Psychology – News

Yun Garrison wins Lee Young Leadership Award from YWCA

Meredith McCarroll — Thu, 26 Mar 2026 19:25:06 +0000

Yun Garrison, assistant professor of psychology, was honored on March 8 with the Lee Young Leadership Award from the YWCA of Central Maine. The award, given for excellence in professional, community, civic, or artistic leadership, was awarded to Garrison in recognition for her community-engaged work, including the Ka Bogso initiative and her community art installation,

Assistant Professor of Psychology Yunkyoung “Yun” Garrison (Phyllis Graber Jensen/�ֲ��ý College)

Ka Bogso, which Garrison co-leads with Fowsia Musse, executive director of Maine Community Integration, uses storytelling and visual arts toward healing from traumatic events that impact refugee women. The resulting work was shown on campus at Olin Arts Center in 2024 and in Lewiston at Munka Studio.

The Lewiston is Our Hope project is a community art installation involving 400 small wood circles on which community members created art that represents hope — individual and communal. Participants ranged from age 2 to 92.

Garrison, who joined �ֲ��ý in 2020, was granted tenure this year, and received the Award for Outstanding Community Project from the Harward Center for Community Partnerships in 2025. Garrison’s work in and out of the classroom centers on psychological well-being and vocational outcomes among people of color and immigrant and refugee communities.

Garrison and Musse continue to team up for public speaking engagements, including on March 26 at the Great Falls Forum at the Lewiston Public Library. Their presentation was titled “Be Healed (Ka Bogso): Posttraumatic Healing and Growth for Somali Refugee Women.”

In the News: February 2026

�ֲ��ý News — Thu, 12 Feb 2026 20:16:32 +0000

Carrie Cushman talks Museum of Art’s Marsden Hartley Legacy Project on Maine Public

Carrie Cushman, director of the �ֲ��ý Museum of Art, spoke about the museum’s current projects .

In conversation with Heather McDougall, manager of music and people at Maine Public Classical, Cushman, who joined the museum in August 2025, discussed the excitement of arriving at �ֲ��ý. The museum is preparing to launch the Marsden Hartley Legacy Project, an online digital catalog of all known paintings and ephemera by modernist painter and Lewiston native Marsden Hartley, which has been in development since 2019.

“We’re really lucky that this is happening at �ֲ��ý, and we will be the home of it and responsible for stewarding it into the future,” Cushman told McDougall.

Carrie Cushman, director of the �ֲ��ý Museum of Art, joined �ֲ��ý in August 2025. (Phyllis Graber Jensen/�ֲ��ý College)

The �ֲ��ý Museum of Art was founded because of the Marsden Hartley Memorial Collection, Cushman explained, comprising over 400 paintings and ephemera by Hartley — by far the largest collection of Hartley’s work — which Hartley’s niece donated to the college in 1955.

“We have people coming to the museum almost weekly requesting to see work from the collection, and many are artists who are looking for inspiration in this 20th century modernist who is finally getting his due,” Cushman said.

Additionally, Cushman’s exhibition The Worlds of Ilse Bing was featured in a in the online magazine What Will You Remember?.

“9 Wellington: First Floor Library with Orange Chair and View of the Livingroom” by Shelburne Thurber (Courtesy of Shellburne Thurber)

The exhibition is on view through May 24 at Wellesley College’s Davis Museum, where Cushman previously worked as the Linda Wyatt Gruber ‘66 Curatorial Fellow in Photography. Exploring Bing’s rise to prominence, coinciding with 35mm photography’s growing popularity, the exhibition “brings her work into conversation with her creative influences and with those who she influenced in the worlds of modern art.”

What Will You Remember? also included the �ֲ��ý Museum of Art’s exhibition Shellburne Thurber: Full Circle, co-curated by Thurber and �ֲ��ý assistant curator Samantha Sigmon, in its February roundup. On view through March 21, the exhibition demonstrates how Thurber’s photography has “visualized interior work that is private, domestic, psychological, or insular.”

Mara Tieken opines on rural schools, students in The Hechinger Report; Women Writers, Women’s Books

Though public school closures and consolidations are becoming increasingly common, they rarely serve their intended purpose of saving struggling school districts money, writes Professor of Education Mara Tieken in an .

For school districts with declining enrollment or decreasing state and federal funding, “school closures may seem logical,” Tieken writes. “Close schools, ‘right-size’ districts, save money. Problem solved.”

However, she explains, school closures require additional transportation and renovation costs, often leading to districts saving little to no money, while students’ test scores and future college and employment outcomes decrease.

Associate Professor of Education Mara Tieken has extensively researched and written about rural schools and their students. (Phyllis Graber Jensen/�ֲ��ý College)

Tieken has extensively researched and written about rural schools and their students. On Feb. 5, she published a piece about the process of developing her latest book — Educated Out: How Rural Students Navigate Elite Colleges—And What It Costs Them — in an .

While writing the book, which explores how students from rural places experience attending a small elite college, Tieken developed an approach to research characterized by slowly developing relationships with the students she was interviewing, she writes.

“We often think of research as a one-way process, a passing of ‘data’ from ‘subject’ to ‘researcher,’” Tieken writes. “But that approach is neither ethical (in fact, it’s often quite exploitative) nor useful. So much more can be learned when the relationship is actually relational.”

The 13 years that Tieken spent researching and writing the book taught her to be a more patient teacher, she says, with an expanded awareness of the struggles that her students from rural backgrounds may be facing. The book culminates with suggestions for how academic institutions can better support rural students.

“All those recommendations that I make in the book’s final chapter?” Tieken writes. “I have to do them, too, and I feel obligated—in a really good way—to encourage others to do them, as well.”

Caylin Carbonell ’12 gives public talk exploring daily life, labor dynamics in colonial New England

Caylin Carbonell ’12, an assistant professor of history at Bowdoin College, gave a public lecture about labor dynamics in colonial New England households, .

Caylin Carbonell, assistant professor of history at Bowdoin College (Courtesy of Caylin Carbonell)

The talk, entitled “Laboring Lives and Hidden Stories in Colonial New England,” was the second installment in a series of free online lectures hosted by the Lincoln County Historical Association, based in Wiscasset, Maine.

Carbonell shared insights on “the daily lives inside colonial households as the country was beginning to take shape, with a focus on laborers, often a diverse group ranging from enslaved and indentured people to hired workers, including Indigenous, African, and European women and men.”

She also discussed the challenges of uncovering the stories of 17th and 18th century laborers from incomplete or nonexistent records. Carbonell, who majored in history at �ֲ��ý, is currently working on a book manuscript that closely explores daily life in colonial New England households.

Boston Globe, Sun Journal cover MLK Day at �ֲ��ý

The held during �ֲ��ý’ Dr. Martin Luther King Jr. Day, “From Silencing to Empowerment: Exploring Anger, Justice, and Post-traumatic Growth Among Refugee Women and Women of Color,” led by Yun Garrison, assistant professor of psychology, and Fowsia Musse from Maine Community Integration.

During the workshop, Garrison and Musse presented a framework of healing from trauma that they developed by examining the experiences of refugee women. For Musse, herself a refugee from Somalia, and other Somalian refugees and immigrants living in Lewiston, the workshop was particularly topical, the Globe reports; Musse said that anxiety caused by the Trump administration’s immigration deportation agenda led her to reflect on past trauma from her immigration experience.

Fowsia Musse (left) of Maine Community Integration and Yun Garrison, assistant professor of psychology, talk during the workshop they led, “From Silencing to Empowerment: Exploring Anger, Justice, and Post-traumatic Growth Among Refugee Women and Women of Color,” during �ֲ��ý’ MLK Day observance. (Phyllis Graber Jensen/�ֲ��ý College)

“When something traumatic happens, how do we hold both anger and peace at the same time? Because sometimes they are pulling us in opposite directions,” Garrison said. “Maybe love and healing can bridge this. I do not know, but that’s what I’m sitting with right now.”

The Lewiston given by Myisha Cherry, an associate professor of philosophy at the University of California, Riverside.

Cherry’s address — “What Do We Do With All This Fear?” — explored the day’s theme of “Love, Anger and the Struggle for Justice” by closely examining and interpreting MLK’s writings and words.

The Sun Journal quoted from President Garry W. Jenkins’ introductory remarks addressing the day’s theme, sharing his interpretation of how love and anger may intersect in the pursuit of justice.

“I would rather spend my days in a space of love rather than a space of anger,” Jenkins said. “But we don’t always get to make that choice. … In linking these two, we have to wrestle with how they exist together — both in tension and in harmony.”

Myisha Cherry, an associate professor of philosophy at the University of California, Riverside gave the keynote address — “What Do We Do With All This Fear?” — to kick off �ֲ��ý’ MLK Day observance. (Phyllis Graber Jensen/�ֲ��ý College)

In sharing MLK’s thoughts about fear, Cherry explained that not all fear was negative; it can, in fact, be harnessed and transformed into a powerful force for change, the Sun Journal reported.

“We should be maestros as opposed to mere masters of our normal fears … and we should transition that normal fear into courage,” Cherry said. “Courage is just not doing something in spite of your fear, it’s taking your fear and matching it up with confidence … and engaging in action.”

As the Sun Journal reported, Cherry linked this healthy fear to MLK’s nonviolent protests and actions, urging all in the audience to use their “normal” fear to advance causes they care about.

“What we should do with this fear is make something beautiful out of it,” Cherry said. “This is a time of fear for lots of us … Turning to King has been illuminating, and I find that fear doesn’t mean that we are weak, it doesn’t mean we’ve given people the upper hand. It means that we’re sensitive to injustice. It means we value the people we’re fearful for and we value the principles that we are scared we are going to lose.”

Brian Shankar Adler featured in DownBeat magazine’s cover story

Brian Shankar Adler — percussionist and �ֲ��ý instructor of drum set, tabla, and other hand percussion — and Grammy-award winning soprano saxophonist Jane Ira Bloom released their debut album once like a spark, in their February issue’s cover story, “Making music in the moment.”

The magazine used the stage at Olin Concert Hall as the setting for a photo shoot with the two musicians, who have performed extensively in Lewiston and Portland, Maine as a duo.

Grammy-award winning soprano saxophonist Jane Ira Bloom (left) and Brian Shankar Adler — percussionist and �ֲ��ý instructor of drum set, tabla, and other hand percussion — play together in Olin Arts Center. (Courtesy of John Doyle/DownBeat)

“We played each other’s compositions, and the music came alive instantly,” Adler told DownBeat. “Over the years, we built up a hefty book of tunes and a musical language with which to communicate.”

Without chorded or bass instruments, the brass-drum duo is a rare one, DownBeat reported. The combination makes for a unique, melodic sound, with roots in jazz, North Indian Hindustani, and Indonesian musical traditions.

“The way I see it, music is interconnected and has the power to communicate beyond borders,” Adler told DownBeat. “Listening to and playing jazz, it’s evident that the music has roots beyond America and arms that extend to virtually every corner of the world. When approached with open ears, curiosity and a sense of respect for the traditions, the possibilities for exchange are really limitless.”

Art New England reviews current exhibition at the �ֲ��ý Museum of Art

On Feb. 5, of “Precision and Expression: American Studio Ceramics from the E. John Bullard Collection,” the current show at the �ֲ��ý Museum of Art, co-curated by Assistant Curator Samantha Sigmon and Lecturer in Art and Visual Culture Susan Dewsnap. “…Bullard sought diversity and individuality in his acquisitions,” Little writes. “He also embraced humor and joy: many of the pieces will prompt a smile.”

Roberto Lugo, Fighting Shirley Cup, 2023, is currently on display at the �ֲ��ý Museum of Art.

Calling it an “entertaining and enlightening exhibition,” Little highlighted an “exquisite vessel” by Mark Bell, “Spherical Vase,” ca. 2011, which he said “exemplifies the Blue Hill, Maine, artist’s seamless style.”

Little also explained the motivation behind Bullard’s generous gift to the museum. “The collector’s longtime ties to Haystack and the Watershed Center for the Ceramic Arts in Newcastle, Maine, inspired his gift, as did the college’s ceramics program led by Susan Dewsnap, who co-curated the exhibition and accompanying catalogue,” Little writes. “Bullard envisions future students exploring and learning from these singular objects. That vision is already happening: interns at the �ֲ��ý Museum researched artists for the catalogue and labels.”

Meet new faculty: Yunkyoung Garrison and the impact of racism and classism on mental health

Emily McConville — Thu, 01 Oct 2020 19:40:30 +0000

Each week this fall, we’ll introduce new �ֲ��ý professors who have tenure-track positions on the faculty.

This year’s nine tenure appointments are in the disciplines of art and visual culture, classical and medieval studies, economics, English, environmental studies, dance, politics (two appointments), and psychology.

This week we introduce the sixth of our nine new faculty members, Yunkyoung Garrison.

Name: Yunkyoung Garrison

Title: Assistant Professor of Psychology

Degrees from: University of Iowa, Ph.D. in counseling psychology and M.A. in educational measurement and statistics; Yonsei University, M.A. in psychology and B.B.A. in business administration

Nontraditional path: As her undergraduate degree indicates, Yun Garrison initially worked in business after graduating from Yonsei University, in Seoul, South Korea.

“I wasn’t really in touch with my own life values,” she says. Instead, she was initially motivated to please her parents, “a congruent Asian cultural value,” as well as to seek happiness through financial success.

A stint in business, specifically the energy sector in South Korea, prompted Garrison to rethink what gives her purpose and meaning.

“The energy industry is male-dominated and, because it’s effectively a monopoly, very change-resistant. For me, working toward change is really important. I didn’t feel it was a good fit for me.”

Humans vs. numbers: Her first job outside business was in a university setting, as a staff member working with international programs and international students. “I enjoyed working with the humans more than numbers.”

From there, she pursued graduate work in psychology. “Psychology was a great fit for me because it has the tools to uncover knowledge while promoting values that are important to me: diversity, social justice, compassion, and humanity.”

Assistant Professor of Psychology Yunkyoung Garrison poses for a portrait on Sept. 10, 2020. (Phyllis Graber Jensen/�ֲ��ý College)

Core identity: Garrison says that her doctoral work has only further solidified her “core identity” as a counseling psychologist, which embraces being a scientist, practitioner, and advocate — “all of which are core roles as a counseling psychologist. That’s how I got into this field, and it’s still continuing, an ongoing journey.”

Her work: A scholar-activist, Garrison wants her research to be a “catalyst for individual and societal change.”

Working with individuals and groups in the place where she’s living, Garrison studies the impacts of racism and classism on mental health — and develops programs to help mitigate those effects.

Meritocracy myth: As a doctoral student at the University of Iowa, Garrison did research that links student stress to the social concept of meritocracy.

Meritocracy suggests that “if you work harder, you’re going to succeed — a really hopeful message,” Garrison explains. Some scholars call it a myth because, as evidence shows, achieving upward through merit may not be possible due to the constraints of racism and classism.

The American Meritocracy Myth Stress Scale “assesses psychological stress among Americans struggling with the meritocracy myth,” she says, by showing that students’ belief in meritocracy creates “psychological disequilibrium.”

Based on her findings, “I’m hoping to develop more programming and interventions for communities of color or underserved communities,” she says. Such programming would have two goals, the first being to gain “more insight about how students internalize the meritocracy myth.” The second would be to help students “develop critical consciousness,” that is, the skills needed to “better understand intricate relationships between beliefs about society and their personal hopes for work and future.”

In community: For her dissertation, Garrison wanted to understand how Latinx and white youth differently view their career paths.

She found rural white students who believe that society is just and the system is fair “tend to have higher career hopes about their future.”

Interestingly, she also found that rural immigrant Latinx students who have critical awareness about the status quo tend to have higher hopes for their future careers and work. “A young person’s critical consciousness plays an important role in underserved immigrant youth’s career development. The more they have critical consciousness, they’re more likely to have a more functional and helpful career belief system.”

Her dissertation research went hand-in-hand with , a school-based program that connects rural youth with careers in health sciences by helping students understand both potential career paths and their own interests and skills.

Why community partnerships? For Garrison, academic research should benefit the communities in which researchers work.

“I’m a newcomer to Maine — I don’t want to assert myself as an expert of the community. I need to learn from the community.”

“There has been a historical divide between academia and community,” Garrison says. “I want to function as a person who feels and creates the connection between academia and communities, who knows what they need and knows how they can help themselves. As an academic, I want to provide resources and add to their existing power.”

In Maine, she adds, she seeks research partnerships with the state’s Somali and Somali Bantu communities.

“I’m a newcomer to Maine — I don’t want to assert myself as an expert of the community,” she says. “I need to learn from the community, and the community will show me and teach me what they need and what their strengths are. I’ll also need to take some time to learn, instead of just starting new projects without their interest and collaboration.”

Why �ֲ��ý: “The job description was so powerful,” Garrison says. “They were looking for someone who can do social justice, community-based psychology, serving immigrant populations, and also keenly aware of the impact of poverty.

“So I was really excited to apply for the job. And during the interview, it just confirmed that, wow, this is an incredibly open-minded, innovative place.” Adding to that, she felt appreciated during the interview.

“I am eager to bring my full self to �ֲ��ý and Maine and contribute to these communities in order for all community members to feel truly valued and appreciated.”

Q&A: Senior Speaker Alexandria Onuoha ’20 and her hope that ‘�ֲ��ý has students who love all people’

Mary Pols — Tue, 26 May 2020 18:27:06 +0000

Offering the Senior Address at �ֲ��ý’ 2020 Commencement is Alexandria Onuoha, a double major in psychology and dance from Malden, Mass.

Commencement 154

What: 154th �ֲ��ý Commencement
When: Noon, Eastern Daylight Time, May 31, 2020
Where: The ceremony will be conducted remotely via livestream.
How to Watch:
�ֲ��ý Web: bates.edu/commencement/live/ (via Facebook embed)
Facebook: �� The two locations will afford the same viewer experience.

Well-known on campus for her work in social justice and her leadership, she’s been an essential part of many campus organizations, including Women of Color (serving as co-president this year) and Amandla! Black Student Union, and the Caribbean Student Association.

She has served as a Senior Fellow in the Admission Office and the Center for Purposeful Work and as a student manager of the Academic Resource Commons.

Alexandria Onuoha ’20 poses for a FaceTime portrait in a park near her home in Malden, Mass. Onuoha will offer the Senior Address at Commencement on May 31, 2020. (Phyllis Graber Jensen/�ֲ��ý College)

In January, she offered the student Welcome at the college’s Martin Luther King Jr. Day observance, encouraging the �ֲ��ý community to continue the difficult work toward greater equity and inclusion “from the ground up. Speak out against injustice even when it might be uncomfortable. We cannot be silent. ”

In the fall she starts a doctorate in applied developmental psychology at Suffolk University.

Your Commencement speech, “Stay Strong & Walk Like You Got Some Sense,” was inspired by something your mother, Vinette Gayle, says to you. It was filmed earlier this month to be part of the virtual ceremony on May 31. Where did you film it?

About 10 miles from my house, at Powder House Park in Somerville. It’s not �ֲ��ý, but it resembles �ֲ��ý because of the greenery. My mom was able to be in a little cameo.

Why did you want to give the Senior Address?

Part of it is representation — it does matter when you see a woman of color, specifically a Black woman, having this honor — but the other part is that I felt I had a great �ֲ��ý experience in that I was able to build relationships across differences.

I felt it would be doing a disservice if my speech did not mention COVID-19, the elephant in the room. But I wanted to make sure that I am also speaking life and motivation into the Class of 2020. I did not want to use COVID-19 as a sad story. It is just one of the many things that has happened for the class.

How did you choose �ֲ��ý, four years ago?

I remember this vividly. It was between �ֲ��ý and another liberal arts college, both of them fit what I needed in terms of a financial aid package. But when I visited �ֲ��ý, that was the best college tour I had been on.

The environment was really amazing. The students looked like they loved being there. The other institutions I went to didn’t feel like that. Dean [James] Reese gave me a hug! I don’t even know what to call it, there was a family vibe. After the Admitted Students Reception, my mom was like, “Your face. You want to be there.”

And also, I wanted to go to a school where I was going to challenge myself, personally. I applied to some of the historically black colleges and universities, but I wanted to make myself uncomfortable, a little bit. The thing about �ֲ��ý is, no institution gets it right all the time, but at �ֲ��ý, they will keep trying and trying until they get it right. �ֲ��ý exceeded all my expectations. �ֲ��ý is a part of the woman I am today.

You’ve been a campus voice around issues of equity and inclusion. How do you approach that work?

I was co-president of Women of Color this year, along with Kati Cabral ’20. We meet new students of color and say, “We want you to feel safe on this campus. �ֲ��ý wants you to feel safe on this campus.”

Our goal for Women of Color is to create an inclusive environment, where all women of color are celebrated. In the past it seems it has been mostly for Black women. It needs to be inclusive of other women as well. I think we did a great job of that this year.

Vice President for Equity and Inclusion Noelle Chaddock speaks with Alexandria Onuoha ’20 following the Martin Luther King Jr. Day keynote session on Jan. 20, 2020, in Alumni Gym, at which Onuoha offered student greetings. (Phyllis Graber Jensen/�ֲ��ý College)

We did tabling in Commons, we gave out little stickers, we had the Center for Purposeful Work collaborate with us on bringing in Dr. Monique Brown ’07. She is from the Caribbean and she is an epidemiologist. We had Michelle Pham ’15, who is Asian and works at Google — she is just dominating tech. We had a great conversation with her.

Amandla! Black Student Union is there to have the conversation and create a fun learning environment. We meet regularly and talk about our experiences, from the uplifting to our difficult experiences on campus, and about mistreatment of Black individuals at �ֲ��ý and all around the world, and healthy ways of dealing with that.

“It is difficult to talk about race especially if you don’t know all the right words and you don’t want to offend anybody. I would just try to show them that it is OK to make mistakes.”

If we have a concern, we need to find a healthy way that is safe for us emotionally, and not silencing our voices, to make sure that our voices are being heard. We also have white students who come and listen. We tell them, “You need to be prepared. You may be uncomfortable. These are real experiences that happen.”

We want to make sure that �ֲ��ý has students who love all people. We want the liberation of everybody. We want people to feel OK with being a woman, being a person of color, being queer.

�ֲ��ý is one of those institutions that is striving to be more inclusive — and it has done an incredible job — but at the same time, there is a lot of work to be done.

Your work extends to other areas, like Admissions, where you started training to give tours during freshman year and ended as a Senior Fellow. What is your role there?

Helping �ֲ��ý reach students of color. Engaging with students and parents who come through the door. There have been a lot of people visiting �ֲ��ý. Our applications have gone through the roof.

As a Senior Fellow I do interviews with prospective students and write up reports. An interview does not make or break an application, but does help give a face to this awesome application. To me that makes a difference. What we want at �ֲ��ý are individuals who are passionate and curious.

You’ve also worked at the Center for Purposeful Work this year and at the Academic Resource Commons all four years, except when you were studying abroad in Denmark during junior year. How did you get involved in the work of peer tutoring and support?

As a freshman, I took the First-Year Seminar “Race, Justice, and American Policy in the 21st Century,” with [Associate Professor of Politics] Leslie Hill. She is a gem.

As a sophomore, I was attached to that class as a tutor. I would attend every class to prompt their thinking if there was a long silence. I was never the first person to raise my hand but I’d just try to keep that conversation going. To let people know this is a safe space, that this is a hard topic.

Alexandria Onuoha ’20 (center) talks with Jennifer Lynn Eberhardt (left), the 2020 Martin Luther King Jr. Day keynote speaker at �ֲ��ý, as �ֲ��ý President Clayton Spencer looks on. (Phyllis Graber Jensen/�ֲ��ý College).

It is difficult to talk about race especially if you don’t know all the right words and you don’t want to offend anybody. I would just try to show them that it is OK to make mistakes. And not to be defensive.

At ARC we have more than 70 tutors for different content areas. The purpose is to serve students with tutoring and writing and speaking sessions. I also did learning strategies, basically meeting students to help them figure out ways to get better study habits.

I always encourage students to use ARC. When I was a freshman, I was sort of hesitant. We want to make sure that you finish and you succeed. I tell people, if you work hard and use ARC and go to professors’ office hours, you will not fail.

At the Center for Purposeful Work, I help create events that will help students find their career path and their interests. I also look over resumes and cover letters and offer feedback to students during drop-in hours. I get to engage with students across all years.

What excites you about your graduate program at Suffolk University?

The focus on activism and social justice. It’s one thing to conduct research in the comfort of a lab, but when you physically get to engage with communities and learn for yourself in person, it creates something magical. Suffolk will allow me to continue my community partnerships that I have developed over the years.

Suffolk is crafting leaders, just like �ֲ��ý. The flexibility of the degree captivated me when I was exploring Suffolk in depth. It is an applied psychology doctorate, which means the expertise I will be engaging in is useful in every context; policy, government, education, and nonprofits.

Alexandria Onuoha ’20 of Malden, Mass., earned a third-place prize in the 2017 Bobcat Ventures pitch competition for her idea for a line of natural and organic hair care products. (Phyllis Graber Jensen/�ֲ��ý College)

My advisor is Dr. Mimi Arbeit, who . Her research interests are in adolescent sexuality development, the ways in which white supremacist ideologies impact marginalized communities, and exploring right-wing extremism perpetuating rape culture. She is also a brilliant, kind, and committed community organizer, which I also aspire to be.

“Every time I perform, people come up to me, people that I’ve never met, saying, ‘I went out feeling uplifted after that.’”

I am not sure what specific career this degree will lead me to, but I know that it will lead me to a position where I can help change policies, create supportive communities, education and healthcare systems, and educate future students on race and sexuality. There is a system here that has only been working for a certain demographic. It needs to work for everyone.

How did your dance major contribute to your thinking?

I have been dancing since I was younger but I never had any formal training. My mother is Jamaican and I learned from her family about Jamaican dance. I’m also half-Nigerian, but I don’t have that same relationship with my father, so I had to learn those dances from my peers.

Alexandria Onuoha performs during the annual Sankofa performance on MLK Day 2020, Jan. 20. Titled Invisible Women, the presentation focused on the stories and perseverance of women of color. (Phyllis Graber Jensen/�ֲ��ý College)

Every time I perform, people come up to me, people that I’ve never met, saying, “I went out feeling uplifted after that.” I use art as a form of activism, celebrating women and their bodies, letting people know about being OK with whatever size you are.

But my dance major encompassed much more than a physical practice. Creating a work of art and then having to explain in the words of the theories you were digesting and the influences you were taking in is a complex and intellectual exercise.

“I am going to watch it with my mom. It is my day, but it truly is her day too. She came from Jamaica and created a great life for me.”

There is also beauty in focusing on different disciplines — sometimes you have to be extremely factual and on point, and sometimes you can be intentionally uncertain. In dance you consider yourself, what is going on in the world, race, class, sexuality. I might cast all Black women, and I don’t owe anyone an explanation for why.

I couldn’t turn in a paper to my psychology advisor, Professor Amy Douglass, and say, “Take this for what it is.” We would both laugh! My work is for my people and it is what it is. There is power in that.

What was a major highlight of your �ֲ��ý experience?

Being on the committee to choose the honorands. That is one experience at �ֲ��ý I will always remember. I’m a sophomore in the room with all these people with Ph.D.s and medical degrees who are not only asking for my opinion but receiving it. Like, “Alex, why do you think this person is deserving of this?” It was a really nice, positive exchange. I don’t think I ever felt uncomfortable in that room.

Who are you going to watch Commencement with?

I am going to watch it with my mom. It is my day, but it truly is her day too. She came from Jamaica and created a great life for me. I am very taken care of and I thank her. According to her, even at the age where I get married and have children, I will still be her baby!

I might put the cap and gown on. We might order something to eat after. We will celebrate the best way we can. Knowing that this too shall pass.

What can we learn about apologies from the #MeToo moment?

Emily McConville — Fri, 13 Mar 2020 13:17:12 +0000

“Not all apologies are created equal,” says Ella Ross ’19.

The truth of that observation has become abundantly clear in the years since investigative reporting on movie producer Harvey Weinstein’s sexual misconduct kicked the #MeToo movement into high gear, initiating a sea change in how we talk about sexism, sexual harassment, and sexual assault.

The movement has resulted in the proliferation of public apologies by dozens in entertainment, media, business, and other fields who have admitted to misconduct.

As a �ֲ��ý student, Ross joined Ceria Kurtz ’19, Talia Binns ’20, and Professor of Psychology Georgia Nigro to try to classify types of public apologies and determine what makes an apology effective.

One effect of the #MeToo movement is a robust sample of public apologies for psychologists to analyze. (Wikimedia Commons)

The result of their independent research, “Apologies in the #MeToo moment,” was published last fall in the journal Psychology of Popular Media Culture.

“A good apology is a recognition of the ways in which you’ve harmed another person, with the emphasis being on the effects on the victim, not on how it’s impacted you as the offender,” says Ross, who is now the civic engagement fellow at the Harward Center for Community Partnerships.

To measure apologies, psychologists have identified several elements, classifying what apologizers say, the way they say it, and the concrete actions they take to repair the harm they’ve done.

In studying public apologies for sexual misconduct, the �ֲ��ý researchers homed in on one subtle but important distinction: whether the apology is focused on the self, or on what they call the “self-other.”

A “self-focused” apology primarily expresses the feelings of the one saying sorry. In admitting wrongdoing, the apologizer might say, “I take responsibility for my actions,” and emphasize how badly he feels. “I am embarrassed and ashamed of my actions.”

Ella Ross ’19, a recent �ֲ��ý graduate who now works in the Harward Center for Community Partnerships, talks with new students on Opening Day in August 2019. (Phyllis Graber Jensen/�ֲ��ý College)

A “self-other focused” apology, on the other hand, takes the feelings of the victim into account. Instead of simply saying, “I did wrong,” the apologizer might say, “I did wrong, and as a result I caused people harm.” Moreover, the apologizer’s negative feelings would primarily focus on the victim. “I feel terrible that I caused you distress.”

The sample of apologies available to the �ֲ��ý researchers shows the extent of the #MeToo movement and the entrenchment of sexual misconduct in many fields.

The news website Vox’s running list of people accused of misconduct contained 219 names as of June 2018, when Nigro and her students gathered the apologies they wanted to study (the list now stands at 262), but the researchers limited their study to 37 people in the fields of arts, entertainment, and media who had acknowledged or apologized for their actions.

“A good apology is a recognition of the ways in which you’ve harmed another person, with the emphasis being on the effects on the victim, not on how it’s impacted you as the offender.”

A key way psychologists evaluate apologies is by looking at how the apologizer plans to make amends with the people they harmed. In studying the 37 statements of apology, the �ֲ��ý researchers had trouble finding actions that were self-other focused.

A person accused of misconduct might promise to go to counseling, or never harass anyone again — but could those actions repair the harm done to the victim?

“That was tricky,” Nigro said. “We spent a long time reading about, talking about, and never quite satisfied with the ‘action’ component, perhaps because there weren’t many actions that anybody took that were focused on the other person. The actions they took focused on themselves.”

In any case, many apologies that arose from the #MeToo movement had elements of both self-focus and self-other focus, though self-focus seemed to dominate.

Professor of Psychology Georgia Nigro. (Phyllis Graber Jensen/�ֲ��ý College)

Take one media figure’s apology for sexually harassing more than a dozen women over a couple of decades. American journalist Mark Halperin admitted that he was “part of the problem” of men harming women in the workplace and acknowledged the “fear and anxiety” he caused “women who were only seeking to do their jobs.”

According to the researchers’ classifications, one might see self-other focused acknowledgement of victims’ pain in Halperin’s apology, but also a self-focused explanation of Halperin’s own distress.

So which kind of apology — self-focused or self-other focused — is “better”? To find out, the �ֲ��ý researchers wrote apologies of their own.

“You’ve got to do some reflection.”

They created a fictional but familiar situation in which a prominent film director is accused of sexually harassing several women. They wrote several apologies for the director to give to the women who accused him, similar in length and tone to the real ones they had already studied.

One of the director’s apologies was self-focused, one was self-other focused, one had elements of both types, and one added statements that were neither self- nor self-other focused, but rather seemed to justify or explain away the director’s conduct, such as, “I thought that the feelings I was pursuing were mutual.”

Nigro and her students then asked several dozen �ֲ��ý students, as well as older adults on the Amazon crowdsourcing platform Mechanical Turk, to rate the quality of the apologies based on variables like perceived sincerity and willingness to accept the apology.

The types of apologies that most resonated with the participants differed according to age, gender, and whether the participant had identified as a prior victim of sexual assault. One thing, though, is clear: Apologies that focus only on the apologizer are not effective.

Talia Binns ’20, who helped run an experiment to determine how people perceive apologies, works on a ceramics project in Olin Arts Center. (Phyllis Graber Jensen/�ֲ��ý College)

“The sincerity of the apology, the willingness to accept it, the judgment that the accuser’s needs were met, and the sense of closure derived from the apology all fell short when an apology contained only the self-focused elements,” the researchers wrote in Psychology of Popular Media Culture.

For the �ֲ��ý student researchers, parsing public apologies has informed both their academic careers and their personal lives. For her senior psychology thesis, Talia Binns looked further into how college-age men and women perceive apologies differently. She also understands “apologies in the media in such a different light,” she says. “I’m like, ‘That’s a bad apology.’”

Ross also parlayed her apology research into her senior thesis, creating a similar experiment in which she asked students to rate apologies related to an incident of sexual misconduct on a college campus.

Ross has also done more hands-on work on restorative justice, a system of justice prominent in some schools which focuses on rehabilitation and reconciliation. Because of her research with Georgia Nigro, she is better able to understand conflict and its aftermath.

Ceria Kurtz ’19, center, turns her tassel at Commencement in May 2019. Kurtz coauthored a study on the elements and efficacy of apologies. (Phyllis Graber Jensen/�ֲ��ý College)

“I know what questions to ask,” she says. “Was the person apologizing talking about how they affected another person, or were they talking about how they’re feeling? If they actually talked about just themselves and how it made them feel sad, I’m like, ‘That’s probably why the other person reacted so strongly against what they were saying.’”

Nigro emphasized that defining the elements of an apology is not the same as creating a formula for the perfect apology. “People need to learn from what they’ve done, but learning isn’t going to be so easy as, ‘I saw this thing in the news and now I know what to say,’” she says. “You’ve got to do some reflection.”

And in the media, on a college campus, or in a restorative justice setting, even a really good apology is only one part of making amends for wrongdoing.

“Sometimes the offender will just quickly jump to an apology because they’re ready to apologize,” Ross says. “They’re not taking into account the self-other aspect of it — ‘Does this person want to hear this? Are they in a place to receive it?’”

‘I don’t know why I said that’: MLK Day keynote looks at hidden bias

Doug Hubley — Thu, 23 Jan 2020 15:12:31 +0000

The racial bias that causes people to associate African Americans with crime, as social psychologist Jennifer Lynn Eberhardt explained to a �ֲ��ý audience this week, even infects very young children — including, at one point, her own son.

Eberhardt recounted an episode on a flight several years ago, when her son was 5. Spotting another African American passenger, the youngster exclaimed that the man looked like his father. To an adult eye, Eberhardt told the �ֲ��ý listeners, there was no resemblance.

And then Eberhardt’s son said, “I hope that guy doesn’t rob the plane.”

Jennifer Lynn Eberhardt, a social psychologist at Stanford University, delivers the keynote address in Alumni Gymnasium during the college’s Martin Luther King Jr. Day observance on Jan. 20, 2020. (Theophil Syslo/�ֲ��ý College)

“Why would you say that? You know Daddy wouldn’t rob a plane,” she retorted. “And he looked at me with this really sad face and he said, ‘I don’t know why I said that. I don’t know why I was thinking that.’”

So even 5-year-olds are already “caught in the grip” of the black-crime association, Eberhardt said Monday during a Martin Luther King Jr. Day keynote address that was often sobering, at times poignant, yet ultimately uplifting. A social psychologist at Stanford and a MacArthur “genius grant” recipient, Eberhardt came to �ֲ��ý to summarize research from her 2019 book Biased: Uncovering the Hidden Prejudice That Shapes What We See, Think, and Do.

With about 700 listeners filling Alumni Gym (the traditional Gomes Chapel venue being unavailable due to ongoing restoration) Eberhardt’s lecture made a powerful beginning to a day of exploring the legacy and lessons of the civil rights icon.

Complete video of the MLK Day keynote at �ֲ��ý College on Jan. 20, 2020.

The gathering began with welcoming remarks from college President Clayton Spencer and Alexandria Onuoha ’20 of Malden, Mass.

Introducing Eberhardt was Associate Professor of Psychology Michael Sargent, a co-chair of the MLK Day Planning Committee and, like Eberhardt, a social psychologist. Tapping the college’s mission statement, he gave a nod to that text’s language about the “transformative power of our differences” — but focused listeners’ attention on the words that come next, the call to cultivate “intellectual discovery and informed civic action.”

“When our words signal a commitment to social justice,” Sargent said, “there is a danger that by themselves, those words amount to nothing more than empty gestures. But informed civic action can give those words meaning.” By engaging with rich opportunities on MLK Day to explore well-informed civic action, “you will follow in the footsteps of Dr. King.”

Associate Professor of Psychology Michael Sargent introduces 2020 Martin Luther King Jr. Day keynote speaker Jennifer Eberhardt. (Phyllis Graber Jensen/�ֲ��ý College)

Eberhardt explained that bias often isn’t subject to the rule of the conscious mind; instead, bias causes trouble and inflicts pain in defiance of our good intentions. Inviting her listeners on a “tour of empirical studies,” her own and others’, she devoted much of her talk to examples of how racial disparities evoke bias within a variety of systems — e.g., criminal justice, education, the economy.

Those research findings were sobering enough that the second part of the talk, dedicated to behaviors that we can learn to disrupt bias, provided a welcome sense of hope and encouragement.

In black-white relations, a powerful engine of bias is the profound association that people make between African Americans and crime. One of Eberhardt’s research projects, from 2004, involved three groups of participants, all of whom were shown what seemed to be flashes of light on a computer screen.

The MLK Day keynote address on Jan. 20 drew a full crowd to Alumni Gymnasium. (Theophil Syslo/�ֲ��ý College)

For two of the groups, the flashes were actually images of faces that came and went too quickly for conscious recognition — a form of so-called subliminal priming. One group was exposed to black faces, one group to whites, and the third saw no faces at all.

Next, all participants viewed images of objects that were unrecognizable at first and incrementally became identifiable. The researchers tracked where in the series participants were able to name each object.

When the images depicted harmless items, such as cameras or staplers, the subliminal priming didn’t affect the participants’ ability to make out the objects. But when the images showed objects closely tied to crime, such as guns, the participants who’d been primed with black faces identified those objects much earlier in the series.

Eberhardt turned next to a 2007 study by researchers led by Joshua Correll. In this “Shoot, Don’t Shoot” project, subjects watched images of people holding either guns or harmless objects. They were directed to push a “shoot” button if they saw a gun, and a “don’t shoot” button if the object was harmless. (The �ֲ��ý audience got a quick opportunity to try this exercise, slapping their right thighs for “shoot” and their left for “don’t shoot.”)

Correll’s participants “found, on average, that people were faster to shoot a black person holding a gun than a white person holding a gun,” Eberhardt said. “They also found that study participants were more likely to mistakenly shoot a black person who held no gun than they were to mistakenly shoot a white person.”

Bias often isn’t subject to the rule of the conscious mind, Stanford psychologist Jennifer Eberhardt told her audience on Jan. 20. Instead, bias causes trouble and inflicts pain in defiance of our good intentions.(Theophil Syslo/�ֲ��ý College)

In schools, the black-crime association manifests, among other ways, as disparities in disciplinary action. Eberhardt cited studies demonstrating that teachers tend to expect more trouble from black boys, in particular, even at the preschool level.

“Black students are more than three times as likely to be suspended or expelled than white students,” she said. “And close to 70 percent of those black students who were pushed out of school end up in the criminal justice system at some point in their lives.”

She continued, “It starts early, and it has real implications for the mental well-being of black students and for their ability to achieve in school. Over time those students worry about how they might be treated in school environments. And those concerns can influence their day-to-day interactions with teachers and also their identity as learners.”

A standing ovation follows Jennifer Eberhardt’s 2020 MLK Day Keynote Address. (Phyllis Graber Jensen/�ֲ��ý College)

Meanwhile, even 17 years after an MIT study called out employers’ preference for white- over black-sounding names on resumes, job-seekers of color still must “whiten” their resumes — reduce a tell-tale name to an initial or omit college activities tied to racial identity — in hopes of evading such bias.

Despite this heavy burden of evidence of bias, there’s cause for hope. “I want to argue here that, although racial bias can touch our lives in so many ways,” Eberhardt said, “we’re not doomed to be under its grip.”

Instead, there are ways to maneuver through or overcome the circumstances, such as situations where people react reflexively, that can unleash bias. One tool is simply to introduce “friction” into a situation: slow people down so they can actually consider their responses.

The tech company Nextdoor, whose social media platform is intended to strengthen neighborly bonds, found that some people, instead, used the platform for racial profiling — reporting, say, that a black man was present in their all-white neighborhood. Eberhardt was among researchers who advised Nextdoor in developing a response.

Mahad Abdi Mohamed ’17, whose work in the Lewiston-Auburn area serves adults and children with intellectual and developmental disabilities, talks with Jennifer Lynn Eberhardt following her keynote address on Martin Luther King Jr. Day. (Phyllis Graber Jensen/�ֲ��ý College)

While the tech world typically strives for less friction in its products, she explained, Nextdoor instead added apparatus that slowed the reporting feature, even if it might hurt business.

The company created a three-item checklist in the reporting mechanism. “The first item was asking people to state the behavior,” Eberhardt said. “It couldn’t be the person’s social category. It couldn’t be a black man. It had to be somebody who was actually engaged in suspicious behavior.” The second item asked for a description of the features, not the social category, of the individual being reported.

“And then the third item on the checklist was to define what racial profiling was,” Eberhardt said. “That one was interesting to me,” because a lot of the users “didn’t know what the definition of profiling was, nor that they were engaging in it.

“So they defined it. And then they also said that this is a behavior that’s prohibited on the platform.” And the checklist worked: “By introducing friction, they were able to reduce profiling by over 75 percent on their platform.”

Awaiting readers at the Alumni Gym keynote session are programs for 2020 MLK Day activities at �ֲ��ý. (Phyllis Graber Jensen/�ֲ��ý College)

Similarly, in the realm of school discipline, encouraging teachers to slow down and actually think about why a student might be acting out has proven effective, halving suspension rates in one study. Moreover, having just a single teacher go through that exercise caused students to view “their teachers in general as more respectful, and they trusted them more.”

Toward the end of her MLK Day address, Eberhardt quoted King: “Change does not roll in on the wheels of inevitability, but comes through continuous struggle.” We have effective tools, she said, to counteract bias, to mend broken relationships from the ground up, “in our own individual lives.

“And our institutions — our police departments, our schools, our corporations — can use these same tools to make sure that everyone in the system can thrive and reach their potential.”

She said, “There’s a lot of power in just the simple things.”

Robbins ’11 is lead author of landmark paper on asexual coming-out experience

Jay Burns — Fri, 16 Oct 2015 15:46:53 +0000

What started as a way for Nicolette Robbins ’11 to spend her final Short Term has become groundbreaking research on what it’s like to come out as an asexual person.

Robbins is the lead author of “A Qualitative Exploration of the ‘Coming Out’ Process for Asexual Individuals,” published in September in the journal

In the creation of this new knowledge, �ֲ��ý friendship and mentorship run deep: Robbins’ coauthors are her thesis adviser, Professor of Psychology Kathy Low — who Robbins says “always gives me a chance to learn from her” — and her classmate and friend, Annie Query.

Nicolette Robbins ’11 uses the findings from her senior thesis in psychology to publish groundbreaking research on the experiences of coming out as asexual.

Asexuality is defined as when someone experiences little or no sexual attraction, and is thought to describe perhaps 1 percent of the population.

Thanks to years of research, we know quite a bit about the LGBTQ coming-out experience. But no similar research has been done on the asexual side. Now, thanks to Team Robbins, we know that the two experiences are psychologically comparable — with one major exception, having to do with the Internet.

The similarities include what happens first, “feeling different at puberty,” says Robbins, who is a research assistant at the Yale School of Medicine looking ahead to graduate school.

“That’s a ubiquitous experience in the realm of alternative sexuality, feeling different, confused, that something is wrong. These are common experiences.”

Other similar themes include the impulse to come out as asexual as an act of self-expression and a way to achieve “identity salience,” a term that describes how our various self-identities (parent, churchgoer, employee, gay person) tend to get along.

While homosexuality is a known and accepted type of sexuality, asexuality isn’t quite there yet. So for someone to come out as asexual, the person first has “to discover that this is even a legitimate option,” Robbins says.

This is where the Internet comes in.

For someone discovering the concept of asexuality, everything from learning terminology to finding a community typically occurs online. People who start to explore their asexual identity tend to find “direct online interaction with other asexuals to see if the identity is an apt fit,” a process that Robbins calls “pivotal.”

The online aspect makes the asexual coming-out experience “unique,” Robbins says. Indeed, the Internet has played a “crucial role in legitimizing asexuality and building a community.”

“The Internet has always helped to facilitate the emergence of different types of sexuality and allowed those people to feel that they are not alone,” Robbins adds.

New information that can “inform interventions, programming, therapy and other kinds of interactions with individuals who identify as asexual.”

From her experience as both a researcher and clinician, Low says the new research helps to further “legitimize the orientation” of asexuality, and it gives teachers, counselors, and clinicians information to “inform interventions, programming, therapy and other kinds of interactions with individuals who identify as asexual.

“If I were doing therapy with an adolescent who was asexual, I might search the published literature to learn more, and turn up this article, which describes what at least one sample of asexual individuals report experiencing.”

Robbins got the idea to pursue asexuality as she pondered her senior thesis. She had set the bar pretty high. “I wanted to look at something totally new.”

Her mind kept going back to one of Low’s psychology courses, “Women, Culture, and Health,” and she recalled how Low had created a safe place in class to talk about “things people don’t talk about” in the realm of sexuality.

“I thought I could do it all.”

Around the same time, Low had seen a call for research on asexuality from another scholar. She mentioned it to Robbins, who “looked into it. At the time there were only about seven publications on asexuality.”

So Robbins launched herself into a broad thesis project, hoping to survey a sample of asexuals; study the relationship between asexuality, sexual aversion, and sexual desire; and gain a better understanding of the coming-out experience for asexuals.

“I thought I could do it all,” she says.

But the topic may have met her “totally new” criterion a bit too well. Robbins couldn’t find enough answers to get her started.

“We couldn’t even answer the question ‘How many asexuals are there?’ Every study we looked at used different criteria to recruit their sample. The prevalence went all the way from 0.03 percent of the population to 1 percent.”

So Robbins pulled a Hannibal of sorts, finding a way by making her own.

She created her own statistically valid questionnaire and obtained 169 coming-out narratives from subjects recruited from online communities dedicated to asexuality.

“I don’t like the idea of creating something that assigns identity.”

In the end, the experience of creating the questionnaire, not the narratives themselves, formed the major part of Robbins’ final thesis. And while Robbins is proud of the thesis — it won her the department’s Drake Bradley Prize in Statistics — she’s ambivalent about the questionnaire.

“I do believe it is useful for researchers, but I don’t like the idea of creating something that assigns identity. I don’t like the idea of not letting people be the ultimate authority of their own sexual identity.

“For me, I don’t know if assigning an official label is helpful when really what I want to get across to the public is that asexuality is so diverse.”

Indeed, an asexual person can have no romantic feelings (aromantic asexual), or they can have romantic feelings but not sexual ones (romantic asexual). Within that realm, they may be heteroromantic, homoromantic, panromantic, demisexual, demiromantic, and more.

“Rather saying that a person is more asexual or less asexual than someone else,” she says, “it’s more helpful to say that they are just asexual in a different way.”

With her thesis completed, Robbins used her final Short Term to take a good look at the narratives. Annie Query, her friend and fellow psych major who has since earned a master’s in social work from the Smith College School of Social Work, helped review and rate the narratives.

The successful publication reflects Robbins’ “exceptional tenacity.”

“We then came together and discussed the emergent themes we had found,” Robbins says.

Professor of Psychology Kathy Low credits Robbins’ “exceptional tenacity” for the achievement of turning her senior thesis into a published article. (Phyllis Graber Jensen/�ֲ��ý College)

A research assistant at the Yale School of Medicine looking ahead to graduate school, Robbins says that Low has “helped me achieve pretty much every single step from college to now.”

For her part, Low says the successful publication of the research reflects Robbins’ “exceptional tenacity.” While many seniors create publishable work, many have “difficulty returning to thesis and editing it down to manuscript length.”

Robbins, however, “really took the initiative with this, and it is a real accomplishment to be first author on a paper like this just a few years out of �ֲ��ý.”

A biennial �ֲ��ý survey shows that around 85 percent of graduating seniors say they’ve developed a close and personal relationship with at least one faculty member.

Robbins personifies that stat.

“Kathy always has a million things going on but she always makes time,” Robbins says. “When I wanted to aim for the top journal, she supported it even though she thought was a longshot” because of the qualitative nature of the research.

Low helped Robbins line up summer research work at �ֲ��ý, and just last summer suggested that two present their research at the International Congress of Behavioral Medicine in Amsterdam.

“Not many people have the opportunity to get that close and feel so supported by a professor,” she says. “I had the greatest experience at �ֲ��ý and I think a lot of that was the psychology department.”

Another faculty member, Professor of Psychology Amy Douglass, invited Robbins to co-present research at the 2011 American Psychology and Law Society Conference in Miami. Robbins had helped Douglass on the research, but still, “she didn’t have to take a chance on me as an undergraduate. But she did.”

At Yale, where she’s working on an Alzheimer’s study, Robbins has found that her undergraduate experience is distinctive, “having written a thesis and still having strong relationships with my �ֲ��ý professors — and getting the chance to publish a paper with my thesis adviser.”

Now applying to graduate school in clinical psychology — with a nifty new credential on her resume — Robbins says Low exemplifies a “type of career I might want to have. She’s a professor, clinician, and researcher.

“That’s the Holy Grail for me.”

�ֲ��ý hosts a talk on societal perceptions of infertility

�ֲ��ý News — Wed, 18 Mar 2015 17:53:45 +0000

The �ֲ��ý College psychology department welcomes Anne Belden for the public presentation Aphrodite, Shame and the Wandering Womb: Understanding the Legacy of Anguish, Shame and Silence Surrounding Infertility at 4:15 p.m. Thursday, March 26, in Room 301, Pettigrew Hall, 305 College St.

The event is open to the public at no cost. For more information, please call 207-786-8297.

The Wandering Womb project is a product of Belden’s ongoing mission to illuminate issues and stigmas surrounding infertility in society. Reproductive authority has been appropriated and attributed broadly across human history. Belden believes that when society distances women from the power of giving birth, a sense of secrecy and shame develops around the female body.

Through visual presentations, coloring books, a blog radio show, and other resources, Belden seeks to explore and revive ancient fertility icons and image-concepts that empower women.

Belden holds a bachelor’s degree in child development from the University of Wisconsin-Madison and a master’s in human development and family relations from the University of Nebraska. Her work in Maine includes filling the role of board president for Hardy Girls, Healthy Women; co-founding a multicultural girls’ chorus (Pihcintu); founding The Toy Library; and serving on the boards of Maine Families with Children from China and the Portland Chinese Language and Cultural School.

Based in Portland, Belden offers fertility, adoptions and transitions coaching through a holistic perspective.

Belden’s professional background and depth of understanding has allowed her to approach coaching as a co-creative, solutions-focused practice that differs in significant ways from adoption-infertility counseling, which aims to diagnose and treat conditions based on medical models.

Belden facilitates free monthly support groups including the RESOLVE Infertility support group, the Pregnancy and Infant Loss group, and Pregnancy After Infertility and Loss group.

A bio-adoptive parent herself with a biological son and a daughter from China, Belden promotes Co-Active coaching, which seeks to open alternative routes to parenthood based on the assumption of a client’s fundamental well-being. In addition to her Gestalt training in the power of the present, Belden is also accredited with Mind/Body training via the Ali Domar Mind Body Institute in Boston.

Biomedical research at �ֲ��ý gets $459K boost from INBRE

Doug Hubley — Wed, 23 Jul 2014 19:38:54 +0000

Larissa Williams, assistant professor of biology. (Mike Bradley/�ֲ��ý College)

Thanks to funding from a network of research and educational institutions in Maine, �ֲ��ý will receive more than $459,000 this year to support biomedical research.

The grant will pay for two faculty projects involving advanced genomic research, as well as other programs and equipment.

�ֲ��ý is one of 13 partner institutions across Maine that share money from the IDeA Networks of Biomedical Research Excellence program, aka INBRE. With similar programs across the U.S., INBRE is funded by the National Institute of General Medical Sciences, one of the National Institutes of Health.

Assistant Professor of Psychology Jason Castro teaches a Short Term course in which he and his students designed a new neuroscience course with a computer-programming emphasis. (Phyllis Graber Jensen/�ֲ��ý College)

In Maine, INBRE supports projects in biology, biochemistry and neuroscience that focus on functional genomics, a branch of molecular biology that seeks to use the massive amounts of data produced by genomic projects to understand how genes function.

Assistant professors Larissa Williams, a biologist, and Jason Castro, a neuroscientist, are the �ֲ��ý research grant recipients. In a competitive process, their projects were awarded $92,000 apiece annually for five years. All told, INBRE funding for �ֲ��ý over the next five years could total nearly $2.3 million.

Using zebrafish as her test subjects, Williams is investigating a protein known as Nfe2 and its role in protecting embryonic fish against the harmful effects of chemicals that create reactive oxygen species, better known as oxidants. Essential to life in small amounts, oxidants wreak biological havoc in larger quantities.

Williams’ lab is one of only three that have published research on the gene responsible for the production of Nfe2 in zebrafish. The gene is found in humans and other animals as well as fish.

“We’re really going to be breaking scientific ground by looking into the effect of the gene,” she says.

�ֲ��ý biology professor Larissa Williams discusses the image of a zebrafish embryo at the Mount Desert Island Biological Laboratory on July 23. Mostly from �ֲ��ý, the students with her are, from left, Nabil Saleem ’15, Roshni Mangar (College of the Atlantic ’16), Katie Paulson ’15 and Sophie Salas ’15. (Bill Church/MDIBL)

Using fish that have been rendered unable to produce the protein, she’ll test the effects of oxidative stress-causing compounds like TBHQ, a common food preservative; the herbicide diquat; and ethanol, better known as beverage alcohol.

In addition to expenses like student stipends and material goods like zebrafish and chemicals, INBRE funds will defray the considerable costs of sequencing the genomes of Williams’ zebrafish subjects to understand the effects of disabling the Nfe2 gene.

Her student assistants, says Williams, will be “getting cutting-edge training in molecular biology and bioinformatics — essentially big biological data sets. It’s the way biology is going, so students will get great training in working with and interpreting these data sets.

“That’s a very, very good skill set to have nowadays.”

Castro studies the olfactory bulb, the part of the brain that directly receives information about odors from the nose. In this project, he seeks to understand the organization of that structure, specifically whether the bulb is divided into circuit modules that can be identified through genomic data mining.

Those data-mining studies will be supplemented with physiological and anatomical research to determine whether, or how, the olfactory bulb modules are distinguished from one another physiologically and in their neurological connectivity.

In other words, can genomic analysis be used to anticipate physiological structure and function? “The research will try to ‘close the loop’ — that is, experimentally test predictions based on data mining,” Castro says. “That’s something that has been historically tough to do.”

Castro predicts that the tools and techniques used in the project will be valuable for studying circuit structures throughout the brain, including pathologies underlying psychiatric disorders.

INBRE programs operate in 23 states or U.S. territories. �ֲ��ý joined Maine’s INBRE program in 2001, the year it was created.

INBRE is important to the growth and stability of the scientific establishment in states that receive comparatively low amounts of NIH funding. The program pays for resources that might otherwise be out of reach — for instance, the data sets that both Castro and Williams will draw on for their research.

“The INBRE grants really allow us to train up-and-coming scientists and create new knowledge in an era where other sources of federal science funding are at a low level,” says Williams.

In addition to supporting individual faculty research at �ֲ��ý, INBRE provides institutional support, with an emphasis on student research and travel: INBRE funds six or seven faculty-student research grants and two summer fellowships for undergraduates each year.

INBRE helped build the Imaging and Computing Center at �ֲ��ý, and pays for �ֲ��ý students who take two-week laboratory courses each spring during Short Term at the Mount Desert Island Biological Laboratory, the lead institution for INBRE in Maine. It also supports collaborations between partner institutions, such as a molecular biology and bio-imaging course �ֲ��ý is undertaking later this summer with Southern Maine Community College.

Since INBRE’s inception, it has brought $50 million in federal funds into Maine, improved research infrastructure and trained more than 2,000 Maine students in biomedical research techniques, according to the MDIBL. INBRE grants have led to the creation of more than 100 new high-paying Maine jobs in research and education.

In addition to �ֲ��ý and MDIBL, the member institutions are a second major research facility, The Jackson Laboratory; the University of Maine, its University of Maine Honors College, University of Maine System campuses at Farmington, Fort Kent, Machias and Presque Isle; Southern Maine Community College; Colby and Bowdoin colleges and the College of the Atlantic.

Award supports Kahan’s study of cultural influences on visual perception

Doug Hubley — Mon, 14 Jul 2014 20:04:05 +0000

Professor of Psychology Todd Kahan. (Phyllis Graber Jensen/�ֲ��ý College)

Todd Kahan, a �ֲ��ý psychology professor who studies how people process visual information, has received a prestigious award that will allow him to explore how cultural differences affect those processes.

A cognitive psychologist, Kahan this fall begins an academic-year sabbatical dedicated to the visual perception study. He has received a James McKeen Cattell Fund Fellowship that allows him to extend his sabbatical time to encompass research in both the United States and Australia.

In recent years, only two to four researchers annually have received the fellowship. Most recipients are affiliated with major research universities, not small liberal arts schools like �ֲ��ý.

Researchers once thought that because all humans have the same physical apparatus for eyesight, visual perception didn’t differ between individuals or across cultures. “But we now know that’s just not true,” says Kahan (pronounced kahn).

A growing body of research indicates that cultural or experiential differences cause disparities in visual processing. For instance, looking at the same series of images, people from East Asian cultures are more likely to spot changes in the background of a scene, where Westerners tend to notice changes in central objects.

Visual perception comprises a crossfire of cognitive processes that the brain harmonizes into the mental image of what we see. Color, motion, edges of shapes and other factors are processed in different areas of the brain — and the brain also seeks to relate the new information to what already lives in our memories, such as a lifetime of cultural experience.

Kahan’s research will focus on timing. “What really interests me is, where in the visual information processing stream does culture seem to exert its role?” Kahan says. “Is that happening only late in visual perception, after an object representation has been formed, or is it at the earliest stages of vision?”

Until recently, researchers haven’t been able to make much progress with that question. “It’s really difficult to try to figure out where in the visual processing stream this is happening,” says Kahan.

But he and his research partners have developed certain visual illusions, presented on computer screens to participants in his research, whose results can be correlated with specific phases of visual processing and may pertain to cultural experience.

During his sabbatical, Kahan will explore how well those illusions actually do correspond to cultural influences on visual perception. He will run comparative perception experiments, based on the illusions, using participants from different cultures — in this case the U.S. and Australia, where he will work with Paul Dux, an associate professor of psychology at the University of Queensland.

“Definitely, your life experiences do shape the way you attend to the world, and they do influence visual perception,” Kahan says. “But I think researchers have tended to stop there. Our group is the only group that I know of where we’re trying to pinpoint where in the visual processing stream this is occurring.”

Broadly speaking, Kahan’s research investigates the mechanisms of paying attention to, perceiving and remembering the incalculable amounts of visual information that life presents. “Attention, perception, memory and language are so highly interconnected they are often hard to disentangle,” Kahan says.

Kahan, who chairs the �ֲ��ý psychology department, joined the college in 2002. Among the topics he teaches are sensation and perception, cognitive psychology, the psychology of language, and cognition in insects, birds and mammals other than humans.

He earned a bachelor’s of science degree in psychology at Syracuse University and a doctorate in cognitive psychology at the University at Albany, State University of New York.