Relevant Work Experience

Data Analyst, Center for Neurosciences and Spine, Virginia Mason Franciscan Health
(2020 – Present)
I contribute to study design, plan analysis and data collection strategies for non-clinical projects, manage databases (e.g., keeping the complex spine database up to date and keeping stakeholders informed about progress), help with IRB submissions, write parts of manuscripts, contribute to conference abstract preparation and submission, and do the majority of statistical analysis for the research center.

Research Associate, Michigan State University
(2019 – 2020)
I organized materials and hypotheses for experimental and correlational research studies, analyzed data, and wrote manuscripts. I made frequent use of MTurk and Qualtrics online survey platforms. I also made frequent use of R, SPSS, and MPlus statistics programs in my data analysis.

Research Associate, Brock University
(2018)
I organized materials and hypotheses for experimental and correlational research studies, analyzed data, and wrote manuscripts. I was also responsible for setting up and maintaining our online and in-person data collection protocols. I made frequent use of MTurk and Qualtrics online survey platforms. I also made frequent use of R, SPSS, Amos, and MPlus statistics programs in my data analysis.

Program Development, Brock University
(2017 – 2018)
I developed and updated online teaching resources based on student feedback. Using html, CSS, and javascript, I created a series of online practice tasks that students could use to study for the statistics course. Each task automatically generated a unique question each time the page was loaded, checked students’ answers, and provided solutions when students were stuck. I was also able to use the results of subsequent exams and the record of students’ use of the tasks to determine that the online resources did improve students’ exam grades. I eventually uploaded all of the tasks to a website so that they were more accessible to students (https://statisticspractice.ca).

---

University Education

PhD in Social and Personality Psychology, Brock University
(2014 – 2018)
Supervisor: Dr. Carolyn Hafer
Dissertation Project Abstract: Despite documents such as the United Nations’ Universal Declaration of Human Rights, people still tolerate human rights violations. My dissertation examined possible methods for reducing this toleration. Specifically, I used “hypocrisy induction” to try and reduce toleration of rights violations and encourage pro-human rights responses. Hypocrisy induction—a procedure based on cognitive dissonance—involves having people recognize that their responses in a given situation are at odds with a strongly held attitude. In Study 1, I examined whether people who support human rights would reduce their toleration of a rights violation when confronted with their previous hypocritical toleration. Although participants who were confronted with their hypocrisy were more willing to act to promote human rights, they did not reduce their toleration of a violation, contrary to expectations. One reason for the lack of change in toleration could be that personal toleration of a human rights violation is not directly related to the occurrence of violations. Thus, for Studies 2 and 3, I extended the hypocrisy induction procedure to a case where an ingroup member’s hypocrisy directly resulted in a human rights violation. Specifically, I examined whether Canadians would alter their own toleration of a violation in response to a Canadian official who permitted a human rights violation. Results from both studies indicated that the group-level procedure was effective at encouraging pro-human rights responses, but not at reducing toleration of a violation. Moreover, results from Study 3 indicated that the effect of the group-level procedure was the result of directly-experienced, not vicarious, discomfort. I refer to the dissonance associated with the former type of discomfort as “group-level” dissonance. Although hypocrisy induction was not useful for reducing the toleration of human rights violations, my results suggest that both the group- and individual-level procedures can be used to encourage other pro-human rights responses.
Click here for full-text

MA in Social and Personality Psychology, Brock University
(2012-2014)
Supervisor: Dr. Carolyn Hafer
Thesis Project Abstract: Despite general endorsement of universal human rights, people continue to tolerate specific human rights violations. I conducted a two-part study to investigate this issue. For Part I, I examined whether people tolerated torture (a human rights violation) based on the morality and deservingness of the target. Participants tolerated torture more when the target had committed a highly morally reprehensible transgression. This effect was mediated by the target’s perceived deservingness for harsh treatment, and held over and above participants’ abstract support for the right to humane treatment. For Part II, hypocrisy induction was used in an attempt to reduce participants’ toleration of the torture. Participants were assigned to either the hypocrisy induction or control condition. Unexpectedly, participants who tolerated the torture more in Part I reduced their toleration the most in the control condition, possibly because of consistency and floor effects. Limitations and implications of the findings are discussed.
Click here for full-text

BA in Psychological Science, Albion College
(2008 – 2012)
Supervisor: Dr. Eric Hill
Thesis Project Abstract: To protect a subjective sense of well-being people blame the victims of crimes, even those who had no control over their victimization (Correia, Vala, & Aguiar, 2002; Lerner & Simmons, 1966). In sexual assault cases, victim blame may be especially prevalent considering how often such cases are rejected (Daly & Bouhours, 2009). This indicates that prosecutorial case rejection reinforces rape myths and promotes victim blaming in sexual assault. I hypothesized that participants would show more victim blaming when the case does not go to trial, that male participants may blame more than female, and that there would an interaction of participant gender and trial manipulation—greatest blame was expected from males when the case did not go to trial. Based on results from Experiment 1 as well as previous research on victim blame, for Experiments 2 and 3 I predicted that higher belief in a just world, and hostile and benevolent sexism would be related to greater victim blame. I also predicted that belief in a just world might be strengthened when the sexual assault case was not brought to trial. While Experiment 1 indicated that not going to trial increased victim blaming and general negativity toward rape victims, this was not replicated in the follow-up experiments. However, follow-up experiments showed a lack of prosecution does lead to strengthening personal just world beliefs. This suggests that prosecutorial case rejection leads to greater victim blame. Future research ought to look into how other court processes influence the victim blaming.