Graduating Hope seniors Tiffany Bell of Bartlett, Illinois, and Marny Ehmann of Sun Valley, California, received the award during the annual meeting of the Midwestern Psychological Association (MPA) held in Chicago, Illinois, on Thursday-Saturday, April 11-13.  They were honored for the abstract of their presentation “The Influence of Implicit-Explicit Mate Preference Discrepancies on Relationship Outcomes,” which highlighted research that they conducted with Dr. Carrie Bredow, associate professor of psychology.

Hope students have won the highly competitive awards during 17 of the past 20 years, with multiple awards in nine of those years.  Only about 20 entries are honored each year from among more than 250 submissions.

Bredow’s research examines how discrepancies between what people say that they want in a romantic partner and what they unconsciously desire in a romantic partner relate to whether or not a romantic relationship is successful.  The team recruited 200 partnered individuals for the study, and asked them to indicate the importance they placed on traits related to attractiveness/vitality, status/resources and warmth/trustworthiness; had them rate their partner on the same traits; tested their implicit standards for the three dimensions; and evaluated their relationships.  They then checked in after three months, six months, a year and two years to determine whether greater correspondence between people’s implicit and explicit standards was related to more positive relationship outcomes.  With the data collection recently completed, Bredow’s team continues to work on the primary analysis.

Bell and Ehmann were among several students and professors who participated in the conference.  Hope students made 15 research presentations during the event regarding research that they had collected collaboratively with members of the faculty, with Hope professors leading or co-leading another three sessions.

Hope College 2019 Psi Chi/MPA Conference Presentations Note: Faculty members, who either mentored the research or made conference presentations themselves, are listed in parentheses.

Thursday, April 11 

8:00-8:45         Psi Chi Poster Session I Developmental & Social
Acoustic Parameters of Child Speech, Abby Meder, Elizabeth Woodford, Darby Baird (Dr. Sonja Trent-Brown)
Evidence for Equality? Guatemalan Adolescents’ Views on Gender, Amy Beasley (Dr. Katelyn Poelker)
Biopsychosocial Correlates of Sleep Hygiene in Preschoolers, Rebecca Messnick, Lauren Evert, Cameron Everse, Micah Manthei, Abby Rakus (Dr. Sonja Trent Brown, Dr. Andrew Gall) 

8:30-10:20, Symposium
Religious De-Identification: Distinguishing Religious “Dones” from Religious “Nones” (Dr. Daryl Van Tongeren)

9:30-10:15 Psi Chi Symposium
Getting in: Applying to Graduate Programs (Dr. Lindsey Root Luna, Dr. Scott VanderStoep) 

9:40-10:25       Psi Chi Poster Session III Cognitive & Other
Child Speaker Identification: Accuracy, Reaction Time, and Engagement with Children, Darby Baird, Abby Meder, Elizabeth Woodford (Dr. Sonja Trent-Brown) 
Exploring the Effects of Contextual Influences on Cognitive Processing through the Use of Silent Centers, Elizabeth Woodford, Abby Meder (Dr. Sonja Trent-Brown) 

10:30-11:15    Psi Chi Poster Session IV Biological & Social
Thinking Outside the Brick: The Effect of Collective Intellectual Humility on Group Creativity, Caitlyn Heidenga, Michala Ringquist (Dr. Benjamin Meagher)
Exploring the Predictive Validity of Implicit and Explicit Mate Criteria over Two Years, Marny Ehmann (Carrie Bredow) 

11:20-12:05    Psi Chi Poster Session V Clinical & Health
The Relationship Between Resilience Resources and Stress, Victoria Gardner, Caitlyn Heidenga, Samantha Stall, Michala Ringquist (Dr. Alyssa Cheadle)
The Associations of Positive and Negative Affect and Religiousness and Spirituality, Nicholai Shaw (Dr. Alyssa Cheadle) 

12:10-12:55    Psi Chi Poster Session VI Cognitive & Positive
Resilience and Health in College Students, Lauren Thorne, Allison Darnell, Yuankun Gu (Dr. Alyssa Cheadle) 

12:30-1:50       Psi Chi Symposium: Data Blitz Session I
The Impact of Parent Awareness on Preschoolers’ Sleep, Lauren Evert, Cameron Everse, Rebecca Messnick, Micah Manthei, Abby Rakus (Dr. Andrew Gall, Dr. Sonja Trent-Brown) 
 

Friday, April 12 

8:30-9:15         Psi Chi Poster Session VII Social & Other
Should I Stay or Should I Go: Exploring Moderators of the Link Between Implicit or Explicit Preference-Partner Match and Relational Outcomes, Brianne Crouse, Amy Beasley (Dr. Carrie Bredow)
The Influence of Implicit-Explicit Mate Preference Discrepancies on Relationship Outcomes, Tiffany Bell, Marny Ehmann (Dr. Carrie Bredow) 

10:30-12:20   Clinical and Developmental Poster Session I
Social Support Predicts Positive Psychosocial Variables in Pregnant Women, Trevor Sooy, Anna Langholz, Allie Thiel (Dr. Alyssa Cheadle)
U.S. Adolescents’ Views of the Ideal Person, Trevor Sooy, Ashley Stegenga (Dr. Katelyn Poelker) 

2:00-2:50         Psi Chi Symposium
Taking the Road More Traveled: Using Your Psychology Degree in the Workforce (Dr. Scott VanderStoep)

Psi Chi – The International Honor Society in Psychology recognizes and promotes excellence in the science and application of psychology.  Founded in 1929, the society has more than 1,130 chapters at colleges and universities across the United States, Canada, Puerto Rico, the Virgin Islands, Ireland, New Zealand, Egypt, Guatemala, and Russia.

The honor society’s chapters are grouped within six regions: Eastern, Midwestern, Rocky Mountain, Southeastern, Southwestern and Western. The Midwestern Region includes Illinois, Indiana, Iowa, Kansas, Michigan, Minnesota, Missouri, Nebraska, North Dakota, Ohio, South Dakota, Wisconsin and Ontario, Canada.

Hope’s chapter was chartered in 1965.  Dr. Lindsey Root Luna, associate professor of psychology, who advises the college’s chapter, is vice president of the Midwestern Region, with responsibilities that include planning the Psi Chi programming during the MPA convention.

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