Summer 2014

	Study cracks brain’s emotional code The human brain turns feelings them into a standard code that objectively represents emotions across different senses, situations and even people, reports a new study by Cornell neuroscientist Adam Anderson.
	Book lauds land-grant university model The land-grant university, 150 years after its inception, remains an extraordinary and compelling model for higher education, with ideas and ideals relevant to even the most elite academies, contends Robert Sternberg in “The Modern Land-Grant University.”
	Book examines hows and whys of economic choices Drawing on perspectives from the early roots of psychology through the latest neuroscience, the new volume edited by Valerie Reyna and graduate student Evan Wilhelms introduces what we know about how and why people make decisions with economic consequences.
	Poor neighborhoods – not poor parents – pack on pounds By age 2, poor children have gained more weight than those who are better off. But after age 2, neighborhood poverty, not family poverty, is linked to weight gain, finds a new study by Gary Evans.
	Girls’ perceptions drive sexual behavior Jane Mendle’s latest research suggests that genetic factors related to how sexually mature a girl thinks she is influence her sexual behavior, above and beyond her actual physical development.
	Online avatar helps demystify breast cancer risk Valerie Reyna and colleagues developed a computer-based system using artificial intelligence designed to mimic one-on-one human tutoring to help women understand breast cancer genetics.
	Kids’ earliest memories might be earlier than they think The very earliest childhood memories might begin even earlier than anyone realized – including the rememberer, his or her parents and memory researchers, according to new research by Qi Wang.
	Survey: ‘Mostly heterosexuals’ have more health problems The largest minority on the sexual-orientation spectrum – the mostly heterosexuals, estimated at around 7 percent of the general adult population – report more health problems than heterosexuals and somewhat fewer than bisexuals finds a review by Ritch Savin-Williams.
	Institute for the Social Sciences grants awards Nathan Spreng is among those who received research awards from the Insititute for the Social Sciences in the Fall of 2013 for research on Brain Network Dynamics.

Students in the News

	Win or lose, this computer game teaches biology Andrew Jefferson, a graduate student in the field of human development, is spearheading development of video games to teach young people about science.
	Undergrads convey their research prowess at forums More than 20 of the students presenting at the Cornell Undergraduate Research Forum were HD majors or worked with a professor in the department.

New Resources

	Embryos, stem cells, human meaning and policy
	Media Literacy

Study cracks brain’s emotional code

By Karene Booker
Reprinted from Cornell Chronicle, July 9, 2014

An illustration of the brain turns feelings and perceptions into a similar code. The color/object gradient represents valence (blue is bad, red is good) - Adam Anderson, Junichi Chikazoe

Although feelings are personal and subjective, the human brain turns them into a standard code that objectively represents emotions across different senses, situations and even people, reports a new study by Cornell neuroscientist Adam Anderson.

“We discovered that fine-grained patterns of neural activity within the orbitofrontal cortex, an area of the brain associated with emotional processing, act as a neural code which captures an individual’s subjective feeling,” says Anderson, associate professor of human development in Cornell’s College of Human Ecology and senior author of the study, “Population coding of affect across stimuli, modalities and individuals,” published online June 22 in Nature Neuroscience.

Their findings provide insight into how the brain represents our innermost feelings – what Anderson calls the last frontier of neuroscience – and upend the long-held view that emotion is represented in the brain simply by activation in specialized regions for positive or negative feelings, he says.

“If you and I derive similar pleasure from sipping a fine wine or watching the sun set, our results suggest it is because we share similar fine-grained patterns of activity in the orbitofrontal cortex,” Anderson says.

“It appears that the human brain generates a special code for the entire valence spectrum of pleasant-to-unpleasant, good-to-bad feelings, which can be read like a ‘neural valence meter’ in which the leaning of a population of neurons in one direction equals positive feeling and the leaning in the other direction equals negative feeling,” Anderson explains.

For the study, the researchers presented 16 participants with a series of pictures and tastes during functional neuroimaging, then analyzed participants’ ratings of their subjective experiences along with their brain activation patterns. To crack the brain’s emotional code and understand how external events come to be represented in the brain as internal feelings, the researchers used a neuroimaging approach called representational similarity analysis to analyze spatial patterns of brain activity across populations of neurons rather than the traditional approach of assessing activation magnitude in specialized regions.

Anderson’s team found that valence was represented as sensory-specific patterns or codes in areas of the brain associated with vision and taste, as well as sensory-independent codes in the orbitofrontal cortices (OFC), suggesting, the authors say, that representation of our internal subjective experience is not confined to specialized emotional centers, but may be central to perception of sensory experience.

They also discovered that similar subjective feelings – whether evoked from the eye or tongue – resulted in a similar pattern of activity in the OFC, suggesting the brain contains an emotion code common across distinct experiences of pleasure (or displeasure), they say. Furthermore, these OFC activity patterns of positive and negative experiences were partly shared across people.

“Despite how personal our feelings feel, the evidence suggests our brains use a standard code to speak the same emotional language,” Anderson concludes.

The study was funded in part by a postdoctoral fellowship from the Japan Society for the Promotion of Science and was co-authored by Junichi Chikazoe, postdoctoral associate in human development at Cornell; Daniel H. Lee, University of Toronto; and Nikolaus Kriegeskorte, University of Cambridge.

Karene Booker is an extension support specialist in the Department of Human Development.

Related Links:
College of Human Ecology
Adam Anderson
The Paper

Book lauds land-grant university model

By Karene Booker
Reprinted from Cornell Chronicle, July 23, 2014

The land-grant university, 150 years after its inception, remains an extraordinary and compelling model for higher education, with ideas and ideals relevant to even the most elite academies, contends Professor Robert Sternberg in his edited volume, “The Modern Land-Grant University” (Purdue University Press).

“Land-grant institutions perhaps best represent the very core of what greatness means in American society – namely, equal opportunity for all and, through it, the chance to make our society and the world a better place,” says Sternberg, professor of human development in Cornell’s College of Human Ecology.

“Land-grant universities are about educating students, not just to be knowledgeable and smart, but also to be wise and ethical … to become future leaders, who will change the world in positive, meaningful and enduring ways,” he says.

The book provides a current and comprehensive review of the role and function of land-grant institutions, with four sections exploring the core mission, environment, public value and accountability of the modern land-grant university. The volume’s 20 chapters feature perspectives on teaching, research and outreach; undergraduate and graduate academic experience; economic development and entrepreneurship; diversity; promotion and tenure; and more. Sternberg’s epilogue concludes the volume with a summary of the values underlying the activities of land-grant institutions.

“The Modern Land-Grant University” offers university administrators, trustees, educational policymakers, faculty and staff not only a vision for higher education founded on the commitment to public service, but also practical insights for navigating today’s challenges.

Karene Booker is an extension support specialist in the Department of Human Development.

Book examines hows and whys of economic choices

By Karene Booker
Reprinted from Cornell Chronicle, July 17, 2014
Valerie Reyna, professor of human development in Cornell’s College of Human Ecology, and graduate student Evan Wilhelms are editors of a new book: “Neuroeconomics, Judgment and Decision Making” (Taylor & Francis).

Drawing on perspectives from the early roots of psychology through the latest neuroscience, the book introduces what we know about how and why people make decisions with economic consequences (e.g., saving money, donating to charity, choosing medical treatment). The volume, written by leading neuroeconomists, neuroscientists and social scientists, answers broad questions about the ways developmental, neurological and individual differences influence our choices; whether deciding quickly is good or bad; whether emotional reactions lead us astray or help; how decision processes change over the lifespan; and the nature of expertise.

“Ours is one of the few books on neuroeconomics, the relatively new field that looks at the biological origins of economic decisions and economic behavior in the brain,” says Reyna.

“The cutting-edge research featured in the book holds promise for improving practice in law, management, marketing, computer science and health care,” she says.

“Understanding how people process numerical information about risks and then make decisions based on this information, for example, will boost efforts to help patients make informed health care decisions and freely decide between treatment options,” she explains.

Reyna and her research team contributed two chapters, combining recent discoveries in neuroscience with Reyna’s “fuzzy-trace theory,” which proposes people represent information both as bottom-line gist meaning and as literal facts, but tend to rely on the simplest gist necessary when making decisions. They show that this reliance on gist representations is beneficial for making choices, helping people accurately predict how they will feel in the future about the outcomes of various decisions. Their next chapter discusses the processes underlying inconsistent or so-called “irrational” choices and sheds light on ways of improving judgments and decisions.

The book is an introduction to decision-making intended for researchers, students and professionals in the fields of neuroscience, psychology, economics, business and public health. Preparation of the book was supported in part by the National Institutes of Health, National Cancer Institute and National Institute of Nursing Research.

Karene Booker is an extension support specialist in the Department of Human Development.

Related Links:
College of Human Ecology
Valerie Reyna
The book

Poor neighborhoods – not poor parents – pack on pounds

By Karene Booker
Reprinted from Cornell Chronicle, June 19, 2014

Evans

By age 2, poor children have gained more weight than those who are better off. But after age 2, neighborhood poverty, not family poverty, puts the pounds on, finds a new study, published in the Journal of Applied Developmental Psychology (35:3).

About one-third of America’s children are overweight or obese, but rates are highest among poor and minority children. The study identifies for the first time the effects of neighborhood-level poverty, family poverty and ethnicity on children’s weight, shedding new light on the origins of adult health disparities, the authors say.

“The effects of neighborhood poverty on children’s weight may be just as important as the effects of family poverty,” says Cornell’s Gary W. Evans, the Elizabeth Lee Vincent Professor of Human Ecology, who co-authored the study with Pamela Klebanov, Princeton University, and Jeanne Brooks-Gunn, Columbia University.

“Children and families are embedded in neighborhoods; poor neighborhoods differ structurally from wealthier neighborhoods, with fewer safe and natural places to play and exercise, fewer supermarkets and more fast food,” Evans explains.

For their study, the researchers analyzed demographic factors and changes in body mass index (BMI) from ages 2 to 6 1/2 for nearly 1,000 children born with low birth weight. In typically developing children, BMI increases during the first year, then declines to a low point before increasing again in what is called adiposity rebound, usually between the ages of 5 and 7. Children who rapidly gain weight early in their first year or who have an early rebound are at risk for obesity throughout life.

Because they tend to gain weight more rapidly over their first two years to “catch up” with normal birth weight infants, low birth weight infants face higher risks for obesity, but being poor, a minority or living in poor neighborhoods adds to their disadvantage, the authors say.

Evans and colleagues found that the low birth weight toddlers from poor families already had higher BMIs than their wealthier counterparts by age 2, at which point the harmful effects of living in an impoverished neighborhood took over. The children in poor and near poor neighborhoods reached adiposity rebound more quickly, and their BMIs increased more rapidly compared to children from non-poor neighborhoods.

The team also found that African-American toddlers displayed an earlier adiposity rebound and greater subsequent BMI increases over time compared to Anglo-American toddlers. Hispanic-American children, on the other hand, had an atypical pattern in which their BMI increased steadily from birth, without exhibiting a decrease and rebound.

“Health disparities emerge early and shape lifelong health,” Evans says.

“Interventions need to address both the fundamental risk factors for pediatric obesity, such as poverty, chaotic living conditions and low parental education, as well as the mechanisms that appear to convey these risks, such as restricted access to healthy food, few safe and natural places to play, too much fast food, child food marketing and high levels of chronic stress, he concludes.

The study, “Poverty, ethnicity and risk of obesity among low birth weight infants,” was supported in part by the Stanford Center for Poverty and Inequality.

Karene Booker is an extension support specialist in the Department of Human Development.

Related Links:
Gary Evans
The Paper

Girls’ perceptions drive sexual behavior

By Karene Booker
Reprinted from Cornell Chronicle, June 23, 2014

Mendle

Genetic factors related to how sexually mature a girl thinks she is influence her sexual behavior, above and beyond her actual physical development, reports a new study.

The study, published in June in Developmental Psychology (Vol. 50:6), is the first to directly test the link between pubertal timing and involvement in specific sexual behaviors, disentangling the genetic and environmental influences shaping adolescent sexual timing and behavior, the authors say. Their findings indicate that unique genetic factors influencing how mature girls think they are predict their engagement in dating, romantic sex and casual sex, whereas genetic factors associated with the timing of puberty predict the age when girls first become sexually active.

Moore

“We’ve known for a long time that when kids go through puberty is strongly influenced by genetic factors, but there’s more to puberty than just biology,” says Jane Mendle, assistant professor of human development in Cornell’s College of Human Ecology and recipient of this year’s Young Investigator’s Award from the Society for Research on Adolescence.

“Dramatic social and environmental changes take place as kids transition into the new roles that come with sexual maturity; it turns out that how girls interpret and respond to these changes is also genetically influenced,” Mendle says.

“While environmental influences are extremely important in the dating and sexual outcomes we studied, we were surprised that genetic factors played such a large role,” Mendle adds.

“We suspect that genetically influenced traits such as sensation seeking and sociality could be at play in shaping how teens navigate the complex social environments surrounding puberty,” says Cornell graduate student Sarah Moore, who is first author on the study, “Pubertal Timing and Adolescent Sexual Behavior in Girls” with Mendle and K. Paige Harden from the University of Texas.

The researchers analyzed information from more than 900 female sibling pairs in a national longitudinal study of adolescent health and risk behavior. The pairs included identical twins, fraternal twins, half siblings, cousins and unrelated siblings, allowing the researchers to distinguish the effects of environment from heredity.

The team found that shared genetic influences on age of puberty and on how girls perceive their physical maturity were responsible for differences in the age at which girls became sexually active. Girls who matured earlier than their peers perceived earlier maturity and also initiated sex at an earlier age. Potentially, this is because genetic factors such as hormone levels influence age of menarche and also affect visible appearance and sexual desire, the authors say.

Genetic factors related only to girls’ perceived maturity, on the other hand, were responsible for their engagement in sexual behavior. Girls who perceived earlier maturity than their peers were more engaged in dating, romantic sex and nonromantic sex. Furthermore, the team found no association between girls’ involvement in specific sexual behaviors and genetic or environmental factors influencing the onset of puberty. In other words, pubertal timing itself is not a risk factor for casual sex as some prior research had suggested, say the authors.

“Our research shows that girls’ perceptions of their pubertal development are different from their actual pubertal development and drive different outcomes down the road,” Mendle concludes.

Karene Booker is an extension support specialist in the Department of Human Development.

Related Links:
Jane Mendle
The Paper

Online avatar helps demystify breast cancer risk

By Karene Booker
Reprinted from Cornell Chronicle, May 29, 2014

A screen shot from the BRCA Gist (Web-tutor) video tutorial that is designed to help explain the incidence of breast cancer in people with the BRCA mutations.

About one in eight American women will be diagnosed with breast cancer during her lifetime – more than 200,000 this year alone. A simple blood test can determine if a woman faces increased risk due to genetic mutations, yet decisions about whether to get the test and what to do about the results are far from simple – a fact exemplified by Angelina Jolie’s choice to undergo a double mastectomy last year upon learning she carried a harmful BRCA1 gene mutation.

To help women grappling with these decisions, Cornell psychologist Valerie Reyna and colleagues developed a computer-based system using artificial intelligence to mimic one-on-one human tutoring.

“To our knowledge, this is the first use of an Intelligent Tutoring System (ITS) in patients’ medical decision making,” said Reyna, professor of human development and director of the Human Neuroscience Institute in Cornell’s College of Human Ecology.

The breast cancer Web-tutor, called BRCA Gist (Breast Cancer Genetics Intelligent Semantic Tutoring), is more effective in helping women understand breast cancer risk and their options than traditional educational materials, reports a study published online May 14 in Medical Decision Making ahead of print.

BRCA Gist provides customized instruction on breast cancer and how it spreads, risk factors, genetic mutation testing and the consequences of testing using an animated talking avatar that engages women in “dialogue” about breast cancer and can even answer women’s questions.

The Web-tutor draws on well-vetted, publically available information and expert advice from physicians, “but the crucial added ingredient,” said Reyna, “is that it effectively conveys the bottom-line or gist of the information.” And that’s what people rely on to make medical decisions, not detailed facts, she said. The key to the Web-tutor’s success, she added, is its basis in fuzzy-trace theory, a model of memory and decision-making that she developed.

To test the Web-tutor’s effectiveness, the researchers conducted two randomized-control trials involving more than 400 women. The studies measured knowledge gains and decisions about genetic testing after completing the new Web-based tutorial, viewing the comparable information from the National Cancer Institute (NCI) website or completing an unrelated Web-based curriculum.

The team found that those who participated in the Web-tutor scored higher on knowledge of breast cancer, genetic testing and genetic risk than those using the NCI website, and both groups scored higher than the control group. In making judgments about genetic testing for those with no risk, the Web-tutor helped participants understand that most women do not have known genetic risks and are not good testing candidates, the authors say. Their results support the concept that a gist-based intervention powered by artificial intelligence can be an effective tool to aid patients’ medical decision-making, they concluded.

The study, “Efficacy of a Web-based Intelligent Tutoring System for Communicating Genetic Risk of Breast Cancer,” was supported by the National Cancer Institute and the National Institutes of Health. The co-authors are Christopher Wolfe, Colin Widmer, Elizabeth Cedillos, Christopher Fisher and Audrey Weill of Miami University of Ohio, and Cornell graduate student Priscila Brust-Renck.

Karene Booker is an extension support specialist in the Department of Human Development.

Related Links:
Valerie Reyna
The Paper

Kids’ earliest memories might be earlier than they think

By H. Roger Segelken
Reprinted from the Cornell Chronicle, April 9, 2014

The very earliest childhood memories might begin even earlier than anyone realized – including the rememberer, his or her parents and memory researchers.

Four- to 13-year-olds in upstate New York and Newfoundland, Canada, probed their memories when researchers asked: “You know, some kids can remember things that happened to them when they were very little. What is the first thing you can remember? How old were you at that time?” The researchers then returned a year or two later to ask again about earliest memories – and at what age the children were when the events occurred.

“The age estimates of earliest childhood memories are not as accurate as what has been generally assumed,” report Qi Wang of Cornell University and Carole Peterson of Memorial University of Newfoundland in the March 2014 online issue of Developmental Psychology. “Using children’s own age estimates as the reference, we found that memory dating shifted to later ages as time elapsed.”

Childhood amnesia refers to our inability to remember events from our first years of life. Until now, cognitive psychologists estimated the so-called childhood amnesia offset at 3.5 years – the average age of our very earliest memory, the authors noted in their report, “Your Earliest Memory May Be Earlier Than You Think: Prospective Studies of Children’s Dating of Earliest Childhood Memories.”

But the children who originally answered, for example, “I think I was 3 years old when my dog fell through the ice,” postdated that same earliest memory by as much as nine months when asked – in follow-up interviews a year or two years later – to recall again. In other words, as time went by, children thought the same memory event occurred at an older age than they had thought previously. And that finding prompts Wang and Peterson to question the 3.5-year offset for childhood amnesia.

“This can happen to adults’ earliest childhood memories, too,” says Wang, professor of human development and director of the Social Cognition Development Laboratory in Cornell’s College of Human Ecology. “We all remember some events from our childhood. When we try to reconstruct the time of these events, we may postdate them to be more recent than they actually were, as if we are looking at the events through a telescope. Although none of us can recall events on the day of our birth – childhood amnesia may end somewhat earlier than the generally accepted 3.5 years.”

Parents might help because they have more clues (e.g., where they lived, what their children looked like at the time of events) to put their children’s experiences along a timeline. When asked, for example, “How old was Evan when Poochie fell through the ice?” they erred less than Evan had. Still, they are not free from errors in their time estimates.

The only way to settle that, Wang and Peterson mused, would be to look for documented evidence – a parent’s diary, for instance, or a newspaper account of Poochie’s memorable rescue.

What girls remember

In this study, as in another published by Wang in 2013, a gender-related difference was noted:

“Females generally, although not always, exhibit superior retention of episodic memories than males,” Wang and Peterson wrote in the 2014 report. The gender differences, according to the researchers, may reflect the development of life narratives in late childhood and early adolescence, where girls often tell lengthier and more coherent life stories than boys.

“The narrative organization of life events,” they speculated, “may allow girls to better remember the events over time, compared with boys.”

Wang, author of “The Autobiographical Self in Time and Culture” (Oxford University Press, 2013), says her earliest childhood memory is “playing with the girls next door.” And given her findings, she wonders if that was around age 4.

Related Links:
Qi Wang
The Paper

Survey: ‘Mostly heterosexuals’ have more health problems

By Roger Segelken
Reprinted from the Cornell Chronicle, April 24, 2014

The largest minority on the sexual-orientation spectrum – the mostly heterosexuals, estimated at around 7 percent of the general adult population – report more health problems than heterosexuals and somewhat fewer than bisexuals.

So say the Cornell psychologists who put mostly heterosexuals – also known as MHs or mostly straights – on the map (and on the minds of human-sexuality scholars and therapists): Ritch Savin-Williams, professor of human development and director of the Cornell Sex and Gender Lab in Cornell’s College of Human Ecology, and Zhana Vrangalova, Ph.D. ’14.

Their study was published in the April 2014 Journal of Sex Research as “Psychological and Physical Health of Mostly Heterosexuals: A Systematic Review.”

“Compared to heterosexuals, mostly straight youth and adults reported more physical and mental health problems,” said Vrangalova, now an adjunct instructor in the Psychology Department at New York University.

“MHs are more likely to experience depression, anxiety, body dissatisfaction and eating disorders (from anorexia to obesity) and are more likely to attempt suicide or self-harm than heterosexuals,” the Vrangalova said. “They also report more health-risk behaviors, like substance use and sexual risk taking, and have more sexual/reproductive health and physical health issues.”

Finally, the mostly straights expressed more experiences of victimization, lower connectedness in their personal and social relationships, and were more likely to inhabit stressful or risky environments than heterosexuals, the psychologists learned. On the positive side, MHs were more educated and suffered fewer broken bones, compared with others on the continuum.

Compared to bisexuals, mostly heterosexuals fared somewhat better on most examined outcomes, although these conclusions were more tentative as there were fewer bisexual comparison groups, and the differences were often small or in the opposite direction.

This first-of-its-kind review of MH health status drew on 60 other studies that were based on 22 datasets across the United States, Canada, Australia, New Zealand and Norway between 1991 and 2013.

The authors described MHs as “more same-sex oriented than exclusive heterosexuals, but less so than substantial bisexuals, in their sexual/romantic attraction, fantasy, physiological arousal, and recent and lifetime sexual behavior.”

The term, MH, gained greater currency in the last five years or so, according to Vrangalova, who co-authored a much-cited 2013 paper, “Mostly Heterosexual as a Distinct Sexual Orientation Group,” in the journal Developmental Review, with Savin-Williams.

They argued for a fourth group in the conventional, three-way (heterosexual/bisexual/lesbian-and-gay) framework. They suggested a spectrum or continuum where sexual-orientation self-identity “is not always either/or.”

While MHs were found to be the largest sexual-minority group – comprising about 4 percent of men and 9 percent of women in the general population – that proportion nearly doubles among college students, Vrangalova commented. “The college years are a time when young people are freer to experiment in all things, to look around and to think about their identities.”

So far MHs go largely unnoticed, the authors noted, writing: “They are likely to socialize in the sexual-majority culture because there is no visible MH subculture nor are MHs actively encouraged to join LGB spaces.”

All the more reason, Vrangalova and Savin-Williams believe, that health professionals should learn “to identify MHs in their practice so they can adequately assess risk and direct care and counseling.”

Public-health professionals and youth-based organizations, they say, “need to be aware of MHs’ substantial presence in the general ‘heterosexual’ population and work to make their services and messages as inclusive as possible.”

The study was funded in part by American Institute of Bisexuality.

Related Links:
Ritch Savin-Williams
The Paper

Institute for the Social Sciences grants awards

Reprinted from the Cornell Chronicle, May 9, 2014

From conducting archaeological research in the Republic of Armenia to exploring how rumors spread through Twitter, the Institute for the Social Sciences’ small grants program funded 22 faculty members’ projects for the 2013-14 year.

Open to tenured and tenure-track faculty members in the social sciences, the ISS’ biannual small grants program awards up to $12,000 for research projects and conferences. According to ISS Director Kim Weeden, the program prioritizes research by early career faculty, that spans across the social sciences, and that is likely to “seed” larger external grant proposals.

In fall 2013, the following faculty members received research awards:

Edward Baptist, associate professor, history, College of Arts and Sciences (A&S): “Freedom on the Move: A Database of Fugitives From North American Slavery.”
Michael Frakes, assistant professor, Law School: “Does the United States Patent and Trademark Office Grant Unnecessary Patents? An Empirical Analysis of Certain Causes and Consequences of PTO Granting Patterns.”
Michael Goldstein, associate professor, psychology, A&S: “Learning to Talk, Learning to Sing: A Comparative Approach to Discovering Mechanisms of Infant Learning from Social Interaction.”
Hyunseob Kim, assistant professor, finance, Samuel C. Johnson Graduate School of Management: “Frictions in Real Asset Markets and Corporate Investment: Evidence from Ship-level Data.”
Edith Liu, assistant professor, Dyson School of Applied Economics and Management, College of Agriculture and Life Sciences (CALS): “The Effect of Globalization on Bank Operations and Borrowing Costs.”
Drew Margolin, assistant professor, communication, CALS: “The Dissemination and Refutation of Rumor.”
Kelly Musick, associate professor, policy analysis and management, College of Human Ecology (CHE): “Parents’ Time With Children and Subjective Well-Being.”
Camille Robcis, assistant professor, history, A&S: “Catholics, Gender and the Gay Marriage Debate in France.”
Nathan Spreng, assistant professor, human development, CHE: “Brain Network Dynamics of Goal-Directed Cognition and Behavior Across the Adult Lifespan.”
Joshua Woodard, assistant professor, Dyson School, CALS: “Farm Bill Dairy Title Milk Producer Survey in New York State.”
Erin York Cornwell, assistant professor, sociology, A&S: “Moving Beyond the Census Tract: Activity Space and Social Networks in Later Life.”

The ISS supported the following projects in spring 2014:

Shelley Feldman, professor, development sociology, CALS: “Precarious Lives, Desired Futures: Reimagining Lives and Livelihoods.”
Jeffrey Hancock, professor, communication, CALS: “Audience and Self-Concept in Social Media.”
Lori Khatchadourian, assistant professor, Near Eastern studies, A&S: “Resilience and Ruination in Mountain Communities: Comparative Regional Settlement Dynamics in the South Caucasus From the Bronze Age to Today.”
Beth Livingston, assistant professor, human resource studies, ILR School: “Men at Work (and Family): Caregiving Responsibilities among the Working Class.”
Michael Manville, assistant professor, city and regional planning, College of Architecture, Art and Planning: “Congestion Pricing: Equity and Environmental Justice Implications.”
Jamila Michener, assistant professor, government, A&S: “Medicaid and the Politics of the Poor.”
Sean Nicholson, professor, policy analysis and management, CHE: “Insurance Competition and Network Offerings.”
Jeff Niederdeppe, assistant professor, communication, CALS: “Narrative, Metaphor and Inoculation: Communication Theory to Promote Multi-Sector Approaches to Improving Health.”
Marina Welker, assistant professor, anthropology, A&S: “Philip Morris in Indonesia: An Ethnography of the Sampoerna Clove Cigarette Company.”

The ISS’ small grants program funded the following conferences in 2013-14:

Debra Castillo, professor, comparative literature, A&S: “Counterstories of Greater Mexico.”
Pamela Tolbert, professor, organizational behavior, ILR School: “Law and Social Science Conference – Increasing Inclusion/Reducing Discrimination – What Works?”

The deadline for the fall 2014 round is Sept. 9. Applications will be accepted shortly after the fall semester begins.

The program is funded by the ISS and the Office of the Vice Provost for Research, with supplementary funding provided by the President’s Council of Cornell Women.

Related Links:
Insititute for the Social Sciences

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