Doctor of Philosophy, The Ohio State University, 2023, Psychology

This dissertation investigates the neural representation of complex social information by employing multivariate methods such as functional connectivity classification analyses and intersubject representational similarity analyses (IS-RSA). The present research examines the functional network associated with social interactions as well as the association between neural similarity and individual differences in emotional reactivity and empathy. Study 1 utilizes multivariate pattern analyses (MVPA) to classify different categories of social interactions based on connectivity patterns between brain regions involved in social perception. Study 2 uses IS-RSA to investigate how individual differences in emotional reactivity modulates the neural representation of different social interactions. Study 3 explores how idiosyncrasies in behavioral measures of empathy are associated with neural synchrony during the observation of naturalistic social scenes depicting specific characters and various types of interactions. Study 1 demonstrates that contextual categorical information about social interactions is better classified by a network of regions rather than within a single region of interest. Studies 2 and 3 suggest that idiosyncrasies in trait-like attributes such as empathy or emotional reactivity reflects differences in neural representation of complex social information. This research contributes to our understanding of how social information is processed in the brain and sheds light on the impact of individual differences on social perception.

Committee: Dylan Wagner (Advisor); Baldwin Way (Committee Member); Steven Spencer (Committee Member) Subjects: Neurosciences; Psychology; Social Psychology

Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.), Bowling Green State University, 2022, Media and Communication

Through an online survey, this research explores the relationship between self-reported social anxiety, self-disclosure, and the use of ephemeral social media affordances. Ephemeral social media content is social media messages, text, pictures, and videos that disappear upon initial viewing or after a short period of time. Recent studies focusing on social information processing theory have utilized the Internet Attribute Perception (IAP) model to show that social media might increase self-disclosure for socially anxious social media users. The IAP model extends social information processing theory to focus on how socially anxious social media users' perceptions of social media controllability can predict online self-disclosure. This survey study utilizes a model similar to the IAP model to better understand the relationship between perceptions about ephemerality and self-disclosure. Specifically, this study focuses on whether users with social anxiety perceive ephemeral social media to be important when engaging with it and if they self-disclose through ephemeral social media content. This study found that social media users with higher reported leveled of social anxiety were more likely to perceive ephemerality as important and engage with ephemeral social media content. More specifically, those with higher levels of social anxiety are more likely to self-disclose online. The results also show that ephemeral social media engagement is indirectly related to online self-disclosure. Furthermore, ephemerality is important to those with social anxiety when they are engaging and disclosing through social media platforms.

Committee: Frederick Busselle Ph.D. (Committee Co-Chair); Yanqin Lu Ph.D. (Committee Co-Chair); Hyungsuk Choo Ph.D. (Other); Louisa Ha Ph.D. (Committee Member) Subjects: Communication

Bachelor of Arts, Wittenberg University, 2021, Political Science

The 2019 Mueller Report revealed a campaign by the Russian Internet Research Agency to influence the outcome of the 2016 U.S. presidential election and insert systemic distrust in Western democracy. The campaign engaged in “information warfare” using false accounts, or bots, to prey on inherent social vulnerabilities that are amplified by the novelty and anonymity of social media, such as echo chambers and the rapid spread of fake news. This thesis explores the aims, methods, effects, and behavioral patterns of bots. It also proposes BotWise, a model designed to distill average behavior on the social media platform Twitter from a set of real users and compare that data against novel input.

Committee: Tyler Highlander (Advisor); Staci Rhine (Advisor); Alyssa Hoofnagle (Committee Member); Yu Bin (Committee Member) Subjects: Computer Science; Political Science; Sociology; Technology

Master of Arts, Miami University, 2017, History

Through textual analysis and mapping of 1790s published travel accounts, this project examines how lower class individuals utilized the growing British Empire to expand their societal status and travel opportunities. Modeled on early novels of the mid-eighteenth century such as Robinson Crusoe and Pamela, these supposedly “true” travel accounts showed their protagonists using personal connections, patronage, and employment to overcome adversity and rise socially. Individuals demonstrated mobility through their public image, dress, and speech. Passing for middle class was difficult, although often achievable through education, conduct, and finances. A publicly available interactive map in ArcGIS Online was created. It shows the routes of travel, characteristics of the travelers' social status, and quotations from the primary sources, allowing them to be compared. The interactive map was built from the travel accounts descriptions of their travels, social status, financial status, and employment through manual data entry. The map is designed to be accessible and appealing to a broad public, enlarging the audience beyond specialists in digital humanities.

Committee: Renee Baernstein Dr. (Advisor); Lindsay Schakenbach Regele Dr, (Committee Member); Robbyn Abbitt Mrs. (Committee Member) Subjects: British and Irish Literature; European History; Geographic Information Science; Geography; History; Literature

Doctor of Philosophy (PhD), Ohio University, 2017, Clinical Psychology (Arts and Sciences)

Children with Attention-Deficit/Hyperactivity Disorder (ADHD) often experience social and emotional impairments. However, there has been limited success in reducing these impairments and increasing social status through behavioral and pharmacological interventions. A fruitful avenue may be identifying the atypical social and emotional information processes that contribute to the impairments and subsequently developing interventions that target impaired, yet malleable processes. Using social information processing (SIP) theory as a guide, indicators of social and emotional processing and the relationship between these processes and social outcomes were examined. Specifically, cue encoding, cue interpretation, and latency to emotion recognition in children with or at-risk for ADHD and children without ADHD were investigated. Participants were 72 children (aged 8-14; 59.7% male; 61.1% Non-Hispanic White), 24 in the ADHD group and 48 in the control group. The SIP tasks included cue encoding, measured via emotion recognition during a face morphing task, and cue encoding and interpretation during a television episode. Significant differences in performance between the ADHD and control groups were not found on any of the SIP tasks. Further, performance on SIP tasks was related to measures of social skill, but not to measures of social impairment. Implications for future research with children with ADHD are discussed.

Committee: Julie Owens PhD (Advisor); Steven Evans PhD (Committee Member); Kimberly Rios PhD (Committee Member); Dianne Gut PhD (Committee Member); Amori Mikami PhD (Committee Member) Subjects: Clinical Psychology

Doctor of Philosophy, University of Akron, 2013, Sociology

This dissertation explores the form and function of social capital, both theoretically and empirically, to understand how it operates within the context of socio-demographic groups based on race, gender and class. Specifically, this study (1) examines major theories of social capital to identify points of comparison and contrast; (2) operationalizes social capital in ways that are theoretically consistent with each approach; and (3) examines each theoretically structured empirical model to determine the extent to which it captures the meaningful experience of social capital across race, gender, and class. The study uses data from the 2000 Social Capital Community Benchmark Survey to create and examine three distinct models of social capital drawn from the theories of Robert Putnam, James Coleman, and Pierre Bourdieu. Confirmatory factor analysis is used to test how well the theoretical models fit the data and multi-sample structural equation modeling (SEM) is used to test hypotheses regarding significant differences in the structure of social capital across race, gender, and class groups. Structural differences in social capital were found for all three socio-demographic groups. However, the findings were not consistent across models. For example, although differences by race were found across all three social capital models, class and gender did not generate similar results. Theoretical and empirical implications for future work on social capital are discussed.

Committee: Rebecca Erickson Dr. (Advisor); Cheryl Elman Dr. (Committee Member); Clare Stacey Dr. (Committee Member); Xi Juan Dr. (Committee Member); Kaltenthaler Karl Dr. (Committee Member) Subjects: Sociology

Master of Arts, The Ohio State University, 2012, Communication

Recent advancements in digital communication technologies have spurred a restructuring of the music industry, affording independent music firms and artists the opportunity to compete more evenly with major firms for market share. With an increased proliferation of music available to consumers, how does information about new music spread through online social networks? Using the diffusion and two step flow theories, this study examines the diffusion of new music through online social networks. As there is a lack of theoretical research involving diffusion theory as applied to online social networks, an exploratory research survey was designed to measure the concepts involved in an effort to understand the process more fully. Questions were designed to explore concepts involved in the hypotheses, including discovery, electronic recommendations, opinion leaders, diffusion and acquisition. A 32-question survey was administered to 460 undergraduate students enrolled in Communication courses at The Ohio State University. Results from data analysis provided evidence that individuals scoring higher on a new music opinion leadership scale will be more likely to listen to new music, discover new music, use electronic recommendation agents, acquire new music that is evaluated positively after sampling and give recommendations about new music. Additionally, results from data analysis provided evidence that individuals who routinely acquire new music will be more likely to acquire new music without sampling, based upon a recommendation from a trusted source.

Committee: John Dimmick PhD (Advisor); Osei Appiah PhD (Committee Member) Subjects: Communication; Marketing; Mass Media; Music

Master of Fine Arts, The Ohio State University, 2011, Industrial, Interior Visual Communication Design

Nowadays, when we talk about sustainability or environmentally friendly practices, we try to convince groups or individuals to be good citizens or good people. Especially young people do not care deeply about pursuing an environmentally conscious lifestyle if it requires an effort on their part. What if one uses fun to influence (i.e., motivate and inform) students about sustainability in their daily life? Would this approach be more successful in changing their behavior? Can sustainability even be considered to be fun? As we already know, behavior change requires motivation and fun could be used as a motivational factor. Proposing that we need to develop programs and concepts that make a sustainable lifestyle fun instead of perceiving it as a negative influence on our quality of life provides new opportunities for projects and interventions. When we make sustainable practices fun, the likelihood to adapt such a new behavior increases. Behavioral change results from a combination of three factors, namely, awareness, information and motivation, which is the most important starting point for fun. This thesis addresses the difficulties in informing and motivating students to choose a sustainable lifestyle by focusing on their consumer behavior. With a fun and playful application, the user should be able to learn and inform herself or himself about a sustainable lifestyle and be motivated to integrate it into her or his own daily life. By offering multiple choices of action as well as the opportunity to be and act as a part of a whole group (i.e., collective action), competition and therefore motivation should be raised. This results from the idea that fun can be experienced both individually or as a group. Design Research is the main tool to develop this informational and motivational application. Research on the target group, in combination with existing case studies in design and the psychological aspects of human decision making, will lead to a design application. T (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Paul Nini J (Committee Chair); Elizabeth Sanders B.-N. (Committee Member); Carolina Gill (Committee Member) Subjects: Demographics; Design; Fine Arts; Sustainability; Systems Design

Master of Arts, The Ohio State University, 2010, Communication

Just as visual cues influence our face-to-face conversations and behavior during cross-cutting political discussions, visual cues in computer-mediated communication (CMC) are hypothesized to do the same. The research presented here assesses the impact of visual cues offered by avatars on perceived source credibility, willingness to engage in cross-cutting political discussion, and reevaluation of a counter-attitudinal political idea. A 2x3 experiment revealed that there were no significant differences in credibility ratings, willingness to engage in cross-cutting political conversation, and reevaluation between those who interacted with a avatar high in human realism, one low in human realism, and no avatar. However, there was a significant interaction between the textual credibility of a message and the decision to reevaluate a counter attitudinal political idea when an avatar was present. These results indicate that when an avatar is present, cues to message credibility become more important in determining reevaluation. Implications for cue processing in CMC and future research are discussed.

Committee: R. Kelly Garrett PhD (Advisor); Brandon Van Der Heide PhD (Committee Member) Subjects: Communication; Political Science; Psychology

Master of Arts, The Ohio State University, 2009, Psychology

The experience of cancer during childhood is marked by significant challenges. In addition to the broader danger of a life threatening illness, children undergo demanding treatment protocols that disrupt daily routines and create a range of side effects that may cause both physical and emotional discomfort. While managing the demands and physical side effects of treatment, children must try to continue normal development. It is commonly suggested that children return to school while still undergoing active treatment in order to maintain academic progress and peer relationships. Nevertheless, a prolonged initial absence after diagnosis is common, and there is often concern that children will experience social difficulties when returning to school due to peer reactions to the physical side effects of treatment. This has led to suggestions that services to facilitate school reintegration should include training in social skills to help children manage illness-related social stressors. Unfortunately, there is little empirical data to guide the content or even support the need for social skills interventions at this time. In fact, there is growing evidence that many children with cancer experience quite positive social outcomes after returning to school. Specific areas of social functioning typically targeted by social skills interventions, such as social goals, knowledge of social strategies, self-efficacy for assertive social interaction, have not been examined in this population. The current study examined areas of social information processing often targeted by social skills programs in order to understand the degree to which these proposed programs may be necessary for children with cancer. Children ages 8 to 15 were recruited upon returning to school while on treatment for cancer. Data were collected in the child's classroom and home. School data collection included peer ratings of the child's social behavior and acceptance, while home data collection included chil (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Kathryn Vannatta Ph.D. (Advisor); Cynthia Gerhardt Ph.D. (Committee Member); Steven Beck Ph.D. (Committee Member); Jennifer Cheavens Ph.D. (Committee Member) Subjects: Psychology

Doctor of Philosophy (PhD), Ohio University, 2002, Psychology (Arts and Sciences)

This research examines the common clinical belief that juveniles who sexually offend are particularly socially isolated and deficient in social skills. Using a validated model of social information processing, potential social cognitive deficits are examined in incarcerated male juveniles with histories of sexual offending as compared with incarcerated male juveniles who committed violent, nonsexual crimes. Specifically, the social information-processing constructs of normative beliefs, hostile attributional bias, social goals, outcome expectancies, and social self-efficacy are explored in these two groups. Juvenile sexual offenders in this sample differ from nonsexual offenders only in the areas of social goals and outcome expectancies. Juveniles who have committed sexual offenses are more likely to rate dominance as a strong social goal in peer conflict situations, but are less likely to expect aggressive behavior to result in positive outcomes. As compared with nonsexual offenders, juvenile sexual offenders appear particularly motivated by their internal conflicts and desires. Treatment strategies addressing only interpersonal skills may not be effective for juveniles who sexually offend; rather, goals and motivations for behaviors must be targeted.

Committee: Christine Gidycz (Advisor) Subjects: Psychology, Clinical

Specialist in Education, Miami University, 2004, Educational Psychology

This paper reports on the social information processes that occur in order for individuals to arrive at a socially competent response. The objectives of this study were to examine the effects of age and aggressive tendency on preschool boys' abilities to solve social problems, specifically examining differences in each step of Crick & Dodge's (1994) 6-step social information processing model. Male participants, ages 3 – 5 ½, were shown a videotape of four social conflicts, each containing an aggressive and competent response, and asked a series of questions. Results were analyzed via multivariate analyses of variance (MANOVA), one way analyses of variance (ANOVA) and correlational analyses. Several trends were found between age and children's abilities to solve social problems, with differences found among the two age groups in the various steps of the social information processing model. This paper also presents limitations with the study and directions for future research.

Committee: Doris Bergen (Advisor) Subjects:

Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.), Bowling Green State University, 2009, Psychology/Clinical

Aggression and prosocial behavior have been shown to have important implications for later social adjustment for children (see Parker & Asher, 1987 for a review). Social information processing, including children's social goals, predicts children's aggressive and prosocial behaviors (Crick, 1995; Crick & Werner, 1998; Delveaux & Daniels, 2000; Dodge, 1980; Nelson & Crick, 1999). Less is known about whether another social cognitive variable, theory of mind, relates to children's social behaviors. The current study sought to elucidate the relations among theory of mind, social goals, and children's teacher-, peer-, and self-rated physical aggression, relational aggression, and prosocial behavior. Seventy children between the ages of 8 to 10 completed measures of theory of mind and social goals, and rated themselves and their peers on social behaviors. Their teachers also completed ratings for each child's aggressive and prosocial behavior. Results indicated that theory of mind skills and social goals are related in some instances to physical aggression, relational aggression, and prosocial behavior. However, the source of the rating (i.e., teacher, peer or self), especially in regards to relational aggression, conditioned the results. There were also gender differences. Further research should take gender and the rater into consideration, as well as other potentially important aspects of social information processing in the prediction of children's aggression and prosocial behavior. It also is important to examine other types of aggressive behavior, such as verbal aggression.

Committee: Eric Dubow (Advisor); Dara Musher-Eizenman (Committee Co-Chair); Molly Laflin (Committee Member); Mary Hare (Committee Member) Subjects: Psychology

Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.), Bowling Green State University, 2006, Psychology/Clinical

Social information-processing models provide theoretical support for an association between social cognitive processes and aggressive behavior (Crick and Dodge, 1994; Huesmann, 1998). However, little empirical research has investigated how two social cognitive factors, social goals and beliefs about the acceptability of aggressive behavior, are related to one another and how they combine to influence child behavior. The present study examined the relationship among children's social goals, retaliation beliefs, and behavior within and across best friend, sibling, and peer relationship contexts. Elementary and middle school children's desire to pursue aggressive and prosocial goals and their approval of verbal, physical, and relational acts of retaliatory aggression were assessed across relationship context, type of aggression, age, and gender. In addition, path models were constructed to determine whether the relationship between children's social goals and aggressive behavior is direct or mediated by children's retaliation beliefs within multiple relationship contexts. The findings indicated that the relationship between social goals and aggressive behavior in relationships with best friends and peers operates differently than in relationships with siblings. Further, children's social goal endorsements and beliefs regarding the appropriateness of aggressive behavior varied by age, type of aggression, and relationship context.

Committee: Dara Musher-Eizenman (Advisor) Subjects: Psychology, Developmental

Bachelor of Arts, Wittenberg University, 2023, Communication

This study aimed at determining if self-identification with a particular industry or group (in this case, the agriculture industry) affected the way messages about that industry or group were perceived, processed, and interacted upon. The Elaboration Likelihood Model (ELM) of persuasion predicts how we process and understand content which aims to be persuasive, based on a number of individual differences and situational factors. The model explains when we first see content, we process it in one of two ways: through a central or peripheral route. The peripheral route of processing required little extra consideration and time are given to the message or content versus the central route of processing requiring additional time and reflection with the message or content. In this research, focus was placed on the agriculture industry and attention was particularly paid to identification, credibility, and content and if in any instances these affected participants' route of processing. Participants were shown messages published by either large corporate agriculture organizations like Future Farmers of America (FFA), Soil and Water Conversation Society, or National Soybean Association or those published by singular individuals such as farmers, FFA members, solar farms, and other agriculturalists or environmentalists both of which are easily for and against the agriculture industry. The first hypothesis of the study was aimed at determining if a relationship exists between individuals' self-identification with specific industries and groups and persuasive outcomes based on the sender of messages being an individual or an organization. The data collected revealed a significant relationship between participants' likelihood to like, quote, and retweet messages that were released from organizations in comparison to messages released by individuals. The second hypothesis of the study was to determine if a relationship is present between higher self-identification with the agricul (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Kelly Dillon (Advisor); Sheryl Cunningham (Committee Member); Erin Hill (Committee Member) Subjects: Agriculture; Communication; Mass Communications; Mass Media; Rhetoric

Doctor of Education, Miami University, 2023, Educational Leadership

This study sought to explore the perceived effectiveness of a teacher mentoring program in a large urban school district in Ohio. One hundred fifty-three new teachers enrolled in the district's residency mentoring program were surveyed about its effectiveness and general demographic information within their first five years of teaching. Furthermore, ten survey respondents volunteered to be interviewed, with five randomly chosen for the study. The results of this study were intended to provide insight into how teacher mentoring programs can help reduce the rate of new teachers leaving the profession, which has increased by 50% in the last decade, as well as the rate of experienced teachers going, which is over 20%. Half of all new teachers are gone within five years, leaving districts and states to invest heavily in recruiting, hiring, and retaining new teachers to combat this growing issue. Over the past decade, the number of new teachers leaving their profession has increased by more than 20% nationally. Many new teachers leave the profession within the first three years, and half are gone within five years. To address this issue, billions of dollars are spent by districts and states to recruit, hire, and retain new teachers. The research was conducted to understand how new teachers feel about their mentoring program in a large urban school district. The opinions of these teachers were examined to explore the program's effectiveness, given the significant investments districts and states have made in recruiting, hiring, and retaining them. This research utilized Bandura's social cognitive theory, sociocultural theory, and Knowles's adult learning theory to explore how new teachers viewed the benefits and drawbacks of their mentoring program, the strategies employed, and what modifications could be made to enhance it. Through surveys, interviews, and transcripts, the research found that having a mentor, more structure, collaboration, and support (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Lucian Szlizewski, Dr. (Advisor); Sherrill Sellers Dr. (Committee Member); Kate Rousmaniere, Dr. (Committee Co-Chair) Subjects: Educational Leadership

Doctor of Philosophy, The Ohio State University, 2023, Educational Studies

This dissertation consists of a theoretical review and two empirical studies investigating adolescents' access of sexual health information. The overarching objectives of this project were to increase understanding of middle school students' sexual health information-seeking behaviors in online settings, namely on social media platforms, and expand general knowledge of young adolescents' questions and concerns about the topic of human anatomy within human sexuality education. A comprehensive review of the theoretical and empirical literature was conducted on adolescent online health information-seeking behavior and health education teaching tools, specifically in relation to sexual health. This review presents ways in which motivational influences impact adolescent social media use to seek health information and offers insight into how Longo's comprehensive and integrated model for understanding health information, communication, and information-seeking (2005) and Self-Determination Theory (Ryan & Deci, 2000, 2020) may be used as frameworks for improved understanding in adolescent use of social media for seeking information related to sexual health. Additionally, an overview of developmental changes within adolescence, and well-established health education tools, is given, providing a lens through which adolescent questions related to human sexuality may best be viewed by those invested in improving sexual health education. In the first empirical study, survey responses from 1,327 participants in 19 middle schools were analyzed to investigate student sexual health attitudes and behavioral outcomes influenced by seeking sexual health information on social media and exposure to sexual health content on social media. It was found that young adolescents frequently use Google, YouTube, and TikTok when seeking sexual health information and that they are frequently exposed to human sexuality content on TikTok, Instagram, and YouTube. When considering sexual health (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Eric Anderman (Advisor); Antoinette Errante (Committee Member); Michael Glassman (Committee Member); Rick Zimmerman (Committee Member) Subjects: Education; Educational Psychology; Health; Health Education; Health Sciences; Middle School Education; Public Health; Public Health Education; Teaching

Doctor of Philosophy, The Ohio State University, 2022, Geography

The rise in rates of opioid overdose is a public health crisis in the United States. Retrospective studies show that the opioid overdose crisis is not homogeneously distributed across space and time, and there is increasing recognition that its etiology is rooted in part by social determinants such as poverty, environmental disadvantage, isolation, and social upheaval. It's important to understand the spatiotemporal variation in opioid overdose emergencies and its possible social and environmental determinants to guide public policy responses to the crisis as the obtained knowledge can benefit health care administration and epidemiological purposes, coupled with the need for generating reliable risk assessment for small geographical areas. This dissertation aims to develop new spatial-temporal methods and utilize new geospatial data for understanding the space-time pattern of opioid overdose events (OOEs) and associated socio-environmental factors for OOEs. This dissertation consists of three major parts: 1) Understand how OOEs evolved over space and time using a regionalized sequence alignment method; 2) Understand the social and physical environmental determinants in OOEs at high spatial-temporal resolution using found geospatial data; and 3) Use city municipal 311 service requests as indicators of neighborhood distress and predicting the trends of OOE hotspots when OOEs data is not available. The outcome of this dissertation helps us understand the critical spatiotemporal characteristics of the opioid overdose crisis and provides valuable information to identify the potential socio-economic and environmental drivers of the crisis as well as geographic areas where vulnerable populations are located, and where interventions should be implemented.

Committee: Harvey Miller (Advisor); Ayaz Hyder (Committee Member); Elisabeth Root (Committee Member); Desheng Liu (Committee Member) Subjects: Geographic Information Science; Geography; Public Health

PHD, Kent State University, 2021, College of Arts and Sciences / Department of Geography

Cancer epidemiology has a long history of applying geographic thinking to address long-standing place-based disparities. This dissertation adds new knowledge to geospatial approaches to social determinants of cancer outcomes. It establishes a framework consisting of three dimensions in evaluating, identifying, and prioritizing spatially heterogeneous risk factors of cancer outcomes. The first dimension is protection. Using a space-time statistic, the first study evaluated whether a non-spatial healthcare policy, Medicaid expansion, has offered protection targeting spatially vulnerable populations against adverse cancer outcomes such as breast cancer late-stage diagnosis. The second dimension is phenotype. Using a classification and regression tree, the study disentangled how risk factors of late-stage breast cancer diagnosis were conceptualized and capsulized as phenotypes that labeled groups of homogenous geographic areas. It provides a novel angle to uncover cancer disparities and to provide insights for cancer surveillance, prevention, and control. The third dimension is priority. Using a geographic random forest along with several validation methods, the study emphasized the importance of the competing effect among risk factors of cancer mortality that are specific to geographic areas. The findings from this study can be used directly for priority settings in addressing the most urgent issues associated with cancer mortality. This dissertation demonstrated that geographic methodologies and frameworks are useful and are imperative to cancer epidemiology.

Committee: Jay Lee (Committee Chair); Jun Li (Committee Member); James Tyner (Committee Member); Xinyue Ye (Committee Member) Subjects: Epidemiology; Geographic Information Science; Geography; Health; Health Care; Health Care Management; Oncology; Public Health; Public Policy; Statistics

MA, Kent State University, 2021, College of Arts and Sciences / Department of Psychological Sciences

People may engage in information avoidance by defensively avoiding learning potentially threatening health information—such as information that may result from getting a COVID-19 test—which may put others at risk. Thus, reducing information avoidance is important. Social norms interventions have successfully promoted behavior change by informing people about what most others do (descriptive norms) and approve of (injunctive norms). Social norms have been especially potent when the normative information is based on a group of people with which the target person strongly identifies. A longitudinal experiment was conducted to test the hypothesis that participants who were presented with descriptive social norms information about COVID-19 testing would indicate greater willingness to obtain a COVID-19 test immediately post-intervention and report greater COVID-19 testing behavior over a four-month period, and that tailoring the message to the person would further increase willingness and testing behavior. College student participants (n=229, 75% female, 84% White) were randomly assigned to one of four conditions in a 2 (Descriptive norms: Relevant to COVID-19 testing vs Irrelevant to COVID-19 testing) x 2 (Tailoring: Specific group information vs General group information) experimental design. After, they reported their willingness to get a COVID-19 test and completed potential moderators of injunctive norms, strength of group identity, and connectedness. A subset (n=42) reported testing behavior four months later. Whereas the social norms manipulation successfully created mean differences in perceived norms between groups, the tailoring manipulation did not influence perceived tailoring. Inconsistent with the primary hypothesis, willingness to get a COVID-19 test did not differ by experimental condition (norms by tailoring interaction: F(1, 225) = 0.28, p = .591, partial η2 = .00). Participants who reported higher (vs. lower) perceived COVID-19 testing injun (open full item for complete abstract)

Committee: Jennifer Taber Ph.D. (Advisor); Joel Hughes Ph.D. (Committee Member); Jeffrey Ciesla Ph.D. (Committee Member); John Updegraff Ph.D. (Committee Member) Subjects: Health; Social Psychology