The Psychology Department faculty, students and staff have some impressive accomplishments over the last year. Below is a brief snapshot of some recent happenings.
Lisa Crockett, Professor of Psychology, Developmental Program, was elected as the next president of the Society for Research on Adolescence.
Michael Dodd, Associate Professor of Psychology, Social and Cognitive Program was named Editor of Attention, Perception, and Psychophysics.
David DiLillo, Professor of Psychology, Clinical Program was awarded Outstanding Research and Creative Activity Award from the College of Arts and Sciences at UNL.
Sarah Gervais, Associate Professor of Psychology, Social and Cognitive Program, Law-Psychology Program, was named Associate Editor at Psychology of Women Quarterly.
Ming Li, Associate Professor of Psychology, Behavior and Neuroscience Program, named Fellow of Division 28 (Psychopharmacology and Substance Abuse) of the APA.
Will Spaulding, Professor of Psychology, Clinical Program, received the The Kraepelin-Alzheimer Medal.
Cynthia Willis-Esqueda, Associate Professor of Psychology, Social and Cognitive Program, Law-Psychology Program, was appointed to the U.S. Office of Minority Health’s Region VII Health Equity Committee (RHEC) in which she is serving on the Cultural Competency subcommittee.
The Psychology Department has also received several grants to fund important research as well as publications on fascinating topics.
Research
Lisa Crockett, Professor of Psychology, Developmental Program, received a research grant to examine early temperament, social/contextual support, and adolescent adjustment from the National Institutes of Health.
Anna Jaffe, graduate student, Clinical Program, Received a grant from the National Institutes of Health to study the effects of alcohol intoxication on intrusive memories.
Amy Ort, graduate student, Neuroscience and Behavior Program, received an Animal Behavior Society Student Research Grant to complete her thesis work on perspective taking in pinyon jays.
Publications
Carolyn Brown-Kramer, Adjunct Professor of Psychology, recently published a paper in the Journal of Health Behavior titled "Planning versus Action: Different Decision-Making Processes Predict Plans to Change One's Diet versus Actual Dietary Behavior." When asked about what she discovered, here is what she said:
Imagine an appointment with your medical provider in which she or he recommends substituting your current diet of cheesy poofs and cola with cruciferous vegetables and skim milk. As you sadly head to the store's produce section to stock up on "rabbit food," you pass a tempting display of freshly-baked chocolate croissants, but you steel yourself against their buttery goodness, recalling the detrimental effects of excessive high-fat food intake recounted by your provider. Or do you? This investigation demonstrated that when we plan dietary choices, we primarily consider the utility of eating healthily versus poorly, and yet when it comes to actually engaging in dietary behaviors, we are driven most directly by positive or negative affect associated with the behaviors. The road to ill health appears to be paved with good intentions... and delicious cheesy poofs.
Maital Neta, Assistant Professor of Psychology, Social and Cognitive Program, Behavior and Neuroscience Program, recently published a paper titled “Spatial and temporal characteristics of error-related activity in the human brain in the Journal of Neuroscience. When asked about what she discovered, she said:
To examine error-related activity broadly, we conducted a meta-analysis of 12 tasks varying by stimulus input (visual, auditory), response output (button press, speech), stimulus category (words, pictures), and task type (e.g., recognition memory, mental rotation). We identified 41 brain regions that showed error-related activity and showed that these regions can be organized based on their spatial (functional brain network membership) and temporal (response timecourse) characteristics. We suggest that, in the place of a single localized error mechanism, there is a large-scale set of error-related regions across multiple systems that likely subserve different functions.
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