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I am most interested in emotional response in groups with (or at risk for) psychopathology. The groups I am most interested in researching include individuals with schizotypal symptoms, dysphoric/depressed individuals, individuals with high trait or social anxiety, and those with other specific personality styles of interest such as obsessive or histrionic styles.
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The methods we typically use include self report and the reports of knowledgeable others, psychophysiological reactions to standard sets of evocative stimuli, and video recordings of behaviors evoked during interviews. We also have conducted a number of studies examining the accuracy of emotional predictions as a function of symptoms of anxiety and poor emotional self-awareness (alexithymia).
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In one study we are examining how individuals with prominent schizotypy symptoms react to emotionally evocative pictures in terms of pupillary reactions and visual exploration. We also collected behavioral responses to emotionally intrusive interviews from these participants as well as reports regarding trait emotional reactivity.
We record visual exploration of pictures as well as measure of physiological arousal such as pupillary reactivity to auditory probes. We also use high quality recording equipment to record verbal descriptions and non-verbal behavior during emotion eliciting interactions. Video tapes are coded to measure aspects of socio-emotional behavior and verbal production is transcribed and coded for communication deviance and affective content.
Click here to see abstracts from recently completed studies (presented at the Society for Research in Psychopathology)
Current lab members:
Graduate students:
Michael Hoerger, MA (ABD, completing his predoctoral internship at University of Rochester Medical Center)
Aaron Kaiser, MA (ABD, completing post doctoral training at Boston VAMC)
Felix Smith, MA (ABD, completing his predoctoral internship at Ohio Psychology Internship Program, Forensic track)
Elizabeth Goss, BS
James Bomersbach, BS
And our able undergraduate assistants:
Ashley Linden
Carl Fraser
Lindsay Pietruck
Syndey Walsh
Molly(Mo) Deslandes
Bill Varoskovic
Kelli Sower
Lisa Kidder
Sample research interests of a few of our graduate students
Mike Hoerger:
Mike has conducted a number of studies while at CMU. Most of these studies have focused on individual differences in “affective forecasting,” such as his recent publication
Hoerger, M., Quirk, S.W., Lucas, R. E., & Carr, T. H. (2009) Immune neglect in affective forecasting. Journal of Research in Personality, 43, 91-94.
He is completing his dissertation developing and examining the psychometric properties of a self-report measure of delaying gratification.
Aaron Kaiser:
Aaron's dissertation represents a novel examination of mindfulness meditation upon emotional reactivity (as measured by pupil dilation responses). He is interested in determining whether a single training of meditation can alter the immediate physiological reactivity to emotionally distressing probes (negative accusatory statements).
Some of our recent undergraduate lab alumni who are currently pursuing graduate education:
Erin O'Connor--Ph.D. Clinical program at University Detroit Mercy
Joshua Scott--Ph.D. Clinical program at Long Island University
Nikki Hernandez--Ph.D. Clinical program at Northern Texas University
Nathan Smith--Ph.D. Clinical at SUNY Binghamton
Jamie Becroft--MA in counseling at Oakland University
Kelley Crandall--MA in counseling at CMU
Joe McLaughlan--Ph.D. Clinical Program at CMU
Jennifer Nerbonne--Ph.D. Clinical Program at Eastern Mich. Un.
Kelley Borton--
Jill Trumbell--
Laura Daniels--
Other dearly missed undergraduate and graduate lab alumni:
Linda Brewer, Ph.D. (2007)
Lakshmi Subramanian, Ph.D. (2006)
Erick Roat, Ph.D. (2006)
Anna Muller, Ph.D. (2004)
Christie VanOchten
some of our noble lab alumni (Spring 2007):
from left to right: Natasha Swan, Jenny Nerbonne, Joe McLaughlan, Kelley Borton, Chris Thomas, Christie VanOchten, Felix Smith, Kelly McCarthy, Jill Trumbell, and Mike Podolan.
more of our lab alumni (circa 2005):
Labmates from the past (left to right): Adrian Accetta, Lakshmi Subramanian, Missy Prusinski, Linda Brewer (back), Erin O'Connor, Joshua Scott, Nikki Hernandez, and Erick Roat.
