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Since the inception of what is now known as the Behavioral Analysis Unit (BAU) at the Federal Bureau of Investigation (FBI) in the 1970s, criminal profiling has become an increasingly prevalent entity in both forensic science and the popular imagination. The fundamental idea of which profiling is premised – behavior as a reflection of personality – has been the subject of a great deal of misunderstanding, with professionals and nonprofessionals alike questioning whether profiling represents an art or a science and what its function in forensic science should be. To provide a more thorough understanding of criminal profiling’s capabilities and its efficacy as a law enforcement tool, this thesis will examine the application of criminal profiling to investigations, various court rulings concerning profiling’s admissibility, and the role that popular media plays in the perception and function of the practice. It will also discuss how future research and regulatory advancements may strengthen criminal profiling’s scientific merit and legitimacy.
This paper explores the psychological experiences of domestic workers in three contemporary Latin American films: Roma (Mexico, 2018), Crímenes de familia (Argentina, 2020) and Que Horas Ela Volta? (Brazil, 2015). Specifically, the motherhood of these three protagonists is explored and analyzed using psychological research that pertains to motherhood, trauma, and the relationships between domestic workers and the families that employ them. This paper reveals that contemporary Latin American cinema portrays domestic workers as having negative experiences of motherhood as a direct result of their occupation and proposes for further protections, policy change, and psychological research to take place for domestic workers in Latin America and beyond.
The present study explored the relationship between desired purchasing behavior and individual differences using two nationally-representative, longitudinal samples of the U.S. population early in the COVID-19 pandemic. Past research has shown that individual differences provide information about how one might respond to threat. Therefore, we predicted changes in desired purchasing behavior across different sociodemographic variables that might reflect those differences. Specifically, we investigated hypotheses related to political orientation, age, sexual orientation, socioeconomic status, and whether or not the participant had children. We measured participants’ reported desired purchasing behavior across eleven categories of goods and investigated the connection between specific demographic variables and desired purchasing behavior. We found that conservatives desired to purchase more basic protection goods (guns/ammunition, cash, gas) and that older people desired to purchase more cleaning supplies and toiletries. These findings illustrate possible explanations for purchasing behavior during the COVID-19 pandemic and reveal directions for marketing designed to influence purchasing behavior.
The Charlie Hebdo attacks fueled an online debate over freedom of expression and religion, whereas the purpose of social media evolved into a humanitarian one following the November 13 attacks in Paris. This research looks into the individual evolutions of the related hashtags that surfaced in 2015, including #JeSuisCharlie (and its opposites, such as #JeNeSuisPasCharlie), #DonDuSang, #PorteOuverte and #RechercheParis, among others. Another research point was with the September 11 attacks—with the 9/11 attacks against the United States, few to no channels were available for the kind of immediate discussions and support seen after the Paris attacks. After spending time in Paris during the spring 2015 semester and researching the aftermath of the Charlie Hebdo attacks and the history of the publication, the conclusion rests on the idea that the online discussions perpetuated by both supporters and dissenters of the magazine contribute to a more robust, open democracy supported by these social media platforms.
A portion of this thesis also delves into the parallels and differences between the American First Amendment and the French free speech laws—all of which pertain to the Charlie Hebdo content and the online responses to the 2015 Paris attacks.
The interviews conducted include a French art history professor at the Sorbonne University in Paris, two creators of the “Je Suis Charlie” Facebook page, an American journalist living in Paris who covered the Charlie Hebdo attack and who was present during the November attacks, and a Muslim-American doctor in Phoenix who founded the American Islamic Forum for Democracy. The ideas surrounding free speech, the value of art such as that found within the pages of Charlie Hebdo, the media’s treatment of religion, traditional democratic freedoms and ties to social media revolutions are all components of this research thesis.
