Faculty and Student Research with Underrepresented Populations
Our main interests concern thought and feeling that exists
outside of conscious awareness or conscious control. In
particular, we examine (a) the predictors of correspondence
between implicit and explicit preferences, (b) the presence of
cognitive-affective consistency in implicit social cognition,
(c) the role of implicit attitudes, beliefs, and identity in
orientation toward math and science, (d) evidence for multiple
or dynamic implicit evaluative processes, (e) the consequences
of implicit attitudes and beliefs in judgment and behavior, and
(f) methodological developments for investigations of implicit
social cognition. These interests are applied in domains of
social import such as: ethnicity and prejudice, the
participation of women in science, and the relationship between
ideology, beliefs, and bias. For example, stereotypes that are
not endorsed may still influence judgments or behaviors through
their representation in memory even when those representations
are not consciously accessible. The qualities of implicit social
cognition provide a novel avenue of investigation into the
relationship among concepts like attitude, belief and identity,
and the freedoms and constraints that accompany membership in
social groups.
The Full Potential Initiative, or FPI, aims to increase understanding of the developmental course and impact of implicit attitudes and stereotypes in science, technology, engineering and mathematics (STEM) domains, especially as they may differentially affect the persistence and productivity of girls, women and underrepresented minorities. FPI is directed by UVa Psychology Department faculty Brian Nosek and Fred Smyth and is supported with a grant from the National Science Foundation (REC-0634041). See our website to learn more:
http://fullpotentialinitiative.org
George W. Bush said in his inaugural speech "What binds
America is not blood or birth or soil but ideals that
move us beyond our backgrounds" and that "every
immigrant, by embracing these ideals, makes our country
more, not less, American." Indeed, cultural diversity
has long been an ideal of American society. My students
and I believe that cultural diversity is not only an
important social issue, but also a critical empirical
issue in psychology. Our research aims to identify the
conditions under which people feel understood or
misunderstood by others with different socio-cultural
backgrounds (e.g., race, nationality, religion, SES,
political orientation). Our long-term goal is to
discover the factors that enhance cross-cultural
understanding.
Dr. Melvin Wilson has an extensive background in academic,
research and training activities generally focused on
understanding contextual processes and outcomes in African
American families and service delivery in domestic violence
issues. His current research interests focus on young,
low-income, unwed, and nonresident fathers. In addition, he is
working on developing intervention protocols aimed at helping
young men meet family responsibilities and involvements..
Currently, Dr. Wilson is conducting a preventative intervention
evaluation study as part of a multi-site research project
designed to prevent the early-onset of conduct problems among
720 toddlers from low-income African American, Latino and
Caucasian families. This project is embedded within the Women,
Infants, and Children Nutritional Supplement Program (WIC)
Centers in urban (Pittsburgh, PA), suburban (Eugene, OR), and
rural (Charlottesville, VA) locations and emphasizes client
concerns as momentum toward behavior change in the intervention
model. A primary focus of this study is tailoring the
intervention to diverse cultural and geographic backgrounds of
families.
Using data from the Early Steps Project, developed by my advisor Melvin Wilson and colleagues, I am currently working on my dissertation project which examines the risk and protective factors for depression in African American mothers. I am interested in exploring both the trajectory and pattern of depressive symptoms experienced by the mothers as well as how factors related to race, gender, and socioeconomic status affect their experience of depression. In previous projects, I explored ethnic differences in parental efficacy and their effects on depressive symptoms and child outcomes as well as ethnic differences in depression and service utilization.
I am interested in the psychological health and well-being of African American youth and families. More specifically, exploring the factors of risk behaviors among African American male adolescents, parental involvement and family functioning.
Amori Mikami and her lab research the causes and consequences of peer rejection, as well as interventions for social problems. As part of this investigation, Professor Mikami is studying things teachers do to encourage their students to be more tolerant of peers who are different from them, and ultimately more likely to build friendships with diverse groups of children.
How does parental sexual orientation affect child development? Much of my recent work has been designed to address this question. Together with students and other colleagues, I have conducted studies of child development among youngsters who were conceived by lesbian or heterosexual parents, using the resources of a single sperm bank; I have studied children parented by lesbian and heterosexual parents both in Northern California and in Central Virginia; and I have studied data about teenagers living with same-sex couples that are drawn from national samples of adolescents in the United States. Our findings suggest that, while the offspring of lesbian mothers are developing in positive ways, and are in fact difficult to distinguish from the children of heterosexual parents on many assessments, they do experience upbringings that are different in some respects from those of youngsters growing up with heterosexual parents. For instance, lesbian and heterosexual couples describe their divisions of labor in quite different ways, with heterosexual couples more likely to specialize - he in paid employment and she in unpaid household work and childcare - and lesbian couples more likely to share both paid and unpaid labor evenly. I am interested in learning more about what impact this and other differences in their upbringings may have on the offspring of lesbian and gay parents.
Studies that are currently underway include an internet survey of lesbian and gay families with children, a study of lesbian, gay, and heterosexual couples, and their adoptive children, and a study of fertility intentions of young adults in sexual minority communities. I hope that this research will shed light on classic questions about what is important in parenting as well as on contemporary legal and policy issues relevant to sexual orientation and family life.
Currently, within Charlotte Patterson's lab, I am working on an adoptive families study regarding two-parent families and their young children (ages one to five years). Adoptive parenting couples include approximately equal numbers of gay dads, lesbian moms, and heterosexual parents. We are interested in exploring how gender and sexual orientation of parents are related to child adjustment, parenting approaches, and family relationships.
Parenthood is one of the most universal and valued experiences of American adults. Interestingly, lesbian and gay adults in the U.S. are much less likely than heterosexual adults to become parents. Working with Charlotte Patterson, I am interested in exploring the psychology of family formation as a function of sexual orientation. I hope that our work will contribute to ongoing debates about sexual orientation and parenthood.
Along with Charlotte Patterson, I am currently studying families headed by gay fathers. I want to get a better understanding of how these families are being created, how they work, and to learn more about the relationship between parents. Specifically, I want to understand the division of labor in these families and the connection it may have to relationship satisfaction.
Dr. Coan studies the neural mechanisms underlying emotion, emotion-regulation and the social regulation of emotion--a process he calls "social affect regulation". Social affect regulation occurs when, for example, one individual works to soothe the stress and fear of another. Recent work in his laboratory has emphasized the study of how individuals in gay and lesbian relationships regulate each other's neural responses to threat cues. This work utilizes functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) and simple hand holding under conditions of mild laboratory induced anxiety. The benefits of social affect regulation for the health and well being of heterosexual couples is widely known and reported. By contrast, gay and lesbian individuals have largely been excluded from work in this area. In addition to his work with gay and lesbian relationships, Dr. Coan has been dedicated to the study of low-income, community samples in his work on the neurophysiology of emotion.
My focus is on Children and the law, and preventive interventions, especially in
juvenile justice. There are three major projects currently ongoing in my research
lab: 1) police perceptions of juvenile offenders and their interrogation,
especially in terms of developmental maturity and competence; 2) etiology of
serious juvenile female offenders and their relation to aggression and violence,
with special attendance to resiliency, risk and protective factors; and 3)
transitions from incarceration to community for juveniles, with special attention
to schools and families. All of these areas have especial relevance for ethnic
minority members. Moreover on all of these projects we work closely with police
departments, the Virginia Department of Juvenile Justice and
Charlottesville/Albemarle Legal Aid Social Justice Center.
My research is focused on personality and ability development and change, broadly
defined. I also work on the development of methods and techniques for measuring
and modeling such changes. Both long-term, developmental changes and shorter-term,
within person variability are of interest to my students and me. Our research of
the past decade or so has been conducted primarily on older adult samples.
My principal research focus in recent years has been the development of a
simplified sign communication system. This project is built on the findings of
earlier studies of sign language acquisition in children of deaf parents and of
motor and language processing in children with autistic disorder. Because nearly
half of all children with autistic disorder historically have failed to acquire
useful speech, many of these speech-limited children were taught signs to
communicate. In many instances, the signs taught were from American Sign Language
(ASL), the sign language used by Deaf persons in the United States. These signs,
however, often are difficult for children with autistic disorder to form and to
remember. In our efforts to devise a simpler sign system, we have tried to create
signs that are easy to form motorically and that are highly iconic (i.e., clearly
resemble the concepts for which they stand). Studies of sign learning and recall
involving college students have shown that these simplified signs are much more
readily learned and recalled than ASL signs. Preliminary findings with atypical
populations also indicate that our simplified signs are quite successfully
learned. Finally, although our initial goal was to develop an effective sign
communication system for children with autistic disorder and with mental
retardation, we now believe that the system may prove beneficial for a much wider
population (e.g., hearing-impaired elderly clients in nursing home facilities).
Kids' Lives, Families, and Friends (KLIFF) is our ongoing longitudinal study
examining the influence of social relationships, autonomy, and attachment
processes on adolescent development. In this study, we are working to learn more
about how young teenagers develop and manage friendships with their peers, and how
family relationships influence qualities of these peer relationships and teens
susceptibility to peer pressure.
Sixth, seventh, and eighth grade students were recruited from a local middle
school in Charlottesville, Virginia. We have 185 families in our study, with over
700 visits happening each year! The sample included 105 European American
adolescents, 49 African American, and 20 that identified themselves as
other/unspecified. The adolescents were of diverse family socioeconomic status,
with the parents reporting a mean family income of $40,000 - $59,9999.
Thirty-three percent of the parents reported a total family income above $60,000
while 44% of reported an income below $40,000.
In our first wave of our study, our teens came in with their parental figures and
later came in with their closest friend. Two additional friends of the teen also
provide additional information. We are currently in our sixth wave of study and
are eager to continue learning more about them as they grow older.
Data is collected about several different areas of adolescence, such as the
quality of family relationships, friendships, peer pressure, school achievement,
delinquency, and internalizing behaviors. The project uses a variety of
measurement methods, including self-reports, semi-structured interviews,
parent-reports, peer reports, and observations of family and peer interactions.
We are doing work on racial differences (specifically Black/White) on measures of anxiety.
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