Students tend to evaluate professors who speak English with non-native accents more negatively than those with native accents, even when there are no differences in learning (Silaj et al., 2023). The current study examines the predictors of accent-based biases in students’ evaluations of instructors. Specifically, we examine the relationship between social predictors (implicit bias, explicit bias, personality traits, accent exposure), linguistic predictors (accent comprehension) and test performance on participants' evaluations of an instructor who speaks English with a non-native accent. Student participants (N = 159) watched a six minute lecture narrated by a Mandarin-accented instructor. At the end of the lecture, they provided an overall rating of both the instructor and the lecture. On the second day, participants completed a battery of social and linguistic assessments. Although people tend to attribute their negative evaluations of accented instructors to difficulties in comprehension, students’ actual ability to comprehend the instructor did not predict evaluations. Instead, we found that the strongest predictor of instructor ratings was students' implicit accent biases, measured using an accent version of the Implicit Association Test. This work has important implications for understanding the roots of accent-based biases and suggests interventions that target social factors may be more effective in reducing bias than those that target linguistic factors.

Anxiety and arrhythmias share symptoms like palpitations, tachycardia, chest pain, and shortness of breath. However, their causes and treatments differ completely. Misinterpreting the two can lead to delayed arrhythmia diagnosis, unnecessary emergency room visits, increased patient distress, higher medical costs, and overuse of cardiology resources. This leads to my research question: How can clinicians reliably differentiate anxiety-related cardiac dysregulation from true pathological arrhythmias using physiological markers such as HRV (heart rate variability) patterns, psychometric measures, and neurovisceral indicators? This study recruited two groups of first-generation Latino young adults, aged 18 to 35. One group consisted of individuals with clinically diagnosed arrhythmia, and another with clinically diagnosed anxiety disorders without cardiac pathology. The analysis focused on the differences in cardiac rhythm activity using psychogenic markers to track heart rate variability from day to day. This study revealed that the heart rate variability in ECG activity showed that shared symptoms from anxiety-related cardiac dysregulation can also mimic heart rate variability from that of pathological arrhythmias. The significance of this research is that it clarifies the physiological differences between anxiety-related cardiac dysregulation and true cardiac arrhythmias. Although anxiety is known to influence autonomic function, the extent to which it alters heart rate variability (HRV) remains underexplored.

Mindfulness, the present-moment awareness, and mindfulness-based interventions (MBIs) have been adopted as alternatives to traditional first-line treatments for major depressive disorder. However, evidence from recent research is mixed, with some studies suggesting that MBIs do not outperform routine psychotherapies. To address this gap, the current study examined the effect of a brief, self-guided mindfulness meditation practice on participants’ ability to remove negative material from working memory and on changes in their mindfulness level throughout the experimental visit. Sixty-three participants (Mage = 19.9) were randomly assigned to listen to a mindfulness exercise or a control audio. All participants then completed the Sternberg task to assess their ability to remove intrusive (i.e., no-longer-relevant) negative stimuli, defined as the reaction time to distinguish the relevance of intrusive negative stimuli and novel negative stimuli. A negative correlation between mindfulness level and depressive symptom severity has been identified (β = -0.35, p = 0.01). Moreover, the reaction time to distinguish intrusive and novel negative stimuli was significantly less in the mindfulness group compared to the control group (t = -2.72, p = 0.01). This finding suggests that self-guided mindfulness exercises may improve depression-relevant cognitive functioning by enhancing the ability to regulate intrusive negative information in working memory.

We interpret the world through a psychological lens shaped by ideology, personality, and experience. When actors step into a role, they adopt worldviews markedly different from their own, temporarily replacing their psychological lens with the character’s. An fMRI study of method actors performing as Romeo or Juliet found that responding in character deactivated neural networks associated with personal identity— an observable "loss of self". Separately, functional near-infrared spectroscopy (fNIRS) research has shown that an individual’s political ideology can be predicted from neural responses alone, suggesting that psychological lenses have distinct signatures of brain activity. This study investigates whether immersing oneself in a character can shift an individual's psychological lens, both behaviorally and neurally. UCLA Theater, Film, and Television students will perform tasks (watching videos and reciting monologues) as themselves and, after a month of character development, in character. We aim to (1) examine whether character embodiment changes participants' interpretive lens, (2) identify self-report, behavioral, and fNIRS neural markers of this shift, and (3) explore whether extended training produces more pronounced neural alignment with the character's perspective. If psychological lenses can be deliberately shifted through perspective-taking, it would open new avenues for understanding and potentially reducing the rigidity of ideological and interpersonal perception.

Short-form videos (e.g., TikTok, Instagram Reels) increasingly shape public opinion. Yet beyond the videos themselves, their comment sections may shape viewers’ opinions, given the brief and ambiguous nature of the content. This study examined whether exposure to biased comment sections shifts participants’ opinions and whether metacognitive awareness (awareness of one’s own thinking) reduces this influence. Fifty participants viewed 12 original videos across common social media domains within a simulated short-form interface. In an online study, each participant viewed videos that appeared either without comments or alongside positive or negative comment sections. Critically, some videos were shown both before and after comment exposure, allowing us to test whether social consensus can override previously formed opinions. After each video, participants wrote comments, which were analyzed to assess alignment with the dominant sentiment of the comment section. Participants also completed a metacognitive survey measuring awareness of potential opinion change and perceived susceptibility to social influence. We hypothesized that participants would align their responses with the dominant sentiment–even after forming an initial opinion without comments–but that greater metacognitive awareness would reduce this effect. Isolating the influence of comment sections in a realistic context sheds light on how everyday social media interactions may shape individual judgment, drive opinion convergence, and reinforce echo chambers.

With the amount of pressure and expectations students go through in schools, it is expected that there is, or at least should be, something schools can do to ease the weight of it all. Young minds are more than academics, but how can schools offer a structure that excludes the common stigma seen surrounding mental health and treatment, and instead allow spaces for students to explore outlets for their stress and struggles? Through a literature review and the involvement of voluntary participation, a project in progress is being done in the search for how involvement in the creative arts relates to students' mental health and well-being. As an artist who aspires to become a psychologist one day, I'm interested in seeing how creative arts impact the mental health of youth. In a world where we are constantly seeing the pressures and expectations impacting young minds, what are the limits for what these brilliant minds can hold? What can creative arts offer to them, and to the world in return?

Neural oscillations and cardiac rhythms interact, supporting autonomic-cortical coupling and psychological functioning. However, individual differences in autonomic regulation may influence the strength of this coupling. Childhood trauma is known to influence long-term autonomic regulation, stress reactivity, and cortical control systems, suggesting it may help explain individual differences in autonomic-cortical coupling. Sargent et al. (2024) examined autonomic function at rest in a sample of individuals with schizophrenia and healthy controls. Their study looked at the relationship between heart rate variability (HRV) and neural oscillations to explore implications for psychological functioning. This project builds on that same work, analyzing Childhood Trauma Questionnaire (CTQ) data collected in that previous study to explore whether childhood trauma exposure is associated with individual differences in autonomic-cortical coupling. We hypothesize that greater exposure to childhood trauma will correlate with reduced autonomic-cortical coupling, potentially linking early adversity to altered regulatory functioning. These findings may also show how childhood trauma contributes to schizophrenia related differences in autonomic regulation, potentially through reduced autonomic-cortical coupling. Results showed that higher levels of childhood trauma, particularly physical abuse and overall CTQ scores, were associated with reduced alpha-band autonomic–cortical coupling. No significant associations were observed in other fre

Everyday discrimination—the frequency of minor discriminatory behaviors (e.g., being followed in stores) rather than major traumatic events (e.g., police violence)—is a chronic stressor that may shape fear learning among individuals in marginalized groups. While prior work links chronic stress to threat sensitivity and fear extinction, less is known about discrimination’s role in fear acquisition. We examine associations among everyday discrimination, fear acquisition, and internalizing symptom severity (anxiety, depression) in late adolescence. Data were collected at the University of California, Los Angeles, and Northwestern University. Participants (N = 263) were aged 18-19 and selected on a spectrum of internalizing symptom risk. The current study uses data from the 30-month follow-up (N = 140). Everyday discrimination was self-reported via the Everyday Discrimination Scale. Anxiety and depression severity were assessed via a Structured Clinical Interview for DSM-5. Fear acquisition data was collected via a differential Pavlovian Fear Learning Task. We hypothesize that everyday discrimination is positively associated with anxiety and depression severity and with heightened fear acquisition. We further propose that individual differences in fear acquisition moderate the association between everyday discrimination and internalizing symptoms. Findings may illuminate how everyday discrimination contributes to risk of internalizing psychopathology via enhanced threat-learning mechanisms and inform early intervention.

Reading with young children strongly predicts language growth and academic readiness (Hoyne & Egan, 2019). Early literacy has been linked to children’s understanding of complex grammatical structures in English (Cilibrasi et al., 2019), but less is known about whether similar patterns extend to other languages, such as Mandarin. Unlike English, which uses classifier words such as “loaves” only when counting mass nouns (e.g., “three loaves of bread”), Mandarin requires classifiers with all nouns. To use classifiers and produce counting phrases appropriately, children need to understand how objects are conceptually grouped by learning classifiers’ meanings: for example, why “loaf” can describe bread but not paper. Because books provide more elaborated and standardized classifier input than speech (Shi et al., 2024), the current study examined links between Mandarin-speaking children’s literacy environment and their knowledge of counting phrases, especially classifiers. We tested 60 Mandarin-speaking children’s (ages 3–5) sensitivity to counting phrase errors via a correction game, and parents reported home reading habits through questionnaires. We hypothesized that greater reading experience would predict better error detection, with stronger effects at older ages, suggesting cumulative literacy benefits. This project broadens understanding of how reading supports language development across languages and offers practical guidance for parents and educators.