In this thesis paper, the mental health consequences of the COVID-19 pandemic are discussed. Chapter 1 discusses what inspired me to write this thesis and follows with a discussion of social isolation during the COVID-19 pandemic. Chapter 2 takes a step back and discusses biological effects of social isolation in general. Chapter 3 discusses the psychological effects of social isolation. Finally, this thesis concludes with a discussion of what can be done to help those experiencing social isolation during the pandemic.

Trauma is increasingly experienced by people in transit as border militarization increases migrants’ exposure to violence and forces them into more precarious situations. For queer migrants, this includes situations where they are more likely to experience persecution and sexual violence. This paper explores the availability of care for queer undocumented migrants in the United States after surviving a precarious and potentially deadly journey from their country of origin to the US, as well as forms of alternative care developed by the undocuqueer community. In particular, it focuses on access to care for LGBT migrants, who face stigmatization on multiple levels and as a result are more likely than their straight counterparts to experience extreme mental health consequences pre-, in-, and post-transit. Faced with a number of obstacles that prevent them from receiving appropriate mental health care, the undocuqueer community utilizes various strategies to ensure that the health and needs of the community are supported. I argue that in spite of facing traumatic experiences and being unable to fully access healthcare to alleviate these problems in the US, LGBT migrants demonstrate extreme resilience and resist the mechanisms that otherwise threaten their mental well-being.

We attempted to apply a novel approach to stock market predictions. The Logistic Regression machine learning algorithm (Joseph Berkson) was applied to analyze news article headlines as represented by a bag-of-words (tri-gram and single-gram) representation in an attempt to predict the trends of stock prices based on the Dow Jones Industrial Average. The results showed that a tri-gram bag led to a 49% trend accuracy, a 1% increase when compared to the single-gram representation’s accuracy of 48%.

The United States houses only five percent of the world’s population but over 20% of its prison population. There has been a dramatic increase in carceral numbers over the last several decades with much of this population being people with mental illness designations. Many scholars attribute this phenomenon to the process of deinstitutionalization, in which mental health institutions in the U.S. were shut down in the 1950s and ‘60s. However, disability scholar Liat Ben-Moshe argues that this is a dangerous oversimplification that fails to credit the deinstitutionalization movement as an abolitionist movement and to take into account shifting demographics between institutions and prisons/jails. This study considers how mass incarceration in the U.S. stems from a trend of isolating and punishing BIPOC and people with disabilities at disproportionate rates as it explores lived experiences at the intersection of mental health and incarceration. Findings inform an abolitionist agenda by highlighting the near impossibility of rehabilitation and treatment in an inherently traumatizing space.

Psychedelics have sparked widespread interest as they offer a potential new form of therapeutic treatment. This thesis paper explores the current and upcoming psychedelics that are being researched for their use in a therapeutic setting. The main substances discussed are lysergic acid diethylamide (LSD), methylenedioxymethamphetamine (ecstasy/molly/MDMA), and ketamine (esketamine). This paper also discusses the mechanism of action for each drug and the underlying research that has been found to support the ethical use of these substances alongside talk therapy