Brown Bag 1:
10/1/14 Joan Newman and Georgia
Brooke
At our first brown bag of Fall 2014 we had
a 2 speakers: Dr. Joan Newman and Dr.
Georgia Brooke speak about their research.
Dr. Brooke is a recent graduate from our doctoral program and she used a
dataset from an ongoing research project with Dr. Newman for her
dissertation. This brown bag provided an
overview of the larger research project and how Dr. Brooke used Propensity
Score Analysis to the dataset for her dissertation.
The project started in 1995 investigating the effects of PCB
pollution on the Akwesasne Native American community. PCBs are man made
chemicals that were banned in the 1970s but prior to that were legally dumped
into rivers like the Mohawk and Hudson rivers and remain persistent in the
environment today. Native American
communities were exposed to these PCBs as a population that utilized the Mohawk
river and ate fish as a dietary staple.
PCBs have previously been found to have negative heath outcomes and
community concerns arose about human health, children’s development, and the
disruption of culture and lifestyle.
Newman et al., (2006) investigated the effects of PCBs and cognitive
functioning of Mohawk adolescents and found that PCB levels were negatively
related to delayed recall, long term retrieval and comprehension knowledge.
For her dissertation, Dr. Brooke used the dataset to
investigate the relationship between breastfeeding and cognition. There have been inconsistent findings in the
literature on breastfeeding – a majority of studies report a cognitive benefit
associated with breastfeeding while others report no benefit. For this particular population of Native Americans, this relationship was even more interesting to investigate because
of PCB contamination in their environment.
The question driving the research was:
Should women exposed to PCBs through contaminated fish consumption
breastfeed their infants? Georgia then
showed how Propensity Score Analysis was a useful approach for answering the
research question. The previous
literature on breastfeeding and cognition could be criticized because of
selection bias: breastfed babies may
perform better cognitively because of their mothers, not because of
breastfeeding itself. PSA addresses the
selection bias common to observational designs. Step 1.
Generate a propensity score – who is mostly likely to breastfeed and
who is unlikely to breastfeed based on certain characteristics (e.g. maternal
education, IQ, SES, smoking habits).
Step 2. Match treatment and control cases with similar propensity
scores, or group similar propensity scores into clusters. Step 3:
compare matched cases or clusters on outcome of interest (e.g. cognitive
scores). Her results showed different
effects for low PSA group (least likely to breastfeed), moderate PSA group, and
high PSA groups (most likely to breastfeed), meaning cognitive benefits of
breastfeeding could vary by population (which explains the inconsistencies in
the literature). The populations that
seem to benefit the most from breastfeeding are those most disadvantaged (low
birth weight, low SES, cigarette smoke).
Brown Bag 2: 10/29/14
Kim Colvin - Intro to
Generalizability Theory
Evaluation of Measures of Resilience and Vulnerability in
Post-Earthquake Haiti: Using Generalizability Theory on the Road to a
Validation Study
At this brown bag we got a chance to hear our new faculty
member Dr. Kim Colvin speak about Generalizability or “G” theory. She provided a short overview of the theory
to introduce us to main concepts and terms followed by an application of
G-theory to a study she recently worked on involving subjects in
post-earthquake Haiti.
G-theory is an extension of classical test theory where an
observed score equals true ability plus error.
According to CTT, though, there’s only one interpretation of error,
meaning all potential sources of error are lumped into 1 error term which can
be limiting in field research where conditions of measurement vary. G-theory
then gives researchers the opportunity to parse out and estimate different
sources of error and leads to better estimates of reliability
coefficients. Researchers can estimate
what proportion of the total variance is due to factors that often vary in
assessment such as setting, time, items, and raters. G theory is particularly useful for assessing
the reliability of performance assessments – which is exactly what Kim Colvin
did in her research with subjects in post-earthquake Haiti.
The goal of the post-earthquake Haiti study was to validate
the House-Tree-Person test, a projective drawing test, as a way to measure
resiliency and vulnerability in people affected by the 2010 earthquake in
Haiti. The test was culturally adapted
for Haiti and was used to identify children who positively adapted or were
negatively affected by the earthquake. HTP test data was collected from 77
children ages 4-15 years old in 2012 and 2013 in different locations (e.g. a
town not widely affected by the earthquake, relocation camps with varying
amounts of aid/resources, and an orphanage).
3 additional assessments were used to collect data in 2013. The goal was to find an assessment that could
be easy to administer and score in order to quickly aid relief workers after a
traumatic event. The data collected
would be used to evaluate where improvements can be made in order to collect
large datasets to better inform validation study of the HTP test.
An analysis of the raters to determine differences in
scoring due to gender and age showed that there were no differences between
genders but there was an age difference for attribute (vulnerable vs.
resilient). An analysis based on
location showed that the biggest difference was due to attribute and it was
most notable for the orphanage location.
No variability was due to raters – this is encouraging because it means
new raters can be trained and results won’t be affected.
After the presentation, we discussed why the HTP was used
instead of other more reliable tests: it
is nonverbal, easy to give, easy to score.
11/10/14
Student Panel
Discussion: The Ins and Outs of
Attending Professional Conferences
Presenters: Fei Chen,
Julio McLaughlin, Stella Li, Tom Robertson
Moderator: Angela Lui
Every semester we try to do a student panel uniquely aimed
at addressing concerns/issues/topics of being a graduate student in our
program. Previously we’ve had panels on
the dissertation process, and the first year of teaching experience. This semester we put together a student panel
discussion on attending professional research conferences like AERA, APA, AEA,
APS and other acronyms. It was a very
interactive panel where both students attending and students presenting
discussed their ideas and experiences.
We talked about some of the purposes/benefits of attending conferences
(e.g. networking with other researchers, professors, universities; keeping up
to date with current research; traveling; additions to your CV). As a graduate student, however, conferences
are also hard to attend because of the expenses involved. Our panel provided students with advice on
how to navigate this aspect – how to search for different funding sources, how
to use money wisely and attend best conferences for graduate students and how
to save on printing/presentation materials.
More and more conferences are now offering webinar options, and special
sessions and rates for graduate students.
Other tips: wear comfortable
shoes, plan ahead especially if there are multiple sessions, and the overall
perception of conferences is that people are more friendly and
approachable/less intimidating at regional conferences compared to the big
national conferences.
Brown Bag 3: 11/24/14
Dr. Dai
Cradles for Talent: Specialized Selective High Schools
For our last brown bag of the Fall 2014 semester, we decided to
try an evening meeting and attendance was overwhelmingly positive! At this Brown Bag Dr. Dai discussed gifted
education, talent development, and specialized selective high schools like
Bronx Science, Stuyvesant, Brooklyn Tech, High School of American Studies and
Brooklyn Latin School in NYC. First, he
discussed the background and the psychological and educational theoretical
underpinnings of gifted education. For
example: talent development vs.
creativity development, formal vs. informal learning, production (prescribed
education) vs. client based (choices, designed for what students wants)
education systems, and learning content vs. developing a way of thinking. Then we got a closer look into how
specialized selective high schools work in terms of their institutional
leadership, admission policies, curriculum structure and requirements, and
infrastructure supports (i.e. teaching capacity, network of support outside of
the school, technology). We discussed
the importance of schools having a rigorous curriculum with post AP courses and
research oriented courses with a wide range of options and choices. Providing “threshold experiences” such as
internships outside of the school, engaging in project based learning, and
choosing a major much like you do in college leads to a more open and
motivating school culture where students are treated as responsible individuals
capable of thinking for themselves and making good decisions. They have good ownership of their learning,
strive for the best, and achieve personal goals. It is especially positive for adolescents who
are trying to find their niche and explore their identity and new
horizons. However, we also discussed
some of the problems with these types of schools – particularly the admissions
process which is a topic of debate among the schools and administrators. Currently, there is only 1 criteria for
admission to specialized selective high schools: scores on the Specialized High Schools
Admissions Test or SHSAT. Some people
say that is not enough to base admission on and other factors should be
considered. Other critics say it leads
to racially unbalanced schools, with an overpopulation of Asian students and
admissions criteria should be reformed so that the schools’ populations more
accurately reflect the area’s demographics.
Another issue that was discussed was the amount of stress experienced by
students who attend specialized selective high schools and how counseling
programs and social and emotional supports are needed not just during high
school but afterwards as well when they transition to college (Big Fish Little
Pond Effect). It was particularly
interesting to hear from some of the students in attendance who went to
specialized selective high schools in NYC who could offer their opinions on
these issues and discuss their experiences.
Social Events
On October 11, 2014 we did our annual apple picking and picnic event at Indian Ladder Farms and Thacher Park.
We also went out for a night on the town at the end of the semester to celebrate people passing comprehensive exams and to get together one last time before winter break. So it's a little late but HAPPY HOLIDAYS from the Ed Psych family and friends! :)
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