Non-invasive prenatal testing is a recently approved form of genetic testing for pregnant women to screen for chromosomal problems such as Trisomy 21 (i.e., Down syndrome [DS]) without the risk of miscarriage. In the event that this test indicates DS, people may consider whether to continue pregnancy, and perceptions of DS may influence this decision. The present study examines whether positively and negatively framed information about DS influences perceptions of DS and the imagined decision to continue or terminate pregnancies when testing indicates a fetus has DS. It was hypothesized that participants who receive positively framed information would be more likely to imagine continuing pregnancy and have more positive perceptions of DS. Participants were given the same set of facts about DS, either framed positively (e.g., “50% have no heart problems”) or negatively (e.g., “50% have heart problems). The participants reported their perception of the syndrome, including personality traits, adult achievements, and level of learning disability. The participants were then asked whether their feelings toward a pregnancy might change if they were aware their child would have DS. Contrary to the hypothesis, there was no significant effect of framing on perceptions of DS or imagined decisions about pregnancy. However, perceptions of positive personality traits were significantly related to greater expected adult achievement (r=.33, p<.03) and lower expected level of learning disability (r=.39, p<.01). Although this study did not show framing effects, the framing manipulation studied was subtle. Given the possible implications for genetic counseling, more research—with a stronger manipulation—could be done to examine these effects.

The purpose of this study is to investigate the ways an individual resists dehumanization and/or disempowerment in the face of marginalizing societal forces, and it theorizes about the relationship among vulnerability, shame, and resiliency for women and queer-identified persons resisting dehumanization/disempowerment. Using autoethnography and other qualitative research methods (i.e., surveys and interviews), the author explores the lived experiences of shame and vulnerability in herself and others. The author applies resiliency theory and an intersectional lens to illuminate vulnerability, shame, and the ways they play themselves out in individual lives and in institutional systems. The author offers the reader insights for how individuals might positively address shame in their own lives and how doing so creates possibilities for future thriving. Shame gives rise to a wide array of disorders, including depression, addictions, and eating and sexual disorders, as well as emotional problems linked to trauma, gender, race, illness, old age, infertility, and gender. In our society, shame manifests itself through alienation, lack of motivation, and feelings of meaninglessness. While guilty people feel they have done something bad or wrong, shame-filled people feel that who they are is bad and wrong. Not only does shame trigger depression, it can also cause domestic violence along with self-esteem issues. Finding out if clients suffer from depression, anxiety other mental illness is beneficial in finding out how those cognitive deficits are looked at in order to seek help and seek recovery.  This population of people have undergone tremendous obstacles in their lives and by using a resilience theoretical lens and a qualitative personage to demonstrate the similarities and differences in how shame affects this group of people.

Albinism is a genetic mutation that strips those affected of the pigment in their skin, hair, and eyes. This alters the appearance of the affected and at times, subjects them to ostracism when interacting with their ethnic group(s). Albinism affects less than 1% of the human population and it is for this reason that understanding their attitudes and opinions on their racial-ethnic identity is important. The goal of this study is not only to investigate participants’ attitudes on and experiences with ethnicity and race, but to spread awareness of participants’ experiences. Participants attitudes and experiences were assessed using a survey and interviews which elaborated on the survey responses. Data for this study are in the preliminary stages of analysis. However, once completed this study they will prove to be one of the few psychological studies on Albinism. This study’s findings also aim to provide information to families of those with Albinism to better care for individuals with this mutation.

As theorized in Black Feminist Thought, Patricia Hill Collins articulates the four main controlling images that surround the Black female experience: Mammy, Matriarch, Welfare Recipient and Jezebel. According to Collins, these negative images are associated with Black women as a means to enact justifiable violence. Past studies examining Black women’s responses to these images have found that there is either a distancing, reimagining, or acceptance of the image as a part of personal identity. It is important to weave out the nuanced responses to the knowledge of these images to gain a deeper understanding into the effects on socialization and self-image. In this study we ask the question, How do undergraduate Black women aged 18-24 attending Portland State University respond to the controlling image of the Jezebel? Due to the social aspect and hook-up culture of college, the image of the overly promiscuous and sexaully-available Black woman is particularly important to understand in a University setting, and furthermore, in a space where the population of Black women is low. Through in depth interviews, we expect to gain responses that initially distance participants from the image of the Jezebel, yet communicate a complex relationship between sexual agency and stigma.

This paper will describe the results of a qualitative study that explores the following research question: how does pleasure function for Black women in college? A growing body of scholarship has discussed Black women’s pleasure in the context of sexuality, personhood, and agency. These scholars have done close readings of the performances of Black women in Hip-Hop and R&B as well as photography, pornography, and have resisted narratives that center oppression and exploitation. These readings move beyond controlling images and respectability politics and make room for the varied and nuanced ways Black women enact agency through a politics of pleasure. However, less research has been done regarding how a politics of pleasure looks in the lived experiences of Black women in college. I aim to address this gap by conducting 5-10 qualitative interviews that include photovoice with current students at Portland State University who identify as Black women and/or Black femmes. I will then transcribe and code each interview. Using a general inductive approach, I will analyze results and show emerging themes within the narratives of respondents. I assume the interviews will uncover diverse definitions of pleasure as well as the many ways these experiences provide a sense of agency and personhood. I ultimately aim to understand the function of pleasure in the lived experiences of these women as they navigate college life. I also aim to contribute new perspectives to the existing literature in Black Feminist Pleasure Politics.

The focus in the current study was to examine how people in middle adulthood develop Generativity(vs. Stagnation ), as proposed by Erikson (1968). In middle adulthood, people become more concerned in helping and leading younger generations into a path that they can prosper, and eventually create a better future for themselves and their community (Bergen, 2007). Although Generativity is considered as a significant developmental task in middle adulthood stage, the process through which how people in middle adulthood may develop a sense of Generativity has not been clearly understood. Previous research suggests that for the process of how people achieve this developmental task of generativity, people first become socially integrated, this means that becoming a leader, mentor, or guardian is acting as a motivator for someone to help others and create a sense of belonging to their own community. Mcadams et al. (1992). By experiencing a sense of social integration, middle-aged adults also become willing to socially contribute. Through social contribution, people tend to have experiences that can help them develop, and have a sense of direction within their own lives to better understand who they are Lawford et al. (2015). It’s assumed that people in middle adulthood need to develop those social dimensions so that they obtain skills that will allow them to develop Generativity. The current study examined how people’s social integration in middle adulthood would lead to the development of generativity through self-acceptance and social contribution, using data from Midlife in the United States (MIDUS 1, (1995 - 1996) and MIDUS 2, (2004 - 2006)). The study’s participants consisted of 3,813 respondents. Path analysis revealed that with demographic variables such as age, unemployment status, and education level held constant, the mediating variables of self-acceptance and social contribution had significant effects on the relationship between social integration and Generativity.

Immanuel Kant, in the Critique of the Power of Judgement, describes how we come to find objects beautiful through an aesthetic judgement. In particular, he claims that an object is beautiful in virtue of its property that we cannot find a concept to match it with. This explains our contemplation when looking at art whereas an object such as a hammer does not motivate us to contemplate it. He also notes that beauty does not rely on the idea of perfection, which is to have the most of certain qualities. In contrast to beauty, Kant puts forth the idea of purposiveness, which is a consideration towards an object's existence being a part of the causation of some end. This means for an object to have a purposiveness would be for it to fit as a means to an end goal. Kant then puts forth the idea of there being two types of beauty, being adherent and pure. Pure beauty follows Kant's general agreement that beauty should be free from concepts. However, Kant experiences certain tensions in terms of adherent beauty, in which an object is beautiful because of its utility. This appears contradictory to Kant's previous commitments to a lack of concepts. I explore these tensions and consider possible Kantian explanations for this. I’ve begun study on Robert Clewis’ “The Origins of Adherent Beauty” to inform this topic as well. Clewis elaborates on the different approaches during that time to reconcile utility and beauty, noting several position Kant takes before assuming his current ideas. If we are able to resolve answers relating to adherent beauty, we will be able to design possible criteria for secondary adherent beauty. Doing so will also allow us to possibly add a purpose to different types of art depending on what concept they are the perfection of.

The works of authors who blur the academic and the personal are often called genre-busting. Conferred that radical title, these authors occupy a liminal space in form and method. This is where I see a pivot to chart a course between recent discourses on queer affect and the potential of positionality in academic research. I will approach and put into dialogue Maggie Nelson’s Bluets and Samuel Delany’s Times Square Red, Times Square Blue to analyze the link between methodology and form, and attend to the places where scholarship oozes personhood. My own method will be partly autoethnographic, coupled with textual analysis that mobiliizes queer and ecofeminist discourses. I will explore how genre-busting writers navigate autographic and academic writing to package and represent experience, thinking nimbly about how they communicate interiority. What kind of vulnerability does this mode of writing perform? This dialogue will be extended to the cultivation of an environmental ethics, in which I propose that writers who write between genres have mapped modes of vulnerability and rupture that are vital to a sustainable discourse.