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2005 Early Researcher Award Honorable MentionsJenessa Shapiro, Eric David, and Ryan Bogdan Jenessa R. Shapiro
Eric DavidE.J.R. David is currently a doctoral student in the Clinical/Community Division at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign. His research is focused on understanding the psychological consequences of colonization. Filipino Americans, the only Asian ethnic group that experienced direct U.S. colonialism, is one of his primary populations of interest. Scholars have discussed Colonial Mentality (CM) as a significant factor in the experiences of Filipino Americans, yet this construct has not received attention in psychology. We addressed this gap by developing the Colonial Mentality Scale (CMS), a theoretically derived and psychometrically tested multidimensional measure of CM. Exploratory and confirmatory factor analyses suggest that CM among Filipino Americans is best conceptualized and measured as composing of five related factors, each of which represents unique manifestations of the construct. Results also suggest that CM is a unique and significant contributor to the mental health of Filipino Americans. Thus, CM should be considered as a potential explanation for the alarming mental health statistics among Filipino Americans, such as high rates of clinical depression and suicide ideations/attempts. We hope that the CMS will facilitate future studies on the psychological consequences of colonization among Filipino Americans and other historically colonized groups. We also hope that the CMS could be useful for mental health research, clinical assessments, and interventions on Filipino Americans, which could in turn facilitate increased societal and psychological understanding of this neglected, understudied, and underserved population. In response to his receipt of an honorable mention Mr. David expresses his gratitude. "For a project focused on Filipino Americans to be recognized by the APA Science Student Council is a great honor. It tells me that others outside of Ethnic Minority Psychology think that my work is important and of good quality. We thank the Council very much for this award." Ryan Bogdan
Along with Dr. Pizzagalli, Ryan expresses his thanks to Dr. Eleanor Willemsen, Dr. Thomas Plante, and Dr. Ian Gotlib for their guidance. Ryan is also "encouraged and excited to see that research investigating reward processing is valued by the larger research community," and he is, "very appreciative that such awards are available to honor scientific contributions by graduate students, and I am honored to be a recipient."
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In her research, they examined the implications of trainers' negative expectations of diverse trainees for training effectiveness. Organizations employ training programs, at great financial costs, in order to provide employees with new information and skills necessary to perform their jobs. However, trainer stereotypes of diverse trainees may engender negative expectations that result in lower-quality training. As a result, rather than "leveling the playing field" for all employees through training, organizations may be unknowingly withholding skills and resources from stigmatizable employees that are necessary to accomplish tasks effectively. In the present study, we examined expectations within training interactions that involve obese trainees, as obese individuals (females in particular) face discrimination in many organizational domains (Roehling, 1999). In the present study, trainee weight (manipulated with a photograph depicting the trainee as either obese or average weight for her height) influenced female trainer pre-training expectations and post-training evaluations of the training and trainee. Furthermore, the results suggest that negative expectations held by trainers were related to trainee post-training evaluations of the training and of the trainer, and, for less flexible trainers, to decrements in trainee performance on the trained task. Overall, the results suggest that trainer expectations can be influenced by stereotypes held about trainee characteristics, thus undermining training effectiveness.
Ryan Bogdan, a 3 rd year Clinical Psychology student at Harvard University was the recipient of a Science Student Council Early Research Award - Honorable Mention in Basic Science. Ryan's award-winning work assessed whether acute stress reduces the ability to modulate behavior according to reinforcement history in order to examine the relationship between stress (a major risk factor for depression) and hedonic capacity. The results of his work indicate that stress impairs hedonic capacity. Ryan's work has important implications, as it provides a potential mechanism by which stressful experiences may be linked to depression.
When asked how the award-winning research has impacted his future research questions, Ryan says, "I see so many directions to pursue!" Indeed, he is currently assessing the genetic and environmental contributions to reward processing, and he is also investigating how stressors may impact the neural circuitry involved in reward processing. Ryan plans to pursue a career in academia, continuing his research on the neural substrates of mood and the ways in which individual differences (e.g., genetics) and environmental factors (e.g., stressors) interact to influence mood, neural activity, behavior, and psychopathology.