Trinity Western University students recently represented TWU at Connecting Minds 2016, a major undergraduate psychology conference involving 30 schools from Canada, the US, and Europe.
At the conference, students from TWU’s Psychology Research Methods class gave presentations called “Interactions Between Mobile Phone Use, Academic Performance, Sleep Pattern and Health Outcomes,” and “Exploring Faith and Empathy.”
“I was not quite sure what to expect as I had set the bar for this assignment quite high,” says Kelly Arbeau, the course instructor. “Both teams surpassed all expectations for a third-year course assignment. The quality of the work, as well as the thought that went into how the research questions would be handled, was both recognized and well-received at the conference.”
The upper-level class split into two teams to research their topics. They worked for four months to find collaborative data, conduct analysis, and create final presentations.
For the mobile phone research project, the researchers collected data from fellow students on their phone use, sleep quantity and quality, and academic performance. The results suggested that while students gained positive social connection and meaning from their phones, higher phone use correlated with lower sleep quality.
The second team of students explored the collection of current research on faith and empathetic responses. They identified common themes in the concept of empathy: an active process, a duty, and a moral imperative. These conclusions, they hope, will bring more clarity to continued research.
The conference ran from May 28 – May 29 and was hosted by Kwantlen Polytechnic University in Richmond.