May 3, 2018
Students honored by psychological sciences department
The psychological sciences department announces this year's departmental award winners. Most of these undergraduate and graduate students were honored at an event on April 24. The Shanteau Fellows were recognized at the department's Undergraduate Research Convocation on May 1.
Jennica Rogers, senior, Manhattan, received the John C. Peterson Undergraduate Scholarship Prize for outstanding graduating senior. She was the Psi Chi Honor Society treasurer this past year, conducted research in Heather Bailey's lab, is a McNair Scholar, and after graduation will conduct research in Bailey's lab as a postbaccalaureate scholar.
Jesseca Pirkle, senior, Jacksonville, Illinois, is this year's recipient of the E. Jerry Phares Undergraduate Research Award. Her research with Kimberly Kirkpatrick entailed the study of factors that alter impulsive choice, specifically high-fat and high-sugar diets and insulin. Pirkle has been a Chapman scholar, a Shanteau fellow, and a College of Arts and Sciences Ambassador among many other recognitions. This fall, she will attend medical school at the University of Illinois.
Sarah Novak, junior, Little Rock, Arkansas, is the winner of the Curtis Lee and JB Gee Psychological Sciences Scholarship. This award is based on a combination of criteria including academic achievement.
Jordan Voss, junior, Hays; Emma Brase, junior, Manhattan; Madison Schaller, junior, Overland Park; and Jaylee York, junior, Scott City, are this year's recipients of the Doreen Shanteau Undergraduate Research Awards. The award provides funds to enable these students to conduct research with their faculty mentors during the following academic year. Voss will study the factors that people use to identify emails as "phishing" — for personal information — versus valid; he will work with Michael Young. Brase will work with Mary Cain to examine the effects of alcohol and environmental rearing condition on protein levels that are responsible for addiction-related behaviors. Schaller will investigate the relationship of adherence to masculine honor beliefs and the perceptions of responses to familial insults on social media in Don Saucier's lab. York will research the relationship between white feminism and racial prejudice also in Saucier's lab.
The Outstanding Graduate Instructor Award was presented to Lisa Vangsness, Aurora, Illinois. Vangsness has taught General Psychology, Judgment and Decision Making, and Experimental Methods Laboratory. She received a monetary award thanks to the Nobuko S. Nicholson Opportunity Fund for Psychological Sciences.
The Outstanding Graduate Research Award/Harry Helson Memorial Scholarship had three recipients this year: Ryan Ringer, Kansas City; Conor O'Dea, Manhattan; and Catherine Steele, Katy, Texas. All three have published multiple research papers in leading psychology journals. O'Dea is completing his degree with Saucier, Ringer with Les Loschky, and Steele with Kirkpatrick.
Finally, the department announced two winners of the Outstanding Graduate Teaching Assistant Award: Hayley Fisher, Nashville, Tennessee; and Evelyn Stratmoen, Oklahoma City, Oklahoma. Their awards were funded by the department's Graduate Teaching Assistant Support Fund that has been generously supported by a number of alumni.