Browse Exhibits (109 total)

The dehumanization theory has recently come into question as it has various definitions between the three fields in which it is studied (e.g., social psychology, neuroscience, philosophy) (Over, 2020). Past research has shown that the dehumanization of another person can lead to increased willingness to cause harm on said person (Rudman & Mescher, 2012; Viki et al., 2013). The present study seeks to gain more clarity into the psychological side of the dehumanization theory through the combination of several previous studies with different methods of achieving dehumanization (Rudman & Mescher, 2012; Tipler & Ruscher, 2019; Viki et al., 2013). While many previous studies have focused on harm, this study will be exploring sexist attitudes and attitudes towards violence. Adults over the age of 18 recruited from Facebook and Reddit will take a survey containing a dehumanization manipulation as well as questionnaires measuring levels of sexism and attitudes towards violence. Only half of the participants will actually be manipulated for dehumanization in this study. A Qualtrics survey will employ a dehumanization vignette, the Ambivalent Sexism Inventory (Glick & Fiske, 1996), and the Revised Attitudes Towards Violence Scale (Anderson et al., 2006). The relationship between those who are manipulated for dehumanization and those who are not will be examined through an independent samples t-test in SPSS. The outcomes of this research will ideally help with some of the disconnect that is present within the dehumanization theory while also providing information about previously under-researched areas. 

Faculty Mentor: Dr. Thomas Holtgraves 

Department of Psychological Science 

Graduate 

Cancer kills nearly 700 thousand people each year in the United States, making the discovery of novel therapeutic targets an urgent need. The c-MYC gene is a cancer-driving gene that is commonly found to be overabundant in tumors. Relevant to the research in our lab, the c-MYC gene promoter sequence is highly enriched with guanines (G’s). G-rich DNA or RNA sequences can form “knot-like” structures termed G-quadruplexes that act as regulatory checkpoints for transcription. For transcription to proceed, the G-quadruplex must be untied. The cell contains enzymes that unwind G-quadruplexes. The major enzyme responsible for untying G-quadruplexes is Dhx36. Dhx36 is overabundant in most cancers and increases c-MYC expression. For this study, I will determine if overexpression of Dhx36 initiates tumorigenesis and/or increases the progression of established tumors. I hypothesize that Dhx36 overexpression will initiate tumorigenesis and accelerate tumor growth. I will test this hypothesis using novel transgenic mouse tumor models. c-MYC expression levels will be assessed using qRT-PCR and RNA sequencing technologies. I expect completion of this work will contribute to the basic understanding of cancer pathogenesis and begin to establish Dhx36 as a novel therapeutic target.

Credits: Taylor Karns, Tyler Osborne, Michael Reisinger, Siara Sandwith, Philip Smaldino Ph.D.

Faculty Mentor: Dr. Phil Smaldino

Department of Biology

Graduate 

"Remembrance" is a piece created navigating body-memory with trauma and movement therapy. After a year long process of research that turned into personal research that turned into a dance film. This involved taking personal trauma and using movement therapy to heal from the past trauma that is held in the body as body-memory. Movement therapy is another form of therapy that does not involve speaking but personal navigation with some guidance. In the film you can see the dance navigating this idea of movement therapy through the art forms of drawing and dance.

Faculty Mentor: Jenn Meckley

Department of Theatre and Dance

Undergraduate 

RefReps, a start up company, currently has an application meant to train referees. Creating lessons for the referees can require a lot of technical knowledge. To aid the team at RefReps, our team was brought to add additional functionalities to allow for admins to expedite the process of uploading, organizing, and shipping these lessons.

The project included a Unity project that had training videos and lessons hard-coded in. Every time a new lesson or video needed to be added, it was a long process that required a developer. In working on this, we have implemented a React app (our “Admin Portal”) and a Firebase database to automate a majority of the process. The React app was created to store the relevant data for lesson packs in the database.

Within the original Unity project, changes have been made to connect the firebase to the application, allowing for lessons to be pulled and displayed without any hardcoding. These lessons are now coming from the database itself. The application also creates the relevant connections for the lessons and properly displays their contents.

Final iterations of this project are geared towards statistics gathering and gamification. Admins are able to see their users' statistics and users are able to view achievements to complete.

Faculty Mentor: Huseyin Ergin

College of Sciences and Humanities

Undergraduate

"Jazz & Civil Unrest: Miles Davis, the Civil Rights Movement, and the Illusion of Life" analyzes Miles Davis' 1959 album Kind of Blue through the Illusion of Life methodology, with the goal of depicting the album as a collaborative representation of the movement.

Faculty Mentor: Beth Messner

Communication Studies

Undergraduate