Abstract: The U.S. higher education system hosts a wide range of international students with the majority from East Asian countries. East Asian international students may have particular difficulty with acculturating into a novel environment given their predominant interdependent self-construal, which contrasts with the largely independent cultural imperative of the West. The present study investigates the potential associations between international students’ acculturation, self-construal (SC), and their academic and psychological adjustment (e.g., achievement goals, academic achievement, subjective well-being) to shed light on how East Asian international students can best adapt to a new culture. Participants included a total of 48 East Asian international students (25 male, 23 female; age range: 18 to 23). Results from a series of correlation analyses indicated that there were no significant correlations between acculturation strategy and self-construal. However, there was a significant... PubDate: Fri, 22 Oct 2021 00:00:00 +000
Abstract: Plant viruses cause serious disease and losses in domesticated crops. However, we know little about plant viruses outside of agriculture. One reason for this is the lack of symptoms of virus infection in wild plants to promptly diagnose and identify with targeted methods. This is now changing with the availability of untargeted “next-generation” sequencing technologies to analyze the viromes of asymptomatic wild plants and study virus impacts on plant health. In this study, we determined whether key winter-growing perennials in local reserves are infected with crop-associated viruses. A previous study in the same locations found that summer-growing perennials host co-infections by multiple crop-associated viruses, but winter-growing plants have not been explored. To enrich for virus sequences, we extracted doubled-stranded RNA, a unique feature of virus replication. We sequenced this material using the Illumina NextSeq platform, then assembled and identified viruses using Galaxy... PubDate: Fri, 22 Oct 2021 00:00:00 +000
Abstract: According to the 2021 Worldwide Gambling Statistics website, more than a quarter of the population gambles, which means literally billions of people gamble at least once a year (Casino.org, 2021). However, despite the vast number of people gambling per year, there is a lack of research on how emotion regulation affects their perceptions and experiences of gambling. Thus, the aim of this study was to better understand the role of emotion regulation deficits in gambling. A survey was conducted to assess the relationship between frequency and type of gambling behavior and emotion regulation difficulties. The participants were gathered from the UCR Psychology Subject Pool (N = 195; after attention checks, N = 162). These participants were directed to a survey that assessed personal experiences and beliefs about gambling and their emotion regulation strategies and difficulties. Results from correlational analyses indicated that people who tend to use cognitive reappraisal (thinking... PubDate: Fri, 22 Oct 2021 00:00:00 +000
Abstract: Personality traits have unique abilities to shine through every action, thought, and belief that an individual engages in. These traits, in addition to other influential life experiences, shape all expressions of personality. Past publications in psychomusicology suggest that music listening preferences can be measured and predicted by personality traits. The present study expands on these discoveries by asking the question: What correlations exist between the Big Five personality traits (Openness to Experience, Conscientiousness, Extraversion, Agreeableness, and Negative Emotionality) and musical instrument listening preferences' 202 participants recruited from Amazon’s Mechanical Turk completed a survey on Qualtrics measuring personality traits through the Big Five Inventory-2, as well as musical instrument and genre preferences. First, results revealed that individuals who prefer to listen to traditionally melodic instruments (such as guitar and piano) tend to have higher... PubDate: Fri, 22 Oct 2021 00:00:00 +000
Abstract: Prior research has identified inconsistencies in relations between extroversion and paranormal beliefs, particularly in the context of a direct association between skepticism and paranormal beliefs. Thus, the current study investigates the role of skepticism and extroversion on the paranormal beliefs of individuals. Participants were 384 students from an accredited postsecondary minority institution enrolled in a Skepticism and Pseudoscience Psychology class. All participants completed a set of online questionnaires that examined their personality traits (i.e., extroversion and neuroticism), skepticism, and paranormal beliefs. A 2x2 analysis of variance indicated that extroverted individuals exhibited greater belief in the paranormal than their less extroverted counterparts. No association was found between skepticism and paranormal beliefs. However, for less extroverted individuals, belief in the paranormal was higher for those with high skepticism relative to those with low... PubDate: Fri, 22 Oct 2021 00:00:00 +000
Abstract: This paper examines the relationship between students’ generational status (i.e., first-generation immigrant students compared to second and third-generation students) and academic achievement. Specifically, it explores the role of identity variables including self-concept clarity (an individual’s degree of awareness regarding their personal attributes) and academic identity (a student’s choice to adopt and commit to a set of academic values throughout their academic career). Self-concept clarity was investigated for mediation effects between the generational status of Latinx and Asian students and their GPA (both overall and major-specific). Lastly, generational status was examined as a moderator of the relationship between GPA and the four types of academic identity statuses (achieved, foreclosure, moratorium, and diffusion). The participants were 857 undergraduate students from a southern California university. The results indicate that self-concept clarity did not... PubDate: Fri, 22 Oct 2021 00:00:00 +000
Abstract: Rheumatoid arthritis is a chronic autoimmune disease that does not have a cure. Therefore, it is important for patients to receive support, which would allow them to ask questions and express their feelings. This study examined online social networks for patients with rheumatoid arthritis to better understand the emotional valence of their initial posts and whether there was an association between posts with negative emotional valence and requesting support/information. We hypothesized that the majority (more than 50%) of the emotional valence of initial posts would be negative, and that there would be an association between negative emotional valence and support/information. Nine hundred eighty-six initial posts from a rheumatoid arthritis online social network via Reddit were coded as either positive, negative, neutral, or mixed. In addition, the initial posts were coded as either requesting support/information, offering support/information, neither requesting nor offering... PubDate: Fri, 22 Oct 2021 00:00:00 +000
Abstract: Our personalities color how we interpret others’ emotions. Some people have an increased tendency to identify others’ facial affect as negative or threatening, which may lead to the misinterpretation of social cues, poor responses in social settings, and could exacerbate feelings of stress or anxiety in social situations. Yet, studies linking personality traits on the Big Five Inventory (BFI), specifically neuroticism, to emotion recognition are mixed (Cunningham, 1977; Matsumoto et al., 2000). This study investigated the effect of neuroticism on people’s discriminability and speed when identifying others’ facial emotions. Participants (n = 37) judged the emotion of faces that were morphed along two emotion spectra: happiness to fear and happiness to anger. Responses determined participants’ negativity threshold, or the point on the spectrum where their judgment switched from happy to angry or fearful. We tested the hypothesis that people who scored high on the neuroticism... PubDate: Fri, 22 Oct 2021 00:00:00 +000
Abstract: In March of 2020, the World Health Organization declared COVID-19 an international public health emergency. In an attempt to slow the spread of COVID-19, the CDC recommended implementing social distancing practices. In this study (N = 732), we examined self-reported indicators of social distancing (e.g., avoiding physical contact, declining social gatherings), duration of social distancing (in days), and the number of times participants went outside in the past week as simultaneous predictors of various measures of well-being (i.e., loneliness, emotional states). When controlling for overall satisfaction of life, findings suggested that individuals who reported higher levels of social distancing also reported more negative emotions, less positive emotions, and more anxiety symptoms. Surprisingly, individuals who reported higher levels of social distancing reported less loneliness. Individuals who reported going outside more often also indicated less loneliness, fewer depressive... PubDate: Fri, 22 Oct 2021 00:00:00 +000
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