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Show StatesmanCampus News Page 2 Briefs Campus & Community Two USU Press books finalists for award Two books published in 2009 by USU Press were finalists in the recent Utah Book Award competition, and one book, "Comb Ridge and Its People: The Ethnohistory of a Rock" by Utah State University San Juan Campus professor Robert S. McPherson, won the award in the nonfiction category. "A River Knows Everything: Desolation Canyon and the Green" by James M. Aton was a finalist in the nonfiction category as well. USU Press is a department of University Libraries at Utah State University. The Utah Book Award is sponsored by the Salt Lake City Library and the Utah Center for the Book. The award honors outstanding achievements by Utah writers who produce exceptional literature having a Utah theme or setting. Established in 1999, the award was presented to one book. Since then, categories have been added to include fiction, nonfiction, poetry and literature for children and young adults. John Alley, executive editor at USU Press, acknowledged the award and the efforts of all involved in the process at USU. "The award not only reflects the great work by professor McPherson, but also our staff members and their efforts to continually produce high-quality books," Alley said. "Comb Ridge and its People" explores a unique 100-mile-long, 200-foot-high serrated cliff and the human cultures it has defined in a small section of the Colorado Plateau. Students ready to participate in polls Utah State University students once again team with other university students across the state to participate in the Utah Colleges Exit Poll in November, the longest running student conducted exit poll in the country. Brigham Young University's Center for the Study of Elections and Democracy sponsors the Utah College Exit Poll, which was first conducted in 1982. USU students, under the direction of Damon Cann and William Furlong, political science professors at USU, will conduct the polling efforts in Box Elder and Cache counties. The results of the poll have proven accurate over its 26-year history, and results are available through the poll's BYU website shortly after the polls close election day. USU's students have prepared for their involvement in the exit poll since early September and upwards of 50 students will participate, Cann said. All are volunteers and represent a variety of majors at USU, including political science, international studies and law and constitutional studies. War correspondent to speak Thursday Monday, Nov. 1, 2010 Alumnus shares triumph over speech hurdles By RHETT WILKINSON staff writer Attorney and USU alumnus Marcus Mumford shared thoughts about his nation-crossing career path, key events that helped him overcome stuttering and the faith he found that helped him throughout the process. Mumford presented "A Stuttering Lawyer and the Philosophy of Science" Friday, Oct. 30 at the David B. Haight Alumni Center on campus. Mumford's speech was the second of The College of Humanities and Social Sciences Distinguished Alumni Speaker series. The purpose of the series is to assure students that obtaining a degree from the college is valuable by featuring speakers who are examples of successful graduates from diverse fields. The focus of Mumford's presentation was to highlight the ways he rose to the top of the law field. He has been employed in New York and Los Angeles, despite a struggle with stuttering that was a hindrance in his work. Severe stuttering was a potential barrier that Mumford, who graduated fro USU in 1996, said he had to learn to overcome after being diagnosed as a child. When he was four, Mumford's parents realized that he wasn't progressing in speech as rapidly as others his age. While at a Boy Scout fundraiser in the later years of his youth his stuttering contributed to his inability to sell a single ticket. At this point, Mumford said his mother played a huge role in helping to shape his character. "After we cried together, she sent me back out again," he said. "I came back late that night and left a note for her that I had sold every ticket." In the question-and-answer session, Mumford described how he served an LDS mission in Rome, Italy, despite the physical struggle. In a way, he said, the stuttering contributed to his building relationships with locals because he had to choose to speak only Italian rather than switching between conversations to English. Focusing on just one language caused him to develop the Italian dialect and thus endear himself to the citizens. Mumford said when he was employed by his first law firm following his graduation from BYU's Law School in 1999, he took 30 minutes to leave a 30-second message. He wasn't going to allow the stuttering to keep him from oral presentations in the courtroom, he said. Once he made it into the courtroom, Mumford said in judges' eyes he had instant credibility as a lawyer because he dealt with an insecurity. He had at some cases been so effective in his delivery that even though he was struggling to utter the next phrase, judges would sometimes mouth what he was about to say next. "(Other) lawyers would kill for that," he said, MARCUS MUMFORD drawing laughter from the audience. "Your professors would kill for that." For the presentation, Mumford used a model with baseball umpires to describe the process of seizing control of a situation and overcoming a struggle. The model contained three phrases that describe different approaches to a potential barrier to aspirations. The first was "I call 'em as they are," meant to describe those who analyze something and claim it to be the concrete truth. "I'm here to tell you that science has had a good run, but needs to have its modesty, just as it has expected from others like religion and art," Mumford said. "It can't determine our values, and can have hoaxes." An example of that "hoax," he said, was being told that he would not really even be able to talk because of his stuttering condition. It was when Mumford realized as a young boy that he could not let others define what his life was going to be, no matter how severe his condition. "My first big step was to step off that ledge," he said. The second phrase of the model was "I call 'ern as I see 'ern," meant to describe those who simply take something taught to them and allow for that learning to influence them completely. Mumford called this theory the "PDS: Pretty Dang Sure" method. The third statement that Mumford spoke about, which he spent the most time explaining, was "They ain't nothing `til I call 'ern." "You need to say 'I am going to be more than acted upon... I am going to be the one that acts," he said. Mumford compared seizing opportunities in life and letting even physical barriers, like his stuttering, not get in the way of those goals, to a parade that sees a curb, but makes the adjustment to not let the curb trip up the rest of the show. "We (need to) react. We are (in need) to be more likely to take the invitation to join the parade," he said. Students who attended were impressed with Mumford's motivating words. "He had a really great life story about staying focused," said Spencer Brown, an undeclared freshman. "I could tell that (his journey) has taken a lot of guts." Sophomore Mark Fuller, whose teacher had canceled his philosophy class to allow Fuller and his classmates to attend, also thought that Mumford's experiences gave a great example of perseverance and overcoming odds. "I liked how he said that that (setting new precedents) is only dangerous when you make it dangerous," Fuller said. Fuller also liked how Mumford provided a philosophical view on what he's done to achieve success in his field. Mumford could also credit success to other significant figures who played roles as motivators in him beating the odds. "I was encouraged by mentors to 'join the parade,'" he said. "Some might just call that a miracle." — rhett.wilkinson@aggiemausu.edu Event explores human addiction research By RANDALL HENRY staff writer Our brains our still developing and will continue to do so until our mid-twenties, said Timothy Shahan, a psychology professor at USU who spoke to students Friday about the use of animals in understandings addiction and human behavior. "Character, judgment, willpower have their basis in brain function, and they can be changed," Shahan said. Shahan began the lecture by describing Phineas Gage, a man who lived during the 1800s, and how an accident caused much of the front part of his brain to be destroyed, leading to a different personality. Shahan described the experiments that Pavlov ran on dogs, and how that type of conditioning is similar to the actions that cause addiction in humans. Stimuli are used to produce certain actions, and that this is true of humans, Shahan said. The "open" signs on the doors of businesses are an example of stimuli that we use, in this case to know when we are able to go in and receive goods and services. "We've known for a very long time that this sort of reward learning plays a very large role in addiction," Shahan said. "Turns out that drugs function as re-enforcers for behavior that produces them." Shahan said that addiction is a disease of the brain that affects the decision-making parts of the brain, and drugs "hijack" the functions of the brain that produce the same chemical you would receive from pleasurable experiences such as spending time with your children. Addiction is also characterized by compulsive and habitual drugseeking and loss of control, Shahan said. "You can't stop, and you relapse when you do manage to stop." Shahan then started to talk about drug cues. Shahan said that if you show someone a drug cue and the same urges associated with drug use appear. Shahan said animal lessons are useful in learning about human brain functions because these sorts of cues can be seen in animals as well as people. Shahan also said that it is not exactly the same, but drugs that humans abuse work the same way as rewards for animals. The primary focus of his research has to do with conditioning and reward learning, Shahan said. Shahan also shared the results his research yielded, and said applying each result to data collected on human behavior allowed for a greater understanding of the behavior cues and how the reward cycle affects these results. Afterwards, there were several activities, organized by Amy Odum, an associate professor with the USU psychology department, including a real human brain on display. Several activities allowed participants to test their own propensities in regard to Shahan's research, such as testing how long you are willing to wait for larger rewards, and your aptitude for problem solving. Kerry Jordan, an associate professor at USU, described her work on infants and their ability to understand abstract concepts. Jordan said that both she and Shahan are interested in how people learn. "He's looking at largely maladaptive human behavior. I'm looking at how humans universally think about certain concepts." Jordan said. Michelle Woidneck, doctoral student at USU and a member of the anxiety disorder clinic, said there are connections between conditioning and some symptoms of anxiety, and the clinic's research is just one of the many studies using variable methods to study human behavior. For more information on addictive behavior, the website for the National Institute on Drug Abuse,http://drugabuse.gov/nidahome.html, has information for different age groups on drug abuse and addictive behaviors. — randall.henry@aggiemail.usu.edu Partiersfrom across the state HOWL late into the night Anne Garrels, senior foreign correspondent for National Public Radio (NPR), will visit Utah State University as a guest of Utah Public Radio Nov. 3 and 4. Garrels will be the special guest on Access Utah, UPR's weekday call-in program Wednesday, Nov. 3, from 9 to 10 a.m. She will give the Morris Media & Society lecture Nov. 4 from 2 to 3:15 p.m. in the Performance Hall on the USU campus. The address is free and open to everyone, and the public is encouraged attend. Copies of Garrels' book, "Naked in Baghdad," will also be available for purchase. Garrels first joined public radio in 1988 after stints in television for NBC and ABC news. She has served NPR with distinction as a diplomatic correspondent, a Moscow bureau chief and, for the past decade or so, as a roving correspondent covering conflicts and wars from Chechnya to Beirut, from Kabul to Baghdad, with stops in Bosnia, Kosovo and Tiananmen Square in China among others. El Compiled from staff and media reports A TOTAL OF 6,565 tickets were sold for The HOWL this year, which presented music groups The Higher and We the Kings. To see more pictures from The HOWL go to www.utahstatesman.com . STERLING BOIN photo |