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  Expectations and Memory: Positive and Negative Expectations of Memorizing the Armenian Alphabet

  Micah Wood and Madeline Hoyt

  Studies suggest that expectations may have an effect on various cognitive functions, including memory. To this point, no studies have exclusively investigated the effect of expectations on short-term memory. This study tested the effect of positive and negative expectations on short-term memory, utilizing the Armenian alphabet as a test of memory. N=45 undergraduate students (23 men, 22 women), ranging in age from 18-26 years were divided equally into three groups: Group 1 was a control group, Group 2 was manipulated to have positive expectations before testing, and Group 3 was manipulated to have negative expectations before testing. All groups were given three minutes to study 18 Armenian letters and their English-letter counterparts. Participants were then given two minutes to write the correct English letter next to each Armenian equivalent. A single-factor ANOVA comparing averages between groups showed non-significant results (p= .15).

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  Do all Blacks & African Americans Have the Same Outcome?

  Amelia F. Belchior

  Do blacks and African Americans have the same outcome in terms of self-esteem, GPA, and SEC? Those who are aware of black history and understand the civil rights movement have higher self-esteem. Those blacks who accept their skin color and apply the self-fulling prophesy of what black is know to be, they have higher self-esteem as well. Black immigrants are more likely to accept their skin color and not associate blackness with living in the ghetto, being good at playing sports and dancing; they are more likely to have have self-esteem than native born African-Americans.

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  The Perception of Children in Chile: Burden or Joy?

  Christine W. Black and Renata Forste

  Globally, family values and behaviors have been shifting. This can be seen through a decrease in the universality of marriage, increased individualism, higher prevalence of divorce, older age at marriage and low birthrates with an increase in planned and controlled fertility. In Latin America, and specifically in Chile, these types of changes have been the most drastic. Data come from the ISSP where about 1,500 Chilean participants were asked a series of questions regarding family and gender attitudes as well as multiple demographic questions. This study looked at how these attitudes contributed to the perceived burden or joy of children. Results found that individuals who have sufficient resources and value the homemaker role see children as life’s greatest joy.

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  "Do You Kiss Your Mother With That Mouth?": Profanity in Popular PG-13 Movies

  Jason Eldredge, Stephen M. Trotter, Kirt Haynie, and Melissa Littlefield

  Exposure to profanity in the media is a concern shared by many. Profanity is often portrayed as humorous and/or innocent. A content analysis of popular PG-13 movies from the 1990s to the present shows the use of profanity is regularly portrayed as having no consequence. The overall amount of profanity in PG-13 movies has decreased since the 1990s.

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  Women's Autonomy and Hypertension

  Benjamin J. Fife

  Based on a nationally representative sample of women in the Dominican Republic, I examine how the amount of autonomy predicts the development of hypertension. Using logistic regression techniques for a sample of 4,869 women, I find that in the presence of demographic controls autonomy does not significantly predict the diagnosis of hypertension. In the case of women in the Dominican Republic, older age, higher weight, lower wealth, urban living and distance to a healthcare facility are better predictors of hypertension.

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  The Effects of Anti-Trafficking Ads on Support for Anti-Trafficking

  Marcos Gallo

  A significant gap exists in the literature on the effectiveness of advertising on increasing support for anti-trafficking policies and community involvement in anti-trafficking organizations. Addressing this current gap, I developed and ran an experiment with approximately 1000 individuals in Chiang Mai, Thailand, a site of high concentration for anti-trafficking NGOs. I investigated the effects of advertisements that use religion, cultural values and national identity. Initial findings indicate that these ads do not affect policy support but bear a positive effect on individuals’ personal involvement with anti-trafficking organizations. Further results suggest that using pro-sociality as a strategy is more effective than using negative rhetoric, adding more insight to this debate in the social marketing literature.

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  Maoist Women Voices

  Marcos Gallo, Amber Bullock, Scott Sweeten, Stéfanie J. Morris, and Joshua D. Sims

  Mao Zedong, the leader of China's communist revolution, promised liberation from exploitation for all, including for women. However, government inefficacy and social inertia impeded meaningful change. Women in Communist China under the rule of Mao Zedong found their voice through civic activity because communist reform policies failed to instate gender equality.

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  PAMs: A Growing Field in Pharmacological Drug Development

  Marcel Hall, J. Kolb, B. Todd Jr., D. Pugh, B. Vance, B. Klienstuber, R. Drecketts, Doris Jackson, H. R. Arias, and S. N. Sudweeks

  Positive Allosteric Modulators (PAMs) are a growing field in pharmacology. PAM-5 and genisteincause acetylcholine (ACh) to elicit larger currents on nicotinic acetylcholine receptors (nAChRs) without activating the channel themselves. In effect, PAMs increase the amplitude of currents at a synapse without altering the normal firing rate of the neurons.

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  Dead Men Speak: What Fremont Burials say about Fremont Society

  Rachel Hansen

  This project examined Fremont burials to determine whether the Fremont were a rank society. Because the data show that there are not elaborate burials with many grave goods the Fremont did not have rank differences in social status. It appears that the Fremont did have specialized ritual leaders (shamans).

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  Explaining Demographic Differences in Marital Quality: The Role of Mental and Physical Health

  Kara Henderson, Jessica Harris, Spencer Young, and Spencer James

  A vast body of literature has measured the demographic differences in marital quality. According to literature on marriage, the poorly educated, females, racial ethnic minorities, and premarital cohabitors report less marital satisfaction. The main focus and goal of our study is to link the various demographic differences with poor marital quality. Much of the research on marital quality has found a link between physical health and marital outcomes. The current research neglects the other factors of mental and physical health are related to marital satisfaction and conflict. We want to observe how mental and physical health may serve as mediators and as a link to demographic characteristics.

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  Novel Pharmacological Target: Characterization of a3b2 nAChRs expressed in Xenopus Laevis Oocytes

  Doris Jackson, Marcel Hall, J. Kolb, B. Todd Jr., D. Pugh, B. Vance, B. Klienstuber, R. Drecketts, and S. N. Sudweeks

  We have identified two subtypes of the novel a3b2 nicotinic acetylcholine receptor (nAChR) found within interneurons of the hippocampus. This novel receptor may be a valuable pharmacological target in drug development for disease such as Alzheimer’s disease (AD) which is largely characterized by degeneration of the hippocampus.

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  Neural Changes Associated with Rewards and Punishment Following Ego Depletion or Boredom

  Travis Z. Johnson, Michael Larson, Marina Milyavskaya, and Michael Inzlicht

  Our brain power is exhaustible. We are constantly trying to find ways to perform at our highest levels. There has been research that has shown that willpower--the capacity to exert self-control--is a limited resource that is depleted after exertion of the brain. Many studies have shown the negative effect that depletion has on daily decisions. Depletion can influence our day-to-day choices and actions in a variety of important ways. The neural mechanisms for ego-depletion are relatively unknown so our purpose is to measure the effects of ego-depletion, and then test ways that it can be decreased or reversed, thus finding a way to improve the negative effects of depletion.

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  Anxiety in college students: Implications from the CCMH database

  Payton Jones and G. Tyler Lefevor

  In 2013, an unprecedented 12.4% of college students were diagnosed or received treatment for an anxiety disorder. Using the Collegiate Center for Mental Health (CCMH) database, which includes data from over 140 university counseling centers, we analyzed covariates of anxiety concerns and the implications of these findings. We found that academic and financial concerns correlate highly with anxiety in college students, suggesting that the recent increase in college student anxiety may mirror the increases seen in the cost and importance of university education over the last few decades.

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  Treatment of Diabetic Neuropathy with Nitric Oxide Gel

  Daniel R. Lathen, David Walton, Yukino Strong, Jeff Ward, Conner Sugrue, Jonathan Trout, Devin Vanderwood, and Alonzo Cook Ph.D.

  Our study investigates a novel therapy to address a vascular factor that contributes to the development of diabetic peripheral neuropathy (DPN) using five experimental groups of a mouse model that spontaneously develops diabetes. The compound under investigation is a nitric oxide (NO)-donating topical gel which has potential as a treatment for preventing and treating DPN.

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  Mule Deer Habitat Along the Wasatch Front

  Aaron J. Snow, Brad Halsey, Mike Smith, and Kaytee Howell

  Mule deer are prominent ruminants across the Northwestern United States. Their sensitive biology makes their habitat hard to come by. Their habitat requires adequate bedding, cover, feeding ground, and close access to water year round. To avoid high winds, low temperatures and heavy snowfall, the winter months often require mule deer to descend from their high elevation homes to the lower elevation valley, particularly in search of food and water. Descending into the valley often means intersecting with urban sprawl. We primarily want to see if the Wasatch Mountains in Utah County provide adequate mule deer habitat and secondly see if it intersects with urban regions.

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  Popular Music: Sexually Saturated? A Content Analysis of Sexual References in Popular Music

  Meghan Terry, Mariah Ramage, Crystal Gardner, Jessica Van Alfen, and Emilee Gregson

  Adolescents and young adults listen to 2-3 hours of music per day. The sexual content of that music is important to identify formation and how they perceive sex and relationships, and genre of music can influence lyrics. This paper analyzes the effect that genre has on both presence and attitude of sexual references in popular music. The sample consisted of 200 of the best-selling songs on iTunes. Results suggest a significant relationship between both genre and presence of sexual references and genre and attitudes toward sex. This study shows that sexual content is prevalent in popular music and could suggest that the lyrics we listen to can impact the way we perceive the world.

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  Putting Arens to the Test

  Tyler A. Balli, Justin Cannon, Blake Brailsford, Aubrey Kartchner, and Hallie Johnson

  For our History 202 class, Professor Larsen assigned us to read excerpts from William E. Arens' book called The Man-Eating Myth. The premise of Arens' book is that all of the instances of one group accusing the other of cannibalism are fabricated. If one digs deeply enough, they will not find reliable first hand accounts of cannibalism. Professor Larsen encouraged us to pick a society that was accused of cannibalism and to investigate whether or not the accusations were valid or not. After researching our group came to the conclusion that Arens was wrong in the case of the Maori. There is so much evidence to support that the Maori were indeed cannibals. However we did come to find that Maori cannibalism had been grossly exaggerated and therefore believed to be more widespread and frequent than it probably was in reality. Our poster depicts that the practice of cannibalism did indeed occur amongst the Maori, but that it had been exaggerated by European missionaries and explorers.

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  More Money, Less Problems? New Answers to Aid Allocation Questions

  Jackson Beazer

  I wanted to investigate how the economic growth of developing countries affects the amount of aid it receives. In a study of the models previously used in aid allocation research, I noticed that the literature alternates between aid per capita and total commitment amounts as the dependent variable. After trying both, I found that economic growth is significant in the aid allocation models, but not in the aid per capita models. I hypothesized that while aid per capita models embody an individual focus on the needs of the recipient country, total aid allocation models embody more of a focus on overall donor strategy. In order to support this theory, I categorized the previous aid allocation studies by their main argument of aid allocation ("donor interest" or "recipient need") and the dependent variables they used. The literature matched up very cleanly with my theory. This not only suggests a new way to measure the allocation of aid, but potentially means that researchers have been cherry-picking results to support their hypotheses in this area of study.

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  Connecting to Disconnect: Internet Access and Loss of Trust in Pre-Arab Spring Egypt

  Rolf David Dixon Jr.

  Research has shown that seeking out and deliberating with like-minded individuals can contribute to the fragmentation and polarization of societies. The study posits that the internet can contributes to just such like-minded reinforcement, via a phenomenon called the echo chamber effect. An analysis of the World Values Survey of Egypt in 2001 supports the claim that the internet can contribute to fragmentation and polarization, as measured by a lack of trust. The analysis shows that access to the Internet, even as early as 2001, with the limited penetration it had in in Egypt at that time, still had a measurable, significant effect on national unity as measured by trust for neighbors.

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  Seeing a More Complete Worker: Religiosity, Income, & Job Satisfaction

  Rolf David Dixon Jr.

  A central assumption to the study of individuals in work settings it to study only the those factors directly connect to the work context. The purpose of this study is to examine whether a more holistic approach to a generally very compartmentalized phenomena, such as job satisfaction, is in order. Using the 1979 National Longitudinal Survey of Youth data collected in 2000, I examine the effects of religious attendance frequency of job satisfaction under the hypothesis that religious attendance will have a statistically significant effect on job satisfaction and that that effect will be positive. The results show that there is indeed a highly significant relationship between religious attendance and job satisfaction, but that relationship is negative, and that there is no interaction effect at different income levels. The findings are then discussed within the context of paving the the way for further incorporation of more ‘holistic’ models of how employees relate to their work as well as a discussion of possible mechanisms explaining the negative relationship found in the data.

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  The Effects of Relatedness, Age and Orphan Status on Child Discipline

  Annie Edwards and Jini Roby

  Objectives: To study the effect that a child’s relationship to the head of the household, age and/or orphan status has on the severity of discipline received by the child in the home. We also looked at the effects of parental education level, parental beliefs in the necessity of physical punishment and parental attitudes regarding domestic violence on these outcomes.

  Data & Methods: Multiple Indicator Cluster Survey (MISC4), UNICEF, 2010, for Ghana (n=54,453), Iraq (n=239,218), Vietnam (n=45,091), Costa Rica (n=22,558) and Ukraine (n=34,889).

  Three latent variables were created to determine discipline severity: mild, medium, and severe. Discipline was considered mild if the adult a) took privileges or a well-liked object from the child, b) explained why the child’s behavior was wrong, or c) distracted the child by giving her something else to do. Discipline was considered medium if the adult a) shook the child, b) shouted at the child, or c) spanked the child on the bottom. Finally, discipline was considered severe if the child was a) struck with an object, b) called a degrading name, c) hit or slapped on the face, head or ears, d) hit or slapped on the limbs, or e) beat up or hit repeatedly as hard as possible. Discipline was scored as 0=no discipline, 1=mild discipline, 2=moderate discipline, and 3=severe discipline.

  Relatedness was measured by whether the child was the offspring of the head of the household, a relative of the head of household (such as a grandchild, or niece/nephew), or a non-relative. Orphan status was measured as being either a non-orphan or an orphan. UNICEF defines an orphan as a child who has one or both parents deceased. Children in the study ranged in age from 2-14 years old. The authors controlled for caregivers’ attitudes towards corporal punishment for children, domestic violence towards women and the education level of both men and women.

  Results: In Ukraine (p

  However, our study found that the most significant predictors of child discipline are: parent’s beliefs that children require physical punishment to be brought up correctly (p

  Conclusions: Children in kin-care living arrangements, and some orphans can be at higher risk for severe discipline. This is important information for those involved in child social welfare worldwide.

  Maltreatment of older children is under-reported and most research in this area is more than 20 years old.

  Child welfare is significantly improved when parents are educated. This also includes education about corporal punishment for children and domestic violence towards women.

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  The Uncomfortable Facts About Korean Comfort Women

  Adam Farrell

  During World War Two the Japanese Imperial Army forced women across Asia into sexual slavery. As many as 200,000 women were victims of systematic rape and abuse. A majority of these women were Korean. After the war, the surviving victims returned home, but the pain of their past did not go away. Many of these women continued to experience discrimination, PTSD and were often ostracized by their own people. Japan has yet to deliver a state redress and official apology to the comfort women. Japan’s denial of the horrors experienced by comfort women during World War Two weakens the efforts made for human and women rights made over the past century and validates current modern day war crimes involving sexual violence. It is imperative that Japan does this before the remaining comfort women are gone.

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  Counterterrorism in Authoritarian and Democratic Governments

  Tai Gray

  This research project aims to determine if significant differences exist in the types of counterterrorism used by authoritarian and democratic governments. A case study of the counterterrorism methods used by the United States and Chinese governments shows that authoritarian governments' methods seem to be more extreme due to a greater influence over domestic media and public opinion, but similarities in the realm of human rights also exist that could suggest a more similar response between the two regime types.

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  In the World but Not of It: Responses of LDS Leaders to the Vietnam War

  Luke Miller

  This poster presents a summary of original research based on public addresses given by LDS leaders during the Vietnam War era. It identifies and describes four different ideological perspectives on the Vietnam War that high-ranking LDS leaders publicly advocated during these years. Given the enormous amount of influence that LDS leaders in the First Presidency and the Quorum of the Twelve have over Mormons, an analysis of their views is critical to understanding the beliefs and opinions of LDS members. Understanding the main points of agreement and disagreement among LDS leaders serves as a starting point to elucidate the evolution of the LDS Church since the 1970s.

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  Time Spent Outside the Home and Marital Conflict

  Hannah E. Murray