About

Bobbi is a local of Pembroke, North Carolina, and graduated in May of 2016 with a degree in psychology. Her proudest accomplishment was graduating an entire year early at the age of 21. Being an honors college student was rewarding for her because it gave her the opportunity to be a senior thesis research assistant, where she learned a lot of new information that had a major impact on her education.

For Bobbi’s senior project she studied self-compassion and perceptions of judgment with Dr. Ashley Allen in order to see if people with low self-compassion perceived others to have higher self-compassion, and also to see whether high self-compassionate people perceive others as judging them less than low self-compassionate people. They hypothesized this effect would be even stronger in a condition when the participants were at fault. They conducted their research through an online study that was taken by UNCP students. The study was made available through the SONA, which is a program designed for students to earn credit for participating in online research.

After graduation Bobbi plans to start the Master’s of Social Work program at UNCP in the fall of 2016. She advises honors college students to go for every opportunity that is available. She encourages students to not get overwhelmed by challenging tasks and to not turn down opportunities just because they seem too challenging. Her greatest memory at UNCP was attending the scholarship dinner and being able to see so many people working hard to further their education.

Senior Project

Title: Self-Compassion and Perceptions of Judgment: Do Self-Compassionate People Perceive Others as Judging them Less?

Mentor: Dr. Ashley Allen