Theses and Dissertations from UMD
Permanent URI for this communityhttp://hdl.handle.net/1903/2
New submissions to the thesis/dissertation collections are added automatically as they are received from the Graduate School. Currently, the Graduate School deposits all theses and dissertations from a given semester after the official graduation date. This means that there may be up to a 4 month delay in the appearance of a give thesis/dissertation in DRUM
More information is available at Theses and Dissertations at University of Maryland Libraries.
Browse
15 results
Search Results
Item Reframing Children's Judgments of Consensus Reliability as a Process of Information Aggregation(2023) Levush, Karen Carmel; Butler, Lucas P; Human Development; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Consensus is a compelling cue to the truth value of a given claim, but certain consensus patterns provide stronger evidence than others. This dissertation examines the developmental trajectory of children’s reasoning about the epistemic value of diverse perspectives for consensus’ reliability. One-hundred forty-four children between the ages of 7 and 9, as well as 48 adults, were introduced to a novel planet and alien groups that live there. Tasked with learning the “right things” about why various natural phenomena occur on this planet, participants were asked which one of two consensus groups, each of whom collectively thought something different, was the “better” group to ask. Participants rated their relative preference for one consensus group over another using a 6-point scale and were asked to explain their reasoning. These findings provide initial evidence that qualitative changes in children’s ability to consider how dependencies can lead to redundant information parallel the developmental shift in children’s appreciation for interpretive diversity in middle childhood.Item THE ROLE OF THEORY OF MIND IN SOCIAL INTERACTION(2021) Alkire, Diana; Redcay, Elizabeth; Neuroscience and Cognitive Science; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Theory of mind (ToM) is assumed to be instrumental to social interactions, yet it is typically studied using non-interactive laboratory tasks. Standard measures are thus limited in their ability to characterize the cognitive and neural substrates of ToM in naturalistic social interactions, as well as the mechanisms explaining social-interactive difficulties in autism spectrum disorder (ASD). Across three studies, this dissertation aimed to highlight and bridge the disconnect between the study of ToM and its real-world implementation. Study 1 assessed the relative importance of a range of social-cognitive, social-perceptual, and social-affective constructs in explaining variance in the social symptoms of ASD. Three standard, non-interactive ToM measures together explained only 6% of the variance in social symptoms, reinforcing the need for interactive approaches to studying ToM. Study 2 applied such an approach using a socially interactive neuroimaging paradigm to measure brain activation associated with both ToM and social interaction. In typically developing children aged 8-12, interacting with a peer, even in the absence of explicit ToM demands, engaged many of the same regions as did non-interactive ToM reasoning, consistent with the idea that social interaction elicits spontaneous ToM-related processes. Study 3 also investigated ToM in social interaction, this time at the behavioral level, by introducing a novel observational coding system that measures the use of (or failure to use) ToM in naturalistic conversation. Among dyads of typically developing and autistic children and adolescents, conversational ToM (cToM) did not predict interaction success. However, the cToM Negative subscale—capturing ToM-related violations of conversational norms—was negatively associated with two forms of non-interactive ToM: 1) recognizing complex emotions from facial expressions, and 2) spontaneously attributing mental states when describing abstract social animations. Furthermore, exploratory analyses revealed associations between cToM and brain activation during the socially interactive neuroimaging task used in Study 2. Findings across the three studies highlight the multifaceted nature of the ToM construct, the value of socially interactive approaches to studying ToM, and the importance of considering ToM alongside other social-cognitive and affective processes when investigating social interaction.Item Contextual factors in children's and adolescents' predictions and evaluations of interracial peer encounters(2021) Burkholder, Amanda Rose; Killen, Melanie; Human Development; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Direct experiences with peers of different races create possibilities for cross-race friendships and reduce racial prejudice and bias. Yet, interracial friendships remain rare in childhood, and decline by early adolescence. Therefore, an essential avenue for research in developmental science is to understand the conditions under which positive interracial encounters are maintained in childhood and adolescence, as these experiences may combat prejudicial attitudes and mitigate discriminatory behavior later in life. Children’s and adolescents’ willingness to engage in interracial peer encounters is not unidimensional, and research targeting how children and adolescents reason about interracial peer encounters provides a window into expectations about these relationships. The present dissertation includes a collection of three empirical papers that each explore contextual factors that influence children’s evaluations, predictions, and preferences in interracial peer encounters. Empirical Paper 1 disentangled children’s evaluations of interracial and interwealth exclusion using a design that focused either on race, controlling for wealth, or wealth, controlling for race. Empirical Paper 2 investigated how children’s and adolescents’ own racial group memberships influenced their predictions and preferences for interracial inclusion within a multi-group context that included information about wealth. Empirical Paper 3 examined the effect of parental and peer messages on children’s and adolescents’ predictions of interracial inclusion. Together, these papers provide evidence that during the interracial peer encounter, the presence of a multi-group context and socializing agents are vital to consider in order to understand, predict, and intervene on children’s and adolescents’ decisions and preferences for interracial peer contact. Discovering the emergence of and age-related changes to attitudes about interracial peer encounters in childhood, and the contextual factors that influence them, will provide valuable information for reducing stereotypes and biases as well as promoting positive peer relationships in childhood.Item DO PRESCHOOLERS TRACK AND EVALUATE SOCIAL INCLUDERS AND EXCLUDERS?(2020) Woodward, Amanda Mae; Beier, Jonathan S; Psychology; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Social exclusion is a hurtful experience that can lead to detrimental effects in the social, cognitive, and physiological domains. These consequences can lead to poor, potentially long-lasting, negative outcomes for children. Therefore, it is critical for excluded children to reduce the impact of its negative effects. One helpful strategy to accomplish this is to select social partners who are likely to be inclusive. The current dissertation investigates cognitive processes that may underly children’s partner choice, including the abilities to detect, track, and evaluate social excluders. In Experiment 1, 4-year-old children (n = 32) experienced direct inclusion and exclusion before evaluating target characters. Surprisingly, children in the overall sample did not evaluate excluders more negatively than includers. Experiment 2 further investigated children’s abilities to track and evaluate social excluders using several methodological improvements and a wider age range, including 4- to 6-year-olds (n = 96). With age, children in the overall sample detected social exclusion more often but did not evaluate excluders more negatively. Children who accurately identified includers (n = 68) also evaluated them more positively than excluders. Experiment 3 investigated whether 3- to 6-year-old children who observed third-party games could detect and evaluate social excluders. While children detected and evaluated social excluders, only older children preferred to play with includers. Overall, this work suggests that young children who detect exclusion also evaluate social excluders negatively, although these evaluations may not influence play partner choices until later in development.Item THE NEURAL CORRELATES OF SOCIAL MOTIVATION IN AUTISM SPECTRUM DISORDER DURING A REAL-TIME PEER INTERACTION(2018) Kirby, Laura Anderson; Redcay, Elizabeth; Psychology; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Autism Spectrum Disorder (ASD) is characterized by difficulties with social motivation and social interaction. However, the neural underpinnings of these processes are poorly understood, and past studies investigating this subject have significant methodological limitations. This study is the first to investigate the neural correlates of social interaction in children and adolescents diagnosed with ASD using a naturalistic “chat” paradigm that mimics real-world reciprocal conversations. Despite core weaknesses in social interaction, participants with ASD showed similar brain activation to their neurotypical counterparts while initiating conversations and receiving replies from peers. Two notable group differences emerged, however. Participants with ASD showed blunted responses in the amygdala while initiating conversations and receiving replies, and they showed hyperactive responses in the temporal parietal junction (TPJ) while initiating conversations with peers. Findings have implications for how we understand social motivational and social cognitive weaknesses in ASD.Item White Matter Connectivity and Social Cognitive Impairment in a Transdiagnostic Sample(2018) Dwyer, Kristen R; Blanchard, Jack; Psychology; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Social cognitive deficits are impaired mental operations underlying social interactions and are present across psychotic disorders, including schizophrenia spectrum, bipolar, and depressive disorders. It is unclear what neurobiological factors underlie social cognitive impairment, though one possibility is that impaired white matter connections within social cognitive cerebral networks may give rise to social cognitive impairment in psychosis. This study extended current diffusion tensor imaging (DTI) research to a transdiagnostic sample of individuals with psychotic disorders and controls and employed a Research Domain Criteria (RDoC) multiple units of analysis approach. The current study aimed to (1) assess the relation between social cognition (theory of mind and emotion processing), social functioning, negative symptoms, and general cognitive ability, and (2) examine white matter integrity within the uncinate fasciculus (UF) and inferior longitudinal fasciculus (ILF) through fractional anisotropy (FA) values, and to investigate their relation to social cognition and social functioning. Thirty-three participants, 25 with a history of clinically significant psychotic symptoms and 8 controls, completed the research project. Results indicated that social cognition was positively related to general cognitive ability, but not social functioning. However, better theory of mind was related to improved community functioning. Negative symptoms were differentially related to social cognition as there was only a negative association between theory of mind and expressive negative symptoms. More severe negative symptoms were associated with poorer social functioning and cognitive ability. White matter integrity within either identified tract did not contribute to social cognitive ability. Although FA within the left ILF was related to overall functioning and social functioning and FA within the left UF was related to community functioning, these relationships were in the opposite direction as originally predicted with better functioning contributing to lower FA. This is the first study to investigate white matter microstructure in a transdiagnostic sample using an RDoC approach. Our results indicate that there may be unique challenges involved in implementing RDoC. We encourage future researchers to recruit larger sample sizes, administer several behavioral measures of interest to create latent variables, and consider novel imaging methods to better address the difficulties associated with crossing fiber tracts.Item Who Will Verify Their Claims?: Investigating the Influence of Group Membership on Children's Expectations About Others' Empirical Practices.(2018) Levush, Karen Carmel; Butler, Lucas P; Human Development; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)The technological landscape of today allows for almost instantaneous global circulation and retrieval of testimonial claims. Children and adults alike are increasingly faced with the task of evaluating claims’ reliability without an ability to assess the validity of the process by which that knowledge is acquired. Expectations of a standard of empirical practice may vary based on the identity of the informant and can thus guide to whom we ascribe epistemic trust. The current studies examine whether 4- to 7-year-old children extend expectations of others’ standard of empirical practice differentially to minimal group members. In both the Pilot (N=36) and Main Experiment (N=96), children were randomly assigned to one of two color groups. We tested whether children’s attributions of verification behaviors were informed by their preference for and perceived similarity to ingroup members. We found that children were just as likely to ascribe verified and unverified claims to ingroup members as they were to outgroup members. A number of possible explanations for this finding is discussed, laying groundwork for an important line of research studying the relation between children’s expectations of others’ standard of empirical practice and perceptions of trustworthiness.Item Electrophysiology of Social Reward Processing in Schizophrenia(2018) Catalano, Lauren; Blanchard, Jack J; Psychology; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Poor social outcomes have been long observed in schizophrenia. Most studies have identified social cognition as an important contributor to social functioning. Recent research suggests that some people with schizophrenia do not appropriately respond to social rewards, including facial expression of positive affect. The aim of the current study was (1) to use electroencephalogram (EEG) and the event related potential (ERP) technique to examine how people with schizophrenia (SZ) and healthy control (HC) participants anticipate and respond to social (smiles) and nonsocial (money) types of feedback; (2) to examine how deficits in social reward processing are associated with motivation and pleasure deficits and social functioning; and (3) to examine differential contributions of social cognition and social reward processing in understanding functioning. Social and monetary incentive delay tasks were used to characterize reward processing. The stimulus preceding negativity (SPN) was evaluated as an index of reward anticipation, and the reward positivity (RewP) was evaluated as an index of reward sensitivity. Results indicated that HC participants (n = 22) showed significantly more anticipation of reward feedback than neutral feedback, as indexed by the SPN. SZ participants (n = 25) showed similar anticipation regardless of whether there was a potential to win a reward. SZ participants were more sensitive to social rewards than HC participants, as indexed by a larger RewP. We were unable to measure the RewP on the money task; however, exploratory analyses on a P2 component suggested there were no group differences in nonsocial reward sensitivity. Within the SZ group, reduced social reward anticipation was related to greater motivation and pleasure deficits but not social functioning. Social cognition was not significantly related to social functioning or social reward processing in the SZ sample. This is the first study to measure the electrophysiological correlates of social and nonsocial reward processing in schizophrenia. Findings provide preliminary evidence of a generalized anticipatory deficit in schizophrenia that is related to impairments in motivation and pleasure. Reward sensitivity to social rewards appears to be intact. Future experimental design considerations are discussed.Item Developmental Neural Correlates of Social Interaction(2016) Rice, Katherine Ann; Redcay, Elizabeth; Psychology; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Children develop in a sea of reciprocal social interaction, but their brain development is predominately studied in non-interactive contexts (e.g., viewing photographs of faces). This dissertation investigated how the developing brain supports social interaction. Specifically, novel paradigms were used to target two facets of social experience—social communication and social motivation—across three studies in children and adults. In Study 1, adults listened to short vignettes—which contained no social information—that they believed to be either prerecorded or presented over an audio-feed by a live social partner. Simply believing that speech was from a live social partner increased activation in the brain’s mentalizing network—a network involved in thinking about others’ thoughts. Study 2 extended this paradigm to middle childhood, a time of increasing social competence and social network complexity, as well as structural and functional social brain development. Results showed that, as in adults, regions of the mentalizing network were engaged by live speech. Taken together, these findings indicate that the mentalizing network may support the processing of interactive communicative cues across development. Given this established importance of social-interactive context, Study 3 examined children’s social motivation when they believed they were engaged in a computer-based chat with a peer. Children initiated interaction via sharing information about their likes and hobbies and received responses from the peer. Compared to a non-social control, in which children chatted with a computer, peer interaction increased activation in mentalizing regions and reward circuitry. Further, within mentalizing regions, responsivity to the peer increased with age. Thus, across all three studies, social cognitive regions associated with mentalizing supported real-time social interaction. In contrast, the specific social context appeared to influence both reward circuitry involvement and age-related changes in neural activity. Future studies should continue to examine how the brain supports interaction across varied real-world social contexts. In addition to illuminating typical development, understanding the neural bases of interaction will offer insight into social disabilities such as autism, where social difficulties are often most acute in interactive situations. Ultimately, to best capture human experience, social neuroscience ought to be embedded in the social world.Item The Effect of Social Interaction on the Neural Correlates of Language Processing and Mentalizing(2014) Rice, Katherine Ann; Redcay, Elizabeth; Psychology; Digital Repository at the University of Maryland; University of Maryland (College Park, Md.)Recent behavioral and neuroscience evidence suggests that studying the social brain in detached and offline contexts (e.g., listening to prerecorded stories about characters) may not capture real-world social processes. Few studies, however, have directly compared neural activation during live interaction to conventional recorded paradigms. The current study used a novel fMRI paradigm to investigate whether real-time social interaction modulates the neural correlates of language processing and mentalizing. Regions associated with social engagement (i.e., dorsal medial prefrontal cortex) were more active during live interaction. Processing live versus recorded language increased activation in regions associated with narrative processing and mentalizing (i.e., temporal parietal junction). Regions associated with intentionality understanding (i.e., posterior superior temporal sulcus) were more active when mentalizing about a live partner. These results have implications for quantifying and understanding the neural correlates of real-world social behavior in typical adults, in developmental populations, and in individuals with social disabilities such as autism.