Department News

Emeritus Distinguished Research Professor Jim Jenkins to be Honored at Fall Acoustical Society of America Meeting

Jim Jenkins will be recognized this November at the meeting of the Acoustical Society of America. There will be a special session honoring his contributions to speech acoustics and perception through training and mentoring as well as research. The papers at the session will be by former students and academic "grandchildren" and "great grandchildren." (students of students and students of students of students....)

Occupational Health Psychology Training Grant

Drs. Paul Spector and Tammy Allen's Occupational Health Psychology training grant has officially been re-funded. They were awarded about $351K over three years. They have 10 OHP trainees, 7 being supported this summer on the grant. This grant is part of the Sunshine Education and Research Center (see http://health.usf.edu/publichealth/erc/index.htm) from Public Health which has an annual budget of $1.2 million and has been refunded for three years.

Spring 2009 Award Recipients

Congratulations to the recipients of this year’s departmental scholarships and awards. It is our pleasure to honor the accomplishments of both our undergraduate and graduate students.

Lauren Bylsma & Erika Litvin & Ariz Rojas
Valerie Reed Memorial Award

Phillip Zoladz & Joseph Mazzola
Eve Levine Graduate Teaching Award

Sari Chait
Stefanie Gilbert Endowed Scholarship in Psychology

Ariz Rojas
Richard Labarba Memorial Scholarship

Tegan Lesperance
PAR Award for Excellence in Psychology

The Psychology Awards Committee
Ed Levine
Marcie Finkelstein
Bill Kinder
Diane Dwyer
Chris Wheldon

Congratulations to Professor Judy Bryant who just received a teaching award from the USF Athenaeum Chapter of the Mortar Board National College Senior Honor Society! As part of the award Judy was made an honorary Mortar Board member (she was in good company as Mayor Pam Iorio was also made an honorary member at the festivities).

Mortar Board is a national honor society that recognizes college seniors for outstanding achievement in scholarship, leadership and service. The USF Athenaeum chapter of Mortar Board was established in 1959 by Grace Allen, wife of USF's first president John Allen, and Professor Margaret Fischer. Mortar Board provides opportunities for continued leadership development, promotes service to colleges and universities and encourages lifelong contributions to the global community. Some notable Mortar Board members include former President Jimmy Carter, Secretary of State Condoleezza Rice, Lance Armstrong, former First Lady Barbara Bush, former New York City mayor Rudolph Giuliani, reading advocate Maya Angelou, and former Supreme Court Justice Sandra Day O’Connor.......and now Judy Becker Bryant!!!

Research Highlights

At this year’s University Undergraduate Research Symposium, Psychology Honors students took home four awards in the Social Sciences division.

• Ashley Sponaugle, first place oral presentation in natural sciences
• Kelly Foyle & Bethann Bower , tied for first place in social science posters
• Ken Alipour , tied for third place in social science posters
• Martha Walter , second place oral presentation in social sciences

From the Honors class, 13 of the 14 students who submitted had their papers accepted at the Symposium, and this total was roughly 40% of all of the papers presented in the Social Sciences division at the Symposium. Mark Goldman gave the keynote address and Kim Badanich organized the judging. Congratulations are also in order to all of the faculty and graduate students who mentored honors students this year and/or served on their committees.

Research Highlights

Congratulations are due to six of our undergraduates who traveled to Embry Riddle (in Daytona Beach) earlier this week to give a **spoken** presentation of their research at the Second Annual Florida Student Conference for Human Factors and Applied Psychology. Each student is part of the honors program, which means that their advisors and Kevin Thompson deserve kudos as well. Thanks also go to Psi Chi, which oversaw the trip and paid for it.

And a special shout out to Emilija Djurdjevic, who not only presented but also chaired a session, and to Christina Donaldson (and her advisor, Chris Ruva), who won the award for the best undergraduate presentation!

The names of all six students are listed below, along with the titles of their talks and their advisors.

Adolescent Binge Ethanol Exposure Enhances Voluntary Ethanol Intake in Adulthood in Male and Female Rats
Authors: Kent Alipour, Antoniette Maldonado, Cheryl Kirstein

The Effects of Pretrial Publicity on Evidence Evaluation: A Story Model Framework Authors: Christina Donaldson (Advisor: Chris Ruva)

What Makes a Leader? Examining Followers’ Implicit Leadership Schemas under Various Leadership Contexts
Authors: Emilija Djurdjevic, Russ Johnson

The Effects of Weight Bias in the Courtroom
Authors: Mallory Hussin (advisor: Kevin Thompson)

Effects on Mental Health in College Students
Authors: Donna Smith, Tom Sanocki

Japanese Parent’s Beliefs about Polite Behaviors of Children who are Exposed to Japanese and American Culture Authors: Naomi Watanabe (advisor: Judy Bryant)

Research Highlights

Assistant Professors Jon Rottenberg and Co-investigator Kristen Salomon received a R21 grant from the National Institute of Mental health to study “Vagal fluctuation as a predictor of concurrent and future depression.” This project will examine the hypothesis that depression risk is related to a lack of dynamic cardiac vagal control, which is potentially important because it suggests that easily acquired and potentially manipulable measures of heart rate variability could be used to assist in the early assessment of depression risk, and perhaps to develop interventions that operate directly upon the vagal pathway itself. The study will be funded for two years.

The Mood and Emotion Lab

Research Highlights

Erika Litvin, a third year doctoral student in our clinical program, was selected by the APA Board of Scientific Affairs as one of only 21 graduate students across all areas for special recognition at this year’s APA conference in Boston, including giving an oral presentation during a "Psychological Science Superstars: Datablitz!" The title of Erika’s study is "Impulsivity and smokers' reactivity to affect and smoking cues." Congratulations, Erika!

Dr. Jane Noll had surprise visitors during her Thursday morning Introduction to Psychological Science class. President Judy Genshaft--along with Vice Provost Dwayne Smith, Dean of CAS John Skvoretz, Associate Dean John Cochran, and the Chair of Psychology Emanuel Donchin--was there to announce that Dr. Noll is one of the recipients of this year's "Outstanding Undergraduate Teaching Award." The award for "Outstanding Undergraduate Teaching" is reserved for those who encourage excellence in teaching our undergraduates. Congratulations, Jane!