Browsing by Author "Thomas Hess, Committee Member"

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At the Zoo and On the Farm: The Effects of an Initial Interview on Pre-Kindergarten Children's Subsequent Recall and Resistance to Retroactive Interference
(2006-07-18) Pierce, Lauren Esther; Lynne Baker-Ward, Committee Chair; Thomas Hess, Committee Member; Jason Osborne, Committee Member
Despite the attention researchers have given to the effects of repeated interviews on eyewitness testimony, relatively few investigations have examined the effects of an initial interview on children's event memory. This study added to the literature by investigating the effects of an initial interview on recall, resistance to retroactive interference, and source monitoring errors. One hundred four-year-old children were engaged in a staged event and were interviewed about this event 4 weeks later. Two between-participant factors, the presence or absence of an initial interview and the administration or lack of administration of a related event during the retention interval, were varied orthogonally. Children in the initial interview group demonstrated greater recall and more elaborations of the target event, regardless of whether or not they had experienced the intervening event. Among the children who were exposed to the intervening event, those who had the initial interview made fewer source monitoring errors than did those who did not have the interview. The findings are interpreted as indicating that an initial interview enhances young children's memory reports by strengthening the memory trace and consolidating the event representation, at least under some conditions.
Equidistance Errors in a Reduced Cue Environment
(2009-10-09) Kaufmann, Karl Alexander; Christopher Mayhorn, Committee Member; James Kalat, Committee Member; Donald H. Mershon, Committee Chair; Thomas Hess, Committee Member
The equidistance tendency (ET) is the tendency of an observer to misperceive the depth interval between objects in a scene as being smaller than it actually is, particularly in the absence of strong depth cues and as the lateral separation between the objects decreases (Gogel, 1965). The present experiment was an attempt to create a display that would evoke a change in the influence of the ET as the lateral separation of display objects was varied. The display configuration used replicated (with updated equipment) that of a previous study (Hill and Mershon, 1985) which had reliably produced the desired effect. However, one property of the new equipment resulted in the appearance of a faintly visible background behind the main display objects that was not present in the previous experiment. In the present experiment, the display object with the poorest depth cues, which was expected to vary in perceived distance due to the ET effect, did not vary in apparent distance. Instead, one of the other objects, with stronger depth cues, varied in apparent distance. The results suggest that the presence of the faint background may have acted as an additional display object, despite its low contrast with the wider background of the visual field. This implies that even objects that are very low in salience can have a significant effect on perceived distances.
Examining Domain-Specific Relationships between Cognitive Functioning in Older Adulthood and Performance on Observed Tasks of Daily Living.
(2010-04-23) Patterson, Taryn; Jason Allaire, Committee Chair; Shevaun Neupert, Committee Chair; Thomas Hess, Committee Member
Protecting my Self through Language: Developmental Differences in Narrative Accounts following a Self-threatening Experience
(2009-11-02) Styers, Mary Koenig; Lynne Baker-Ward, Committee Chair; Thomas Hess, Committee Member; Shevaun Neupert, Committee Member; Jason Osborne, Committee Member
Understanding how adults perceive and respond to threatening situations has been investigated by numerous social psychologists. However, these researchers have neglected to consider the development of these responses. One notable omission is how individuals at different ages use language to protect their sense of self in everyday negative situations. This study investigated cross-sectional differences in responses to everyday problems, conflicts and issues in salient domains of the self. Fifty-five older elementary students, 51 middle school students and 54 college participants each narrated accounts of two recent problematic experiences that differed in their overall importance to the self and provided ratings of their recollections and psychological responses to these experiences. Participants at all age levels reported that the narrated events differed in their overall importance, intensity and self-relevance according to their level of salience to the self. In addition, there were cross-sectional differences in the density of internal states language, and the relationship between language use and subsequent event sequelae varied by age group. For the elementary age group only, participants who used positive reappraisal in their narratives experienced a decrease in importance and participants who used a higher percentage of positive emotion terms sought less assistance following the experience and reported higher levels of cognitive avoidance. For the middle school age group only, usage of positive reappraisal was associated with higher levels of cognitive avoidance of the experience. Finally, for the college age group only, usage of positive reappraisal was associated with lower levels of cognitive avoidance. The findings are interpreted as indicating distinct patterns of responses to self-threat at different points in development. Further research should investigate language differences in developmental responses to self-threatening situations prospectively.
Understanding Socioeconomic Differences in Kindergarteners' School Success: The Influence of Executive Function and Strategic Memory.
(2010-05-20) Turner, Kimberly Ann; Lynne Baker-Ward, Committee Chair; Thomas Hess, Committee Member; Mary Haskett, Committee Member; Hiller Spires, Committee Member; Jason Allaire, Committee Member