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A Letter from the Founding Members

As the founding Editors of OPUS, we are so pleased to see the exceptional efforts of the Applied Psychology Undergraduate Program continue to prosper. When the inaugural team came together in 2009 we aimed to foster student collaboration and create an enriching community of scholarly pursuits. We hoped to make psychology accessible to a wide range of audiences, to amplify undergraduate student perspectives in their training in the practice and application of psychology, and to bolster professional collaboration between undergraduate students and faculty mentors. These aims, of course, are continuous. Our hope for OPUS is that it will continue to represent increasingly intersectional, diverse, and global perspectives on the applications of psychology in the service of social change, to deepen friendship and fellowship amongst students, and to bolster professional development and creativity. We are proud of the OPUS team at-large for investing in this endeavor, and grateful to the faculty mentors for their steadfast support and guidance.

As the British psychoanalyst, D.W. Winnicott (1990) said, “Home is where we start from.” Indeed, APUG provided OPUS—and us—a home from which we started. We have since made our way across the globe, carrying our passion for applied psychology in tow. We are certain the OPUS staff and readership for years to come will carry on in our footsteps and create new pathways for others to follow. Read on for an update on our journeys over the past decade.

After graduation, Vanessa attended the University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, where she received her Ph.D. in Developmental Psychology in 2016. She is an applied developmental health psychologist with a focus on the reduction of racial/ethnic health disparities through critical psychological and social justice lenses. She is currently an Assistant Professor of Psychology at Ursinus College. In August 2019, she will begin an Assistant Professorship at North Carolina State University as a member of their Applied Social and Community Psychology program.

Following completing the APUG Honors program, Jackson went on tocomplete a PhD in Clinical Psychology at the Derner Institute, Adelphi University in 2016. As a first-year doctoral student, he was selected for the Health Professions Scholarship Program and commissioned as an officer in the US Navy. He is currently stationed at the US Naval Academy in Annapolis, MD where he serves as a staff psychologist at the Midshipmen Development Center. He also instructs a graduate course in the Department of Organizational Leadership and Learning at George Washington University, and serves as a consultant for Little Bee Books, a children’s book company based in NYC.

After APUG, Sibyl went on to pursue a graduate degree in Guidance Counseling and remained in the NYU Applied Psychology Department. During her graduate program, she worked as guidance counseling intern with high school students in the South Bronx and at an Alternate Learning Center for middle school students in East Harlem. At the same time, she worked on several research projects, both in the Applied Psychology department and at the

NYU Child Study Center. After completing her graduate degree, Sibyl moved to Boston to work on research projects at the Harvard Graduate School of Education. She has had the pleasure and privilege of contributing to multiple longitudinal studies that have looked at multi-tiered reading interventions for students in elementary and middle school (Catalyzing Comprehension through Discussion and Debate) as well as understanding the long-term benefits of pre-k in BPS students (Expanding Children’s Early Learning).

 

Click here to return to the Spring 2019 Issue Contents page.

Rachel Lim – Editor-In-Chief (r.lim@nyu.edu)

Rachel Lim is a senior in the Applied Psychology undergraduate program. She is a member of the Latino Family Engagement and Language Development (L-FELD) research team, where she has the opportunity to work with teachers and children in early childhood classrooms in New York City. In her time at NYU, Rachel has gained various research experiences. As a past extern at NYU FTRG, she coded videos of teen relationship interactions to examine patterns of dominance and coercion. Rachel was also an intern at the NYU Child Study Center where she was involved in the development of research protocols for gaining normative and clinical data through Internet-based research methods. Rachel’s research interests primarily lie in early childhood education and developmental psychology. Currently, she is pursuing an Honors thesis on teachers’ instructional support in early childhood classrooms and its implications for children’s learning.  

 

Alexa Montemayor – Editor-In-Chief (am7129@nyu.edu)

Alexa Montemayor is a senior in the Applied Psychology undergraduate program with a minor in Sociology. She is a research assistant on the RISE (Researching Inequity in Society Ecologically) team, led by Dr. Shabnam Javdani and Dr. Sukhmani Singh. As a part of the RISE team, Alexa is also a member of the ROSES (Resilience, Opportunity, Safety, Education, Strength) data collection team, a community-based program that is being implemented and evaluated as a part of a New York University study. The goal of the ROSES study is to learn more about the needs of girls who are at-risk for involvement or are involved with the juvenile justice system and to understand how the system can better work for these individuals. Alexa recently joined the additional Phase 1 project on ROSES, where she is creating a qualitative coding scheme to identify common themes in juvenile justice system stakeholders’ perceptions of the legal system in New York City and the way that girls interact with the system. Alexa is also a volunteer at Bellevue Hospital where she routinely screens children and adolescents in the psychiatry department. Alexa hopes to continue her work in social justice and is pursuing a masters degree in social work.

 

Khirad Siddiqui – Editor-In-Chief (khirad.siddiqui@nyu.edu)

Khirad Siddiqui is a senior in the Applied Psychology undergraduate program, and is currently an Editor-in-Chief of OPUS. Her primary research interests are in discrimination, criminal justice, and prison reform. She began her research with the Fair Housing Justice Center on a project about housing discrimination against Muslim-Americans, and then transitioned to a role on the NYU Publicolor/PaintClub team to research an intervention in schools around New York. She has been working as a Juvenile Justice Advocate with the R.O.S.E.S. research team for the past year, which has allowed her the privilege of working directly with girls who are involved in the juvenile justice system. Currently, she is pursuing an Honors thesis on the justifications that parents give for filing legal petitions against their children. She also serves as the President of the Applied Psychology Undergraduate Club and works on-campus as a Presidential Intern at NYU.

 

Kerry Luo – Contributing Writer (kl2563@nyu.edu)

Kerry Luo is a senior in the Applied Psychology program with a Creative Writing minor. She has been on L-FELD for one year transcribing data, conducting direct child assessments, and volunteering in lower elementary classrooms. Over the past three years, she has worked directly with youth in a variety of settings such as correctional facilities, creative writing workshops, and afterschool programs. Kerry is interested in how the school setting influences socioemotional development for multicultural populations and wants to focus her career on culturally competent mental health care and advocacy for children and adolescents.

 

Ellie Harrison – Senior Staff Writer (egh268@nyu.edu)

Ellie Harrison is a senior in the applied psychology department, minoring in education and animal studies. She currently works as a therapeutic horseback riding instructor with GallopNYC and an advocate with NYU’s ROSES advocacy program for juvenile justice involved girls. She is also president of NYU Psi Chi, the international honors society of psychology. Next year, she will be teaching special education in New York City public schools through Teach for America.

 

Shira Richards-Rachlin – Contributing Writer (srr400@nyu.edu)

Shira Richards-Rachlin is a senior in the Applied Psychology program. Her fieldwork at Kurtz Psychology as well as internships at the Child Study Center and the Child Mind Institute have exposed her to multiple clinical settings treating children with Selective Mutism, Oppositional Defiant Disorder, ADHD, and more. Shira is looking forward to attending graduate school for social work in order to broaden her clinical lens, and she hopes to one day work at Bellevue Hospital assessing and diagnosing children in the emergency room.

 

Anastasia Knight – Senior Staff Writer (afk307@nyu.edu)

Anastasia Knight is a senior at NYU studying Applied Psychology. Currently, she is an advocate on NYU ROSES, advocating for system-involved girls to assist them in accessing their resources and challenging negative narratives. She has also interned with The Fortune Society, an organization based in Long Island City which provides formerly incarcerated individuals with access to job training, education, employment opportunities, meals, ATI programs, and more. In the future, she is interested in pursuing policy consulting, in hopes of making a difference in how businesses and local governments navigate inclusion and accessibility.

 

Alyce Cho – Communication Director (ac5843@nyu.edu)

Alyce Cho is a senior in the Applied Psychology program with a minor in Sociology. Her primary area of interest is in child development and special education. Currently, she is a research assistant at CRCDE, exploring spatial skills of Korean and U.S. Children, as well as child and parent interaction in play. She plans to pursue her interests in special education by furthering her education in special education law.

 

Click here to return to the Fall 2018 Issue Contents page.

Christina Ducat

In 2015, females accounted for 38% of juveniles placed in detention for status offenses (e.g., low-level, non-violent crimes such as running away, truancy, curfew violations, underage drinking, and incorrigibility; Sickmund, Sladky, Kang, & Puzzanchera, 2017), despite representing only 15% of residential placements (Office of Juvenile Justice & Delinquency Prevention, 2015). In fact, girls are arrested, petitioned to court, and placed in detention facilities for less severe offenses at a disproportionate rate compared to boys: whereas status offenses represent 12% of girls’ residential placement, similar offenses account for only 4% of boys’ offenses (Sickmund et al., 2017). This trend in asymmetrical sentencing speaks to the double standard that exists for boys and girls involved in the juvenile justice system (Chesney-Lind & Pasko, 2013).

Gender differences alone, however, do not account for all the variation in the sentencing severity of female defendants; defendants who are tried on the exact same charges receive sentences of varying severity depending on judges’ perceptions of any given defendant (Doerner & Demuth, 2010). In particular, research suggests that physical appearance in the courtroom may be an individual-level characteristic that systematically impacts sentencing severity (Fontaine & Kiger, 1978). As girls who dress in accordance with stereotypical feminine norms tend to be given shorter and less severe sentences than those who deviate from them (Chesney-Lind & Pasko 2013), it is plausible that the way a girl chooses to dress in court might affect how a judge perceives her and in turn the severity of her sentence (Davis, 1992, Fontaine & Kiger, 1978). Drawing upon defensive attribution theory, it is evident that judges’ perceptions are subject to influence by extralegal factors that impact their sentencing (Danziger, Levav, & Avnaim-Pesso, 2010; Shaver, 1970). However, despite the recent increase in the number of young women tried in juvenile delinquency cases and the notable increase in female incarceration rates (Carson, 2015; Hockenberry & Puzzanchera, 2015), there remains a paucity of research focusing on how judges’ and juries’ perceptions of female defendants are associated with differences in courtroom experience. As such, this paper aims to address the aforementioned gap in the literature by exploring the relation between the physical expression of gender (e.g., dress) and judges’ perceptions of the defendant, and how these perceptions relate to sentencing severity.

Clothing Choice and The Female Court Experience

While an ideal judge is objective and sentences strictly according to the facts of a case (Guthrie, Wistrich, & Rachlinski, 2007), external or extralegal factors such as physical appearance and dress influence how the judge perceives the defendant’s guilt, and subsequently the severity of a judge’s sentence (Danziger et al., 2010; Doerner & Demuth, 2010; Fontaine & Kiger, 1978). The physical expression of individual characteristics is particularly salient as it is one of the first things a judge perceives about a defendant when hearing a case. In fact, the interpretation of these physical characteristics, including dress, is often informed by stereotypes (Gurney, Howlett, Pine, Tracey, & Moggridge, 2017). At the commencement of the case, judges may use the defendant’s physical appearance as a mechanism by which to derive meaning regarding who the defendant is, what they value (Davis, 1992), their confidence, professionalism, and overall approachability (Gurney et al., 2017), and their social status (Ridgeway, 1991). Furthermore, clothing choice is perceived as an expression of the defendant’s respect for the judge, and how seriously the defendant is treating the legal process – both of which inform the judge’s sympathy for the defendant (Petrucci, 2002). Such attributions, however, are not uniformly imposed across defendants (Doerner & Demuth, 2010; Fontaine & Kiger, 1978; Rokeach & Vidmar, 1973).

In particular, gender differences contribute to variations in courtroom experience (Javdani, Sadeh, & Verona, 2011), that arise from gender-specific norms of behavior (Chesney-Lind & Pasko, 2013). Girls are expected to adhere to gender norms and are punished for the failure to conform to such norms (Javdani et al., 2011). As compared to males, females are disproportionately subject to marginalization when they deviate from feminine norms. In particular, female behaviors that deviate from socially dictated gender norms are perceived as lapses in morality (Chesney-Lind & Eliason, 2006), which leads to the perception of girls as delinquent (Javdani et al., 2011). Such expectations surrounding conformity manifest within clothing choice, which are used to convey larger messages about who a person is and what they value (Davis, 1992). In the United States, norms of appropriate female dress are culturally operationalized as conservative yet feminine (Grubb & Turner, 2012); deviation from this ideal, in turn, is often met with punishment in the form of hostile sexism (Glick & Fiske, 1996). As such, there exists a double standard: girls are expected to be obedient and embody traditional family values, whereas boys’ deviant behaviors are permissible in the courtroom because ‘boys will be boys’ (Chesney-Lind, 1977). If girls fail to comply with these courtroom standards, they are deemed aggressive or violent, and are more likely to be judged harshly and sentenced more severely as a result of their deviation from stereotypical norms of femininity (Chesney-Lind & Pasko, 2013; Petrucci, 2002). In the courtroom, this kind of punishment materializes through greater sentencing severity – explaining, at least in part, the imbalance in female incarceration rates (Carson, 2015; Chesney-Lind & Eliason, 2006; Javdani et al., 2011).

Judicial Perceptions and Sentencing Severity

There still, however, remains significant variability in the sentencing severity among female juveniles. Regardless of a defendant’s conformity to or deviation from gender norms, they are still subject to judges’ biases involving their individual-level characteristics (e.g., gender and age; Doerner & Demuth, 2010). Value judgments are placed upon girls on the basis of physical appearance, and the resulting perceptions arising from value judgments have salient implications for the sentencing of a defendant (Cramer et al., 2013; Grubb & Turner 2012). The ways in which individuals – and specifically judges – assess physical appearance and make subsequent sentencing decisions is characterized by defensive attribution theory (Mitchell & Byrne, 1973; Shaver, 1970).

Defensive attribution theory explains a cognitive bias in which one is more likely to attribute fault to another individual if he or she perceives the other as being different from the self (Shaver, 1970). People use “common sense knowledge of social structures” to infer the motivations and relative social position of others (Garfinkel, 1967, p. 76), and one indicator of these social structures is physical appearance, including clothing choice (Davis, 1992; Forsythe, 1990). When the judge believes they share common ground or similar values with a defendant, they are more likely to rule in the defendant’s favor by affording them lenient sentences (Fontaine & Kiger, 1978; Shaver, 1970). Conversely, it follows that where there is a perceived difference between the judge and the defendant, harsher sentences are more likely. As such, female defendants who deviate from stereotypical norms of dress may establish greater perceived differences between the defendant and the judge, given that the defendant conveys a different set of values than what the judge may hold (Grubb & Turner, 2012). This values-mismatch contributes to the variability in assigned culpability among individuals of similar personal characteristics and infractions (Cramer et al., 2013; Shaver, 1970), in which differences in perceived guilt or responsibility of a defendant result in variations in sentence severity for the same charges. In fact, women as a group are sentenced less severely than men for the same crimes; women who deviate from stereotypical feminine norms, however, are sentenced more severely than men who are charged with the same crimes (Chesney-Lind & Eliason, 2006; Chesney-Lind & Pasko, 2013). These findings suggest that greater expectations are placed on women in terms of adherence to gender norms, in that perceived deviation from these norms leads to more severe punishment in the form of severe sentencing (Glick & Fiske, 1996; Grubb & Turner, 2012). It is thus evident that clothing represents one facet by which judges infer a defendant’s characteristics and guilt (Forsythe, 1990), that contributes to systematic differences in sentencing severity even among girls.

Discussion

Despite the empirical evidence that highlights the disadvantaged position of girls in the courtroom (Javdani et al., 2011), research involving the role of judicial bias in sentencing, and especially as it involves marginalized populations such as women and youth, is limited. In fact, only some research has investigated the role of variability in clothing type (e.g., defendants who wear institutional dress, such as prison jumpsuits) in being found guilty by a jury or receiving more severe sentences from a judge (Fontaine & Kiger, 1978). Furthermore, the extant research surrounding the role of clothing choice in sentencing outcomes is largely based upon studies completed in the 1970’s and 80’s, with little continuing research. Addressing this gap is critical in light of changing societal norms surrounding dress, as well as the notable increase in female juvenile incarceration in recent years (Carson, 2015; Hockenberry & Puzzanchera, 2015). Future research should therefore closely investigate the ways social constructions of gender norms impact girls involved in the juvenile justice system, and how those norms might impact sentencing severity when judges are exposed to female defendants who differ in physical appearance but have nonetheless been charged with the same crime. Analyzing the consistency of judicial decision-making represents one significant step in moving towards an unbiased justice system, and a fuller understanding of the needs of this population. With this greater understanding, it becomes possible to effectively advocate for and work with girls in the justice system in a gender-responsive manner.

References

Carson, E.A. (2015). Prisoners in 2014. U.S. Department of Justice: Office of Justice Programs. Washington, D.C.: Bureau of Justice Statistics.

Chesney-Lind, M. (1977). Judicial paternalism and the female status offender: Training women to know their place. Crime & Delinquency, 23(2), 121-130.

Chesney-Lind, M., & Eliason, M. (2006). From invisible to incorrigible: The demonization of marginalized women and girls. Crime Media Culture, 2(1), 29-47.

Chesney-Lind, M., & Pasko, L. (Eds.). (2013). Sentencing women to prison: Equality without justice. In The female offender: Girls, women, and crime (pp. 119 – 152). Thousand Oaks, CA: Sage Publications.

Cramer, R., Gorter, E., Cornish Rodriguez, M., Clark, J., Rice, A., & Nobles, M. (2013). Blame attribution in court: Conceptualization and measurement of perpetrator blame. Victims & Offenders, 8(1), 42-55.

Danziger, S., Levav, J., & Avnaim-Pesso, L. (2010). Extraneous factors in judicial decisions. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 108(17), 6989-6892.

Davis, F. (1992). Do clothes speak? What makes them fashion? In Fashion, Culture, and Identity (pp. 3-18). Chicago, IL: University of Chicago Press.

Doerner, J., & Demuth, S. (2010). The independent and joint effects of race/ethnicity, gender, and age on sentencing outcomes in U.S. Federal Courts. Justice Quarterly, 27(1), 1-24.

Fontaine, G., & Kiger, R. (1978). The effects of defendant dress and supervision on judgments of simulated jurors: An exploratory study. Law and Human Behavior, 2(1), 63-71.

Forsythe, S. (1990). The effect of applicant’s clothing on interviewer’s decision to hire. Journal of Applied Social Psychology, 20(19), 1579-1595.

Garfinkel, H. (1984). Common sense knowledge of social structures: The documentary method of interpretation in lay and professional fact finding. In Studies in Ethnomethodology (pp. 76-103). Cambridge, United Kingdom: Polity Press.

Glick, P. & Fiske, S. (1996). The ambivalent sexism inventory: Differentiating hostile and benevolent sexism. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 70(3), 491-512.

Gurney, D., Howlett, N., Pine, K., Tracey, M., & Moggridge, R. (2017). Dressing up posture: The interactive effects of posture and clothing on competency judgments. British Journal of Psychology, 108(2), 436-451.

Guthrie, C., Wistrich, A., & Rachlinski, J. (2007). Blinking on the bench: How judges decide cases. Scholarship@Cornell Law: A Digital Repository, 93(1), 1-44.

Grubb, A., & Turner, E. (2012). Attribution of blame in rape cases: A review of the impact of rape myth acceptance, gender role conformity and substance use on victim blaming. Aggression and Violent Behavior, 17(5), 443- 452.

Hockenberry, S., & Puzzanchera C. (2015). Juvenile court statistics 2013 report. National Center for Juvenile Justice. Retrieved from https://www.ojjdp.gov/ojstatbb/njcda/pdf/jcs2013

Javdani, S., Sadeh, N., & Verona, E. (2011). Expanding our lens: Female pathways to antisocial behavior in adolescence and adulthood. Clinical Psychology Review, 31(8), 1324-1348.

Mitchell, H., & Byrne, D. (1973). The defendant’s dilemma: Effects of juror’s attitudes and authoritarianism on judicial decisions. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 25(1), 123-129.

Office of Juvenile Justice and Delinquency Prevention (2015). Spotlight on Girls in the Juvenile Justice System. Retrieved from: https://www.ojjdp.gov/ojstatbb/snapshots/DataSnapshot_Girls2015.pdf

Petrucci, C. (2002). Respect as a component in the judge- defendant interaction in a specialized domestic violence court that utilizes therapeutic jurisprudence. Criminal Law Bulletin, 38(2), 263-297.

Ridgeway, C. (1991). The social construction of status value: Gender and other nominal characteristics. Social Forces, 70(2), 367-386.

Rokeach, M. & Vidmar, N. (1973). Testimony concerning possible jury bias in a Black Panther murder trial. Journal of Applied Social Psychology, 3(1), 19-29.

Shaver, K. (1970). Defensive attribution: Effects of severity and relevance on the responsibility assigned for an accident. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 14(2), 101-113.

Sickmund, M., Sladky, T., Kang, W., & Puzzanchera, C. (2017). Census of juveniles in residential placement. Retrieved from: http://www.ojjdp.gov/ojstatbb/ezacjrp/

OPUS Information Session

Wednesday, September 13, 6:30 – 8:00 PM

Kimball Hall Lobby, 246 Greene Street

OPUS, APUG’s very own Online Publication of Undergraduate Studies, is accepting submissions for our Fall 2017 issue! Come to our information session to learn more about the types of submissions we accept. We will also be advertising available staff writer positions for the 2017-18 school year. Meet the current editors-in-chief and get your questions answered! Refreshments will be served.

OPUS Open Hours

Friday, December 1, 4:30 – 7:00 PM

Kimball Hall Lobby, 246 Greene Street

Looking for a second pair of eyes to look over that final paper or Applied Assignment? Unsure about APA format? Come swing by our biannual Open Hours, hosted by OPUS. Our editors-in-chief and staff writers will be there to provide you with 1:1 tips and suggestions on your paper(s). Refreshments will be served.

Greetings and welcome to OPUS!

We couldn’t be more thrilled to serve as the Editors-in-Chief for the 2017-2018 academic year. Since its inception in 2009, OPUS has provided Applied Psychology undergraduates with a forum for sharing their independent work. On this website, you will find a list of our upcoming events, past issues, our mission statement, descriptions of staff writer positions, staff biographies, and more.

This year, we are excited to welcome submissions in the form of literature reviews, research proposals, case studies, and abstracts of independent projects and honors theses. In addition, staff writers are welcome and encouraged to produce psychology-related book reviews, opinion pieces, and interviews with professionals in the field. We hope to produce a publication that reflects the diverse research interests and showcases the scholarly work of NYU psychology undergraduates.

For general inquiries, please do not hesitate to contact us at nyuappliedpsychopus@gmail.com.
Sincerely,
Julius Utama and Elysha Clark Whitney
2017-2018 Editors-in-Chief

https://wp.nyu.edu/steinhardt-appsych_opus/2016/08/30/welcome-to-opus/