Group of Liberty students ties for first-place award at Virginia Association for Psychological Science conference

Five groups of undergraduate students from Liberty University’s Department of Psychology presented their work at the Virginia Association for Psychological Science (VAPS) annual conference, held April 13-15 last week in Alexandria, Va., with one team tying for first place for the conference’s Frederick B. Rowe Award for the Best Undergraduate Paper.

The winning team, led by faculty instructor Blake Fraser, focused on the topic of loneliness in college students, which has become a growing issue across the country. They competed among other universities in the Commonwealth, including James Madison, Radford, and George Mason, and tied for the award with University of Mary Washington.

The paper was based on research data they have collected since last spring and involved a sample that consisted of male and female undergraduate Liberty students who were asked to complete questionnaires and participate in individual interviews regarding their personal definitions of loneliness and thoughts on what causes it. Their findings showed that the participants defined loneliness as “a subjective feeling experienced when lacking friends, social support, or meaningful connections with others.” The top three factors were anxiety, fear of rejection/insecurity, and grief/loss. Fraser said the team plans to make minor edits to their paper before submitting to academic journals for potential publishing.

The other four groups from Liberty presented research on college students who are on the Autism spectrum, the struggle with statistics anxiety and math anxiety, perceptions of substance abuse, forgiveness in different personalities, and mindfulness.

Liberty’s psychology students have attended the VAPS conference every year since 2011 (except 2020, when the event was canceled due to the COVID pandemic).