Presenting a poster at the 2022 SPSP Conference

Author: Danielle Shaver | Majors: Psychology and Social Work | Semester: Spring 2022

Presenting research at a conference feels like a “rite of passage” in academia. It is a moment of validation—a moment to appreciate the hours, days, and weeks of losing yourself in research articles, new ideas, and unexpected findings.

My name is Danielle Shaver, and I am a senior honors college fellow, studying psychology and social work, and I am fascinated by close relationships. You do not have to be a researcher to know that family relationships, friendships, and romantic relationships can be places of great fulfillment, but they can also be places of great hurt. This leads us to the inspiration for my research…attachment theory. Attachment theory tries to explain how our past relationships can predict how we “attach” in our future relationships. Attachment theory also speaks about “insecure attachment” or attachment that is characterized by fearful or avoidant patterns. I wanted to zoom in on this phenomenon and inspect a characteristic of this insecure attachment—self-criticism. Specifically, I wanted to examine how levels of self-criticism could predict our regulation efforts after relationship conflict. I wanted to examine this ironic question…

What makes someone with high self-criticism, someone who supposedly thinks through how to “better” themselves and their relationships constantly, react so poorly after relationship conflict?

With my thesis advisor, Dr. Veilleux, we created 2 studies to examine these relationships, and we found something interesting. As we predicted, people with high self-criticism tend to use more “maladaptive regulation techniques” to handle their negative emotions. These techniques include things like rumination, catastrophizing, withdrawal, and other blame—things that do not tend to help personally or relationally.

However, we predicted that this relationship would be stronger for romantic relationships than friendships (due to the amount of research I read on romantic relationship and how they relate to attachment theory). Well, we found that doesn’t really matter. Instead, we found that other relationship factors matter: relationship importance, relationship satisfaction, and how frequently conflict occurs in the relationship.

Exciting!

I flew to San Francisco to present a poster at the 2022 Society of Personality and Social Psychology Conference (SPSP). Here, I learned all about the current research on the effects of personality, the impact of culture, new interventions for minority students, and factors of close relationships. Still, the highlight of the conference was presenting my poster to these very experts.

They placed me in a large conference room filled with a hundred small, circular tables. Professionals set up their resources in preparation for what looked like researcher speed dating. As the event doors opened, I sat there excited and a bit nervous as attendees started to trinkle in. Then, it happened…someone sat down and asked me about my research.

The next hour flew by. People specializing in close relationships, attachment, and self-criticism all came by to see what I could have found. Before this, I had only reported my research findings to friends and family, receiving shy smiles and niceties in return. But now, at this conference, I was able to “geek out” with the attendees, and we exchanged new ideas, thoughts, and hypotheses. Reflecting on this time, I realized other benefits of presenting at a conference I had not thought of before.

When you need to explain your research in a short period of time to people with no background knowledge of your project, you get really good at perfecting your pitch. You shed the “fluff” and irrelevant information quickly, and you find the true meat-and-potatoes of your research. It can help refocus you if you have found yourself caught in the weeds of confounds, mediating variables, and smaller findings. It can help refresh your view of your own research.

Similarly, it can give you a new perspective. After explaining your research, I found one of the best things to do is to ask your listener, “What do you think explains these findings?” They might come up with a future study or a hypothesis that had slipped your mind before. Think of your poster presentation as a conversation with other curious individuals.

Most importantly, it can renew your confidence in your own ability and research. Coming back from San Francisco, I realized that I have something valuable to say—something that other researchers find fascinating enough to make them listen to an undergraduate student.

It’s time to finish up my data analysis and write the thesis! After I defend my thesis in April and graduate in May, I will be attending graduate school to obtain my Master of Social Work. Ultimately, I hope to work as a therapist specializing in trauma treatment and recovery.

My experience conducting, writing, and presenting research with the Honors College has given me the ability to jump into novel situations, speak with confidence about my studies, and passionately pursue my academic interests. If you are thinking about presenting but it scares you, do it! It could be the very thing you need to refresh your perspective, get you out of a rut, or give you the next push you need.