PEANUTs Lab

PEANUTs Lab

PEANUTs Lab moving to Texas Tech University

by

This Fall semester, Dr. Rioux and the PEANUTs Lab are moving from the University of Oklahoma to Texas Tech University.

Dr. Rioux and the PEANUTs Lab will be located within the College of Health and Human Sciences, where Dr. Rioux will be affiliated as a founding member of the new Department of Interdisciplinary Human Sciences.

The lab will welcome undergraduate students as research assistants and Honors thesis students, graduate students completing theses within the human sciences masters program. The lab also welcomes inquiries from prospective postdoctoral fellows (see Join the lab website tab for more details).

Life History Research Society Conference

by

Last May 29-31, undergraduate students from the lab attended and presented their research at the Life History Research Society international conference in Montreal, Canada!

McKenna Nhem presented her Honors research. She conducted a scoping review on environmental sensitivity to social environments in adult mental health. After reviewing 31 studies and over 100 interactions, she found that most studies focus on genotype as an individual sensitivity factor and internalizing problems as a mental health factor, with most studies not testing sensitivity based on recommended statistical analyses.

McKenna in front of her poster

Zoe Childers-Rockey and Emily Flesher presented research they conducted as research assistants. They examined the feasibility, cost, and representativeness of social media recruitment for a pregnancy cohort. They found that social media is an efficient recruitment method, and that while the sample was more diverse than community-based samples, it was less diverse than the US Census.

Zoe and Emily in front of their poster

Conference of the Society for Research in Adolescence

by

Madison Bissa, who graduated from her undergraduate degree in December, presented her Honors thesis work at the conference of the Society for Research on Adolescence last week in Chicago! Madi’s poster speed talk was on a systematic review of the moderators of the association between parental separation and adolescent externalizing behaviors. Dr. Rioux also presented her work on alcohol use age of onset and substance use disorder symptoms conducted with colleagues at the University of Montreal.

Madison in front of her poster
Dr. Rioux in front of her poster.

Provost’s UReCA Summer Fellowships – Summer 2024

by

Congratulations to Honors thesis student McKenna Nhem and undergraduate research assistant Christina Personette, who both received the OU Provost’s Undergraduate Research and Creative Activity (UReCA) Summer Fellowship! The fellowship will support their independent research over the summer.

McKenna will work on a research project examining how individuals differ in their sensitivity to experiences of discrimination in the prediction of mental health in a national sample of adults in the United States.

Christina will work on a project examining how pregnant individuals differ in their sensitivity to recent stressful experiences in the prediction of mental health in the first trimester of pregnancy using data from the Experiences of Pregnancy cohort study.

McKenna Nhem headshot and project title: Environmental sensitivity to discrimination in the prediction of adult mental health.

Christina Personette headshot and project title: Sensory processing sensitivity and vulnerability to recent stressful experiences in the prediction of mental health in pregnancy.

Oklahoma Psychological Society Conference

by

Several of our lab members presented their research at the Oklahoma Psychological Society (OPS) annual conference on April 5, 2024! Click on the students’ pictures to see their poster!

Fily Wahidin (graduate research assistant) presented her poster Prevalence and Frequency of Cannabis Use in Adults and State Cannabis Legislation: A National Study in the United States. Her project finds that cannabis use prevalence and frequency in adults (18+ years old) did not differ based on state-level cannabis legislation.

Fily in front of her poster.

LaMauri Franklin (Honors thesis student) presented her poster Adverse childhood experiences and perinatal depression, anxiety, and depression. Her project finds that both household and community level adverse childhood experiences predicted symptoms of depression, anxiety, and anger during pregnancy.

LaMauri in front of her poster

Madison Bissa (Honors thesis student who graduated in December 2023) presented her poster Is measuring gender associated with participant dropout in a pregnancy cohort? Her project finds that including three questions on gender identity, modality, and binary in study questionnaires did not lead to study dropout among pregnant participants.

Madi in front of her poster.

McKenna Nhem (Honors thesis student) presented her poster Environmental Sensitivity to Social Environments in Adult Mental Health: Scoping Review. Her project finds that (1) most studies examined genotype as an individual sensitivity factor, (2) most studies examined internalizing problems as a mental health outcome, and (3) most studies did not properly test their data within current theoretical models.

McKenna in front of her poster.

Zoe Childers-Rockey and Emily Flesher (undergraduate research assistants) presented their poster Pregnancy Longitudinal Cohort Recruitment via Social Media Ads with Zoom Calls: Cost, Effectiveness, and Representativeness. Their project finds that social media advertisements were an efficient way of recruiting pregnant participants and that while the resulting sample was less diverse than the US population, it was more diverse than pregnant participant cohorts recruited in person.

Zoe was also the recipient of the Outstanding Undergraduate Student Award! Congratulations Zoe!

Zoe and Emily in front of their poster.

Christina Personette (undergraduate research assistant) presented her poster The interaction between sensory processing sensitivity and recent stressful experiences in prenatal mental health: Diathesis-stress or differential susceptibility? Her project finds that recent stressful events were associated with depressive symptoms in pregnancy only for individuals with a highly sensitive personality.

Christina’s poster was the recipient of one of the awards for best poster! Congratulations Christina!

Christina in front of her poster.

Megan Waldron and Delaney Fulp (undergraduate research assistants) presented their talk The Highly Sensitive Personality and the Sensory Profile. Their project finds that the highly sensitive personality is related to a sensory profile characterized by a combination of low stimulus registration, high sensory sensitivity, and high sensation avoidance

The lab’s students also received several awards!
(1) Zoe Rockey received the Outstanding Undergraduate Student Award following her nomination from Dr. Rioux. (2) Christina Personette received one of the Best Poster Awards. (3) Finally, McKenna Nhem, Madison Bissa, Christina Personette, and Fily Wahidin got second place representing the University of Oklahoma in the Psychology Bowl Trivia Competition!

Zoe Rockey with her award
Christina Personette with her award
McKenna Nhem, Christina Personette, and Madi Bissa with the Psychology Bowl awards.
Group of women sitting around a table.

The students’ presentations and accomplishments were celebrated with a post-conference dinner in Oklahoma City!

TOPS scholarships!

by

Congratulations to our research assistants Delaney Fulp and Christina Personette on receiving the University of Oklahoma Department of Psychology’s TOPS (The Outstanding Psychology Student) scholarships!

The scholarship is given each year to outstanding students with excellent coursework records who contribute significantly to research, service, and/or community engagement in the department.

Delaney received the General Psychology scholarship and Christina, who is completing a statistics certificate along with her psychology major, received the Quantitative Statistics scholarship. Both were recommended by Dr. Rioux for their outstanding work in the lab along with other campus involvements.

Graduate and Undergraduate Research Conference Presentations

by

Congratulations to the lab’s students who presented their research at the University of Oklahoma Graduate and Undergraduate Research Conference on March 29!

Jacob Stephens (undergraduate research assistant) presented his poster Mental Health and Digital Media Use in the First Trimester of Pregnancy.

Jacob in front of his poster

Annika Testerman (undergraduate research assistant) presented her poster Adverse childhood environments and substance use in pregnancy during COVID-19.

Annika in front of her poster

Madison Bissa (graduated with her Bachelor’s degree in December 2023) presented her Honors thesis Moderators of the association between parental separation and adolescent externalizing behaviors: A systematic review.

Madi in front of her poster.

Oklahoma Psychological Association Convention

by

Several of our lab members presented their research at the Oklahoma Psychological Association (OPA) annual convention on November 3, 2023! Click on the students’ pictures to see their poster!

Madison Bissa (undergraduate Honors thesis student) presented her poster Moderators of the association between parental separation and adolescent externalizing behaviors: A systematic review. Her review finds that factors at the individual, family, and broader community levels moderate the association between parental separation and adolescent substance use and externalizing problems. Madison’s poster was the recipient of one of the awards for best poster! Congratulations Madi!

Madison Bissa in front of her poster.

Zoe Childers-Rockey (undergraduate research assistant) presented her poster Parent Preferences for Peer Connection in Virtual Mental Health and Parenting Support Platforms. This research conducted in collaboration with the Hearts and Minds Lab finds that parents have strong preferences for connecting with peers if participating in a virtual (online or app-based) mental health and parenting program.

Zoe Rockey in front of her poster

Madison Donohue (research assistant; graduated with her BA in Spring 2023) presented her poster Mental Health and Digital Media Use in the First Trimester of Pregnancy. Her project found that anxiety and depression are associated with more social comparisons on social media as well as being more comfortable asking for and sharing information online than in person.

Madison Donohue in front of her poster.

Emily Flesher (undergraduate research assistant) presented her poster Cost and effectiveness of participant recruitment via social media ads with Zoom calls for a study on mental health in pregnancy. Her research finds that social media is an efficient recruitment method for pregnancy cohorts, with Facebook being the most cost-effective, followed by Instagram and Reddit (Twitter was not effective).

Emily Flesher in front of her poster.

McKenna Nhem (undergraduate Honors thesis student) presented her poster Studies of person-environment interactions in adult mental health still focus on diathesis-stress: Initial results from a scoping review of studies citing environmental sensitivity theories. Her scoping review finds that studies on person-environment interactions in the prediction of adult mental health still tend to examine only one theoretical model (diathesis-stress) while citing but not testing competing models.

McKenna Nhem in front of her poster.

Annika Testerman (undergraduate research assistant) presented her poster Adverse childhood environments and substance use in pregnancy during COVID-19. This research conducted in collaboration with the Healthy Families Lab, Developmental Neuroimaging Lab, and Developmental Psychobiology Laboratory found that adverse childhood experiences were a stronger predictor of substance use in pregnant individuals during the first year of the COVID-19 pandemic than pandemic-related stressors/hardship.

Annika Testerman in front of her poster.

Fily Wahidin (graduate research assistant) presented her poster Cannabis Legislation and Use Before and After Pregnancy: Descriptive Results from a National Cohort in the United States. Her project finds that cannabis use prevalence in the year before getting pregnant as well as during the first trimester of pregnancy did not differ based on state-level cannabis legislation.

Fily Wahidin in front of her poster.

Honors College UROP Scholarship

by

Congratulations to our research assistants Delaney Full and Megan Waldron, who received the Honors College Undergraduate Research Opportunities (UROP) Scholarship!

UROP funds research projects led by undergraduate students.

This scholarship will fund Delaney and Megan’s research project conducted in the PEANUTs Lab, which will examine the associations between the highly sensitive person scale and the adult sensory profile.

Headshots of Delaney Full and Megan Waldron.

UReCA showcase presentation

by

Congratulations to Madi Bissa who presented her results at the University of Oklahoma UReCA showcase on September 29!

Madi is conducting her systematic review on the moderators of the impact of divorce on adolescent externalizing behaviors as part of her Honors research and UReCA summer fellowship.

Madi Bissa in front of an academic poster