The effects of cognitive load and lying types on deception cues

120 leaves : ill. ; 29 cm.Includes abstract and appendices.Includes bibliographical references (leaves 94-105).Over the last decade, inducing cognitive load has been introduced as a possible lie detection technique (Vrij, et al., 2006). Evidence suggests that lying is a cognitively taxing task; therefore, increasing a deceiver’s cognitive demands should make lying even more difficult, and true deception cues should become apparent. The present study investigated various behavioural cues that occurred between individuals who lied by omission or falsification. Cognitive load was used to amplify deception cues within subjects on half of the interview questions. It was predicted that there would be differences between cues based on deception type. The findings in the present study have revealed a main effect of cognitive load and a main effect of lying type. There was no interaction effect between cognitive load and falsification. The individual deception cues that were responsible for the variance are identified and implications for deception detection research and law enforcement are discussed

Interview expectancies: awareness of potential biases influences behaviour in interviewees

Expectancy effects are known to influence behaviour so that what is expected appears to be true. In this study, expectancy was induced using (fabricated) information about honesty and specific group membership. Targets were tested in a non-accusatory interview environment using neutral and information-gathering questions. It was hypothesized that those exposed to the negative information (the expectancy) would demonstrate behaviour consistent with an increased cognitive load, and evidence was found to support this prediction. Due to the investigative nature of the information-gathering questions, it was also expected that the targets exposed to the expectancy would exhibit more of these behaviours in the investigative portion of the interview. Some behaviour was found to support this prediction (i.e. shorter responses and increased speech disturbances); however, indicators of performance altering load were not observed during this phase of the interview. These findings support the hypothesis that expectancy effects can noticeably alter interviewee behaviour

Teaching Matters: Essays by UMF Faculty

Essays by faculty at the University of Maine at Farmington.https://scholarworks.umf.maine.edu/publications/1086/thumbnail.jp

A Day in the Life of Microcystis aeruginosa Strain PCC 7806 as Revealed by a Transcriptomic Analysis

The cyanobacterium, Microcystis aeruginosa, is able to proliferate in a wide range of freshwater ecosystems and to produce many secondary metabolites that are a threat to human and animal health. The dynamic of this production and more globally the metabolism of this species is still poorly known. A DNA microarray based on the genome of M. aeruginosa PCC 7806 was constructed and used to study the dynamics of gene expression in this cyanobacterium during the light/dark cycle, because light is a critical factor for this species, like for other photosynthetic microorganisms. This first application of transcriptomics to a Microcystis species has revealed that more than 25% of the genes displayed significant changes in their transcript abundance during the light/dark cycle and in particular during the dark/light transition. The metabolism of M. aeruginosa is compartmentalized between the light period, during which carbon uptake, photosynthesis and the reductive pentose phosphate pathway lead to the synthesis of glycogen, and the dark period, during which glycogen degradation, the oxidative pentose phosphate pathway, the TCA branched pathway and ammonium uptake promote amino acid biosynthesis. We also show that the biosynthesis of secondary metabolites, such as microcystins, aeruginosin and cyanopeptolin, occur essentially during the light period, suggesting that these metabolites may interact with the diurnal part of the central metabolism

Where bias begins: a snapshot of police officers’ beliefs about factors that influence the investigative interview with suspects

The aim of the current study was to obtain a snapshot of police officer’s beliefs about factors that may influence the outcome of the investigative interview with suspects. We created a 26-item survey that contained statements around three specific themes: best interview practices, confessions and interviewee vulnerabilities. Police officers (N = 101) reported their beliefs on each topic by indicating the level of agreement or disagreement with each statement. The findings indicated that this sample of officers held beliefs that were mostly consistent with the literature. However, many officers also responded in the mid-range (neither agree nor disagree) which may indicate they are open to developing literature-consistent beliefs of the topics. Understanding what officers believe about factors within the investigative interview may have implications for future training. It may also help explain why some officers do not consistently apply best practices (i.e. strong counterfactual beliefs) versus officers who reliably apply literature-consistent practices to their interviews (i.e. knowledge-consistent beliefs).This research is supported by a fellowship awarded from the Erasmus Mundus Joint Doctorate Program, The House of Legal Psychology (EMJD-LP) with Framework Partnership Agreement (FPA) 2013-0036 and Specific Grant Agreement (SGA) 2015-1610 awarded to Nicole Adams.Published onlin

Bodies in Culture, Culture in Bodies: Disability Narratives and a Rhetoric of Resistance

In this dissertation I historicize dominant discourses of disability and place my analysis of five published disability narratives in dialogue with those discourses in order to show how the authors of these narratives craft alternative rhetorics to resist representation that casts them as unsuited to public space. Critical to my dissertation is my belief that personal narratives by rhetoricians with disabilities are invaluable sites of rhetorical inquiry, especially in light of the marginalized subject position of people with disabilities in the larger culture. Because my dissertation connects rhetoric and disability studies, my purpose is two-fold. For rhetorical theorists, I argue that attention to dominant discourses of disability and the alternative rhetorics in disability narratives can expand our present understanding of rhetorics of the body to interrogate: (1) who has the authority to speak and who doesn't; (2) who the dominant culture grants the position of subject and who the dominant culture sees as inherently "Other" or an object; and (3) how differing intersections of identity as configured by the actual appearance of the body can often determine whether or not the body "speaks" or is "spoken of" and, in conjunction, whether or not that body is heard, ignored, or silenced. For disability studies scholars, I rediscover the disability narrative as a genre that provides people with disabilities an opportunity to make meaning of their embodied experiences and their material circumstances while simultaneously addressing the ways in which disability itself is also a social construction similar to race, class, and gender. Ultimately, I argue that disability narrative can be a vehicle for a "rhetoric of resistance" that I posit allows people with disabilities to: (1) move their bodies and their voices from the margins to the center of public space; (2) revalue the embodied experience of disability as a site for knowledge and meaning making; and (3) challenge dominant discourses of disability that cast the disabled body as inferior and thereby serve as justification for the cultural devaluation and social marginalization of people with disabilities

Speaking of—and as—Stigma: Performativity and Parkinson's in the Rhetoric of Michael J. Fox

In this essay, I utilize the intersections between disability theory and rhetorical theory to identify two key and interconnected stages of actor and activist Michael J. Fox's performativity of disabled identity: first, a rhetoric of passing and second, a rhetoric of masquerade.  Ultimately, I claim that Fox as a visibly disabled rhetor speaks both as stigma—because his rhetoric issues from and through his body as he experiences Parkinso'’s disease—and of stigma—because he performs disability not just to provide an exigency for research into cures but also to challenge the cultural norms that dehumanize the disabled subject.

Chlorine Species’ Fate in Fenton Electrolysis of Wastewater

This study investigates the fate of chlorine species and other inorganic compounds during electro-Fenton electrolysis treatment of reclaimed wastewater. The aim of this study is to understand how the matrix of species in wastewater would be influenced by electrolysis as a tertiary treatment process. MATLAB® mathematical modeling software was used to obtain reaction pathways and rate constants of chlorine species in synthetic wastewater. This model was then mirrored onto the experimental data of real wastewater and compared to those results previously obtained. It was determined that the mathematical model fit both the synthetic and real wastewater data, therefore confirming that the experimental tests using synthetic wastewater are an accurate representation of the real circumstances