AGGRS grants support three psychology doctoral candidates
Congratulations to psychology graduate students Rani Bawa, Lily Brouder and Natalia Provolo on their success in this year's Alumni Grants for Graduate Research and Scholarship competition! All have received funds to support work on their doctoral dissertations. Learn more below about each student and their research.
Rani Bawa
Doctoral Candidate, Social Psychology
"This award will fund my dissertation research investigating how and why people often relate their own life experiences to different forms of media, to help make sense of their own life experiences. My research thus far finds evidence of this process, which we call autobiographical memory tuning. Given that people can flexibly construe their own autobiographical experiences in different ways, we suggest that when motivated to, people can construe their own autobiographical experiences as more or less similar to a form of media, such as a song’s lyrics. The grant will fund studies testing what motivations, such as a motivation to belong and feel socially connected, lead people to engage in autobiographical memory tuning. In addition, the research will examine outcomes of autobiographical memory tuning such as increasing a person’s general sense of belonging, overall sense of purpose in life, and the sense of connection they feel with the singer."
Lily Brouder
Doctoral Candidate, Clinical Psychology
"This award will support my dissertation project, in which I am interested in comparing two different strategies for reducing depressive symptoms. Cognitive behavioral therapy (CBT) uses cognitive restructuring techniques to help individuals with depression learn how to correct their thoughts for greater accuracy. In recent years, some treatment researchers have suggested that CBT may instead achieve its effects through a different mechanism, called analytic rumination. I will conduct a comparison of two single-session interventions: cognitive restructuring versus analytic rumination, to determine which promotes a greater reduction of depressive symptoms at one-week follow up."
Natalia Provolo
Doctoral Candidate, Clinical Psychology
"This award will support my dissertation project: Examining the benefits of learning by teaching on cognitive behavioral therapy skill acquisition. Clients learning and using skills is a very important part of CBT and shown to promote CBT’s effectiveness by leading to decreased depressive symptoms. Recent treatment research has looked at how to promote skill acquisition, specifically through promoting learning and memory. Originally inspired by the responses from a qualitative follow-up study of clients who completed CBT with us years prior, I want to test whether clients teaching CBT skills to other people helps promote their understanding and acquisition of the skills. Educational psychology research has shown for decades that teaching is beneficial but teaching has yet to be tested in the context of CBT skill acquisition."
