Saint Anselm College

About: Saint Anselm College is a education organization based out in Manchester, New Hampshire, United States. It is known for research contribution in the topics: Politics & Nurse education. The organization has 255 authors who have published 522 publications receiving 7222 citations.

The Scar That Binds: American Culture and the Vietnam War

Abstract: In The Scar That Binds, Keith Beattie examines the central metaphors of the Vietnam War and their manifestations in American culture and life. Blending history and cultural criticism in a lucid style, this provocative book discusses an ideology of unity that has emerged through widespread rhetorical and cultural references to the war. A critique of this ideology reveals three dominant themes structured in a range of texts: the "wound," "the voice" of the Vietnam veteran, and "home." The analysis of each theme draws on a range of sources, including film, memoir, poetry, written and oral history, journalism, and political speeches.

Source-sink dynamics within a plant population: the impact of substrate and herbivory on palm demography

Abstract: Site factors have frequently been shown to affect survival, growth, and reproduction in plant populations. The source-sink concept proposed by Pulliam is one way of integrating this spatial demographic variation into population models. Source-sink models describe a population where propagules from “source” habitats sustain less productive “sink” areas. We adapted this concept to model the population dynamics of the understory palm Chamaedorea radicalis on two substrates, rock outcrops and forest floor. In our model, sources and sinks correspond to fine-scale demographic structure within the population, rather than spatially discrete subpopulations as described in the Pulliam model. We constructed a stage-structured population matrix model that integrates the site-specific demography of individuals across two habitats types that are linked by migration. We then parameterized this model with field data from C. radicalis. To address whether observed differences in palm demography between rock outcrops and the forest floor were due to natural variation between microsites or due to differences in browsing intensity from free range livestock, we parameterized separate models based on the substrate-specific demography of protected, non-browsed palms and of palms exposed to burro browse. Results showed that herbivory reduced survival and fecundity on the forest floor, which in the absence of seed migration resulted in a projected decline of forest floor palms (sinks). However with seed dispersal, palms persisted and total population growth (both substrates) was projected to be positive, indicating that seed dispersal from non-browsed palms on rock outcrops (sources) was sufficient to sustain C. radicalis on the forest floor.

Negative mood reverses devaluation of goal-directed drug-seeking favouring an incentive learning account of drug dependence.

Abstract: Background Two theories explain how negative mood primes smoking behaviour. The stimulus–response (S-R) account argues that in the negative mood state, smoking is experienced as more reinforcing, establishing a direct (automatic) association between the negative mood state and smoking behaviour. By contrast, the incentive learning account argues that in the negative mood state smoking is expected to be more reinforcing, which integrates with instrumental knowledge of the response required to produce that outcome. Objectives One differential prediction is that whereas the incentivelearningaccountanticipatesthatnegativemoodinduction could augment a novel tobacco-seeking response in an extinction test, the S-R account could not explain this effect because the extinction test prevents S-R learning by omitting experience of the reinforcer. Methods To test this, overnight-deprived daily smokers (n= 44) acquired two instrumental responses for tobacco and chocolate points, respectively, before smoking to satiety. Half then received negative mood induction to raise the expected value of tobacco, opposing satiety, whilst the remainder received positive mood induction. Finally, a choice between tobacco and chocolate was measured in extinction to test whether negative mood could augment tobacco choice, opposing satiety, in the absence of direct experience of tobacco reinforcement. Results Negative mood induction not only abolished the devaluation of tobacco choice, but participants with a significant increase in negative mood increased their tobacco choice in extinction, despite satiety. Conclusions These findings suggest that negative mood augments drug-seeking by raising the expected value of the drug through incentive learning, rather than through automatic S-R control.

How does schema theory apply to real versus virtual memories

Abstract: Schemas are cognitive frameworks that guide memory, aide in the interpretation of events, and influence how we retrieve stored memories. The purpose of this study was to explore how schemas operate in a well-known environment and to examine whether or not schemas operate differently in real versus virtual environments. Twenty-four undergraduate students from a small liberal arts college in the northeast participated for course credit. Two identical offices (a real office and a virtual office) were created and filled with eight consistent and eight inconsistent items. Each participant explored either the real office or the virtual office for 20 seconds without any knowledge that their memory would be tested. After leaving the office, participants completed a recognition task and a short demographic questionnaire. Overall sensitivity and higher confidence in recognition memory scores was found for inconsistent compared to consistent items. Greater support for the consistency effect was observed in this study and interpreted in terms of the dynamic memory model and the schema-plus-correction model. The results also demonstrate that virtual reality paradigms may produce similar outcomes compared to the real world in terms of some memory processes, but additional design factors must be considered if the researcher's goal is to create equivalent paradigms.