Interpersonal Trauma and Mental Health among LGBQ+ College Students: Examining Social Support and Trauma-related Drinking as Mediators

Despite the increased risk of childhood, adulthood, and lifetime interpersonal trauma among LGBQ+ individuals, existing research that has examined the influence of interpersonal trauma on mental health has primarily focused on LGBQ+ adolescents and samples of LGBQ+ community-based adults, and less on LGBQ+ emerging adults in college. Additionally, limited work has focused on mechanisms that might explain the relations between these variables. Thus, the current study tested the relations between interpersonal trauma (i.e., childhood sexual abuse, adulthood sexual victimization, and lifetime physical assault and IPV) and mental health outcomes (i.e., anxiety symptoms, depressive symptoms, and PTSD symptoms), and examined social support and trauma-related drinking as mediators of these associations among LGBQ+ college students. Participants included 179 LGBQ+ college students (M = 19.48, SD = 0.74) who completed measures of interpersonal trauma, social support, trauma-related drinking, and mental health. Results indicated that each form of interpersonal trauma, except intimate partner violence, was related to at least one mental health symptom. Additionally, trauma-related drinking mediated the relations between adulthood sexual victimization and anxiety symptoms, depressive symptoms, and PTSD symptoms. Similarly, social support partially mediated the association between lifetime physical assault and PTSD symptoms. Findings have research and intervention implications by highlighting the ways that interpersonal trauma and social/ coping processes affect LGBQ+ college students’ mental health

Ethnic-Racial Identity and Academic Achievement: Examining Mental Health and Racial Discrimination as Moderators Among Black College Students

This study tested the role that dimensions of ethnic- racial identity play on academic achievement, and examined mental health, racial discrimination, and gender as moderators of this association among Black college students. A total of 321 college students who identified as a Black/African American female or male (M age= 18.4; SD = .34) completed measures of ethnic-racial identity, perceived racial discrimination, and mental health. Hypotheses were tested using path analyses to assess the associations between ethnic-racial identity (i.e., affirmation, exploration, and resolution) and GPA, and whether anxiety, depression, and racial discrimination moderated these relations similarly or differently for males and females. Results from this study indicated that ERI exploration was marginally associated with GPA for females, but not for males. Further, ERI exploration was related to GPA among males with high levels of depression, but not among males with low levels of depression. Similarly, ERI resolution was associated with GPA among males with high levels of anxiety, but not males with low levels of anxiety. Findings have implications for intervention by clarifying the nuanced ways that ethnic-racial identity, mental health, and gender impact Black college students’ academic success

A Narrative Review of Interpersonal Trauma, Mental Health, and Substance Use Among LGBQ College Students

A Narrative Review of Interpersonal Trauma, Mental Health, and Substance Use Among LGBQ College Students Meagan Nguyen, Dept. of Psychology, Mar’Quelle Winfield, & Eryn DeLaney, Dept. of Psychology Graduate Student, with Dr. Chelsea D. Williams, Dept. of Psychology College is a critical time for LGBQ (lesbian, gay, bisexual, queer) individuals due to sexual identity formation and trauma exposure (e.g. Arnett, 2000; Acierno et al,. 2001). Studies have shown that heterosexism is manifested on college campuses through discriminaition and cultural norms that devalue LGBQ individuals and perpetuate heterosexuality as normative and superior (Rankin et al., 2010). Additionally, there is a drastic increase in prevalence across different trauma types (e.g., sexual assault), as well as the continuation of risk behavior and psychological distress, including substance abuse (Oswalt & Wyatt, 2011) during this time period. Using psychinfo to find articles to day, the purpose of this literature review was to examine the literature review and identify gaps in work that has exposed the associations between intimate partner violence (i.e., IPV), childhood sexual abuse, physical assault and sexual assault on mental health and substance use among LGBQ college students. Findings indicated that the previously mentioned associations exist among LGBQ+ adults. Discussion will include limitations within these studies, implications and future directions to improve LGBQ college students’ outcomes.https://scholarscompass.vcu.edu/uresposters/1337/thumbnail.jp

Ethnic-Racial Identity and Social Outcomes in Childhood: A Research Review

Ethnic-Racial Identity and Social Outcomes in Childhood: A Research Review Grace Bryan, Dept. of Sculpture, Keyri Hernandez, and Chloe Walker and Eryn DeLaney, Dept. of Psychology Graduate Students, with Dr. Chelsea Williams, Dept. of Psychology Ethnic-racial Identity (ERI) is the labeling, identification, and processing regarding ethnicity-race that takes place during childhood (Umana-Taylor, 2014). Development of ERI begins as early as 4 years (Derlan et al., 2017), and may have implications for social outcomes, such as prosocial and externalizing behaviors. The aim of the current narrative review was to review research that has tested how ERI is associated with social outcomes, and identify gaps in this field. The results of the narrative review suggest that, in adolescence, higher ERI is associated with better social outcomes, such as prosocial behaviors (Armenta et al 2011:Streit et al 2020). Further, findings of the review indicated that limited work has included individuals younger than adolescents; one study that did found that lower ERI was linked with more externalizing problem behaviors (Smith et al., 2009). The review also highlighted various gaps in this literature, such as that an operational definition of prosocial behavior in the context of ERI needs to be established, and there is a lack of research that includes multiracial individuals, and individuals younger than adolescents. Future research should investigate ERI and social outcomes in childhood with diverse samples, as such research may provide important information to school systems, counselors, and caregivers about the development of ERI and its implications for development.https://scholarscompass.vcu.edu/uresposters/1299/thumbnail.jp

Sex Differences in Skin Tone Predicting Depressive Symptoms among College Students of Color

Sex Differences in Skin Tone Predicting Depressive Symptoms among College Students of Color Jenifer Rodriguez, Jenna Minter, Depts. of Psychology and Political Science, Eryn DeLaney, Dept. of Psychology Graduate Student, & Chloe Walker, Dept. of Psychology Graduate Student, with Dr. Chelsea D. Williams, Dr. Amy Adkins, Dr. Tricia Smith, & Dr. Danielle Dick, Dept. of Psychology Skin tone, or more specifically the meaning and treatment that society attaches to skin tone, has been found to impact individuals’ outcomes, with those with darker skin tones (who experience more colorism) experiencing more negative outcomes (e.g., Norwood, 2014). However, less research has tested whether there are sex differences in these relations. Intersectionality theory (Crenshaw, 1989) suggests that one’s lived experiences result from their holistic experiences of intersecting aspects of themselves (e.g., skin tone and sex). Thus, to address gaps in research, the current study examined sex as a moderating variable in the relation between skin tone and depressive symptoms among 81 college students of color who were part of a larger study on cultural experiences, genetics, and ancestry. We hypothesized that sex would moderate this relation, such that skin tone would predict greater depressive symptoms, and this association would be weaker among males compared to females (Hunter, 2007). A linear regression was conducted to test our hypothesis. Findings indicated that sex moderates the relation between skin tone and depressive symptoms, however, in a direction contrary to our hypothesis. In particular, there was no relation between skin tone and depressive symptoms among females (B = .08, p = .54), however, for males, those with darker skin tones had lower depressive symptoms (B = -.53, p = .02). In conclusion, this study pushes for more research on the sex differences in how skin tone affects mental health among college students.https://scholarscompass.vcu.edu/uresposters/1332/thumbnail.jp

Conversations About Race and Perceptions of Racial Discrimination Among Emerging Adults

Conversations About Race and Perceptions of Racial Discrimination Among Emerging Adults Alanna Cason, Depts. of Psychology and Criminal Justice, Angel Whitfield, Maria Cisneros, Dept. of Psychology Graduate Student, Arlenis Santana, Dept. of Psychology Graduate Student, & Eryn DeLaney, Dept. of Psychology Graduate Student, with Dr. Chelsea D. Williams, Dr. Tricia Smith, Dr. Amy Adkins, and Dr. Danielle Dick College students of color have positive race-related experiences (e.g.., positive conversations), as well as negative race-related experiences (e.g., racial discrimination and negative experiences about race; Spencer 2006). Limited work has focused on conversations students have about race, although the U.S. has become more diverse especially in college settings (Martinez-Acosta & Favero, 2018). To address these gaps, the current study focused on bidirectional relations between students’ conversations about race and how they are related to discrimination experiences among 95 college-age students of color. We hypothesized that (1) more negative conversations about race (and less positive conversations) would increase students’ perceptions of racial discrimination, and (2) the more students experienced discrimination, they would have more negative conversations (less positive conversations) about race. Two linear regression analyses were conducted. The first analysis indicated that negative conversations about race (B = .38, phttps://scholarscompass.vcu.edu/uresposters/1303/thumbnail.jp

A Biomechanist's Guide to Defying Gravity: An Exploration of the Physiological Link between Sensorineural Function and Postural Control

In the United States, 28.7% of adults aged 65 or older experience a fall every year, amounting to an estimated 29 million falls. Of these falls, 7 million result in injuries that require medical treatment and contribute to an estimated $50 billion in medical costs. Even when provided proper medical care, fallers experience lasting mobility problems and face an increased risk of future falls, creating a vicious feedback loop of falls and injury. Though seemingly mundane, maintaining balance is a precarious act, requiring the body to overcome one of the most ubiqiutous forces in the universe – gravity. To do so, the body must constantly monitor conditions, both internal and external, and initiate fine muscular contractions to remain upright. One of the primary contributors to falls in older adults is visual, vestibular, and somatosensory degeneration, which dampens sensory input and limits an individual’s ability to produce well-informed, coordinated movements and overcome physical obstacles. Because these changes can initially be very subtle, predicting the first fall, and therefore preventing the vicious fall-injury cycle, can be incredibly challenging. Thus, the need for more sensitive measures of balance is apparent. The present work aims to tackle this gap in measurement through the evaluation of physiologically-inspired measures of sway and their relation to changes in sensation ability. More specifically, this work will capture the individual contributions and integration of vision, vestibular sense, and somatosensation as well as evaluate potential opportunities to augment sensation through the use of vibratory stochastic facilitation. This dissertation contains three specific aims, (1) characterizing sway behavior during a simulated, progressive decline in somatosensory function, (2) quantifying the influence of vision, vestibular sense, and somatosensation on underlying postural control mechanisms, and (3) investigating the effect of subthreshold vibratory noise on postural sway. In all of these aims, analysis will employ rambling-trembling decomposition of the center-of-pressure, a method that seeks to understand motion from mechanistic perspective by separating sway into rambling (central, supraspinal) and trembling (peripheral, spinal) components. Across these three studies, it is apparent that spinal control mechanisms, as opposed to supraspinal, are influenced most significantly by sensorineural input (or lack thereof). In healthy individuals facing sensory challenges, such as those included in this work, this is indicative of an intact ability to set and reset an equilibrium point, but an impaired ability to enact this “plan,” creating a large discrepancy between planned and actual motion. Though more work is required to fully understand this effect, the present work serves as a foundation for future investigations that will include a wider variety of sensory challenges and clinical populations. With this knowledge, we may one day be able to enhance fall risk assessment techniques and rehabilitation practices using a more efficient, targeted approach. Ultimately, these advancements may reduce the prevalence of geriatric falls and improve overall quality of life with age

An Investigation of Rambling-Trembling Sway Trajectories with Simulated Somatosensory Deficit

The purpose of this study is to investigate the effects of simulated somatosensory deficit and vision on (1) linear measures and (2) rambling-trembling-derived measures of the COP during quiet standing. It was hypothesized that (1) linear COP measures will show greater changes from baseline as deficit severity increases and there will be an interaction between the deficit severity and visual condition, with the effect greater in the eyes-closed condition compared to the eyes-open, and (2) rambling (RM) and trembling (TR) parameters will show similar trends across deficit and vision conditions, but with different magnitudes, and present greater sensitivity to deficit detection compared to the COP measures. The long-term goal of this study is to understand postural sway from a mechanistic perspective and use this information to develop a clinically-relevant measure of balance that is sensitive to changes in somatosensation abilities. Fifty-two healthy young adults (aged 22.10 ± 1.88 years, 29 male, 23 female) participated in the study. Participants were asked to stand on two force plates (AMTI, Watertown, MA) with a standardized stance and either eyes open (EO) or closed (EC). Five foam thickness conditions (0”, 1/8”, 1/4”, 1/2”, and 1”, corresponding to F0, F1, F2, F3, and F4, respectively) were used to simulate varying degrees of somatosensory deficit. Participants completed three trials with EO and EC for each randomly-ordered foam condition. Foot-floor kinetic data were filtered with a 10 Hz lowpass Butterworth filter and analyzed using MATLAB software (Mathworks, Natick, MA). Force and COP data were used to calculate RM and TR time series, as detailed by Zatsiorsky & Duarte (1999). Velocity, acceleration, and jerk in the mediolateral (ML) and anteroposterior (AP) directions were calculated for every measure type (COP, RM, and TR). Percent changes were calculated using F0 as the baseline. MATLAB software was used to perform three- way analyses of variance with Tukey’s HSD post hoc tests with p<0.01 to determine analyze effects of vision, foam thickness, and measure type. Linear regression of each parameter across foam thickness was performed to estimate measure means across the full spectrum of simulated deficit. The EO condition produced no statistically significant differences across any foam condition, often plateauing after F2. Therefore, further analysis was performed primarily using EC data. For EC trials, the F4 condition showed greatest percent changes from baseline for all assessed parameters, with an upward trend in mean values from F1 to F4 for COP, RM, and TR measures. In general, standard deviations were very large, likely due to the large sample size and inherent variability in postural sway between subjects. However, some statistically significant differences between COP, RM, and TR acceleration and jerk were still able to be found. In terms of sensitivity, COP captures the smallest change in foam thickness, but RM provides a robustness across parameters that is not found in COP or TR. Dependence on sway direction is evident, with AP parameters often showing greater percent changes across foam thickness. RM and TR measures showed different behavior in the AP- and ML-direction, with RM greater than COP and TR in the AP-direction. This result is particularly interesting when considering the physiological mechanisms attributed to RM and TR, as these results suggest that movement in AP-direction may be more heavily influenced by the central nervous system. The findings of this study suggest that RM-TR derived measures may: (1) provide a greater degree of deficit detection ability than traditional linear COP measures, and (2) reveal previously unknown mechanisms of postural control

Vicarious Trauma Exposure and Its Effects on Mental Health among Adolescents and Adults: A Narrative Research Review

Vicarious Trauma Exposure and Its Effects on Mental Health among Adolescents and Adults: A Narrative Research Review Harris Davis, Dept. of Psychology, Angel Whitfield, Sydney Judge, Bailee Beverly, Jenna Minter, Harrison Davis, and Eryn DeLaney and Chloe Walker, Dept. of Psychology Graduate Students, with Dr. Chelsea Williams, Dept. of Psychology A narrative research review was conducted to examine studies that have tested the relation between vicarious trauma (i.e., witnessing abuse of others; Trautmann, S., Reineboth, M., Trikojat, K., Richter, J., Hagenaars, M. A., Kanske, P., & Schäfer, J. (2018). and mental health in adolescents and young adults. Using psycinfo to find research conducted to date, this review indicated that there are various types of trauma that adolescents might be exposed to (e.g., domestic abuse, emotional abuse, and physical abuse) and various forms of mental health issues (e.g., post traumatic stress disorder, depression, and anxiety) that might result from such trauma. (Erolin, K. S., Wieling, E., & Parra, R. E. A. (2014)., , Stowkowy, J., Goldstein, B. I., MacQueen, G., Wang, J., Kennedy, S. H., Bray, S., Lebel, C., & Addington, J. (2020). Findings from this review also suggest that there is a relation between varying types of traumatic exposure and several types of depressive symptoms (Monfort, E., Afzali M. H. (2015), Merza, K., Papp, G., & Szabó, I. K. (2015) and that there are more studies on adults than on adolescents. These effects will be discussed. Gaps in the literature will be referenced and potential future research directions will be acknowledged. In conclusion, this narrative research review emphasizes the importance of knowing the effects of vicarious trauma on adolescents and adults for preventative purposes.https://scholarscompass.vcu.edu/uresposters/1336/thumbnail.jp

THE ASSOCIATIONS BETWEEN SEXUAL VICTIMIZATION AND HEALTH OUTCOMES AMONG LGBQA COLLEGE STUDENTS: EXAMINING THE MODERATING ROLE OF SOCIAL SUPPORT

Sexual victimization is a prevailing public health concern that differentially impacts sexual minority populations (i.e., people who identify as lesbian, gay, bisexual, asexual, or queer) compared with their heterosexual and cisgender counterparts (McCauley et al., 2018). Studies have shown that sexual violence is associated with depressive symptoms, post-traumatic stress disorder symptoms, and alcohol use (Aosved et al., 2011; Bedard-Gilligan et al, 2011; Carey et al., 2018) among heterosexual college students. However, we know less about the potential effects of sexual victimization on health outcomes among sexual minority college students. Understanding these relations are especially important because sexual minority college students often experience unique challenges and are at increased risk of sexual victimization in comparison to their counterparts (Cantor et al., 2015; Edwards et al., 2015). Moreover, few studies to date have examined the moderating role of social support in buffering the links between sexual victimization and health outcomes. Guided by the minority stress framework (Meyer, 2003), the current study examined the extent to which sexual victimization influences health outcomes (i.e., depressive symptoms, post-traumatic stress disorder symptoms, and alcohol use disorder) among sexual minority college students. Furthermore, we examined whether social support moderated the association between sexual victimization and each health outcome. The current study included 234 students who identified as being part of the Queer community (e.g., Gay, Lesbian, Asexual, and Queer) from a larger university-wide study (i.e., Spit for Science; Dick et al., 2014). The participants in the present study were 18-22 years old (M = 18.46, SD = .412) and majority female (i.e., 74%). Fifty-six percent of the participants self- identified as White, 16% as Black or African American, 13% as Asian, and 15% as American Indian, Latinx, Pacific Islander, or Multiracial. Students provided online self-reports of their sexual victimization experiences (Blake et al., 1990), social support (Hays et al., 1995), depressive symptoms (Derogatis et al., 1973), post-traumatic stress disorder symptoms (Weathers et al., 2013) and alcohol use (DSM-V). We used a series of regression models in Mplus v 7.2 (Muthén & Muthén, 1998–2014) to test our research questions, with multiple imputation to handle missing data. Findings indicated that sexual victimization was positively related to depressive symptoms (b = .21, p = .00), post- traumatic stress disorder symptoms (b = .43, p = .00), and alcohol use disorder (b = .45, p = .00). Furthermore, social support significantly moderated the association between sexual victimization and depressive symptoms, however, in a direction contrary to hypotheses. Specifically, greater sexual victimization was associated with greater depressive symptoms among sexual minority college students with higher levels of social support (b = .29, p = .00), and the association was not significant for sexual minority college students with lower levels of social support (b = .13, p = .26; Figure 1). Discussion will center on the detrimental effects of sexual victimization on health outcomes among sexual minority college students, as well as providing potential explanations and future directions for the nuanced ways social support functions in the lives of sexual minority college students.https://scholarscompass.vcu.edu/gradposters/1079/thumbnail.jp