Monthly Archives: November 2019

First semester undergraduate lab member, Jo, recently gave her first article presentation titled Secondary Traumatic Stress, Burnout, and Compassion Satisfaction in a Sample of Spoken-Language Interpreters that was published by Christopher J. Mehus and Emily H. Becher. The researchers of this study wanted to analyze the level of secondary posttraumatic stress (SPTS), burnout, and compassion satisfaction in spoken-language interpreters and compare them to the population normed score. They predicted that refugee interpreters who may have similar personal histories with their clients, would exhibit higher levels of SPTS. The results showed that burnout and the prediction that refugee status would increase SPTS was not significantly different than the population norm. This suggests that the interpreter’s ability to connect to their clients, develop high compassion satisfaction, and find meaning within their work may protect them against burnout and SPTS. These results help to facilitate the discussion of interpreter psychological support programs by understanding what affect’s their psychological states from the impact of their client histories. The researchers believe that future directions should seek to better understand the psychological impact of interpreting and how it influences the overall quality of their relationships through interpreting. Jo would like to use this article to build upon her own interests in examining how signed interpreters may be influenced by SPTS. Good job on your presentation, Jo!  

Fifth year PhD student, Whitney, recently presented the third part of her dissertation on The Impact of Captive Swim-With-Dolphin Programs on Children’s Mental Health and Environmental Attitudes. She conducted a study that examined childrens’ educational and psychological aspects before and after interacting in a swim-with-dolphin program. She looked at the childrens’ knowledge of dolphin welfare, environmental attitudes, and conservation behaviors along with their perceived social support, emotion regulation, and empathy. Whitney also analyzed heart rate changes and the impact of physical touch between the dolphins and the children. She incorporated stress and trauma measures in the study, such as posttraumatic growth (PTG), as well. She found that swimming with captive dolphins can help with emotion regulation and heart rate but not empathy or environmental attitudes which may indicate very little long-term impacts from the program. Whitney found that conservation behaviors were positively correlated with human support, as well as, empathy. She found that younger participants were more aware of the environment than the older participants, whereas older participants perceived more support from their parents in comparison to the younger participants. Whitney did not find any significant correlations between stress symptoms and psychological variables but she is still analyzing the data for results on physical touch. She believes that these findings could help create programs to increase various educational and psychological aspects in children such as their overall emotional and behavioral health. Amazing work Whitney, we look forward to hearing more of your results!

Recently, second year undergraduate lab member, Brooklin, presented her exploratory analysis on one of the lab’s current studies as a preparation for an upcoming psychology conference known as Michigan Academy. Her presentation titled, Optimism & Resilience. An Exploratory Look at the Survey using Vignette Data, looked at the relationships of the two traits among undergraduate college students in hopes of finding aids for student’s chances of scoring jobs after graduating. Based on previously conducted research regarding the relationships between optimism and resilience, Brooklin choose to examine the relationships between the two while looking at different scales of comparative and adjusted optimism. With the data collected thus far, she found significant relationships between the scales and she plans to continue examining them with a larger sample size as research continues to be collected. Great job, Brooklin, we can’t wait to see what more you find!

First year master’s student, Kara, recently presented her master’s thesis proposal titled Identifying the Tipping Point of Recognition of Depressive Symptoms in Undergraduate Students based on Self-efficacy. Based on previous research conducted, Kara is interested in looking at depressive symptomology and how it impacts college student’s perceptions of tipping points and self-efficacy. Kara aims for her research to help aid in determining self-efficacy at early ages and to better understand tipping points among younger populations for implementable courses of action. Kara has expanded and refined her idea (based on her presentation) and will also be looking at various disorders that are prevalent among college students such as alcohol abuse. She mentions that there is a high prevalence of alcohol abuse and binge drinking in the undergraduate population which can be predictive of future problems with alcohol abuse disorder. She is excited to focus on other metal and psychological disorders while maintaining her main idea of determining where people perceive tipping points of these disorders to be. Great work Kara, we cannot wait to learn more!