Matching Items (4)
Description
The spread of urbanization leads to habitat fragmentation and deterioration and changes the composition of ecosystems for species all over the world. Different groups of organisms are impacted differently, and insects have experienced loss in diversity and abundance due to changing environmental factors. Here, I collected seed beetles across 12 urban and rural sites in Phoenix, Arizona, to analyze the effects of urbanization and habitat variation on beetle diversity and abundance. I found that urbanization, host tree origin, and environmental factors such as tree diversity and density had no impact on overall beetle diversity and abundance. Beetles were found to have higher density on hosts with a higher density of pods. In assessing individual beetle species, some beetles exhibited higher density in rural sites with native trees, and some were found more commonly on nonnative tree species. The observed differences in beetle density demonstrate the range of effects urbanization and environmental features can have on insect species. By studying ecosystem interactions alongside changing environments, we can better predict the role urbanization and human development can have on different organisms.
ContributorsPaduano, Gabrielle (Author) / Savalli, Udo (Thesis director) / Sweat, Ken (Committee member) / Division of Teacher Preparation (Contributor) / School of Mathematical and Natural Sciences (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor)
Created2018-05
Description
Stress, empathy, and emotion regulation are factors that can greatly shape an individual's behavior, thoughts, and physiology. The degree to which an individual experiences stress, demonstrates empathy, or is able to regulate emotions can influence his or her ability to establish strong social bonds. The current study investigated the relationships among stress, empathy, and emotion regulation and considered gender differences in these relationships. I hypothesized that higher levels of current stress would be associated with lower levels of empathy and greater difficulties with emotion regulation, and that empathy and emotion regulation would be positively related. Supporting these hypotheses, the following relationships were found: (a) negative correlation between stress and empathy, (b) positive correlation between stress and emotion regulation difficulties, and (c) negative correlation between empathy and emotion regulation difficulties. Results also revealed that greater perceived stress was associated with less empathy in women, but it was unrelated to empathy in men. On the other hand, stress was associated with greater emotion regulation difficulties in both men and women, indicating that either gender may experience a greater disturbance in their emotional response within a social situation when under the influence of stress. Empathy and emotion regulation are positively correlated in both genders, which might suggest that high emotion regulation may allow for appropriate empathy responses within a given social context.
ContributorsHanna, Rand Maria (Author) / Roberts, Nicole (Thesis director) / Burleson, Mary (Committee member) / School of Mathematical and Natural Sciences (Contributor) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor) / School of Social and Behavioral Sciences (Contributor)
Created2016-12
DescriptionResearch has shown that adverse and traumatic events negatively affect a person's psychological outcome. However, research is lacking in the area examining at which life stage trauma is more harmful to experience. Additionally, the role of vulnerability and resilience factors may strengthen or ameliorate this relationship.
ContributorsColvin, Carah (Author) / Davis, Mary (Thesis director) / Lemery-Chalfant, Katheryn (Committee member) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor) / School of Mathematical and Natural Sciences (Contributor) / Dean, W.P. Carey School of Business (Contributor)
Created2023-12
Description
Since the advent of DNA analysis, organizations such as the Innocence Project have been able to exonerate people who were wrongfully convicted of crimes, often due to erroneous forensic evidence analysis. In many cases, analytical techniques, such as fingerprint analysis, toolmark analysis, or hair comparisons have been cited as nearly infallible sources of evidentiary fact. However, these methods rely on subjective interpretation by a forensic examiner and lack stringent, quantitative methods for ensuring reliability and accuracy. For most of these methods, the examiner is supplied only with the unknown sample from the crime scene, and a known sample from a suspect. This, combined with the influence of psychological factors such as confirmation bias, has resulted in the need for a reliable mechanism of ensuring the efficacy of a particular type of analysis as well as the objectivity, and competence of the analyst. One proposed method to resolve these issues is the use of a filler-control method, in which analysts are given an “evidence line-up” containing at least three samples: the unknown sample from the crime scene, a sample from the suspect, and at least one filler sample from an individual who is not involved in the investigation. This method provides a reliable method for estimating error rates for an analyst and can provide the analyst with direct feedback about their performance to accurately gauge their competence. This method also helps to prevent the introduction of confirmation bias, as the source of the samples is unknown to the analyst. The goal of the current research is to test the capacity of a filler-control method to lead to better confidence-calibration of examiners’ match judgements when compared to the conventional method. The hypothesis of this experiment is that participants using the filler control method will have improved performance and increased confidence calibration due to receiving feedback over the course of the trials when compared to participants using the traditional method.
ContributorsRocha, Bethany (Author) / Smalarz, Laura (Thesis director) / Kukucka, Jeff (Committee member) / Barrett, The Honors College (Contributor) / School of Mathematical and Natural Sciences (Contributor)
Created2022-05