in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. / Degree Awarded: Summer Semester, 2007. / Date of Defense: June 18, 2007. / Gratitude, Positive Feedback, Interactional mediation, Praise, Pride, Humility, Accuracy, Motivation / Includes bibliographical references. / Dianne M. Tice, Professor Directing Dissertation; Frank D. Fincham, Outside Committee Member; Roy F. Baumeister, Committee Member; E. Ashby Plant, Committee Member; Colleen M. Kelley, Committee Member.

Prevalence rates of nonsuicidal self-injury (NSSI; the deliberate destruction of one's own body tissue in the absence of suicidal intent) are quite high among adolescents and young adults, and appear to be increasing. Additionally, NSSI-related content is developing a large presence on mainstream social media websites such as YouTube and Twitter, which could encourage or normalize NSSI. Yet little research has examined the individuals who post and view NSSI content online or what functions this behavior may serve. A sample of 135 individuals age 18-37 who had self-injured in the past two weeks (71 individuals who posted NSSI content online [Posters] and 64 who did not post NSSI content online [Non-posters]) were recruited though social media websites. Results indicated that individuals post NSSI content online to serve two functions: a social motivation function (SM; for the purpose of social attention and manipulation in order to attain reactions or resources from others or their environment), which was predicted to be more commonly reported, and an emotion, expression, and connection function (EEC; to regulate and express emotions or to connect with others socially), which, inconsistent with the hypothesis, was found to be more commonly endorsed. Contrary to expectation, Posters did not have more psychopathology than Non-posters, and the functions of NSSI were similar across groups. Finally, inconsistent with hypotheses, results indicated that the frequency of posting NSSI content online and time spent looking at NSSI content online was not related to the frequency or duration of NSSI. Although NSSI-related social media use was not a maintenance factor among adults, future research should examine NSSI-related social media use among adolescents, who may be more strongly influenced by self-injury content on social media. / A Thesis submitted to the Department of Psychology in partial fulfillment of the Master of Science. / Fall Semester 2015. / October 1, 2015. / Nonsuicidal Self-Injury, Social Media / Includes bibliographical references. / Jeanette Taylor, Professor Directing Thesis; Thomas E. Joiner, Jr., Committee Member; Colleen Kelley, Committee Member.

Recent research has demonstrated that social exclusion can increase the motivation to develop new affiliative bonds with others. The primary goal of the paper was to examine the effect that social exclusion would have on gratitude toward a novel person. An additional goal was to test how social acceptance would influence gratitude toward a novel other. Across two studies, social exclusion increased self-reported gratitude for a small gift among people low in a sense of entitlement compared to those in a control condition. Social exclusion also increased perception of the benefactor's interpersonal warmth among less entitled participants. Perception of the benefactor's warmth mediated the increase in gratitude among low entitlement participants in both studies. Additionally, socially excluded low entitlement participants were perceived as being more grateful in hand written thank-you notes compared to nonexcluded participants (Study 2). These findings suggest that, upon feeling socially excluded, people low in entitlement had a heightened motivation for social affiliation that led them to overperceive warm intentions in the benefactor. The overperception of warmth is what caused gratitude to increase among socially excluded low entitlement people. Social acceptance increased gratitude compared to control conditions and was not moderated by psychological entitlement. Unexpectedly, social acceptance also increased the perceived value of the benefit. The heightened perception of gift value was found to mediate the increase in gratitude in both studies. / A Thesis submitted to the Department of Psychology in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Science. / Fall Semester 2015. / October 22, 2015. / Includes bibliographical references. / Roy F. Baumeister, Professor Directing Thesis; Paul Conway, Committee Member; Wen Li, Committee Member.

In the face of a competitive marketplace, businesses are searching for effective solutions to managing employee work behavior. One such approach is through the systematic application of Organizational Behavior Management. While investigations of pay-for-performance programs and incentive systems have demonstrated desired changes in workplace behavior, little research has been conducted on the Performance Matrix, a measurement system and objective feedback tool. The current study offers insight on the construction and general effectiveness of the Performance Matrix when used in conjunction with a work-contingent incentive and feedback system for small groups. Primary research questions tested the efficacy of the Performance Matrix as a tool to change the customer service behaviors of 12 retail sales associates. Secondary questions pertained to manipulations of the prioritized weight distribution feature of the Performance Matrix, how it is used, effects on non-targeted behaviors and relation to response covariation, and assessment for preference and end-user satisfaction. Results indicated that customer service-type performance was changed on average by 10 percent when weight distribution differentials were 15 or more. No detrimental effects were found for other behaviors not targeted for incentive earnings. Implications for implementing a Performance Matrix system with incentives are discussed. / A Dissertation submitted to the Department of Psychology in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy. / Degree Awarded: Spring Semester, 2005. / Date of Defense: March 28, 2005. / Task Priorization, Weighted Distribution, Employee Incentives / Includes bibliographical references. / Jon S. Bailey, Professor Directing Dissertation; Pamela L. Perrewe', Outside Committee Member; Frank Johnson, Committee Member; E. Ashby Plant, Committee Member; Tom Welsh, Committee Member.

Comorbidity between Borderline Personality Disorder (BPD) and substance use disorders (SUDs) is very common and is associated with a host of harmful consequences to the individual. However, it is not definitively known what accounts for this comorbidity. We examined the possibility that certain BPD symptom clusters were differentially related to risk for comorbid SUD diagnoses and symptoms. Studying the factor analytic research on BPD, a 3-factor solution has emerged with the symptoms of chronic feelings of emptiness, unstable interpersonal relationships, and identity disturbance often presenting on the primary factor (i.e., accounting for the most variance). Using a non-clinical sample (N = 121), the relationship between three symptom dimensions (defined according to prior factor analytic work) and presentation of comorbid SUD diagnoses and symptoms was examined. The results from the hierarchical regression analyses indicated that not only were the different symptom clusters of BPD differentially associated with SUD diagnoses, but also that certain symptom clusters accounted for this comorbidity just as well as the full symptom count of BPD. Strengths and limitations of the study are discussed as well as possible avenues for future research. / A Thesis submitted to the Department of Psychology in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Science. / Degree Awarded: Spring Semester, 2009. / Date of Defense: January 22, 2009. / Borderline Personality Disorder, Substance Use Disorders, Comorbidity, Symptomotology / Includes bibliographical references. / Jeanette Taylor, Professor Directing Thesis; Joyce Carbonell, Committee Member; Christopher Schatschneider, Committee Member.

Research examining age differences in metamemory has consistently found that the ability to monitor one's memory remains relatively intact as we age. Recently, researchers have been striving to understand the relationship between monitoring and control during encoding and retrieval in an effort to find ways of increasing the efficiency of learning. The current study explores the impact of monitoring on performance for both younger and older adults in an everyday technology-driven task. Participants learned 20 tasks in Quicken and made judgments of learning (JOLs) about their ability to recall a 3-4 step task on a test immediately following training. The timing (immediate vs. delayed) and inclusion of the JOL into the training session varied across the 3 conditions. Results suggest that the incorporation of JOLs into the training of these tasks improved recall performance for both younger and older adults. Timing of the JOL cue did not impact monitoring accuracy in younger adults, but delayed JOLs improved monitoring accuracy in older adults. / A Thesis submitted to the Department of Psychology in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Science. / Degree Awarded: Spring Semester, 2010. / Date of Defense: September 4, 2009. / Training, Metamemory, Skill Acquisition, Cognitive Aging, Aging, Older Adults, Everyday Tasks, Judgments Of Learning, Interventions, Off-The-Shelf Computer Software / Includes bibliographical references. / Neil Charness, Professor Directing Thesis; Colleen Kelley, Committee Member; Joyce Ehrlinger, Committee Member.

The transcription factor ΔFosB is increased in the brain after repeated exposure to several forms of stimuli. The nucleus accumbens (NAc), an area of the brain involved in rewarding behavior, is a site of major ΔFosB activity after exposure to chronic stimuli, including, but not limited to, drugs of abuse, stress, wheel running, sucrose consumption, and sex. The medial preoptic area (MPOA) is an area important for sexual and parental behavior. The immediate-early gene product c-Fos is observed in the medial preoptic nucleus (MPN) after initial sexual experience, and to a greater degree after multiple experiences. c-Fos is also found in the MPOA after parental behavior (i.e. retrieving pups), as is FosB, the full-length transcript of which ΔFosB is a truncated form. ΔFosB has recently been found to be increased in the NAc after multiple sexual experiences; however, FosB and ΔFosB have not been investigated in the MPOA after any amount of sexual experience. For this thesis, we used immunohistochemistry (IHC) to investigate FosB/ΔFosB activation in the MPOA of male rats that were given various amounts of sexual experience, including fifteen, one, and zero sessions. Two groups received fifteen sessions; one group received their last experience one week before sacrifice, whereas the second group received their last experience the day before sacrifice. We found the number of FosB/ΔFosB-immunoreactive cells is increased significantly in the MPN of males given one experience, compared to naïve males and the experienced group receiving their last experience one week before sacrifice; those given long-term sexual experience (up until the day before) were not significantly different from any of the other 3 groups. Western immunblotting was used to determine the molecular identity of the protein being expressed in IHC. It appears that ΔFosB, at 35-37kDa, is expressed in the MPOA after the first sexual experience. Based on these results, it is postulated that ΔFosB in the MPOA may be important for the priming of sensory and/or motor integration in the MPOA with the initial sexual experience of male rats. / A Thesis submitted to the Department of Psychology in partial fulfillment of the requirements for the degree of Master of Science. / Degree Awarded: Fall Semester, 2009. / Date of Defense: July 31, 2009. / Male Rats, Sexual Behavior, Medial Preoptic Area, FosB / Includes bibliographical references. / Elaine M. Hull, Professor Directing Thesis; Mohamed Kabbaj, Committee Member; Barbara G. Licht, Committee Member.