Category: Honors College

Effects of Anthropogenic Noise on Vocal Communication in the Great Kiskadee (Pitangus sulphuratus), Rufous Hornero (Furnarius rufus), and Thrush-like Wren (Campylorhynchus turdinus)

Author(s): Anna McElhinny

Mentor(s): David A. Luther, Shawn Heath Smith, Biology

Abstract

Anthropogenic noise produced by car traffic, aircraft, and construction occurs at low frequencies which often overlap with the frequencies used in avian communication, which can limit the effectiveness of vocal signals. Many avian species alter their song to minimize overlap with noise and maximize effectiveness; however, the majority of studies have been on oscine birds in the northern hemisphere that learns their songs and are known to have high vocal plasticity. To understand how suboscine birds with innate songs (i.e., do not learn songs), the largest avian group in South America, adapt to anthropogenic noise, we examined the effects of noise on the song and call characteristics of Great Kiskadee (Pitangus sulphuratus), Rufous Hornero (Furnarius rufus), and Thrush-Like Wren (Campylorhynchus turdinus). We hypothesized that each species would change the frequency of their vocalizations in areas with relatively loud anthropogenic noise. We recorded vocalizations from each species at 21 sites from Santa Cruz to Samaipata, Bolivia during the summer of 2022. Data analysis is underway, and the preliminary results will be presented soon. We expect they will indicate that suboscine birds that do not learn their songs can also exhibit plasticity in song expression by adjusting the minimum frequency of their song, which addresses a key gap in our understanding of how birds respond to anthropogenic noise in under-studied systems.

Audio Transcript

I have no audio transcript at this time, unfortunately.

College of Humanities and Social Science College of Science Honors College OSCAR

LGBTQ+ Representation in Education

Author(s): Cameron Hunt, Emma Ealley, Isabella Roman, Skylar Leih

Mentor(s): Toni Farris, Honors College

Abstract

There is current debate surrendering policies in primary education on whether to allow LGBTQ+ material in history and social science classes or not. Some deem it as liberal indoctrination, inappropriate for children, too difficult and complex to teach, or disrespectful to religious students and families. Others see the implementation of LGBTQ+ representation in education as productive, inclusive, diverse, and vital for students to learn in order to expand their knowledge of types of people, allow them to understand themselves and one another better, and create a supportive, accepting environment. After researching current legislation and the benefits and concerns of implementing LGBTQ+ education, as well as reading of the wants, needs, and emotions of the parties involved in this conflict. The information has been compiled into a website with blog posts detailing the effects of LGBTQ+ representation on students and parents, and how schools and policies relate to this issue. These blog posts aim to inform students, parents, school employees, and any other readers on LGBTQ+ representation in the educational system and approach it considering the concerns of both supporters and deniers equally.

Audio Transcript

Hi my name is Isabella Roman. Hi, my name is Skyler Lee. I’m Cameron Hunt and not present with us today but editing our video is Emma Ealley. So, in our Honors 130 project we were assigned to research an identity conflict because our class is Resolving Identity Conflict and so the topic we chose to do is LGBTQ plus Representation in Education. So, there’s current debate in the United States right now on the representation of the LGBTQ plus community in local education should be promoted or avoided altogether. Studies showed that students feel safer when seeing their identities represented in school curriculum but there is parent and administration pushback due to conflicting values. So, many teachers feel hesitant to approach the topic because it could have a very significant impact on their careers, so this conflict mainly boils down to conformity versus diversity and identity and self-expression. In our conflict analysis we identified main interests and needs as well as positions. So in our interests and needs we identified things like self-expression, representation, conformity and autonomy as well as things like access to information, healthcare, and safety. We identified major positions being Pro-LGBTQ plus representation groups, Anti-LGBTQ plus representation groups and third parties. All right and now we move on to the categorization and complexity of the parties involved. In this slide we’ve included the grassroots level of parties involved such as parents, students, and teachers and more. Each group can essentially be split into Pro-LGBTQ plus supporters and Anti-LGBTQ plus supporters, however parents hold the most variation in terms of relevant positions for this conflict. It should be considered that there are parents who may have children who are part of the LGBTQ plus community and this may affect their positions, priorities, and interests. Next slide please. And as you can probably tell, the situation is very complex. There are many ways to break down the parties and each have their own needs wants and desires, although these mostly overlap. There’s also division within those parties due to different patterns of thinking and the knowledge that they have on various topics. This would be due to cognitive bias, which essentially means that your brain is confronted with two very different perceived truths and thus, cannot decide which is actually true. Positioning is whichever side the a person chooses to align with in a particular conflict. And cognitive bias and positioning in an argument lead to dehumanization on both sides there are the immediate biases that are based on emotion but there are also deeper biases that lead someone to disregard information that does not fit with what they already know or believe about something. All this leads to one side being considered less than human for their beliefs and position which is dehumanization. Next slide please. Our group has created a conflict map for our project that includes the other parties involved, more than just the grassroots parties listed in our conflict analysis. this map includes the middle-range and top-range leaders as well as the parties of the grassroots we already mentioned as well as delving into each party’s interests, needs, values, and rights, which is linked in our website. Next slide please. Alrighty, to address this situation we came up with an advocacy plan. Our plan was to create a blog educating the public on the importance and key elements of LGBTQ plus representation in primary education. As a result, we created this website on Google sites; we had four blog posts “How to Implement LGBTQ Representation,â€ “The Importance of Representation,â€ “The Role of Parents”nd “Schools and Curriculums.â€ The main goal of this was for people, at least a couple people, to read it and just kind of understand the other view, even if they don’t necessarily agree, just to understand that this topic is a lot more complex than it looks on the surface. As a result, one of the biggest challenges for this situation as a whole was trying to remain neutral. We all hold an opinion on this, we’re all cognitively biased towards one party, and so to be able to split those apart and write concisely in a neutral position was very hard. although it did allow us to learn to mediate between others in ways that involve all of the parties involved. And that was our project for our student advocacy. Thank you so much for watching!

College of Science Honors College OSCAR

Behavioural Analysis of Asian Elephants at Smithsonian National Zoo

Author(s): Gwendolyne Fields

Mentor(s): David Luther, College of Science

Abstract

Asian elephants (Elephas maximus) are classified as endangered species by the IUCN, facing major threats of habitat loss and human-elephant conflicts. With one-third of their population in a human-care setting, research among these environments is important to enable the species’ survival and hopeful reintroduction to the wild. The Smithsonian National Zoo houses seven Asian elephants: six females, Kamala, Bozie, Maharani, Swarna, Trong Nhi and Nhi Linh and one male, Spike. The newest addition to the herd, Trong Nhi and her daughter Nhi Linh arrived from the Rotterdam Zoo in November. To help them adapt to their environment and new herd, I observed and categorized their behaviors through video recordings on the ZooMonitor camera system. I observed 15 hours of video footage, with behaviors marked on an ethogram every four minutes that passed during the observation time. Specifically, Trong Nhi demonstrated stress behaviors, which we investigated when and why this was occurring. Preliminary results indicated that Trong Nhi demonstrated the stress behavior “head bobâ€ before 12:00pm. Although some hours were collected on focusing between the hours 6:30-12:30 pm, there was insufficient data to determine the significance of why it occurred. Future studies will assess the environment around Trong Nhi leading up to the stress behavior which will help better care for her. This can also help the animal team determine when to attempt for Spike and Trong Nhi or Nhi Linh to mate which would be an important step in the conservation of the species.

Audio Transcript

Hi my name is Gwendolyne Fields and you’re joining me here today at Smithsonian’s National Zoo, currently at the Elephant Barn House.

You can join me inside to meet some of the elephants. Here we have Nhi Linh and Trong Nhi, mother and daughter, 19 years old and 9 years old. For my OSCAR Research project, I focused on them and their behaviour.

To tell you more about the elephants here at Smithsonian’s National Zoo, we have seven elephants. So we have six females and one male, Spike. Our other females along with Trong Nhi and Nhi Lhin are Kamala, Rani or Maharani, we also have Swarna and Bozie. These girls came to us in November and they are from Rotterdam Zoo in the Netherlands. And that’s why I focused on them because we do not know much about their behaviours and it was really important for us to better their care if we understood more about their behaviours themselves.

So to talk more about my research project, I ended up focusing on the stress behaviour that Trong Nhi was showing. She basically would raise her head up and do a big yawn or bob her head. So we wanted to look more into that and see why that was occurring and when it was happening. So we did a preliminary research portion where we looking at video footages for a day and split it between two hours within different parts of the day to see what time of day would she maybe show this behaviour.

So to give you an idea about what the day is like working with the animal keepers. We start off our day feeding the elephants at 6:30 in the morning and then we start cleaning the enclosures, meaning picking up poop and cleaning drinkers, as you can see in this video. The animal keepers do their health checks on the elephants to make sure there are no injuries and they all seem in good condition. Once we have our lunch break, we feed them again with bamboos and green vegetables and fill up on their hay. This is what I help with once a week, on top of doing my research project.

So as you can see here, this is a video of Trong Nhi and Nhi Lihn first meeting Spike. One of the reasons that the girls came to the Zoo here is to eventually get them to mate with Spike. Further along the research, the behaviours seen with other members of the herd, including Spike would be very beneficial.

The data of Trong Nhi and Nhi Lhin were collected through an ethogram, essentially a spreadsheet of the different behaviors that were observed for the elephants. When doing the video footage, I used the ZooMonitor Camera System and was able to view footages of the elephants for up to 2 months in the past.

With the time I had during the semester on top of going to the zoo once a week, I was only able to look through 15 hours of footage during two days. This obviously was not enough to establish a real connection between the stress behavior that Trong Nhi was demonstrating and what was causing it, but we did notice that Trong Nhi demonstrated her stress behavior during earlier parts of the day, before 12:00 pm.

Overall, we have a better idea of when we should maybe pay more attention to this stress behavior and have the team come up with a solution to better her care. Thank you for watching, I hope you guys enjoyed your day at the zoo with the Elephants at Smithsonian.

College of Humanities and Social Science Honors College

Political Conflict in Gun Legislation

Author(s): Daniel Nephew

Mentor(s): Toni Farris, Honors College

Abstract

This project was a part of my HNRS 130 Identity Conflict class. Throughout the semester-long project, I dove into understanding the identity conflict surrounding the political deadlock in addressing gun violence in the United States. In this project I attempted to dissect why Congress can’t reach a majority decision regarding gun legislation rather than the political discussion surrounding the conflict itself. The video highlighted some eye opening findings from GMU students who believe the main problem in addressing legislation such as this one is the labels of “Democrat” or “Republican” which creates division leading to the current legistative deadlock.

Audio Transcript

Hello everyone. We’re here at George Mason University to talk to students about gun legislation and to try to see why it’s such a big conflict and trying to reach a political node over on what’s your political affiliation. I’m not really too big into politics, but I would say that unlike in the middle, leaning to the left a little, I’m more in the middle, but I lean more conservatively. I’m registered as an independent, but I am more left-leaning, so I’m not a fan of the two-party system, but I definitely aligned with the right on most social issues. I’m officially a Democrat, but I would call myself a socialist. So what does being a Republican means here? So it means, I think, a focus on personal liberties, personal freedoms, as well as like combating crime, ensuring that more moral laws are enforced. Like that. It means progressive in America, it means fighting for the people more. And what does being a Democrat or socialists me too in terms of key issues on Congress? Well, I can answer really simply to me. It simply means that we live in a society where basically we have in equal distributions of, let’s say, wealth, power equality. And I would prefer to live in a world where we have more equal distribution of everything. That’s basically what it means to me. I’d say from my perspective, I think a very big thing in this country is bipartisanship, especially when it comes to the whole Democrat, republican thing. I’m not very into bipartisanship. I think it skews a lot of people’s ideas and reasons why people do the things that they do. Which is why kind of align myself more with the socialist identity even so I wouldn’t even say to them socialist. But again, honestly, I just think bipartisanship is outdated and it’s not really the best system of politics that we could operate under. And again, I’m not an expert, but I have my critique. Can I just say to me, bipartisanship? It’s like it’s like a smokescreen really, for much greater issues that we have in society. That’s what it is to me, absolutely. So you’ve got such a very interesting issue. Labels like bipartisanship. It’s either your phone card, Democrat, given me approaching you guys with that question, you define more on a spectrum then I said one of the other. Do you think that the label of you being a Republican or Democrat creates more division than helps solve issues. I definitely agree because I think that people tend to align themselves with slick party issues. So it’s like, oh, if the Republican Party cares about this single issue, then I’m going to align myself with caring about that issue because I’m a Republican or vice versa for Democrats, I think it’s kinda the same in either party. And I think that when it gets muddled down with identity politics, that kinda loses its genuineness. Like what is it that people are advocating for change? Thor? Is it like just because you’re a Democrat, isn’t just because you’re Republican, is it because, you know, Hillary Clinton said so is because some of Trump’s at. So like, why is it that you do the things that you do? So what do you think about gun ownership? I think I don’t like I think there should be gun control. I personally wouldn’t own a gun. I can understand why some people feel more comfortable with a gun, but yeah, I think we definitely need stricter gun control laws. Without Ben control, anyone get this? And you have like open laws about guns. Like chaos can happen like anyone could be buying guns. And as you see in some states, like like, like 18-year-old kids buying guns, shooting up schools and things like things like that can happen when guns open. Is there any issues that you descend from the Republican Party? Oh, yeah. So abortion, I think is a big one. There’s some things I don’t agree with that. Gun laws, but that’s kinda very broad. I think those are the two big ones. Fall. Talking about GAN loss. Do you think that what’s your opinion on gun ownership or gun restriction? Gun restriction. I like I like I support gun ownership if it’s in the right cases. If someone’s breaking into your house, it’s you. You need to protect yourself and your family if you have a family. But there’s some things that could be improved restricted, Definitely. In my opinion, yes. You have an example. Like maybe ARs. Not having AR is maybe shotguns only for hunting. Rifle is for hunting, but not for maybe home defense or and limiting access. Definitely limiting access. So make it obviously harder to get one. Yeah. Okay. So I am Second Amendment absolutist essentially. So I believe that most gun laws are infringements. Let’s say you had a Republican candidate that all your other political views align with? Yes. But there are in favor of gun restrictions that totally deal breaker for you. It would be very difficult for me to vote for them. The only way I would vote for them probably is if the other candidate was in favor of abortion. So this is the number of gun deaths in the United States, 1999-2016. And can you take a guess on which each one of these numbers represent and these are your options. And there’s one extra one. Maybe, that one Is suicide, maybe mass shootings, legal intervention, accidental. It’s still the leading gun deaf cause. It is suicide. The second one is homicide, and the third one is Lear intervention. And the last one is measuring is why why did you make those choices as the exhaustion? I feel like maybe that because that’s what the news covers maybe. So e.g. he said to be mass shootings. It’s a big number of different from 2000 to her and tells him to barely. Do you feel like there is a perspective that the news for Jack that is not true to reality. It makes you believe that it is more than into an actual truth. I don’t think it’s necessarily on purpose, but I think it’s just because they cover more negative things. And like, I feel like school shootings are covered in the news a lot. Like mass shootings in the United States? Yes. Do you believe that there is a issue there that there is increasing and mass shootings every day creases number of victims. I think strings are a problem for sure. I don’t think that it is as big of a problem as the media makes it out to be. That being said, it is still a tragedy every time it happens. And I think that there should be steps taken to reduce mass shootings in America. Now, do you think that gun restriction of laws would help decrease? I think that in terms of decreasing mass shootings, no, I think that it might they might affect the type of weapon used maybe, but even then I think that sort of like a complete buyback and ban, we wouldn’t see any real change in terms of mass shootings. Not do you think that health care interventions, first assessments, and other ways that don’t really mess with the second amendment would be a better improvement than gun restrictions. Absolutely. I think that the end of the day, people targeting gun legislation as a means to solve the issue of mass shootings are ultimately treating a symptom rather than the underlying problem. I think that the underlying problem in this country is mental health. And like outlets for mental health as well as a lot of young men. I feel like, especially in this culture and society, feel like they are not being listened to, being heard and feel like they don’t have any purpose. And I think if we combat the mental health, as well as trying to give these young people more of a fulfilling role in society, it would drastically cut down on the number of disaffected young men who feel like they need to lash out. So a lot of Republicans say that it’s not the gun that kills people. It is the person. What do you think about that statement? I mean, obviously it’s not the gun that kills, but when people have access to get those guns, they’re going to get them and then they can still use them to kill. Not everyone thinks the same. Some people, there’s some crazy people out there. You don’t know who’s gonna do. What would they have the ability to do what they want? How about what are you guys feeling about gun ownership? Um, my dad doesn’t affect own a gun. He was not in the military. He just has this little quirks that’s used to build them and sell them. And now he just has one to have one. But I think on the issue of gun control, it’s always been such a loaded issue for me and I’ve never really been able to just sit down with it because I remember being in high school and it was such a big thing when I was in high school with Parkland and things like that. And I just think there’s so many sides. That’s not really a consideration. Yeah. Not even that. I think it’s like there’s gun control as a political issue and control as a personal issue. And I’ve always found it so difficult to come to consensus, especially because those two things are so separate. Like you you would have to consider good control on a personal level like your dad having guns versus, you know, because it’s so multifaceted that I feel like it’s there’s a reason that no one’s really come to a consensus because it feels it possible to come to one. There’s current that lock-in Congress regarding how to handle gun legislation. Democrats want to restrict it, and Republicans want to preserve the current setting. Do you think there’s any chance that they could find a middle ground on how to let’s say. Restrict a little bit on a ship, but at the same time have Republicans keep their freedoms? I mean, if I’m being honest and realistic, I don’t think they can find a middle ground because everyone’s always going to find a way to be dissatisfied with the situation. Like it, especially when it comes to those types of things, abortion and gun control, between the Democratic and Republican. There’s not really much of a middle ground when they come, they can’t find the one. That’s why they’re always arguing or something. Something always is off to the other party who talks about how you’re very pro Second Amendment. It true or politician. And you’re under his gun legislation debate where there’s just been a mass shooting and people are trying to figure out how to solve the problems. How would you go on about it without making any concessions about? Yes. So I would probably try and introduce a bill or support legislation that specifically overhauls mental health spending as well as programs that would have greater mental health access for, for instance, especially for people in schools. I feel like we already have school counselors. I feel like it would be a really good step in the right direction to see on staff, school psychologists that would be free of charge for students, as well as having like a kinda like a national hotline almost which would coordinate with local law enforcement if need be, and local clinics and mental health providers. I think that that would be a great step in the right direction. Yeah. And then none of that would include any kind of gun legislation. And Leslie, I wanted to ask, do you feel like that locking Congress? Congress is in deadlock because people can make concessions. A set of concession is find a middle ground instead of being black and white. Yeah. So like we were kind of talking about this earlier. We’re saying there are so many parts to bipartisanship. Democratic Party, the Republican Party, especially the Republican Party. Again, we were talking about the whole idea of pro Trump and Trump Republicans. And we were saying that, again, I think with issues like that, it’s not necessarily people being unable to decide or not reaching a consensus. I think it’s merely explain it. I feel like it’s essentially like this group of people has this set idea and we’re going to stick to it because I feel like a lot of politics now are. So set. The precedent like, Oh, this is what our party represents like this is traditionally the values that we adhere to regardless of current events. And that’s not saying that political parties that can’t keep with the times. But again, I think it’s still says a lot regarding this uptick in gun violence in America. I mean, I feel like I don’t know the specific statistic, but I feel like gun violence has been an all-time high even in the first half of 2022. Like, I don’t know, I think it’s just identity politics. I think that’s mainly it. Like people are so set in their ways when it comes to bipartisanship that no one’s going to budge. No one can really make any set decision. Well, thank you guys so much. I appreciate it. Thank you.

College of Public Health Honors College Undergraduate Research Scholars Program (URSP) - OSCAR

The lack and delay of endometriosis diagnosis in black women

Author(s): Nene Uwaomah

Mentor(s): Jhumka Gupta, College of Public Health

Abstract

Endometriosis is a chronically painful condition with poor health related outcomes for those diagnosed with it. These outcomes may include chronic pain, infertility, and experiences with stigma, among others. While there is some research available on the experiences of women of color in other jurisdictions, the experiences of women of color in the DC metro area, who have been diagnosed with endometriosis, have yet to be characterized. This study serves to understand how black women and other women of color with symptoms suggestive of endometriosis experience medical racism. This will be done with a focus group from participants from the ENDO-Served study on endometriosis in women of color based in the DC metro area. The research question: are women of color who report discrimination in the healthcare setting more likely to have a lack or delay of diagnosis of endometriosis? The methodology used in this study was a qualitative methodology, done with interviews of women of color with endometriosis. Through these interviews the participants will express their experience with their diagnosis of endometriosis and the treatment they received from their healthcare provider. Results from this methodology will help us to explore a deeper understanding of the perceptions and stigma of this condition. As well as help to develop programs related to reducing barriers as well as time of diagnosis, addressing racism, and stigma, among black and other women of color. This research was conducted with the funding of OSCAR and URSP at George Mason University. The research was overlooked by Dr. Jhumka Gupta a professor at George Mason University, and Julia Mandeville, Ph. D candidate responsible for the study and creation of Endo-Served.

Audio Transcript

Hello and thank you for coming to my presentation. My name is NeNe Uwaomah and I’m presenting my study are women of color who report discrimination in the healthcare setting more likely to have a lack or delay of diagnosis of endometriosis. My mentor is Dr. Gupta from the Department of Community and Public Health at George Mason University.

Some background from how we got to this topic question; endometriosis is an understudied disorder of the uterus. Endometriosis is a disorder in the female reproductive system that occurs when tissues that normally line the uterus, grow outside of the uterus. It is a chronically painful condition with poor health related outcomes for those diagnosed with it. Endometriosis impacts 1 in 10 women, and is a condition characterized by debilitating pelvic pain and activity impairment that can also lead to infertility. Other than the lack of research into the experiences of women in these populations with endometriosis, there are also disparities in the diagnostic outcomes. Studies have found that Black women were less likely to be diagnosed with endometriosis (OR 0.49, 95% CI 0.2 9 -0.8 3)4, or were more likely to have a delay in diagnosis (µ=2.6 years older (95% confidence interval [CI], 0.5-4.6), when compared to white women(Li, et al, 2021).
The methodology used in the study included both qualitative and quantitative formats. First was an IRB approved Qualtrics survey prepared by Endo-Served. A project developed for the study of endometriosis in women of color in the DC, Maryland, and Virginia metropolitan area. The study identified key similarities between volunteers and their experience with endometriosis and the healthcare system. From the survey, significant numbers showed that discrimination was a factor with the women’s diagnosis along with stigma. From the survey participants a few women volunteered to participate in individual meetings to discuss their diagnosis story and experience in healthcare. Authentication of participants was prioritized. Their identities remain anonymous. It was ensured that the participants were aware of and comfortable with the study design and purpose. The interviews allowed the participants shared their difficulties with their diagnosis, as well as answer questions pertaining to their experience. The questions included;
Tell me your diagnosis story
2. Where did you first hear the word “endometriosis”?
a. Probe for family/friends, social media vs health care provider
3. In our data with ENDO-Served (explain what Endo-served is if they are not familiar), we are finding that women who reported learning about endometriosis for the first time from a family member/friend also reported more experiences with racism in a healthcare setting. Why do you think this is?
a. How, if at all, does this relate to your experiences?
4. What do you think needs to change regarding racism in healthcare settings?

The interviews resulted in similar answers between the four participants. ¾ of the women had to receive second and third opinions as their concerns were not taken seriously enough by their first physician. All of the women experienced excruciating pain, heavy bleedings, nausea, extended fatigue and some experienced problems with childbearing. Each woman explained their difficulties as they did not feel heard by their medical professionals and were stereotyped into the stigma that their pain tolerance was higher as black women. They were made to feel isolated and crazy, resulting in trauma of life alterations. When the women were diagnosed, all had to undergo surgery in order to remove cysts, fibroids, and growths. At the point of diagnosis, the women were in moderate and severe stages of endometriosis.
Most women had just first heard of endometriosis when they were being diagnosed, and those that did not first hear it through diagnosis, had looked up their symptoms through non-formal sources and discovered endometriosis. The cause of endometriosis is unknown, but it is believed to be a genetic or hereditary disorder. There is no cure, but a hysterectomy is the medical recommendation to cease major pain.
The lack of representation in research and clinical studies, is of consequence for women of color in the diagnosis, management and treatment of endometriosis which may result in misunderstanding, misdiagnosis and lack of appropriate treatment options when engaging with healthcare providers. This prompts a need for further research and action on this topic as there are many more women suffering in pain due to insufficient knowledge on this topic. Continued work on this study will help to foster a deeper understanding of the perceptions and stigma of this condition and additionally provide evidence for developing programming related to reducing barriers as well as time of diagnosis, addressing racism, and stigma, and facilitating help-seeking among Black women and other women of color.

Thank you for listening and I would like to also thank my mentors and co-organizers at George Mason University; Dr. Jhumka Gupta, Dr. Anna Pollack, Julia Mandeville, and Lauren Kornegey, as well as all the volunteers for the interviews and survey participants. And of course, a big thanks to Dr. Karen Lee and the undergraduate research scholars program and OSCAR for funding my project this semester.

Honors College Schar School of Policy and Government Undergraduate Research Scholars Program (URSP) - OSCAR

The Persistence and Proliferation of Congressional Caucuses

Author(s): Molly Izer

Mentor(s): Jennifer Victor, Schar School

Abstract

While congressional member organizations (e.g., caucuses) in the U.S.
Congress are frequently trivialized by political punditry, they have been
proliferating over the past 30 years, ever since then-Speaker Newt Gin-
grich changed House rules to de-fund them. If caucuses are nothing more
than performative posturing, why do so many persist, with dozens of new
groups being formed each congress? We theorize that caucus ”birth” is
driven primarily by constituent interests and advocacy groups, while cau-
cus persistence is a function of groups’ effectiveness at connecting legisla-
tors who would be otherwise disconnected from one another. This paper
explores the persistence and proliferation of these campus clubs using a
novel data set comprised of the universe of individual caucus memberships
1993 – 2020. We statistically model caucus characteristics associated with
group survival, which include group size and bipartisan support. We use
quantitative and qualitative evidence from interviews to assess the extent
to which the explosion of caucuses on Capitol Hill has been driven by
advocacy groups. A richer understanding of this pervasive congressional
institution contributes to understanding the many ways that members of
Congress interact with one another. This understanding helps ultimately
to explain the parameters of congressional dysfunction.

Audio Transcript

Hi, I’m Molly Izer. I’m an undergraduate in the Schar school, majoring in government and international politics. And the title of my presentation is the persistence and proliferation of congressional caucuses.
And my mentor on this project is Dr. Victor also in the Schar school. So the point of this project and the research origin stems from a very important to 2013 study that was published by Dr.
Victor as well as her coauthor, Dr. Neils Ringa of the university of Wisconsin in the 2013 study. It was the first time they demonstrated a longitudinal study, which means over time on informal networks in the house of representatives.
Since the 2013 study of there have been massive changes and the ideological administrative and legislative norms governing the house of representatives and as such, it’s important to conduct a further longitudinal study on topic with our expanded dataset and in taking into account, the continuous changes that Congress simply put Congress has changing.
And so should our understanding. So this project in particular, explicitly focuses on the reasons that drive the birth and persistence of congressional member organizations also known as caucuses.
And it’s part of a larger project that explains the importance of informal networks and legislative institutions and how informal connections act as driving forces instead of large deliberative body.
Essentially, we, we hypothesize that congressional member organizations are part of the reason that people are able to coordinate collective action across the term, a broad coalition.
There are 435 members of the house of representatives, meaning one singular member. Isn’t very powerful, but when they’re in groups, they hold a little bit more power.
So a congressional member organization, essentially a way to do that, it’s almost like a informal club that members of Congress can rally around.
And there are some pretty interesting examples of types of caucuses. They range anywhere from the congressional voting caucus to the coalition for autism research to climate change related things.
There are over 700 documented caucuses that we have in Dr. Baker’s data sets and make been continuously growing. So just to emphasize the point that we need to continue to study them over a long period of time, I’m quick a picture of speaker of the house, Newt Gingrich, former speaker of the house, flipping grudge.
And he’s infamous for having changed the rules a while ago on how caucuses operate and what their administrative statuses can be.
And that’s another example of why it’s important to continue to send them over time, to see if changes to the institutions that Gover in informal networks will actually change anything about what they do or why they exist.
So the aims of this research are threefold. The first is that we aim to further understand what drives the birth of congressional member organizations and why they continue over time.
An important thing to understand about the house of representatives is that in the house, the term limits are only two years, meaning every two years, every single member has to go through reelection processes.
And while it can be to you as a voter, it’s even more tedious when you’re actually a member of the house or of their staffers, because it means you have to essentially rebuild your entire coalition every two years.
So it’s important to understand why it is that members continue to engage in certain parts. If it’s going to add on additional work on top of their already very busy schedules, we also want to map connections and social networks within the house of representatives.
And we want to track those networks in relation to broader data on legislative activity and institutional opera, opera realization. This is really important too, because we have to consider not only how institutions bind members of Congress, but also how outside forces informal networks can have a monumental impact on them.
And finally, we want to clarify, emphasize the value of informal institutions and legislative bodies and what benefits they pose to the legislative process as a whole.
So we use two different types of data. It’s really hard to look at informal networks through a solely empirical lens, which is why this year we had to integrate the qualitative data process.
So first to explain the qualitative data process, our qualitative data consists of hours of interview transcripts from various staffers in the house of representatives.
And that includes lobbyists and independent advocates who may engage with them. These were conducted via zoom, and we’re using the transcripts by coding them in NVivo, which they qualitative did software for our quantitative data.
We’re using an original data set, but Dr. Victor created and has kept since the hundred and third Congress, the hundred third Congress heard it in 1993.
And it goes all the way through the 117, which is the current Congress we’re in. Now that will end in November.
So essentially the data records, the party caucus and leadership positions that every single member of Congress occupies at any given time, the master file consists of over 6,000 data points and is managed largely largely in our, and that’s how we manage all of our quantitative and empirical analysis.
So we have many different hypotheses that are staked out in different phrasing so that we can use empirical tests to test each one of them individually.
But our general hypotheses are that caucus birth is driven primarily by constituent interests and then advocacy groups while Congress persistence, meaning keeps going over time is a function of how effective the group is connecting people who would otherwise not really meet each other or interact at all.
So our preliminary findings are a little bit limited because we’re still going through the writing process, but we do have a couple of really interesting visualizations here.
So this first one up here is, um, a one, a one party caucus members. And as we can see, they have increased by party at disproportionate rates with Democrats on average, joining more one party groups than Republicans.
In addition to the sheer number of congressional caucuses has continuously increased up until the 116 Congress. We’re not entirely sure if the, uh, the gap in increasing after 116 Congress is due to the COVID-19 pandemic or because of the January six insurrection we’ve gathered qualitative data that suggests both either or neither of them finally moving forward with this project.
So obviously we’re going to continue the writing process. And Dr. Richter is working on a larger book apart of which this will be integrated into it a little bit, but this paper in itself was accepted to the American political science association annual conference, which this year will take place in the beautiful city of Montreal.
So we’re excited to keep moving forward and continued to report our findings.

Honors College School of Business Undergraduate Research Scholars Program (URSP) - OSCAR

Understanding the Relationship Between Students’ Sense of Belonging in High School and College

Author(s): Dhruv Dewan

Mentor(s): Blake Silver, Sociology and Anthropology

Abstract

My project is a focus on the relationship regarding sense of belonging as someone moves to College from High School. So in other words, what affects the sense of belonging in college students and what affects the sense of belonging in high school students and is there a correlation? I focused on this topic because there was some research on college sense of belonging, less research done on high school sense of belonging, and almost no research done on correlating this information. So I began with gathering information on each survey participant and moved on to asking them questions related to their sense of belonging in college, sense of belonging in high school, and asking them to compare their sense of belonging between these 2 time periods. Creating a collection of responses based on varying factors found in the demographic questions.

Audio Transcript

[Title]
Hello there, my name is Dhruv Dewan and this is a video regarding an OSCAR funded research project that I am currently in the process of concluding. A quick little introduction about me, I am a junior in the Honors college studying finance. So now that’s over let’s get into what the project is about.

[Next Slide]
My project is a focus on the relationship regarding sense of belonging as someone moves to College from High School. So in other words, what affects the sense of belonging in college students and what affects the sense of belonging in high school students and is there a correlation? I focused on this topic because I realized that I had a decrease in my sense of belonging as I came to college but other people had an increase. Trying to see if there was a correlation, I realized that there was some research on college sense of belonging, less research done on high school sense of belonging, and almost no research done on correlating this information. As such, I wanted to be the first one to do such research.

[Next Slide]
So I began with gathering information on each survey participant and moved on to asking them questions related to their sense of belonging in college, sense of belonging in high school, and asking them to compare their sense of belonging between these 2 time periods. Creating a collection of responses based on varying factors found in the demographic questions. Sadly because I am still concluding the survey, there is little to no analysis done at the moment.

[Next Slide]
Now, what can we do with this information? Hopefully later down the line this information can be transmitted into a test for High School students that will be able to inform students what college may be best for their sense of belonging. However, of course, this is if we can find a correlation and do a lot more research. I hope that this research can be done in multiple countries and we can compare if there is a difference among borders.

[Next Slide]
This research project couldn’t have been completed without some help. So thank you to Dr. Blake Silver, Dr. Karen T Lee, URSP, and finally OSCAR for funding this project. Thank you for listening!

Honors College Undergraduate Research Scholars Program (URSP) - OSCAR

Using image analysis to study the succession of coral reef micro-communities

Author(s): Teagan Corpening

Mentor(s): Jennifer Salerno, Environmental Science and Policy

Abstract

Coral reefs are extremely important ecosystems that support a wide range of species and provide many ecological services. Many young corals react to cues from reef micro-communities that may alter where they choose to grow based on the presence and abundance of recruitment inhibitors and facilitators. Much research has been conducted on coral reef succession at the macroscale, but little research has been conducted on succession at the microscale. This research seeks to answer the question: do benthic micro-communities change over time, in light vs dark? To study this, settlement tiles were placed at three replicate sites on the White Hole coral reef site in Roatán, Honduras and left for one year to allow micro-communities to develop. Monthly images were taken of the top and bottom surfaces of tiles between June 2021 and September 2021. Morphospecies on each tile surface were identified and outlined by hand in ImageJ. Differences in community composition were calculated for each tile using Bray-Curtis distances and compared using permutational analysis of variance tests. There was no significant difference in community composition over time, but there were significantly different communities on the tops and bottoms of the tiles, likely driven by changes in the relative abundance of light. However, the data used in this project is a portion of the total data collected. Once more tile images are included in the analysis, it is expected that change in community composition over time will be significant. The implications of these results could help improve future restoration methods.

Audio Transcript

Title Slide:
Hello, my name is Teagan Corpening, and I will be presenting my research, “Using image analysis to study the succession of coral reef micro-communities”. This work was performed in the Salerno Lab.

Introduction:
Coral reefs are important ecosystems because of the many ecological services they provide, including coastal protection and providing habitat for a wide range of species. Protecting coral reef ecosystems is integral to protecting the biodiversity of marine ecosystems and preventing shoreline degradation. Understanding coral reefs at the microscale is important because of the connection between micro-communities of algae and other invertebrates that live on the sea floor and large-scale coral reef health. Coral recruitment and cover are heavily influenced by micro-communities. By better understanding the influences on coral recruitment, restoration methods can be improved.
I am working with Jordan Sims, who is a PhD student working on a larger settlement project in Roatan, Honduras.
My project seeks to better understand coral reef succession at the micro-scale by studying how micro-communities change through time and how environmental conditions, primarily light, drive community succession. My project seeks to answer the question: Do benthic micro-communities change over time, in light vs dark? This was done by observing community succession focusing on six different functional groups (CCA, fleshy macroalgae, filamentous algae, turf algae, other invertebrates, and biofilm). The presence of different functional groups is important to differentiate between because some groups, like turf algae, are coral recruitment inhibitors while other groups, like CCA, are coral recruitment facilitators.

Study Site:
This study was carried out in Roatan, an island off the coast of Honduras in Central Latin America. My study site is a reef on the northwestern coast of Roatan called White Hole.

Methods:
[1] Ceramic tiles were placed on three platforms across the White Hole reef site in Roatan Honduras. For this project, tile images at each platform were taken once per month between June and September of 2021. Images were taken of both the top and the bottom surfaces of each tile. The primary difference between the top and bottom surfaces of the tiles was the amount of light available to the communities. The tops of the tiles received more light than the bottoms of the tiles.
Here’s an image of one of our tile platforms once it has been secured to the reef. Settlement tiles were secured to the platform using zip ties.
[2] Here are representative unedited tile images after the tiles were removed from one of the platforms. On the left, we have the bottom of the tile and on the right, we have the top of the same tile.
[3] I cropped the unedited images to remove the unnecessary pieces including the collection bag and the sides of the tiles.
[4] These are the labelled tile images. I performed labeling by hand in ImageJ. I identified 85 different morphospecies and traced the boundaries of each morphospecies. The morphospecies were then combined into 6 different functional groups. After labeling, I used ImageJ to calculate the relative abundance of each functional group in each image.
functional groups:
These are examples of the six different functional groups that I combined the morphospecies into. These groups include Crustose Coraline Algae, filamentous algae, fleshy macroalgae, turf algae, biofilm, and other invertebrates.

Results:
[1] Differences in community composition over time and between tile surfaces were calculated using Bray-Curtis distances. To compare the micro-community composition on the tops and bottoms of the tiles and the micro-community composition through time, PERMANOVA tests with 999 permutations were performed. There was no significant change in community composition over time, but there were significantly different communities on the tops and bottoms of the tiles.
[2] On this graph, we can better visualize the drivers of the differences in functional group composition between tops and bottoms of the tiles. Bottom surfaces had a significantly higher percent cover of biofilm than top surfaces. We can also see a higher percent cover of other invertebrates on bottom surfaces. However, top surfaces had higher percent cover of turf algae and fleshy macroalgae.

Discussion:
The tops and the bottoms of the tiles were determined to have different community composition. This is most likely because of the differences in light. These results are supported by other studies that have also seen changes in benthic cover and functional group productivity influenced by the abundance of light (Vooren, 1981). The greater amount of light available to the communities on top surfaces is likely what is driving the observed increase in algal growth.
This study only used a portion of the tile images and data that were collected in the larger settlement project. There are four additional timepoints from this reef site and another full set of images from a replicate reef site. For the next steps of this project, I’ll continue to analyze more tile images so that more timepoints and replicates can be included in statistical analysis in the future. We expect to see a significant pattern of change emerge as more tile images are included in the project’s scope.
Acknowledgements:
Thank you to Dr. Salerno for being my mentor, to Jordan for helping me with the analyses, and to Jennifer Keck for taking the tile photos.

Honors College School of Business

What to do after Roe v Wade

Author(s): Urooj Syeda, Lauren Tong

Mentor(s): Toni Farris, Honors College

Abstract

Abstract
The topic we chose to do our project on was abortion. This is a topic we are passionate about since women have constantly fought to be represented and heard, but with the new legislation being passed, we are once again having to fight for ourselves. Not only has the United States taken a step back in gender equality, but the country has become even more polarized as states are given even more freedom to decide how extreme their laws can be in regard to abortion. In hopes of contributing to the fight and advocating for those who can’t, we have created a website to inform people about what actions they can take if they need an abortion. Women should have the right to have a say in what they do with their own bodies and should also be given the opportunity to choose for themselves, whether they are ready to become a parent or not. https://communitycollege89.wixsite.com/site

Audio Transcript

hi this is what to do after rovie Wade
0:02
by say the Lauren Tong it is a conflict
0:04
analysis of the abortion issue in the
0:06
United States we will be looking at the
0:08
positions and entrance of our party’s
0:09
pro-choice and pro-life
0:11
for context Roe v Wade is a Supreme
0:14
Court decision that ruled that under the
0:16
constitutionality of the 14th Amendment
0:17
and the right to privacy it is the
0:19
woman’s right to have an abortion this
0:20
was recently overturned even before Roe
0:23
v Wade was overturned conservative
0:25
States still had restrictions on
0:26
abortions this made it very hard for
0:29
women to gain access to safe and legal
0:32
abortions
0:33
which can cause significant harm to a
0:36
lot of women across the states who are
0:37
getting unsafe in illegal abortions when
0:40
you criminalize abortions it only leads
0:42
to unsafe abortions
0:43
this has led to many court cases on the
0:46
topic and has become highly debated
0:47
issue in the U.S
0:48
let’s look at the conflict maths of
0:50
pro-life this party wants Roe v Wade to
0:52
stay overturned as abortions conflict
0:53
with a personal beliefs they have right
0:55
they have interest in the rights of The
0:56
Unborn fetus as a in their future that
0:58
would be jeopardized if abortion became
1:00
legal they value family and religion
1:04
a categorization of this party generally
1:06
consists of politically conservative and
1:07
heavily religious but not everyone who
1:09
Associates them as a pro-life member
1:11
falls into these categories the general
1:13
public typically views pro-life members
1:14
as people who disregard the mother’s
1:15
human rights this is a misconception and
1:18
Amendment many members of pro-life are
1:20
not anti-womens rights
1:22
furthermore this issue includes lots of
1:24
cognitive biases and dehumanization that
1:26
needs to be addressed let’s look at the
1:28
conflict analysis for pro-choice the
1:30
party wants Roe v Wade to be reinstated
1:32
so that women have the right to abortion
1:34
their interests are in getting
1:35
reproductive freedom and Justice and
1:37
bodily autonomy for women as well as
1:39
women’s safety they value their voices
1:42
being heard and recognized and the
1:44
safety of a mother
1:45
people in the app Group might believe
1:48
that pro-choice Believers disregard the
1:50
fetus completely again this is not true
1:53
this categorization does not fit all of
1:55
people who fall into per choice
1:58
many people also might have significant
2:00
cognitive biases against this group and
2:02
saying the the Young Generation in
2:04
immature this is again not always the
2:06
case
2:07
by belittling their beliefs that it’s
2:09
saying it is an easy way out of the
2:10
consequences of unsafe sex there is
2:13
significant dehumanization on both sides
2:15
of the issue and we seek to reduce this
2:17
for us let’s look at our conflicts map
2:19
in the significant stakeholders involved
2:21
within the issue this includes the
2:24
government
2:25
the church and religious groups and
2:28
National Organization for Women and
2:29
women’s rights groups
2:32
our advocacy plan is to reduce
2:34
humanization by creating a website
2:36
providing information about the both
2:39
sides of the issue the timeline of the
2:41
abortion legislation in the United
2:43
States as well as significant
2:45
information about what people can do if
2:47
they’re in in need of abortion clear
2:49
outlines on what the recent overturning
2:51
of Roe v Wade means this website can
2:54
help a lot of women finding resources
2:55
and a lot of people on helping to
2:58
understand the pro-life and pro-choice
2:59
sites of the debate
3:02
furthermore we made the website easy to
3:05
navigate while also being informative to
3:07
further our impacts
3:09
um one of the challenges was definitely
3:11
technical difficulties with setting up
3:13
the website another challenge we’ll be
3:15
finding unbiased information and being
3:17
as neutral as possible
3:19
it can also be difficult to get this
3:21
website out to the public and to a lot
3:23
of people
3:24
we hope that raising awareness and
3:26
providing information about both sides
3:28
of the issue would stop dehumanization
3:30
of parties
3:31
thank you for listening

Honors College Undergraduate Research Scholars Program (URSP) - OSCAR

First-Generation College Students and their Housing Status on College Belonging

Author(s): Joselyn Castellon Almanza

Mentor(s): Blake Silver, Honors College

Abstract

Our population is becoming more diverse with each generation. With many financial and housing options, this has resulted in a big portion of the college student population being first-generation students yearly. This is representative in the literature, especially regarding first-generation identity and housing status. First-generation students struggle with a lack of information and unknown expectations as they face higher education with no reference point. Added to the first-year experience, it could result in a challenging and confusing year. Housing status as a topic has been explored as learning communities, residential dorms, and commuting from home. These living spaces provide different resources that could aid the college experience. Studies have investigated its impact on academic success and retention, but not college belonging. College belonging is about a sense of security, and its investigation has been seen to support academic success. Thus, focusing on this topic could bring about ways to increase the quality of the college experience. As a result of past literature, this study will explore the impact of first-generation and housing status on college belonging with first-year students. I will explore the connotations and feelings behind the statuses of “first-generation” and housing, with specifics to the terms “commuter” and “resident.” I will then see if it may influence a student’s sense of self and how they think others may view them, thus affecting their sense of belonging. My investigation is based on hourly in-person interviews with first-year students that fit those identities. Through this, I will explore the relationship between first-generation and housing status on college belonging. I hope to provide more support for students’ overall success and well-being in college with my anticipated findings.

Audio Transcript

Hello, I am Joselyn Castellon Almanza, and my mentor is Dr. Blake Silver. And this is my project on first-generation college students and their housing status on college belonging.

I then investigated housing status cause housing status as a topic has been explored as learning communities, residential dorms, and commuting from home. These living spaces provide different resources that could aid the college experience. One study looked into housing status on academic performance. It saw that commuters earned a higher academic standing than residential students (Simpson and Burnett, 2019). This was interesting because a lot of past studies stated the opposite. It even went further to say that students’ academic status is based on how much they invest their energy into the college experience instead of the actual living situation (Simpson and Burnett, 297). And since studies have investigated its impact on academic success and retention, it led to me thinking of housing status and how it could impact college belonging.

College belonging is about a sense of security, and its investigation has been seen to support academic success. Thus, focusing on this topic could bring about ways to increase the quality of the college experience. A study has seen that college belonging matters as it works with well-being, high persistence, and graduation. This discussion of belonging can help us see its importance, its complexity, and how it provides a feeling of security (Nunn, 48). Another study has shown that socioeconomic status informs how students experience belonging (Ostrove and Long 2007).

This leads to my research questions; What impact does being a “first-generation college student” have on someone? What impact does housing status, commuting or residential, have on someone? How do these identities influence college belonging?

With these questions, I will explore the connotations and feelings behind the statuses of “first-generation” and housing, with specifics to the terms “commuter” and “resident.” I will then see if it may influence a student’s sense of self and how they think others may view them, thus affecting their sense of belonging.

My investigation is based on hourly in-person interviews with first-year students that fit those identities. There will be 16 interviews with 16 people. Eight will particularly fit under the commuting identity, and eight will fall under the residential identity. With all being under the first-generation college student identity. The interviews will then be coded with Dedoose coding software. It will look at what words or phrases are used frequently. I will then analyze it to see the reoccurring theme and draw conclusions from it.

My interview questions are based on three topics: first-generation identity, housing status, and college belonging. And here are some of my example questions. For example: “What comes to mind when you think of a first-generation student?”, “How do you think others view you based on your housing status?” and “Do you feel like you belong in your college based on your definition?”

Through this, how the first-generation experience and housing status affect college belonging will be further investigated. In the future, I hope it leads to more efficient resources for first-generation college students and college housing. As well as reform programs to help those students that fit those identities.

Thank you. If you have any questions, please contact me at [email protected].

College of Engineering and Computing Honors College Undergraduate Research Scholars Program (URSP) - OSCAR

Analyzing how the EEG of a person changes when playing a rhythm game of a familiar and unfamiliar song in a VR environment

Author(s): Xander Boit

Mentor(s): Nathalia Peixoto, Neuroscience Program

Abstract

Familiarity in music has been reported as an important factor in creating emotional and positive responses in the brain. Previous research indicates that the brain is interpreting familiar music completely differently than how it interprets unfamiliar music. To our knowledge, there is no EEG dataset correlating completion of a physical task during exposure to music. Our project aims to fill this gap by acquiring EEG data that would show the impact of unfamiliar and familiar music on a person’s brain after completing a rhythm game in a virtual reality environment. We will use a five-electrode, commercially available headband to acquire EEG data during experiments with healthy subjects. We then compare unfamiliar and familiar music before and after playing the rhythm game, “Beat Saber”. The experiment will follow a matched pair design, meaning that each individual subject will only be compared to their own EEG. The virtual reality videogame, “Beat Saber”, is a rhythm game that involves using imaginary sabers in order to slash boxes that indicate a specific direction along with the song playing during the game. Using MATLAB, the sets of EEG data will be separated into the brain wave dominant frequency bands (beta, alpha, theta, delta, and gamma). Finally, the power of each band will be compared to its counterpart to investigate patterns across all trials. Using previous literature findings, conclusions will be determined to see if there are any significant differences between the generated data set and existing data.

Audio Transcript

I am Xander Boit and my project is Analyzing how the EEG of a person changes when playing a rhythm game of a familiar and unfamiliar song in a VR environment

My mentor is Dr. Peixoto and my department is bioengineering.

This was completed in Fall 2022 as a URSP. Thank you OSCAR for providing funding and support for this project.

So existing literature; familiarity in music has just generally a positive correlation with how the brain responds.

There are a couple of sources I used.

The first one says that familiarity in music has been reported as an important factor in creating emotional and positive responses in the brain.

And then the second source says additionally, music can improve cognitive performance, especially when it is familiar.

And so, essentially what I concluded from all of these and other sources I found is that previous research shows that there are clear benefits associated with familiar music in relation to mental state.

Now what I was looking for is how does this actually apply to an action. Because a lot of this research is kind of stationary or is just a task. But with the VR equipment, we have this opportunity to have them record the EEG data while they are actually doing a task that involves full-body movement and music at the same time.

And so that’s why I kinda chose to do this project.

So the technology that I have for this project is in three categories: Virtual Reality Equipment, EEG Recording Equipment, and the Data Analyst Software.

The first part is the virtual reality equipment. The lab I am in has the HTC VIVE Pro 2 Headset.

These two pictures you can see are pictures I took in the lab of the VR headset. The top picture being the actual headset and the bottom being the two hand-held controllers that you use when using the headset.

I had a decent amount of issues getting the VR headset to work properly throughout the semester, and it kinda delayed my project a decent amount.

The first one was I had issues with audio output. The headset actually has two speakers on it, you can see off to the side of the top picture. The speakers are tilted outward currently. They would not play audio. And if they did play audio, if I got it to work, they were super scratchy and basically unbearable. Obviously, this is a huge issue for an audio based project, so I spent about several weeks figuring this out and eventually I just figured out that unplugging the cords and replugging them back in until it works is actually consistent for some reason, and I haven’t had many issues with it since, which surprises me to be honest. But, if it works, it works.

Then the other issue, probably the bigger issue, if video resolution. Now, we have a pretty good graphics card in the computer that is attached to this VR headset. But this VR headset is so powerful that it can outperform the top-of-the-line graphics cards. I decided to use my whole budget in one go and buy a new computer, which has a 3060 graphics card and top-of-the-line for lots of stuff. It was a pretty good deal since graphics cards are cheaper right now. I bought that, but with the whole new computer, it got delayed three to four times due to miscommunication, product delays, and whatnot. I will be getting it in the middle of December. I currently do not have it to actually use for this project, but I will have it for next semester.

The video game I am using is Beat Saber, which is probably the most popular VR game. If you have seen any VR game, it’s probably been Beat Saber. It’s essentially Guitar Hero, but VR. You have the two controllers and you have to slash things.

I have a video actually, it’s about thirty seconds long. I can show a little bit of what it looks like. This may be a little loud. I recorded this in the lab. You can see the two sabers I am holding. My left hand is the red one and my right hand is the blue one. You can see I am just slashing with the arrows on the cubes with the beat of the music. So this is how we are making it into a rhythm game recording thing.

I think the really cool thing about this is the EEG part of the project. We have the Muse 2 Headband in the lab, and that is what I am using; there is a picture of it to the right there.

This Muse headband records at four different locations: left ear, left forehead, right forehead, and right ear. So basically it’s just around the outside of the skull.

The cool thing about this is that when I initially designed the project, we planned on having a full-cap EEG on, which meant that we couldn’t use it during the VR section. But with this one, you can actually wear this underneath the VR headset. So we can record the EEG and have the VR going at the same time, so we don’t have to worry about any gap in time or just any of that error that could occur. This is very useful for getting what is actually going on in the brain while the activity is happening.

The third part of the technology aspect is MATLAB. You probably have heard about it before if you know anything about programming. It’s essentially a software that allows me to filter and analyze EEG data.

I went into it with two main goals. To separate my data into key frequency bands, like delta, gamma, beta, alpha, and theta. These are different frequency bands. Essentially, there is known information about what these bands indicate: calm, stressed, active. Just a bunch of different things, but I am not going to go into all of them, since they are kinda specific in some categories.

We eventually want to use these key frequencies to compare power levels of each band against familiar and unfamiliar samples, because this is a matched-pair design. Meaning that for each person, we are getting a familiar and unfamiliar sample. We are going to link those two samples together and look at the difference essentially of these power levels of each of the five frequency bands.

The progress so far; we haven’t made all the progress yet since I have not collected data yet. Generally, I think I got behind in this project, which is my own fault. I have the data, its loaded into MATLAB, and I can separate the frequency bands. I just need to figure out how to filter it exactly, which takes a decent amount of time going through literature and seeing what previous researchers have done. So that is where I am currently at with MATLAB.

Here is a picture I generated using my MATLAB code. This shows the RAW EEG data of the four locations that I talked about previously. The left ear, left forehead, right forehead, and right ear. You can see it’s a mess, this is why we need to filter and separate them. Because right now, this doesn’t mean anything.

This is an example kinda thing. This isn’t exactly how I want my data to look, since it is filtered incorrectly for what I am trying to do. You can see this separates the data into the five frequency bands. You can see the levels and how this is. This is kind of what I want, then we are gonna take the power level of these and compare them against each other for the familiar and unfamiliar.

For research logistics. The IRB approval process; I started way too late. I got distracted with troubleshooting the VR equipment and didn’t realize how long it would take. Right now I am at the final stage of approval for the IRB, so hopefully I get that done and can start next semester as soon as possible.

I mentioned it before, but computer purchasing delays. Had a lot of miscommunications, and it’s been pushed back to the middle of December now, when it is going to arrive.

Future plans. Get IRB approval, which I just mentioned. Gather the data, after I have the approval from IRB. Analyze and report the findings. And depending on how the results turn out, publish a research paper on the results.

This is my work cited. Thank you so much for watching this video and let me know if you have any questions.

Honors College Undergraduate Research Scholars Program (URSP) - OSCAR

Comparing Growth Rates of Somaliland and Namibian Cheetah Cubs

Author(s): Gwendolyne Fields

Mentor(s): David Luther, Environmental Science and Policy

Abstract

Cheetahs (Acinonyx jubatus) are classified as endangered species by the IUCN, facing major threats of habitat loss, illegal pet trade and human-cheetah conflicts. With approximately 7,500 individuals left in the wild across Africa, research is significant to understanding and ensuring their species’ survival. At Cheetah Conservation Fund (CCF), located in Namibia, research has been ongoing since its establishment in 1990, and was once known as the cheetah capital of the world. CCF also has a campus in Somaliland, where currently 86 cheetahs of the “Tanzanian cheetahs” (Acinonyx jubatus raineyi) are being cared for, and 29 “South African cheetahs” (Acinonyx jubatus jubatus) at Namibia’s facility. This project investigates the comparison of growth rates between Somaliland and Namibian cheetah cubs. Through CCF’s data of cheetah cubs rescued between 2006-2022 within Somaliland and Namibia, weights, meat and milk consumption has been recorded from 0-6 months and organized in a new Excel Spreadsheet. 19 individuals are recorded from Namibia, and 46 are recorded from Somaliland. Few statistics through RStudio have been done, however significant results of the sum of weights from 0-6 months with other covariates indicate males have a higher growth rate than females, and Somaliland has a lower growth rate than Namibian cheetah cubs. Further statistics will be conducted to understand more about growth rates and what affects it, as well as the difference between Namibian and Somaliland cheetah cubs.

Audio Transcript

Good Afternoon! My name is Gwendolyne Fields, and you are joining me here today with Peter, Tiger-lily and Senay in Namibia. For the past two months I have been here at Cheetah conservation fund, also known as CCF. CCF was established in 1990 by Dr. Laurie Marker, where the goal is to help conserve these endangered species.

So, a lot of our cats here are permanent residents. So, this means that a lot of them have come in before the age of 6 months and because of that, their mothers were not able to teach them the proper skills to actually survive in the wild. So, some skills including what prey to hunt, such as duikers, steenboks, springboks, kudus and oryx’s as well as what predators to avoid: lions, snakes and hyenas. And so, a lot of them have actually also been useful for research and understanding more about the species themselves and how to conserve them the best.

So here on our Namibian campus, we have 29 cheetahs and on Somaliland’s facility we have 86 cheetahs. So a lot of these cheetahs have come in at very different ages, so these siblings came to us at the age of four weeks. Others have come in at 5 days, 10 days, so very young. A lot of the cheetahs that have come in were rescued with different scenarios, so some farmers actually might have killed the mothers, some farmers might have captured them and in other cases people have kept the cheetahs as pets as well. So, like I mentioned before, having them here has been very useful for research and also their conservation.

Here are three of our cheetah cubs at CCF who arrived when they were 3 weeks old. Speaking of cheetah cubs for my research project, I have been working with Dr. Laurie marker, and other CCF staff members as well as my mentor Dr. David Luther where I am investigating the comparison of Somaliland and Namibian cheetah cubs growth rates. From data collected back from 2006 until most recently 2022, I have been gathering all this information on a new excel spreadsheet from individuals between the ages 0-6 months.

Other than spending time on my research project, I have been part of the cheetah team working to take care of the cheetahs by feeding them, giving their meds if needed, cleaning and managing their enclosures.

Moving on to the results for the project so far. I have created some graphs as well as produced some statistical analysis of the data through RStudio.

This first graph demonstrates the average weights of Somaliland and Namibian Cheetah cubs from the age of Day 1-14. As you can see there is a linear relationship between the weights and days of the cubs. The R-squared value is around 0.59 indicating a moderate goodness of fit of the model. We notice the Somaliland average weights are less than the Namibian weights. The second graph demonstrates the average weights of Somaliland and Namibian Cheetah cubs from the ages of Week 3-26. The R-squared value of 0.91 demonstrates a very strong linear relationship. Once again, the Namibian weights are larger than the Somaliland weights on average.

The third graph is a boxplot displaying the first two weeks of age. We notice the Namibian data appears to have more range and a higher average weight. The last graph is a boxplot displaying weeks 3-26 of age. We notice the Namibian data appears again to have more range and a higher average weight; however, it appears less robust than the previous graph. Running these last two graphs’ data through R, we found no significance in terms of their weights and comparing them between the two locations. Meaning the p-value was greater than 0.05.

Last but not least, the sum of the weights for all weeks did not appear to have significance with meat and milk consumption, yet the location of Somaliland was significant indicating their cubs are less likely to survive, and the males in general appear to have higher growth rates than females (indicating greater chance of survival).

We still have many questions to answer, such as how much the cheetah cubs grow in general, what month they grow the most and how exactly does diet affect their growth, especially relating between the two locations of cheetahs.

Thank you so much for watching and for everyone who has helped me on my project so far! Bye!