The annual Missouri Undergraduate Psychology Conference was held on Nov. 8 and 9 at the Park University campus. This was the ninth year the conference took place with the participation of other schools such as Avila University, Northwest Missouri State University, Westminster College and Columbia College.
Students were able to show their research projects in oral presentations, board presentations and virtual oral presentations for students who were not able to come.
“I’m here to support to of my fellows and their presentations,” said Hether Bernet, psychology major from Central Methodist University. “And to see what other people are presenting and working on and maybe get ideas for my future research. It is the first time I come to the conference.”
On the first day students had the possibility to show their work to the judges and other members attending the conference. Refreshments and snacks were provided.
“I researched the antisocial personality disorder,” said Jill Kujawa, Park University junior social psychology major. “This is the first time so I was kind of nervous and a little shy because I didn’t know if I wanted to present or not but I’m actually exited to be here and I’m exited to listen to the speakers.”
Gaelynn Wolf Bordonaro closed the day with a presentation titled “International Art Therapy Response to Human Created and Natural Disasters.”
Other speakers participating the conference included Teresa Rodgers and Michael Stoutimore with their presentation titled “Variations on a Theme: Two perspectives on Working in the field of Applied Behavior Analysis”; and Philip Wann with his presentation “What Price Lobotomy? Psychological Assessment at the Missouri State Hospitals during the Era of Psychosurgery.”
“So, in our project we were looking at art therapy and creating mandalas,” said Amanda Shaw, Park senior in psychology and fine arts. “I wanted to see what the benefits of art therapy are so I research and found that creating mandalas lowers anxiety and depression and increases energy and concentration which it’s very helpful for people. This is the third time I’m presenting in a psychology conference I want to achieve more experience in talking among people about things I research I want to meet new people with different thoughts I also want to hear the speakers invited.”
Park University professors were invited to participate to the conference as judges and attend to the oral presentations and speaker presentations.
“I’m very exited about meeting the undergraduates who are already interested in research because that is kind of a rare thing generally a lot of people don’t think about doing research until they are in rad school,” said Theresa Mason, Park University department chair for psychology and sociology.
“So it’s really nice to see undergraduates who are presenting their research projects. So far I’ve been very impressed with the presentations that we have and I m looking forward being in some of the oral presentations as well.”
Brain games, presentations and other activities also took place on Nov.9 as well as the final award ceremony.
