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PSY 357 Emotional Writing Disclosure with Formerly Depressed Students: A Preventive Intervention Study
UNDERGRADUATE RESEARCH PROJECT
Faculty:
Jamie Pennebaker, Ph.D.
Contact:
Eva-Maria Gortner
Email: evagortner@sbcglobal.net
Phone: (512) 916-9165
Description:
Writing about one’s deepest thoughts and feelings about stressful and traumatic events has been found to benefit people’s overall health, immune functioning, psychological well-being, and other measures such as improved grade point average and faster job re-acquisition after being laid-off. These effects have been found in many populations across multiple countries.
In this study, we’d like to implement the emotional writing intervention with college students who have been depressed in the past but are currently recovered. Since depression is known to be a highly recurrent disorder, and up to 80% up people who have once been depressed can become depressed again, it is important to find an easily accessible and widely available intervention that could prevent the recurrence of future depressive episodes in a vulnerable population. This study seeks to determine whether emotional writing could help prevent future onsets of depressive episodes in those who are at-risk. We are also interested in other benefits of writing for this particular population, such as overall health, grade point average, and well-being.
Qualifications:
- Be motivated, reliable, and excited about research in psychology
- Be able to think independently and critically
- Completion of PSY 418 with a B or better and/or upper-division standing (preferred)
- Be able to commit 8-10 hours a week during certain weeks in the semester
Duties:
- Help in administering the experiment to participants
- Questionnaire Scoring
- Data Entry and Management
- Weekly Meetings
Other Information
This is a great opportunity to learn more about research in clinical psychology and interventions that could possibly help the vast number of people who have at one point in their life been depressed. If you are interested in graduate school in psychology, this will look great on your application. Please e-mail or call me with your name, phone number, and brief description of your background. We’ll then set up a brief meeting.
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