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Wheaton College     Norton, Massachusetts
Psychobiology > Research

Research

At Wheaton, the faculty in the Psychobiology Program believes that students learn best by doing. Asking a question on your own, getting your hands dirty as you wrestle with finding the answer--these are experiences that are not forgotten, and from which much more is learned than a simple list of facts. To that end, we strongly encourage our students pursue independent research. In some cases, that research may be a project designed and developed by a faculty member; in other cases, it may be a project of the student's own design. In either case, students may receive academic credit for their research efforts, and typically present their work at local and/or national conferences.

The Psychobiology Research Team

The Psychobiology Research Team consists of students and faculty working in partnership to explore common areas of interest under the rubric of Psychobiology. The team meets once a week to debrief and share results. Sub teams of students work on a particular subset of the data collection and analysis, but every team member learns how to do all the tasks used by the team as a whole. Thus within the team, there are specialists, while everyone on the team is a bit of a generalist. Students that are more experienced in the use of a given technique train others--in some cases, first year students are teaching seniors how to use the microtome, while seniors teach juniors how to score videotape data. At the end of the semester, student≠s present talks on their findings and many have presented their work at international, national, and regional conferences. The format of the team builds a work and learning collaboration that is identical to those we believe we will find in the workplace, and gives us "on-the-job" training, while increasing our science literacy and technical skill sets. Each member of the team learns with the others, as well as from the others, and learns by doing. We believe that the kind of research partnership between students and faculty that is evident in the Psychobiology Research Team is an ideal way to learn and to do science. The Research Team experience is also an effective means of promoting student success in the sciences, as all of the Research Team members who have graduated to date are in graduate training or have jobs in their major fields.

Recent Investigations by Wheaton College Psychobiologists

  • Erica McNally '00: Comparing Three Hypotheses for Local Increases in Amphibian Deformities
  • Elizabeth Donovan '99 & Erika Mello '00: Distortions in Body Image: A Comparison of College Women with High School Women
  • Thais Mollet '99: Physical Therapy, Osteopathy, and Chiropractics: A Meta-analysis of Treatment Effectiveness for Lower Back Pain
  • Jill Brederson '99: Prenatal Stress and Anxiety in the Elevated Plus-Maze: Dose-dependent Effects of Benzodiazapine Anxiolytics
  • Melissa Milton '98: Effects of Prenatal Stress on Rats' Performance in the Morris Water Maze
  • Melissa Milton '98: Effects of Water Opacity on Rats' Performance in the Morris Water Maze
  • Igor Schwartzman '98: Prenatal Stress Affects Brain Weights in Neonatal Rats
  • Igor Schwartzman '98 & Kendra Ward '00: Social Facilitation of Diet Preference in Prenatally Stressed Rats
  • Kristine Smith '97: Effects of Environmental Enrichment on Behavior of Prenatally Stressed Rats
  • Jonathan Thayer '97: Prenatal Stress Affects Opioid-Mediated Nociception in Juvenile Rats
  • Jonathan Thayer '97: Effects of Environmental Enrichment on Behavior and Physiology of Rats
  • Heather Millette '97: Social Behavior of Binturongs in a Captive Setting
  • Christina Colby '95: Cross-fostering Effects on Acquired Food Preferences in Mice
  • Amy Franklin '95: Deteriming Conditions Under Which Rodents will Forage Under Bright Moonlight
  • Trudy Smith '95: Effects of Menstrual Stage on Men's Attractiveness to Women
  • Jessica Sutphen '95: Caffeine's Effects on Exam Performance
  • Rob LoPiccolo '95: Use of Visual Cues for Individual Recognition in the Green Iguana
  • Amanda Shames '95: Use of Exhibit Space in a Mixed-Sex Captive Mandrill Group
  • Jill Collins '94: How Self-Esteem, Self-Monitoring, and Perceptions of the Social Norm Affect Drinking Habits of Wheaton College Students
  • Amber Hromi '94: Riding Therapy's Effects on Self-Concept in Special-Needs Children
  • Catherine Largay '94: Effects of Exercise on Pain Tolerance in Rats
  • Maria von der Pahlen '93: Use of Language Universals in Schizophrenic and Non-schizophrenic Adults
  • Stacey Nee MacFarlane '93: Avoidance of Adult Femoral Secretions by Juvenile Green Iguana

 

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