Tag: Poster 10

Autistic Tendencies and Visual Processing: A Local Bias versus a Global Deficit

Presenter: Melissa Dollar

Mentor: Paul Dassonville

PM Poster Presentation

Poster 10

Past research suggests that individuals with autism spectrum disorders (ASD) exhibit an enhanced locally-oriented processing bias, but have an attenuated tendency to use global contextual cues. In addition, the autistic trait of systemizing has recently been found to predict sensitivity to global contextual cues, where high systemizing tendencies are associated with a decreased tendency to pro- cess misleading global context (e.g., visual illusions.) It is currently unclear, however, whether individuals with heightened systemizing drives, such as those with autism, display the same decreased tendency to process context when it provides information beneficial to performance. The current study examined the extent to which systemizing tendencies were predictive of whether individuals could use beneficial global-contextual information in two perceptual tasks. For two different visual tasks we found a significant benefit of the presence of an upright frame (compared to no frame), and no correlation with the autism and systemizing quotients and the extent to which participants benefited from the global context of the frame. These results suggest that individuals with heightened systemizing drives, such as those with autism, can still utilize global information when it is beneficial to performance.

Do Distinct Types of Progenitors Contribute to Enteric Nervous System Development?

Presenter : Charlotte Taylor

Major : Biology

Mentor : Judith Elsen

Poster 10

The enteric nervous system (ENS), the largest component of the peripheral nervous system, provides intrinsic innervation of the intestinal tract and modulates gut function. The ENS forms a complex network of different neuronal subtypes and glial cells. ENS progenitors originate in the hindbrain, migrate to the gut, migrate caudally along the gut in two parallel streams, and eventually encircle the gut. ENS progenitors express different marker genes, e.g. phox2b, sox10, and ret. Our goal is to take advantage of the zebrafish model to learn whether expression of these marker genes designates distinct ENS progenitor populations. We used a phox2b:GFP transgenic line that expresses in ENS progenitors and double fluorescent in situ hybridization to quantify progenitor marker gene expression and colocalization in GFP+ cells. Our analysis suggests that subpopulations of enteric progenitors are present during zebrafish ENS development. These subpopulations are characterized by the following marker combinations: phox2b/sox10/ret, phox2b/ret, and phox2b. Our data also suggest that phox2b and sox10 expression is consistent along the length of the gut and ret expression is higher caudally. Our next step is to conduct lineage tracing studies to learn if distinct ENS progenitor subpopulations give rise to different ENS cell types, by tracing the offspring of genetically labeled subpopulations of progenitors. Traditionally, the Supreme Court has deferred to the President in times of war; however, following 9/11 the Court took an active role in placing limits on the President’s unilateral pow- ers. The Court’s decisions in these cases were effective in restraining Executive power, but they only somewhat protected and restored the detainees’ civil liberties. The protection of certain individual rights has been followed by the curtailment of others. Currently, the Obama Administration is facing criticism for the indefinite detention of detainees, and this study provides a framework which outlines how civil liberties can again begin to be restored.

Exotic Sexuality: Examining the Effect of Exotic Dancing on Women’s Sexuality

Presenter: Amber Bryan

Mentor: Lamia Karim

Poster: 10

Major: Women’s and Gender Studies 

Exotic dancing has been studied widely in the fields of anthropology, sociology, psychology, and women’s and gender studies with scholars such as Bernadette Barton and Katherine Frank arguing that women become exotic dancers because they are suffering from repetition compulsion, causing dancers to follow intimacy scripts both at work and outside of work. However, these arguments, as well as the past research conducted, have not adequately addressed the issue of how exotic dancing may affect the sexuality of the women working in the exotic dancing profession.

My research has examined and compared the participatory sexual encounters of women before becoming dancers to their participatory sexual encounters after becoming dancers. The rarely acknowledged issue of working as an exotic dancer and the effects it has had on women’s sexual interest in other women was a particular point of interest throughout this study. Through ethnographic and empirical research, I have determined that working as an exotic dancer does have an impact on the women’s sexuality, who they choose to engage in sexual encounters with, and how frequently the women participated in sexual encounters outside of work, though the outcome was different for each woman. The data also shows that, while some of the women did experience an increase in sexual activity with multiple partners, most of the stereotypes about exotic dancers, that they are whores or lesbians, did not hold true.

Collective In-form-ation: How Do Alternative Assembly-Based Collectives Function as Sites of Knowledge Production?

Presenter: Celia Easton Koehler

Faculty Mentor: Shaul Cohen

Presentation Type: Poster 10

Primary Research Area: Social Science

Major: Geography

Funding Source: UROP Undergraduate Research Grant, $1000; Thesis Research Grant, Clark Honors College, $1000

A typical structure of an organization includes a President, a Vice-President, a Chief of Financial Affairs, and other employees organized in a hierarchy. Information tends to flow vertically in a hierarchy; it would be rare for a president and a janitor to exchange messages directly, first the janitor might approach the secretary or their manager, for example. Not all organizations, however, choose this structure. Rejecting verticality, some organizations choose a less defined chain of command and adopt a horizontal structure. Assemblies are a typical, major component of a horizontally run organization. They are like meetings except instead of majority vote or authority-decides, assemblies tend to be consensus-based; that is, every participant must agree or disagree for a decision to be passed. This project seeks to understand how knowledge is produced within assembly based (or other horizontally –inclined) collectives. Analysis of alternative collectives often focuses on their characterization as sites-of-contention. An example of this framing includes press covering local occupy movements. While this is certainly part of the narrative, collective assemblies can and should be seen as spaces of education. They exist to form practices, inform citizens and often aim towards social changes. In addition, social space created from places perceived as public or open are often sites of emergent culture—conversations and narratives form there and are later formalized and institutionalized. Through observation and analysis of collectives in Andalucia, Spain, this project will demonstrate how collectives function as learning spaces. In January of 2016 individuals in Granada, Spain began planning a feminist festival, Transfemifest, for May 8-9, Individuals mounted a WordPress and Facebook and invited anyone interested to attend weekly planning meetings run by consensus. Through looking at the processes through which individuals in Granada form collectively to plan and pull-off a festival around feminism, we can see how they work to inform community members and catalyze a broader conversation about intersectional-feminism in institutions around the city.

Exploring Manufacturing Variability in Calcareous Sand Tempered Pottery on Yap, Western Caroline Islands

Presenter(s): Haden Kingrey − Anthropology, History

Faculty Mentor(s): Matthew Napolitano, Scott Fitzpatrick

Poster 10

Research Area: Archaeology

Funding: National Geographic, UO Global Studies Institute, Edna English Trust for Archaeological Research, and the Center for Asian and Pacific Studies

The oldest identified sites on Yap are identified by presence calcareous sand tempered (CST) pottery from deeply stratified deposits. With few exceptions, CST pottery, made from locally produced clay, has been recovered from Rungluw and Pemrang, two sites in southern Yap, western Micronesia (northwest tropical Pacific). Although poor preservation conditions and small sample sizes make it difficult to reconstruct vessel size, detailed analysis of sherds demonstrates at least two sub-types. Recent excavations at Pemrang have yielded the largest sample of CST pottery ever recovered and allow for inter- and intra- site comparison. Results will help us understand the poorly understood early settlement of Yap.

Population size mediates mating effects on lifespan in female C. elegans

Presenter(s): Ruben Lancaster

Faculty Mentor(s): Katja Kasimatis & Patrick Phillips

Poster 10

Session: Sciences

Mating is vital for sexually reproducing species, yet the ideal mating strategy for males and females can differ. The ensuing conflict between the sexes results in negative population fitness effects. Previous studies in the nematode Caenorhabditis elegans show that a male-skewed sex ratio during mating causes female lifespan decreases, indicative of sexual conflict. However, these studies do not reflect ecologically relevant mating conditions on which sexual selection and sexual conflict are acting. Therefore, I conducted population-based mating assays using both natural and male-skew sex ratios. I found no effect of mating on lifespan relative to virgin females in either sex ratio condition in two different strains of C. elegans. My results identify population size as a potential mediator of mating effects on female lifespan and highlight the need for ecologically relevant conditions for understanding life-history traits.