Author's Note
Krcmar, 2011; DeLoache et al., 2010; Dynia et al., 2021; Neuman et al., 2014 assessed the effectiveness of teaching technology and media on teaching infants language and reading skills.

I wrote this short literature review for my Cognitive Development class. This paper was part of a quarter-long term project that involved summarizing cognitive development research for an academic audience and then translating those findings for a lay audience. Because of the requirements of the term project, this paper, even though it’s mostly academic, makes practical recommendations for parents.

I wrote this paper for my CMN 161: Health Communications class to research more about suicide in the U.S. I first explore the suicide crisis in the U.S. from multiple different perspectives in order to understand the factors that lead to increased suicidality and the current interventions that exist for tackling the suicide crisis. Later on in the paper, I then discuss the purpose and effectiveness of the #RealConvo campaign conducted by the American Foundation for Suicide Prevention during May 2019.

Courtney Banzon is a fourth year undergraduate student studying Psychology and Sociology at the University of California, Davis. Courtney’s interests in psychology lay primarily in the realm of clinical and abnormal psychology. Through her studies, Courtney learned about the use of exposure therapy to treat combat veterans with Post-Traumatic Stress Disorder (PTSD). This piqued her curiosity about other methods used to treat trauma disorders.

Elijah Valerjev is a recent graduate with the class of 2024, obtaining his degree in Microbiology with a double minor in Professional Writing and Education. He enjoys writing and learning about various science topics associated with the brain and substances. Additionally, he has an interest in free-form writing and intends to publish several novels about introspective stories, both fiction and nonfiction. In his free time, he enjoys boxing, baking, and buying books.

Joy Zheng is an undergraduate in the class of 2026 studying psychology. One of her favorite things to do in her spare time is cooking and baking, bringing the concept of nutrition and macromolecules to the playing field. Initially, this piece was born in the University Writing Program 001 with Professor Monterrey and examined the relationship between junk food and a student’s academic performance.

I was involved with Dr. Charan Ranganath’s Dynamic Memory Lab since shortly before the COVID-19 pandemic. I performed remote work since 2020 on multiple projects with the lab. I was very excited to begin working on my own project with the support of my mentor, James Antony, who has performed examinations on event segmentation in naturalistic contexts in the past.

I wrote this paper for PSC103A: Statistical Analysis of Psychological Data with Rohit Bantra. As an avid coffee connoisseur, I was interested in finding whether or not my caffeine consumption was good for my mental health. I hope this paper interests those who also enjoy their coffee, even if they are a tad disappointed with the results (as I was). This was my first experience coding in R and engaging with quantitative psychology, which both came in handy when I used the same skills/concepts to complete my honors thesis. 

I wrote this paper for my PSC 142: Social & Personality Development class with Dr. Paul Hastings. As a whole, in this article, I wanted to focus on how the COVID-19 pandemic disproportionately affected marginalized communities throughout the U.S. in terms of mental and social-emotional health.