Get Moving to Graduate Psychology Talks on Exercise, Memory

The next talk in the Psychology Graduate Research Series, co-hosted by the Farquhar College of Arts and Sciences and NSU’s Center for Psychological Studies (CPS), will feature presentations on research conducted by two students in the college’s M.S. in Experimental Psychology program.

Psychology Graduate Research Series

Presentations by Mackenzie Rack-Wildner and Brandi Viparina

Wednesday, Apr. 10
Noon–1:00 p.m.
Parker Building | Room 338

 

About the Research

“Movement and Cognition”
By Mackenzie Rack-Wildner | Faculty Adviser: Leanne Boucher, Ph.D., assistant professor at the college

Fitness and exercise are of major importance to individuals because of their influence on human health. This research investigates how movement or walking can impact one’s cognitive functioning, specifically the person’s inhibitory control mechanisms. It is expected that there will be differences in cognitive performance when participants are exposed to a movement condition, as opposed to when the person is expected to remain still, prior to completing the task. This research applies to the growing literature examining how health and fitness can play important roles in understanding human functioning from a cognitive perspective.

“I Can Hear You, I Just Can’t Remember You: A Look at Auditory Degradation on Memory”
By Brandi Viparina | Faculty Adviser: Leanne Boucher, Ph.D., assistant professor at the college

According to the Effortfulness Effect, working memory in elderly adults with hearing loss is impaired due to the increased cognitive efforts hearing loss puts on the central executive, a vital component of the working-memory model. This increased need for attentional control makes it difficult to properly encode information to be remembered. The research to be discussed hypothesizes that the presentation of white noise during encoding will mimic the effect of frequency loss sustained in the hearing of older adults and will impair the retrieval of auditory information.

The Psychology Graduate Research Series is free and open to the public. Pizza will be served. For more information, contact Jaime Tartar, Ph.D., associate professor and coordinator of psychology research at the college, or Sarah Valley-Gray, Psy.D., associate professor at CPS.

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