Abstracts - 2018 Dr. Rae Linda Brown Undergraduate Research Symposium
Published student abstracts from the Dr. Rae Linda Brown Undergraduate Research Symposium at Pacific Lutheran University, held on April 14, 2018.
*Abstracts listed in alphabetical order by the last name of the first author. Abstracts published as submitted by student authors.
| Author(s) | Title | Abstract |
|---|---|---|
| Jenise Cavness | Improving Luminescent Solar Concentrator Efficiency Using Doped Nanocrystals and Ligand Exchange | Luminescent Solar Concentrators (LSCs) are a promising technology for collecting sunlight and producing concentrated light for photovoltaic solar cells or photocatalysis. An LSC is a transparent waveguide with embedded dyes. The dyes absorb sunlight and then luminesce, the emitted light propagates by waveguiding in the LSC and can be collected at the edges. The most efficient LSCs often use nanocrystal quantum dots as the dye. We are examining the improvements in LSC efficiency by using elongated Mn-doped ZnSe/ZnS nanocrystals as the LSC dye. Doped nanocrystals have a large effective Stokes shift which has been shown to increase LSC performance. We are also examining whether exchanging the native nanocrystal ligands with novel methacrylate ligands will improve dispersion of the nanocrystals in the LSC matrix and increase LSC efficiency. |
| Aminda Cheney-Irgens | A Privileged Response To A Global Issue: The United States Rejection Of The Paris Agreement | In light of the recent decision by the United States to withdraw from the Paris Agreement, we must ask ourselves why our government has historically failed to prioritize environmental concerns. The Paris Agreement emphasizes the need for global cooperation in addressing the blatant effects of climate change affecting many communities and ecosystems, yet was rejected on the basis that it would cause job insecurity for many Americans. Using Willis Jenkins' models of sustainability, we can ask why the government is more concerned with economic and political sustainability, focusing on the facilitation of the capitalist economy and creation of jobs, and how this leads to ecological sustainability often being overlooked. *** This tendency can be linked to the Calvinist and early Protestant beginnings of the nation, which idealized economic prosperity as a sign of divine favor, encouraging a focus on monetary gain rather than a stewardship for the earth. Considering that our legal system and traditions are largely based on these early Protestant principles, these roots arguably impact the inability to recognize and address environmental considerations with sufficient attention. In order to responsibly respond to the growing number of social and economic concerns resulting from anthropogenic climate change, we must adopt a more holistic mindset, realize that economic systems are innately intertwined with both environmental and social institutions and consequences, and invest in areas such as renewable energy which simultaneously create employment and provide the accustomed standards of living at a significantly lesser cost to the environment. |
| Aminda Cheney-Irgens | A State of Disgrace: An Ecofeminist Critique of the Interpretation of Women and Animals in Coetzee's Post-Apartheid South Africa | Ecofeminism is a field of feminist critique that links the oppression of women and nature to patriarchal structures, arguing that the experiences of men, women, and animals are different because our societal hierarchies prioritize men. Ecofeminist theorist Carol Adams analyzes the way patriarchal society constructs the types of suffering, asserting that men experience episodic suffering, attributed to unique situations, while women are victims of a perpetual and inescapable chronic suffering at the hands of male aggressors. J.M. Coetzee's novel Disgrace provides the opportunity to explore an ecofeminist interpretation because it illustrates that the chronic suffering felt by women is also experienced by non-human animals. Set in post-Apartheid South Africa, Coetzee’s novel portrays violence committed by men of different races and ages, victimizing women and animals who are powerless in responding to their assault. Over the course of the book, the male protagonist -- a highly unsympathetic character, due to his uncompromising sexism -- develops a more caring relationship with animals through the example set by female characters and his increasing ability to identify with the animals’ suffering. But he leaves the female experience largely unconsidered in his ethical development, illustrating the difficulty of coming to terms with and understanding the unspeakable horrors in which he has participated. Coetzee's deliberate choice to leave this issue of validating the female experience unresolved demonstrates the pressing need to end the patriarchal characterization of female suffering as “chronic” and therefore “normal,” in order to end the culture of brutality which is perpetuated against women. |
| Rebecca Crust | Exploration Of Diversity in Melampsora Willow Rust Populations in Northeastern America | Melampsora rust is one of the predominant pathogens of the biofuel crop shrub willow (Salix spp.) in the Northeastern United States. The two major willow rust pathogen species in New York State are M. americana, which alternates on balsam fir as a host, and M. paradoxa, with larch as an alternate host. To manage willow rust in the field, knowledge of the diversity of the rust population in New York State is required for breeding resistant cultivars. To achieve this, we extracted DNA from willow rust isolates collected in the summers of 2015 and 2016 and then compared internal transcribed spacer (ITS) region sequences for these isolates. A phylogenetic tree was generated using sequences from New York isolates and three type species ITS sequences for M. americana, M. paradoxa, and M. ribesii-purpurea as an out group. Of 103 isolates sequenced, we found that 90.7 percent were of the species clustered with M. americana, and 9.3 percent were of the species clustered with M. paradoxa. This work suggests that shrub willow cultivars with resistance to M. americana should be more heavily emphasized in shrub willow breeding programs in the Northeastern United States. |
| Michael Diambri | Queer Spaces, Gay Places: Gay Bars And Seattle’s Lgbt Community In The 1970s | This archival-based research project examines the cultural history of Seattle’s gay and lesbian bars in the 1970s by exploring queer sites of socialization as factors shaping the development of the city’s LGBT community. Originally completed as a requirement of the Benson Fellowship in Business and Economic History at Pacific Lutheran University, my project has used various primary sources from Seattle-based news outlets from 1973 to 1985 to highlight the role that gay bars and clubs had in shaping LGBT culture and sociopolitical activism. For this presentation, three LGBT bars serve as my main historic case studies—The Monastery, Shelly’s Leg, and The Silver Slipper—each of which had an important but ephemeral influence on Seattle’s LGBT culture. Collectively, primary sources covering these bars reveal a diverse story of community building and culture that is not presented in the current writing on Seattle’s LGBT history. Additionally, this research suggests that, while activism and politics are fundamental pathways to understanding the experience of American LGBT communities, a sole focus on activism and politics often removes notions of personhood, sociality, economic influence, and leisure from queer history. Thus, the story presented is crucially enriched by considering the fundamental role that the queer business owners of lesbian and gay bars and their patrons played in the construction of queer ideologies that abetted the development of Seattle’s LGBT community. In all, my project concludes that stories of business owners, their queer clientele, and the queer spaces they constructed give impressive views into the rich, burgeoning culture of queerness cultivated in Seattle and beyond during the 1970s. |
| Riley Dolan | Analyzing And Documenting Guatemala's Civil War Monuments | After the 36 year civil war in Guatemala, wherein several acts of genocide were committed, several memory sites were constructed to remember those most affected by the conflict. Unfortunately, the research done on these memory sites is very limited and not accessible to the general population. In the summer of 2017 I traveled to Guatemala to document various memory sites by writing descriptions of my experiences at the sites and taking photographs. Dr. Palerm and I are in the process of using the Digital Humanities lab at PLU to create a digital map of these memorials, which will make them accessible worldwide. Additionally, through using theoretical frameworks such as Andreas Huyssen’s “Present Pasts: Urban Palimpsests and the Politics of Memory,” we are analyzing how and why the portrayal of Guatemala’s civil war is being shaped depending on how a monument represents the conflict. Provisionally, we have come to find that depending on where a monument is located (e.g. in the capital city where almost no violence occurred vs. in a rural town that was massacred) and who funded the construction of the monument (the state vs. people in a town that were affected during the war), that there are drastically different portrayals of the conflict. From our observations, monuments funded and constructed by the government focus on vague notions of peace and moving on from the war, whereas monuments made in communities where conflict occurred place culpability on the government and name specific individuals killed by the state. |
| Kyle Drugge | Mental Skills Techniques for Building Self-Confidence in Golf | Self-confidence is a very important component to peak performance for athletes. A common misconception about self-confidence is that people either have it, or they don’t. Research shows that self-confidence can actually be learned and can have a positive impact on an athlete’s performance. “The most common finding in peak performance literature is the correlation between self-confidence and success” (Williams, Zinsser, & Bunker, 2015, p. 274). This research project was created with the PLU Men’s Golf team in mind, and can be used as a mental skills tool to explain techniques for building a player’s self-efficacy in golf. Self-efficacy is a situational-specific type of self-confidence and the underlying principles of self-efficacy can be translated to any other sport, and even non-athletic, performance domains. The project is a culmination of findings from Sport Psychology literature, as well as several sources of media that include quotes and testimonials from high-performing athletes, coaches, and sport psychologists, who give real-life examples of the applied research found on self-confidence. My purpose for creating this project was sparked from personal experience as a former college golfer that occasionally struggled with self-confidence on the golf course. From there, I wanted to learn how to properly build self-confidence so I could help other golfers that may be struggling with their own self-confidence. Now as a former student-athlete, and current Assistant Coach, I can share what I have found with the other high-performing golfers on the PLU Golf Team to build their confidence, and hopefully influence their performance. |
| Joel Earlywine | The Relationship Between Opioid Prescriptions And The Opioid Epidemic: Insight From California Counties | The United States has seen an upsurge in opioid overdoses in the past decade and just recently, President Trump declared the opioid epidemic a public health crisis. In 1990, physicians began prescribing drugs containing opiates at very high rates and during that time, opioid overdoses continued to soar. In 2016 alone, over 64,000 people died from drug overdoses. Used properly, as prescribed, opioids can be a very effective tool in alleviating pain and facilitating recovery. And yet, it is hard to overlook the apparent correlation between increasing prescription rates and soaring death rates from overdose. In 2011 the Center for Disease Control (CDC) used data from 1999 to 2008 to analyze the rates of fatal opioid analgesic overdoses, and found that prescriptions of opioids were related to opioid overdose rates. My project looks at the tie between prescription rates and overdose rates, using a time period that expands upon that of the CDC. Data from California counties between the years 2008 and 2014 will be used to evaluate whether opioid prescriptions are still a main driver of this epidemic. Multiple panel regression methods are used to evaluate this relationship, including fixed effects and negative binomial regressions. Results show that, in fact, prescription rates are a main driver of the opioid epidemic; prescriptions of opioids are positively correlated with opioid overdose deaths. Results also show that higher hospital admission rates due to acute opioid poisonings are negatively correlated with opioid overdose deaths, which speaks to the effectiveness of our healthcare interventions. |
| Olivia Egejuru | Investigating The Effects Of Oxidative Dna Damage In Saccharomyces Cerevisiae On Survivability And Mutagenesis | Reactive oxygen species (ROS) are byproducts of normal cellular metabolism. However, their levels can be increased by external factors such as UV-A light or hydrogen peroxide, causing oxidative stress. These ROS can damage the DNA, and if the damage is left unrepaired, it can lead to permanent mutations that may affect the characteristics of the cell. Our laboratory is interested in the mechanism by which non-dividing cells acquire mutations in response to selective pressure that inhibits their growth, a process known as adaptive mutagenesis. Previous work has shown that compromising the repair of oxidative DNA damage (ogg1Δ cells) or the proofreading capacity of the RNA polymerase during transcription (dst1Δ cells) increases the frequency of adaptive mutagenesis. Work by Koyama et al (Koyama, H.; Ito, T.; Nakanishi, T.; Kawamura, N.; Sekimizu, K. Genes to Cells 2003, 8, 779-788) indicates that dst1Δ cells are more sensitive to oxidative stress than their WT counterparts. In this study, we assessed the effects of oxidative stress on cells lacking dst1, both alone and in conjunction with ogg1Δ, with respect to cell survival and mutagenesis. While data collection is ongoing, preliminary results will be presented. |
| Katherine Enyeart | The Effect Of Noncontingent Reinforcement (Ncr) Used For Treatment Of Problem Behaviors | When a student engages in problem behavior, reinforcers are given to stop the occurrence of a problem behavior or encourage desired behavior. Reinforcers are contingent upon the production or cessation of the behavior and allows the student to obtain an object or attention, or escape a task demand or specific person(s). Noncontingent Reinforcement (NCR) is where the student has access to their reinforcer independently of their performance of the problem behavior. When NCR is implemented, the student is systematically given their reinforcer on a time schedule, no matter what behavior is occurring. This intervention is used mostly for student’s whose problem behavior is motivated by access to attention. NCR aims to disassociate the student’s reinforcer from the behavior by abolishing the need for attention. The student is given what they want, until they no longer desire it e.g. they will not engage in challenging behavior to obtain it. This project’s purpose was to analyze an evidence-based intervention used to decrease the occurrence of problem behaviors that have an adverse effect on a student’s education. To determine the effectiveness of NCR, credible databases were searched to find peer reviewed articles, of no more than twenty years old, discussing both the successes and failures of implementing NCR. Keywords such as autism, Noncontingent Reinforcement, intervention and behavior were used to narrow down the search for varying methods of intervention. From the information gathered, we concluded that implementing NCR in classroom settings, result in a more inclusive educational experience for students with special needs. |
| Richard Frohock | Individuality Versus State: An Examination Of Identity In Anthony Burgess’s A Clockwork Orange & The Wanting Seed | Within the context of a state that exercises direct control over the lives of its citizens, any expres-sion of individualized identity serves as an act of rebellion against said state. British author An-thony Burgess explores this concept in his two novels, A Clockwork Orange (1962) and The Wanting Seed (1962). Both of these novels illustrate the length to which a state will go in order to dominate the identities of its citizens. Such domination is import to these societies because it en-sures that they remain in a position of power. With this in mind, Burgess uses his novels as thought experiments, illustrating how identity can be used as catalyst for social uprising. There-fore, through an analysis of how identity is used to undermine the absolute totality of the state within these two novels, we are able to reveal the importance of promoting individual identity by holding it in a higher regard than the stability of society. In this way, I use this essay to refute the idea that “the needs of the many, out weigh the needs of the few” by showing that needs of the many are best fulfilled by meeting the needs of the one, promoting their individual identity. |
| Kaitlin Gardiner | Macbeth’s Inability To Perceive And Expel Evil And The Functioning Of The Eye | William Shakespeare’s play Macbeth is a play full of imagery and the effect imagery has on the observer. This is derived from early medical assumptions of Galenic and emission theory, which together state that the sight of various objects can physically impact the viewer. Observing evil objects was thought to be harmful in that it could hinder one’s ability to perceive danger, making it more difficult to avoid. For example, Macbeth is exposed to evil throughout the play in the form of the witches, the apparitions, and the unclean status of the air that accompanies them. Evidently, Shakespeare and his characters are aware of the influence evil has, implying that Macbeth disregards the danger and continues to seek it out. As according to the Bible, it was believed that a king should be able to dispel evil with his gaze, something that Macbeth illustrates he is unable to do. Thus, Macbeth has lost his divine right to rule, as he has become effectively poisoned by the evil he witnesses, which contributes to his usurpation at the end of the play. |
| Trisha Glover | Influences Of Informants’ Age and Expertise: Trust Of Testimony by Adults Regarding Food Contamination | This study examined the degree to which college students trusted the testimony of various experts regarding the safety of food. Current research has focused on the trusting nature of young children when concerned with the safety of consuming foods that have been previously contaminated. More specifically, current research has investigated this “contamination sensitivity” in young children to determine which individual’s testimony (i.e., adult–experts and child–experts) a child will trust when concerned with whether a food is safe or unsafe to consume. Children (N=81) and adults (N=64) viewed video clips with female informant pairs (e.g., mom vs. nurse), providing testimony about whether foods were “okay to eat.” In each clip, participants saw a covered bowl and were told that it contained a food they liked. They watched a mischievous stranger place an unknown contaminant into the bowl. Participants decided whom to ask whether or not the food was okay to eat, watched informants examine the bowl’s contents and make opposing claims, and made a choice (okay/not okay) based on the testimony. After four trials, participants rated who was better at answering. Separate 3 (age: younger, middle, or adult) X 4 (condition: adult expert, child expert, neutral, or nurse expert) ANOVAs were run on the number of expert–based responses for the three measures. Findings indicate that age–related factors, rather than expertise–related factors, are highly considered when initially trusting an informant. Additionally, endorsement of expert opinions was influenced by the age of the individual, as well as the age of the expert. |
| Athena Gordon | “album”: A Braided Memoir | During my English Nonfiction Writing capstone, I wrote a memoir titled “album,” which explores the intersection between anxiety, memory, and my relationship with my father. I propose to read several short excerpts of this piece for PLU’s Undergraduate Research Symposium. Throughout the text, I meditate on several salient moments during my childhood and the emotional tone of my memories, particularly unpacking how my childhood exchanges with my father have influenced my interactions with the social world. Unlike traditional memoirs, these various vignettes of memories break chronology and lack a traditional linear plotline, specifically employing the braided technique of creative nonfiction writing. This structural form of multiple interwoven thematic braids exemplifies the tangled nature of memory and social relationships, highlighting convoluted human experiences. The braided form in this essay was influenced through writing of Brenda Miller and Amanda C. Niehaus, as well as the arrangement of musical albums which often juxtapose songs with different tempos, lyrical themes, and musical styles. In order to strengthen the narrative structure, the memoir also has repetition of several sensory-driven images, namely acoustic instruments and lemons. This imagery serves to bridge the various braids in the essay to provide thematic consistency to readers, amidst the complexity of the structural form. |
| Courtney Hartman and Miranda Martens | Another Look at What Instructors Say: Analyzing Emergent Categories Of Non-Content Instructor Talk in an Introductory Biology Course | The language that instructors use in the classroom may play a significant role in aspects of student learning. In a previously published study, the Instructor Talk framework was developed and defined as non-content language that an instructor uses that is not related to the concept of the course. Building on this study, 8-additional courses were analyzed, resulting in the identification of emergent categories of Instructor Talk not previously found in the original study. Our goal was to answer the question: Is there Non-Productive Instructor Talk present in the original dataset that consisted of a college-level introductory biology course class transcriptions? To test if the emergent Non-Productive categories found in the follow-up study were present in the original study, we used a two-phase process to reanalyze transcripts from the original study’s course. We had two researchers re-read each class transcript individually and use qualitative coding to identify quotes of Non-Productive Instructor Talk, then combined their findings to reach our results. We found that Non-Productive Instructor Talk was present in the original study but was rare compared to the whole-course dataset. Additionally, the rate of Non-Productive Instructor Talk that an instructor uses varies, and some instructors may tend to use more of this language than others. The rubric for identifying Instructor Talk has the potential to be used as a tool and resource for biology education researchers who wish to add on to this topic and instructors of any subject who wish to evaluate their own teaching styles to improve science teaching. |
| Faith Heimlich & Elizabeth Parkhurst | Mental Skills Tool- Self Talk | Self talk is a dialogue one has with themselves, which can happen inside their head or spoken out loud. Self talk has been shown to have a positive impact on learning new skills and improving overall performance by helping with skill acquisition, attentional focus, controlled reactions, and triggers for automatic execution. These benefits are evident in all levels of athletes and learners, in both gross and fine tasks. Self talk serves two functions, motivational and instructional. Self talk is specific to the individual, but the benefit of self talk is greatly increased with practice, no matter what type is used. *** Methods: To create this mental skills training tool, an in-depth video search was performed to find clips of sport psychologists and athletes discussing and demonstrating the role of self-talk. Many videos were selected, clipped, and placed together to create a cohesive training tool that is focused on providing coaches and athletes a reference for why self talk is important and how to use it correctly. It defines self talk, gives multiple examples of how it can be used, and discusses the functions of self talk. It also gives athletes cues for a variety of tasks, and teaches them to change negative thoughts to positive. The goal of this tool is to equip coaches and athletes with information to effectively use self talk, and to maximize effectiveness of athletes by talking through specific skills that are being learned, mentally preparing for the task, and recovering effectively following mistakes. |
| Xinhui (Sunny) Huang | Elucidating The Role Of Transcription In Adaptive Mutagenesis With Rad26Ko Cell Lines Of Saccharomyces Cerevisiae | Acquisition of drug-resistance in microorganisms has been of great interest in research and medicine. When cells are under selective pressure, their growth is often arrested, however some cells will undergo adaptive mutagenesis, a process in which arrested cells develop a mutation that allows them to overcome the selective pressure and resume growth. During growth arrest, replication will not take place, but transcription continues to provide proteins required for cell survival, thus we are interested in the contribution of transcription in the mechanism of adaptive mutagenesis. Using the yeast Saccharomyces cerevisiae as a model system, we explored the interplay between transcription and DNA damage in initiating adaptive mutagenesis by generating a mutant cell line lacking Rad26, a protein required for transcription-coupled DNA repair (TCR). We knocked out Rad26, both alone and in conjunction with Ogg1, deletion of which increases the steady state levels of oxidative DNA damage. Results showed that Rad26 depression neither increases nor decreases mutation frequency (WT: 1.5 x 10-7, rad26: 6.8 x 10-8) indicating that it had little to no effects in adaptive mutagenesis at the transcription level. |
| Jessica Johnson | Children and Adults Rely on Prior Knowledge and Informant Accuracy When Evaluating Testimony About Contamination | Developmental research demonstrates that young children selectively trust a domain-specific expert rather than a neutral informant, and children as young as 3 or 4 have an understanding of contamination sensitivity (knowing if food is safe to eat). Here, we explore children’s trust in testimony about whether foods are safe to eat after making contact with visible contaminant. We assessed children’s (age 4-6, n=54; age 7-8, n=68; age 10-12, n=48) and adult’s (n=64) selective trust of experts differing in knowledge of germs and contamination paired. Previously, we demonstrated that children (ages 4-9) largely ignored testimony from experts when it conflicted with their prior knowledge about contamination. In the present study, we recoded the data to examine whether children are responding based on expert accuracy rather than expertise. Participants viewed video clips consisting of female informant pairs (mom vs. nurse or child) who provided conflicting testimony of whether food was “okay to eat” after a mischievous stranger put a contaminant (grass/leaf/coin/paperclip) in the bowl. There were four conditions: mom/nurse, mom implicit expert/child, mom/child expert, and mom explicit expert/child. Adult participants acted as a comparison group to understand the developmental endpoint of trust of testimony. Older children and adults performed similarly in recognizing and trusting expertise testimony that middle and young children look past. The three oldest age groups were significantly more likely to trust accurate informants as opposed to domain-specific experts. This demonstrates the development of trust in accurate testimony beginning around age 6 in the context of food contamination. |
| Emma Loest | Paris Nights: Queering Time and Space in Giovanni's Room | Expatriation in James Baldwin’s Giovanni’s Room has long been the topic of scholarly discussion; it is, after all, the driving force that sends Baldwin’s protagonist David on his journey of queer self discovery. Although this theme is essential to the novel, it is the new ways in which David engages with time and space that allow him to explore his sexuality. While in Paris, David meets and falls in love with Giovanni, a fellow migrant working in a gay bar. Giovanni’s job demands that the couple depart from the normative experience of diurnal time and instead lead a largely nocturnal life. By living at night and sleeping during the day, David and Giovanni reject standard constructions of time and instead operate within their own temporality. Additionally, the places in which David and Giovanni spend time—like the gay bar and Giovanni’s room—not only serve this nocturnal lifestyle but also foster the development of queer countercultures that are spatially removed from heteronormative society. By spending time in places that subvert heterosexist constructions of time and space, David and Giovanni create for themselves a queer reality that uniquely relates to their life together. Applying a queer theoretical lens to constructions of space and time shows that while expatriation initiates David’s journey, it is the redefinition—or queering—of time and space that drives the queer plot of this novel. |
| Alex Lund | “’To Salvage Something Of The Scobey Line!’: Grain Elevators And Community In Northeastern Montana, 1917-2017” | The relationship between the Railroad and the communities it created has long been studied as an integral part of westward expansion and for its role in the global trade of agricultural goods. Likewise, when it comes to Rail abandonment, the economic factors of this relationship have been well studied to explain decline in Rail service. However, very little of this research addresses the social and economic impacts abandonment has on the communities that are left behind. Furthermore, the role of grain elevators and what happens to them after Rail abandonment is often overlooked, particularly those communities that maintain elevators without Rail service. This paper utilizes Scobey, Montana, as a case study to explore the social and economic relationships between an agricultural community and its grain elevator before and after Rail abandonment. Primarily through the use of local newspaper, the Daniels County Leader, and interviews with Scobey community members, this study addresses the business relationship between grain elevators and the communities they serve, and the choices this farming community has been forced to make to remain viable. This paper gives voice to an under represented group in American agricultural history, the Rail abandoned community. By researching the economic and social impacts of Rail abandonment upon Scobey and the subsequent strategies independent farmers are forced to employ, economically feasible solutions can be developed that are respectful of local populations and addresses needs of the community and various agricultural businesses present. |
| Madeline Marello and Samantha Simundson | Children's Biological And Expertise-Based Explanations Regarding Trust In Others' Testimony About Food Safety | We investigated children’s preferences and their responses for domain-specific expertise testimony concerning food contamination through a two-part study. This is important to research so that parents and guardians of children can begin to understand how children are influenced by others in specific regards to food and consumption. Participants were exposed to videos where informants gave conflicting testimony, provided by either a domain-specific expert or a neutral informant about a contaminated bowl of food. In the first study, there are four sequences of a video showing a person placing a contaminant in a bowl of food. The four different contaminants were either a coin, a leaf, grass, or a paperclip. In the second study, the methods were kept the same except the contaminant was unidentifiable to participants, so that participants were unable to use their own prior knowledge. Our main focus was examining the free responses children gave to questions of why they believe the food is okay or not okay, why someone might get sick or not if they ate the food, and how much the participant would or would not like to try the food. These open-ended answers were coded on a biological knowledge scale and an expertise scale. The biological knowledge scale has been used in previous articles to identify how much biological knowledge a child possessed by the key words they use in their responses. The word ‘germ’ shows a higher biological knowledge level than the word ‘dirty’. The expertise scale we created for this study works similar to the biological knowledge scale, in that higher reliance on informants in response constitutes a higher expertise knowledge and usage. We were interested in comparing the free responses from both studies, to determine if there are any differences for when the contaminant is known or unknown. Participants in the first study of the visible contaminant all age groups were more likely to use biological responses when explaining their choices, stemming from previous knowledge. However, for the non-visible contaminant study, all age groups were more likely to use expertise responses. This further demonstrates that children as young as five-years-old are able to understand contamination concepts, and when needed can also rely on expertise. This shows that children when able to use prior knowledge of food safety will override expert testimony, and when they cannot use prior knowledge will trust who they believe to be an expert on food safety. |
| Tegan Mitchell | Living Out Of Bounds: The Queered Crucifixion Of Matthew, The Good Shepherd | In the American Mountain West, a life of rugged individualism and freedom stretches the physical boundaries of community. The hills and landscapes, especially in Wyoming, have been largely defined by Christian religious tradition and conformity to Christian conviction. The region’s widespread faithful commitment to religious conformity has contributed to denying queer visibility, queer place, and queer existence. In this paper I approach The Laramie Project, Moises Kaufman’s documentary theatre that pulls from interviews with the people of Laramie after the murder of Matthew Shepard, through an interdisciplinary lens, considering historical and sociological contexts as well as the theories of queer space and place. The commitment to conformity in Laramie, reflected in The Laramie Project, condemned Matthew Shepard’s queer identity, denied his right to queered space in the town, and ultimately played a role in his horrific murder. Many interviewees of The Laramie Project claim a resemblance between Jesus of Nazareth nailed to the cross and Matthew Shepard bound to the fence; both men close to death for hours and left to look over the landscapes below them. However, the version of Jesus most interviewees claim that Matthew mirrors is a falsehood of the White, western, conformist church. My analysis illuminates that the figure of Jesus which Matthew Shepard truly embodied is the Jesus who was a queer-ally, a nonconformist, and a martyr-for-the-marginalized. I argue that the text juxtaposes two versions of Christian faith, one being the conformist Christian landscape that rejected Matthew, and the other the unapologetic queered space Matthew created with his role as a martyr for the oppressed, not unlike Jesus. |
| Sean Murphy | The Impact And Implications Of The Use Of Pitch Correction Programs In The Music Industry | This study investigates perceptions on how pitch correction technologies have impacted and been received in the music industry and among audiences. This question is important because technology has made a monumental impact on how we experience and create music. Pitch correction programs, like Auto-Tune and Melodyne, are being used almost every day. To obtain my results, I engaged in a literature review on the topic, surveyed students on campus, and interviewed semi-professional and professional recording engineers and producers who work in the music industry. I created my questions with a neutral tone, so as not to taint the results from the surveys and interviews. The results seem to indicate that pitch correction programs can be used for more than just fixing a bad pitch - they can be used in very creative ways to achieve a certain quality of sound. However, many people also believe that they have been used too much and in undesirable ways, and this is what has tainted the technology in the eyes of mainstream media. Clearly pitch correction programs are here to stay, and will continue to impact how we experience and create music. Audiences may need to adapt to this new reality, both enjoying the new possibilities that pitch correction offers, while still holding musicians to high standards of ability. |
| Emily Ness and Gabrielle Kamm | Decorating Carbon Electrodes With Gold Nanoparticles To Study The Kinetics Of Redox Reactions | Batteries and capacitors are essential to storing energy in portable electronic devices, such as electric vehicles, smart phones, and laptop computers, but further technological advances are needed to increase the amount of energy that batteries and capacitors can store and the rate at which they can store and then release energy. Battery and capacitor electrodes commonly contain carbon because it is lightweight, safe, and inexpensive. However, carbon does not carry out redox reactions as quickly or as efficiently as gold or platinum electrodes do. Because precious metal electrodes are too expensive to be practical, we hypothesize that low-cost carbon electrodes can be made to behave as though they are made of gold by decorating the surface of the carbon with only trace amounts of gold nanoparticles. We tether gold nanoparticles (~10 nm in diameter) to the surface of electrodes and then make electrochemical measurements to test how quickly redox reactions happen on these electrodes. Our preliminary data shows that while gold nanoparticles themselves don’t accelerate redox reactions, heating gold-modified carbon electrodes to 300˚C changes the chemistry at the surface of our electrodes enough that redox reactions occur at faster rates than on bare carbon electrodes. |
| Courtney Olsen | Stolen Children: Abduction, "Germanization", And Adoption Of Children From Nazi-Occupied Eastern Europe | By the time of the collapse of the Nazi regime in May 1945, hundreds of thousands of children from Poland, Czechoslovakia, Yugoslavia, and other Nazi-occupied territories were kidnapped for adoption by German families. Selected for their light hair, blue eyes, and perceived racial superiority, these children were subject to rigorous racial examinations and psychological “Germanization” processes to make them suitable for adoption. This project investigates the abduction of these “racially valuable” children from the eastern occupied territories of the Nazi Regime and the social and political pressures behind them. These abductions began in response to Nazi insecurities about the future of the German bloodline and were part of a larger initiative to bolster the Aryan race called the Lebensborn Program. This aspect of the program had a three-fold purpose: to promote the growth of the “master race”, to separate “good blood” from “bad blood”, and to be used as another weapon against those living in the east. Through an analysis of a wide range of primary and secondary sources, I examine Nazi racial and pronatalist policies, the organizations and Nazi leadership involved with the kidnappings, and personal accounts from kidnapped children and their families. This research illuminates another lesser-known but nonetheless disturbing piece of the wide range of crimes committed by the Nazi Regime. |
| Claire Pahlmeyer | The Effect Of A Trade School Education On Lifetime Earnings | The rising cost of attending four-year universities concerns students and parents across the nation, calling for possible educational alternatives. One alternative may be trade schools, offering a shorter path from secondary education to the workforce. In deciding which post-graduation path to pursue, students may be interested in the rate of return to each of these options. The rate of return, in this case, is the marginal increase in discounted lifetime earnings as a percentage of total monetary investment in the additional requisite training. Many estimates have arisen calculating the rate of return to a four-year degree, but comparatively little has been done for trade schools and short-term programs. This study is a preliminary attempt to fill this gap, focusing on beauty schools as a specified form of trade school, and comparing tuition and early-career salaries from twenty-three beauty schools in the state of Washington to pre-calculated Washington averages for four-year universities. If the return to beauty schools is higher, one would expect to see an increase in students’ capitalizing on the program with the higher rate of return so as to maximize lifetime earnings and make a logical career choice. Preliminary results suggest a higher rate of return for four-year programs, indicating a much larger return on investment for students studying at four-year universities than those at trade schools. However, clumping in the results challenges the adequacy of the sample size. Further studies with expanded data sets would likely reveal a smaller gap between rates of return for each program. |
| David Redman | Replication Of--A Bad Taste In The Mouth: Gustatory Disgust Influences Moral Judgment (Eskine, K. J., Kacinik, N. A., & Prinz, J. J. (2011).) | This study was conducted as part of the Collaborative Research and Education Project (C.R.E.P.) which aims to replicate studies with important findings to verify the results and to capitalize on the educational benefits of conducting established research. It was a replication of “A Bad Taste in the Mouth: Gustatory Disgust Influences Moral Judgment (Eskine, K. J., Kacinik, N. A., & Prinz, J. J. (2011)”, which found that disgusting taste elicited harsher moral judgements and that those who identify as politically conservative hold harsher moral judgements than those who identify as politically liberal. In addition to the original study an Islamoprejudice measure was added with the purpose of identifying levels of Islamoprejudice. The study had 57 participants drink either a sweet, bitter or neutral beverage and then were asked to read and rate several vignettes on how morally offensive they were (the bitter condition was intended to elicit harsher moral judgements). Following the vignettes participants responded to the Islamoprejudice measure which consisted of 19 questions. The original study was replicated before any additional measures were completed by the participants. We were unable to replicate the findings of Eskine et al. (2011) as there were no differences of moral judgement between taste conditions or between political ideologies. There were no differences on the Islamoprejudice measure between taste conditions or between political ideologies. The results did indicate moderate levels of Islamoprejudice. |
| Blakely Sanders | The Acute Effect Of An Exercise Class On Sensory-Deprived Static Balance In Older Adults | Research question: What is the effect of a single bout of exercise on sensory-deprived static balance in older adults? Rationale: The risk for falls drastically increases with age, with one in three adults over the age of 65 experiencing a fall every year. Stay Active and Independent for Life (SAIL) is an evidence-based program that has been implemented in several facilities to prevent falls. The acute effects of the exercise class of the SAIL program on balance has not been evaluated. Research Methods: Fifteen participants volunteered for a pretest-posttest designed experiment. The participants completed two balance tests lasting 20 seconds in duration during quiet bipedal stance. Participants were instructed to keep their eyes closed, while standing on a pressure platform before and after the exercise class. Results: The average center of pressure before and after the class was 45.7 ± 33.3 cm and 39.2 ± 17.2 cm, respectively. This data was not statistically significant (p = 0.19). The average change in center of pressure along the medio-lateral (ML) axis before and after the exercise was 1.32 ± 0.8 cm and 1.28 ± 0.65 cm, respectively. The average change along the anterior-posterior (AP) axis before and after exercise was 3.25 ± 1.4 cm and 3.32 ± 1.1 cm, respectively. Conclusions: The results showed no significant difference in balance after one bout of a SAIL class in older adults. This data indicates that an exercise bout does not negatively impact balance in this population. |
| Jana-Alicia Schmidt | Children’s Literature On The Syrian Refugee Crisis: Disrupted Attachment In "Akim Rennt" | Only a limited number of children’s books published in Germany since 2015 provide insight into the lives of Syrian refugee children: their escape from their homelands, their perilous journeys, and the difficulties of adjusting to their new lives, including their integration into German schools and communities. "Akim rennt" ("Akim Runs"), an illustrated children’s book by Claude K. Dubois, is a powerful example of the healing potential of children’s literature on this topic. Trauma theory illuminates Akim’s journey, allowing deeper understanding of the trauma that Syrian children refugees endure. Akim’s traumatic experiences disrupt his attachment to his mother, causing dissociation and avoidance of others. The text reflects this trauma in a series of clustered black-and-white sketches – sometimes uninterrupted by text for pages at a time when Akim is unable to speak – that depict this disrupted attachment. "Akim Runs" thus fulfills a two-part need: it provides Syrian children with a powerful literary validation of their traumatic experiences, while also offering German children contextual and sympathetic background regarding their Syrian peers. |
| Susan Schowalter | Television’s Lasting Impact: A Case Study Of Marshall Mcluhan’S Theory Of The Global Village In The 1960S | This paper focuses on the influence of television in the major historical events that took place in the 1960s. I utilize author Marshall McLuhan’s theory known as the global village. McLuhan describes a change in human interaction on a global scale that is caused by new technology. This paper analyzes nine distinct historical events: Zengakuren, the 1960 U.S. presidential debate, the Civil Rights movement, Prague Springs, the U.S Democratic National Convention of 1968, Sorbonne, the Vietnam War, Biafra, and the 1968 Mexico Olympics. By providing a case study of McLuhan’s theory, this paper argues that live television impacted these historical events through the broadcasts of local protests to a larger audience and that McLuhan accurately predicted the extent of television's impact in the 1960s. Live television provided information regarding the development of current events happening in one part of the world to individuals on the other side of the world, creating a public that was, as McLuhan would say, more “with it” than ever before. This change ultimately led to public opinion influencing events that would have received little global attention only decades earlier. McLuhan observed this shift in public awareness with incredible accuracy while it was happening. The shortcomings of McLuhan’s theory regarding the use of media and technology today are also examined. |
| Hannah Soltis | An Open Book?: University Libraries and their Roles in Society | One of the fundamental purposes of a library is to be a repository of information to which members of a local community (i.e. the people who live within reasonable traveling distance of the physical resources), can go to research or learn. However, in the case of many university libraries, there is an inherent privilege built into their systems of operation in a way that denies the original goal of dispersion of knowledge. The exclusionary nature of these libraries thus hinders the ability of some community members to engage with the resources closest to them and precludes the scholarship that could emerge. By examining the policies and stated missions of the Bodleian Libraries at the University of Oxford, the Biblioteca Central at the National Autonomous University of Mexico, and the Suzzallo Libraries at the University of Washington, I analyze the varying ways that these libraries, which were born of different times and cultures, interact with their surrounding communities and to what degree they are working to improve their inclusivity. Each library’s histories and policies demonstrate the ways their goals as institutions and their roles in their communities have evolved to be more or less accepting. |
| Eldon Sorensen | The Impact Of Chronic Graft Vs. Host Disease On Survival In Bone Marrow Transplant Patients | Cancer patients who receive a bone marrow transplant are susceptible to developing Graft-versus-Host Disease (GvHD); a medical condition where the donor cells attack the host body. GvHD can be classified into two categories: acute and chronic GvHD. Acute GvHD develops within 100 days of the transplant whereas chronic GvHD develops after approximately 100 days. Data were collected from 128 cancer patients who received allogeneic bone marrow transplants at the University of Iowa Hospitals and Clinics and were followed prospectively. The objective of our study was to assess and compare the impact of chronic GvHD on overall survival in patients treated with and without antihuman T-lymphocyte immune globulin (ATG). Survival analysis methods were employed in a statistical analysis of the data. In particular, we used Cox regression to model and test for significant survival effects of GvHD and ATG. The applications of our models provide estimates of the degree to which chronic GvHD impacts survival in patients who received allogeneic transplants. |
| Sarah Stafford | Impact Of Static Versus Dynamic Stretching On Power Output In Recreational Wheelchair Basketball Players | Question: Is there an impact on dynamic versus static stretching on power output in recreational wheelchair basketball players? RATIONALE: Research on the most effective type of warm-up is equivocal and research on wheelchair athletes is minimal. METHODS: In this study, 6 recreational wheelchair basketball athletes (4 females and 2 males, age = 23.16 ± 7.33 yrs.) completed 4 different trials. Each trial consisted of a 30 second upper body Wingate Anaerobic Test (WANT). The first trial for each participant was a familiarization trial. The experimental trials, completed in a counterbalanced order, were a static stretching trial (STAT), dynamic stretching trial (DYN), and a control trial (CON). Before the STAT and DYN, each participant completed a 5 minute static or dynamic warm-up. The peak wattage during the upper body WANT test and the participants rating of perceived exertion (RPE) after the 30 second upper body WANT was recorded. RESULTS: There were no significant mean differences seen in the peak wattage between the three trials (p>0.05). RPE was found to be significantly different between DYN and STAT [16.00 ± 1.80 (DYN) vs. 17.16 ± 1.47 (STAT), p=0.006]. CONCLUSION: There were no statistically significant results on peak power output. There was a significant difference in RPE showing participants felt less exerted after a dynamic warm-up opposed to a static warm-up. Further research should be conducted assessing different warm-up strategies and durations on performance outcomes in this population. |
| Maddie Titelbaum | Female Participation In Community Forestry Practices, Kotra Block, Rajasthan | Forest landscapes in India affect the livelihoods of 200 million citizens, 89 million of whom are considered Scheduled Tribes under Constitution Order 1950. A history of laws recognizes tribal communities right to property ownership, traditional knowledge, and the use and management of resources, the actual rights granted varies greatly across the nation. This study is situated in Rajasthan, a semi-arid desert and mountainous region in a predominantly tribal area called Kotra block. The block is heavily forested and has varying degrees of controls over the forest land by the Forest Department, and Community Forest Rights (CFR) Committees. This research study examined sociocultural push and pull factors that helped or hindered female empowerment and active participation in community forest management. This study consisted of a literature review, observation of community meetings, interviews with tribal women, a forest officer and Non-government Organization (NGO) workers to determine the sociocultural factors impacting female participation in community forest management. The results of this study concluded that local NGOs like Astha Sansthan have positively influenced female participation in local governance and demands for land rights, however, many systemic gender and livelihood issues still hinder active participation from most tribal women. This study concludes that NGOs should continue involving women in leadership roles and should continue work that addresses tribal livelihood and particularly women’s issues. Additionally, this study concludes that the government should fulfill and expand on polices for forest rights and tribal self-governance. |
| Toriana Vigil | Improving Luminescent Solar Concentrator Efficiency Using Doped Nanocrystals And Ligand Exchange | Luminescent Solar Concentrators (LSCs) are an innovative solar technology that can be paired with traditional photovoltaic solar cells or can be paired with a photocatalyst. The functional unit of a LSC are the embedded dyes, which absorb sunlight and then luminesce. The emitted light then propagates throughout the device by wave-guiding and can be collected at the edges. For utmost efficiency, nanocrystal quantum dots can be used as the dye. We are postulating potential improvements in LSC efficiency through the use of elongated Mn-doped ZnSe/ZnS nanocrystals. As doped nanocrystals, our Mn:ZnSe/ZnS quantum dots will likely have a large effective Stokes’ shift, which has been shown to increase LSC performance. The elongated shape of these nanocrystals will allow for them to be aligned within the polymer matrix of an LSC, potentially reducing scattering and escape cone losses. To further improve efficiency, we are also examining the exchange of native nanocrystal ligands with novel methacrylate ligands in order to increase solubility of the nanocrystals in the LSC matrix. Thus far, Mn:ZnSe/ZnS quantum dots with exchanged ligands are a promising dye for increasingly efficient LSCs. |
| Hilary Vo | “the collective:” A Counterpublic Working To Increase Sense Of Belonging For Students Of Color At Pacific Lutheran University | Through my research, I apply a theoretical framework based in literacy studies to a student activist group, “the collective,” which is working to increase sense of belonging for students of color at a predominantly white liberal arts university, Pacific Lutheran University. Through my research, I have found that historically, students of color in predominantly white university settings report a lower sense of belonging than white-identified students. Literacy as applied to “the collective” can be explored in multiple frameworks, however, the frameworks of “discourse communities” and “publics and counterpublics,” will be the focus for contextualizing this group. A discourse community is defined by Kinkead as, “a group of people who share values and assumptions and ways of communicating… As a result of association among its members, a discourse community shares common language characteristics and patterns” (Kinkead 151). I seek to build upon existing literature about sense of belonging for students of color, and my goal is to examine the dominant discourse community of Pacific Lutheran University through an examination of the PLU 2020 Vision: Affirming Our Commitments, Shaping Our Future Document, and compare it to “the collective” as a counterpublic via the Necessary Steps for the Advancement of Racial Equity at PLU. |
| Breanna Wiersma | Life, Health, and Oppression in De Amor y de Sombra | Authoritarian governments are upheld by institutional support: for Isabel Allende’s De Amor y De Sombra (Of Love and Shadows), the invasive involvement of the military in civilians’ personal matters and their simultaneous disregard for the value of citizens’ lives are essential for the dictatorship to maintain control. However, Allende illustrates how it is not only clearly corrupt structures that reinforce oppression, but that authoritarian structures are also upheld through central institutions’ implicit support. Institutions’ inability to reject or respond to systemic injustices reinforces oppression, even if these structures may not share or support the ideology of the oppressive leadership directly. In this case, the medical system echoes the dictatorship’s problems of authority and silencing, while doctors’ ineptitude and the lack of resources in rural communities leave gaps in needed care that more corrupt structures — in this case, the military — step in to fill. Through examining the use, misuse, and lack of use of systemic medical care in the novel, I explore how while dictatorships may be founded on authoritarianism, corruption, and the disregard for the needs of the people, seemingly benevolent structures (in this case, the healthcare system) work to reinforce this oppression. |