Department of Psychology
Commencement Celebration
Class of 2020
“The horizon leans forward, offering you space to place new steps of change.”
– Maya Angelou
Welcome Remarks by
Patricia Reuter-Lorenz Ph.D.
Dr. Reuter-Lorenz is the Chair of the Psychology Department and the Michael I. Posner Collegiate Professor of Psychology and Neuroscience.
First we recognize 4 outstanding graduate student instructors (GSI’s) who received this year’s Rackham Outstanding GSI Award or the Department of Psychology Outstanding GSI Award.
The Excellence in Mentoring Award is presented to a graduate student who is recognized by undergraduate students for outstanding training, mentoring and support of undergraduate research assistants. This year’s winner is Caitlin Posillico.
Caitlin is a 4th year graduate student in biopsychology working under the mentorship of Dr. Natalie Tronson. Caitlin has an outstanding track record of mentoring undergraduate students inside and outside the laboratory. She has mentored students in virtually all programs in our department, from summer research students (SROP, BPEndure, SPINES), to UROP students during the semester, to volunteers, to students enrolled in Psych 326 and 422, to honors students, as well as others including UMich PREP students, Neuroscience program rotation students, and her junior peers. The following quote reflects how her students feel about her commitment to mentorship.
“Caitlin isn’t someone you meet and can forget. She has been there for me and in the same manner has been there for every one of the undergraduates in our lab, mentees or not. For this reason, Caitlin epitomizes what it means to be an outstanding mentor. She is someone who goes above and beyond to help, inspire, and challenge others out of the goodness of heart, someone who truly cares about the research she is doing, and someone who loves to take this passion and pay it forward to the next generation of curious minds.”
– Undergraduate student mentored by Caitlin.
The Psychology Diversity Committee is pleased to announce the awardees of the 2020 Psychology Student Diversity Research Awards and the 2020 Psychology Student Diversity Service Awards. These awards are supported by a Faculty Allies for Diversity grant awarded to our department from the Rackham Graduate School.
Remarks by
Todd Chan Ph.D.
Dr. Chan is a graduating student in social psychology. His research examines how people think and behave differently when they feel rejected or lonely, and how people can adaptively cope with these feelings of social disconnection. As well, he studies what behaviors are effective at creating closeness in relationships.
Dissertation: Measuring executive function during early childhood: The utility of direct assessments, teacher ratings, and group-based tasks.
Dissertation: Educational relevance in adolescence.
Dissertation: "We gon’ be alright": Racism, media, and the sociopolitical development of Black youth.
Dissertation: Proximal and distal relations between interpersonal conflict, social connectedness, and youth suicide risk.
Dissertation: Adolescent critical racial consciousness.
Dissertation: Internalized stigma for concealable marginalized identities: a barrier to group-related political engagement?
Dissertation: It‘s not just ’bad apples.‘ It’s also about the barrel: Critically analyzing organizational and social factors in sexual harassment rates and outcomes.
Dissertation: Age-related neural dedifferentiation in the sensorimotor system and its behavioral consequences.
Dissertation: Modesty or secrecy? The costs of being modest in close relationships.
Dissertation: Cognitive development in the context of trauma: Longitudinal implications of intimate partner violence for women and children.
Dissertation: Black women in media: Representations, effects, and social commentary.
Dissertation: Too close for comfort: Resisting relevance as a lever for persuasion.
Dissertation: Career identity and profiles of value beliefs in four academic domains in high school.
Dissertation: Improvisational theater for psychological health.
Dissertation: The role of internalizing symptoms in accounting for intra-and inter-individual variation in alcohol use problems.
Dissertation: Attitudes about disability and political participation since the 2016 U.S. presidential election.
Dissertation: Safe here, but unsafe there? Institutional signals of identity safety also signal prejudice elsewhere.
Dissertation: Contextual influences on youth socioemotional and corticolimbic development.
Dissertation: Are they real? Examining the regulatory effects of non-deceptive placebos on emotional distress.
Dissertation: Young families in the community: an exploratory analysis of child welfare contact among young mothers and their children.
Dissertation: She resides at the intersections: how race, gender, and sex shape changes in Black girls’ achievement and affect in math and science across high school.
Dissertation: Examining behavioral phenotypes of overeating and obesity: environmental, psychological, and neurobiological influences on food motivation and palatable food consumption.
Dissertation: Class matters: social class identity profiles of Black students and implications for psychological adjustment to predominantly White institutions.
Dissertation: Children’s evaluations of interlocutors in foreigner talk contexts.
Dissertation: Racial and gender identity beliefs among Black college women attending PWIs: examining developmental trajectories and associations with interpersonal discrimination and college adjustment.
Dissertation: Neural mechanisms of reward processing in antisocial behavior.
Dissertation: Reputations matter: peer expectancy socialization among adolescents in the classroom.
Dissertation: Micro-and macro-psychological analyses of attention and the role of cholinergic systems.
Dissertation: M(other) nurture: exploring the influence of maternal care on the development of infant emotion processing, regulation, and the emotional brain.
Dissertation: Food characteristics implicated in biobehavioral indicators of addiction in vulnerable individuals.
Dissertation: Well-being and health: evidence that the health benefits of well-being are contingent on cultural and personal factors.
Dissertation: The income trajectories of college-educated families living in or near poverty: Assessing predictors and outcomes in two national datasets.
Dissertation: Language and literacy development as revealed through the bilingual brain.
Dissertation: Understanding behavioral and physiological consequences of variation in maternal care and glucocorticoids.
Dissertation: Development of the relational meaning in life questionnaire: Relational meaning in life and well-being
Dissertation: Mind-wandering: what can we learn from eye movements?
Thesis: The Content of Spontaneous Thought: Investigating the Role of Personal Concerns in the Verbalized Stream of Consciousness
Thesis: Examining Malaysian Mothers’ Ethnotheories of Maladaptive Behavior in Preschool Children
Thesis: Exploring the Relations between Mental Health Outcomes and Academic Resilience in Transfer Students
Thesis: Basic Psychological Need Fulfillment as a Mediator Between Positive Emotions and Positive Adjustment: A Test of the Broaden-and-Build Model of Positive Emotions in Chinese Adolescents
Thesis: Exploring Associations Among EF Components Across Three Measurement Types
Thesis: Adolescents, Extracurricular Activities, and Experiences of Gender-Based Harassment
Thesis: Does Morality Matter in Perceived Risk of STD Contraction?
Thesis: Hypocognition of Mental Health: How is our cultural background and gender affect our understanding of mental disorders?
“There is nothing more beautiful than finding your course as you believe you bob aimlessly in the current. Wouldn’t you know that your path was there all simultaneously, waiting for you to knock, waiting for you to become. This path does not belong to your parents, your academics, your leaders, or your lovers. Your path is your character defining itself more and more everyday like a photograph coming into focus.”
—Jodie Foster
The Albert C. Cain Honors Award was established in honor of Professor Cain, former department chair and director of the Honors Program. The award assists students presenting their research at a major scientific conference.
Today, we recognize Alexandra Wormley with the 2019 Al Cain Honors Award. She presented her research on traditional values and disease threat at the annual convention for the Society for Personality and Social Psychology in February. Alexandra graduates with a Bachelor of Arts in Psychology with Honors. Congratulations, Alexandra.
Abbey Hamlin is the recipient of the 2020 Al Cain Honors Award to present her research titled “Which aspects of social engagement are most strongly associated with episodic memory performance in older adults?” at the upcoming American Psychological Association conference. Abbey graduates with a Bachelor of Arts in Psychology with Honors. Congratulations, Abbey.
The W.P. Tanner Memorial Award is an annual prize for an innovative research project conducted by an undergraduate student. The award was created in memory of Wilson Tanner, who started his work at Michigan as a graduate student in 1949.
Logan Burley is the recipient of the Tanner Award for 2019. Logan’s research focuses on how people perceive the gender of faces. Logan graduates with a Bachelor of Arts in Psychology with Honors. Congratulations, Logan.
The Anne Rudo Memorial Scholarship identifies a student with an academic interest in both psychology and biology. The scholarship is given in memory of Anne Rudo, a senior at the University of Michigan at the time of her death.
Giselle Uwera received the 2019 Rudo Award. Her thesis examines the effect of perceptions of food scarcity on attitudes towards food. Giselle is graduating with a Bachelor of Science in Biopsychology, Cognition, and Neuroscience with Honors. Congratulations, Giselle.
The Martha Muenzer Memorial Award was established by the parents of Martha Muenzer, who passed away while she was a student in LS&A. The award is given to an outstanding woman in the Psychology Honors Program.
Shannon Shaughnessy is the recipient of this award. This year, she completed her thesis on “Character Strengths and Their Influence on Social Relationships in Children.” Shannon graduates with a Bachelor of Arts in Psychology with Honors. Congratulations, Shannon.
The Lorraine Nadelman Honors Thesis Award in Developmental Psychology was created to recognize exceptional and interesting work produced by an undergraduate student in the last phase of their degree.
Today we recognize Sylvia Gisler with the 2020 Lorraine Nadelman Honors Thesis Award for her thesis titled “Developing Morphological Awareness: Predictive Characteristics of Production Errors.” Sylvia has earned a Bachelor of Arts in Psychology with Honors. Congratulations, Sylvia.
The Schwabauer Internship Award was established with support from Rich and Gwen Schwabauer. This award acknowledges a graduating senior who has demonstrated a remarkable commitment to improving the lives of others through service learning and community engagement.
Cooper Wrona is the recipient of the 2020 Schwabauer Internship Award. Cooper will complete a paid internship at Glacier Hills Senior Living Community in Ann Arbor this summer. Cooper graduates with a Bachelor of Arts in Psychology. Congratulations, Cooper.
The W.B. Pillsbury Prize is awarded to honors students for an outstanding research thesis in the field of experimental psychology. We have two recipients of this award.
The first recipient is Amanda Szczesniak. Amanda’s thesis examined the influence of marital commitment on mate guarding. Amanda is graduating with a Bachelor of Arts in Biopsychology, Cognition, and Neuroscience with Highest Honors. Congratulations, Amanda.
Our second recipient is Marisa Meyer. Marisa’s thesis explored the role of digital play in child development. Marisa is graduating with a Bachelor of Arts in Psychology with Highest Honors. Congratulations, Marisa.
We turn now to a special group of undergraduate students who completed theses in their majors. These students worked closely with faculty and graduate students on state of the art research. They each completed a written report of their projects. Each thesis was then reviewed by three faculty, and for many, given a designation of graduating “with honors.”
Thesis: DHEA: Moderating Factor of Psychological and Physiological Responses to Stress
Thesis: Oral Contraceptives and the Vulnerability to Acute Stress-induced Depression and Anxiety
Thesis: A Preliminary Study on the Relationship Between Sleep, Depression and Cardiovascular Dysfunction in a 4 Sample Population
Thesis: Sleep Quality and Executive Function in Diverse Older Adults
Thesis: Behavioral State-Dependent Brain Stimulation Improves Manual Dexterity
Thesis: Investigating the Effects of Value-driven Attentional Capture on ADHD and Control Participants
Thesis: Sex Differences in the Acquisition of Pavlovian Conditioned Approach and Fear Conditioned Behaviors in Rats
Thesis: Main Lifetime Occupational Demands, Late Life Cognitive Functioning and the Moderating Role of Gender
Thesis: The Manifestation of Meaning: How ‘Generic-You’ Emerges in Military Personnels’ Writing
Thesis: The Role of the Medial Amygdala in Motivation
Thesis: N400 Latency Effect in Lexical Access -A Meta-analysis
Thesis: Cognitive Costs of Active Facebook Use
Thesis: Effects of Urbanization on the Behavior of Fox Squirrels (Sciurus niger)
Thesis: Impacts of Acculturative Stress and Substance Use on the Mental Health of University of Michigan Students
Thesis: Longitudinal Study of ERN and CRN in Children: Kindergarten to First Grade
Thesis: Understanding the Family Member Experience in the ICU: Expectations vs. Reality
Thesis: The Effect of Subliminal Reward Signal on Reinforcement Learning
Thesis: Do Young Children Demonstrate a “Reverse” Endowment Effect? Tracking Ownership and Object Preference in Owned Toys Versus Peers’ Toys
Thesis: Autobiographical Memory in Older Adults: Self-Relevance and the Reminiscence Bump
Thesis: Comparing Cortical Excitation and Cortical Inhibition in the Orbitofrontal Cortex hotspot
Thesis: Functional Connectivity Between Ventral Striatum and Dorsal Premotor Cortex Is Predictive of Reward-Related Enhancement of Motor Skills
Thesis: Evaluating an Academic Success Program’s Effectiveness in Promoting Sense of Belonging, Sense of Capability, and Academic Outcomes among Black Students
Thesis: Age, Gender Roles, and their Association with Mental Health
Thesis: Investigating Corticotropin Releasing Factor Neuronal Circuitry in Positive and Negative Reward Motivation
Thesis: Spatial Navigation Performance Associated with PTSD and Trauma Type
Thesis: Examining the Relation Between Big Five Personality and Social Media Use Across Platforms and Populations
Thesis: Mapping the Anterior Cingulate Cortex for a Hedonic Hotspot. Effects of Optogenetic Stimulation on ‘Liking’ and ‘Wanting’ in Rats.
Thesis: The Influence of Marital Commitment on Mate Guarding
Thesis: Revealing the Roles of Sleep-Preparatory Behaviors in Sleep Physiology
Thesis: Examining Health Behavior Constructs in the Context of Low Food Accessibility
Thesis: Loneliness and Negative Affective Conditions in Polish College Students: Clarifying If and How Feeling Socially Isolated is Associated with Expecting the Worst, Not Expecting the Best, or Both?
Thesis: Validation Study of Cartoon-Based Visual Analogue Pain Scale Towards the Construction of a Novel Pain Scale
Thesis: Social Support Moderates the Link Between Familial Risk for Depression and the Hypothalamic-Pituitary-Adrenal-Axis Stress Response
Thesis: Facial Gender Ambiguity
Thesis: Is Swiping Bad for You? Dating Application Use and Mental Health Outcomes Among College Students
Thesis: The Influence of Political Party Affiliation on Agreement with Political Statements
Thesis: The Relationship Between Subjective Age and Three Measures of Episodic Memory
Thesis: How Does Brain-derived Neurotrophic Factor Relate to Ketamine Treatment for Depression and Chronic Pain?
Thesis: Developing Morphological Awareness: Predictive Characteristics of Production Errors
Thesis: Social Engagement and Episodic Memory in Black and White Older Adults
Thesis: Small-Group Composition Effects on Executive Function in Early Elementary School
Thesis: The Great Food vs. Eating Addiction Debate: Effects on Obesity Stigma and Policy Support
Thesis: Using Animation to Facilitate Second Language Learning
Thesis: The Relationship Between Childhood Anxiety and Maternal Attachment Styles
Thesis: Minority Stress and Sexual Minorities of Color: The Mediating Role of Mastery
Thesis: Exploring the Role of Digital Play in Child Development
Thesis: Investigating Relationship Between the Error Related Negativity at Ages 4-6 and Anxiety at 7-10
Thesis: Predictors of Perseverance and Optimism in the Kids’ Empowerment Program
Thesis: Cardiovascular Reactivity to Interpersonal Stress: The Roles of Race and Chronic Stress
Thesis: Together or Not at All: How Shared Interests Between Partners Encourages Stable Self-Definition
Thesis: Cross-Cultural Variation in Emotional Reasoning and Behavioral Causality in Regards to Depression and Neurasthenia
Thesis: Experience of Sexual Assault and Perfectionism as Predictors of Self-Destructive Behaviors in Female College Students: Distinguishing Between Self-Harm and Suicidal Behaviors
Thesis: Temporal Associations Between Reasons for Alcohol Use and Alcohol Consequences in Adolescents and Emerging Adults
Thesis: Predictors of Character Strengths for Children Participating in the Kids’ Empowerment Program
Thesis: To Conceal or To Reveal: Examining What Children Understand About Revealing Their True Identity While Online
Thesis: “Achievement has no color:” Colorblind Ideologies and Race & Ethnicity Course Selection
Thesis: Do Eating Disorder Treatment Outcomes Differ for Individuals with Comorbid Substance Use?
Thesis: The Influence of Pathogen Threat on Traditionalism
Thesis: Loyal Friend or Dutiful Citizen? How Culture Shapes Responses to Moral Violations
Thesis: The Effect of Anecdotes on Science Evidence Evaluation
And once the storm is over, you won’t remember how you made it through, how you managed to survive. You won’t even be sure, whether the storm is really over. But one thing is certain. When you come out of the storm, you won’t be the same person who walked in. That’s what this storm’s all about.
– Haruki Murakami
Remarks by
Marisa Meyer B.A.
Marisa is a graduating honors student in Psychology.
Her research examines the impact of digital play on child development. She has received multiple university and national awards during her time at Michigan including the prestigious 2020 W.B. Pillsbury Prize for best thesis and the Best Abstract Award at the 2019 American Pediatric Association Conference.
As the Chair of the department, it is my duty to close out today’s ceremony. But before I bring this celebration to a close, let’s recognize the parents and family members who have supported our graduates throughout these years, paying the bills, doing the laundry, sending care packages, packing and moving the stuff, drying the tears, giving the hugs and encouraging words, and all the many things that made this day possible for our graduates. This celebration is also our way of thanking you for supporting our graduates and for trusting us — the Department of Psychology — with your graduate’s education. Thank you!
It is my distinct honor and privilege to congratulate the psychology graduating class of 2020! GO BLUE!
– Patricia Reuter-Lorenz Ph.D.
Copyright 2020 – University of Michigan