Christina Perazio is recipient of Charles H. Turner Award

Christina Perazio, PBO '11, is one of this year's recipients of the prestigious Charles H. Turner Award, given by the Animal Behavior Society to deserving undergraduate researchers.

Christina has been assisting 51品茶assistant professor Teresa Dzieweczynski, Ph.D., department of psychology, with her research for the past year. Christina's work has focused on understanding how communication networks in Siamese fighting fish might be affected by whether or not the participants in these networks have interacted with one another previously. Christina was the lead investigator on this research question and was assisted by Courtney Gill (PSY and ANB '11) and Lindsey Carleton (PSY '14).

The Animal Behavior Society started the Charles H. Turner Program in 2002 as a means of increasing undergraduate participation at the annual Society meetings and encouraging exceptional undergraduate researchers to pursue graduate studies in animal behavior. ABS has received support from the National Science Foundation for this award, which brings 10 undergraduates from schools around the country to the meetings. The Turner Award covered all expenses associated with attending to the conference as well as providing an incredible mentoring experience as each award recipient is paired with a well-known senior researcher in the field of animal behavior during the meeting.

Christina was present a poster on her work "I know you: familiarity with an audience influences male-male interactions in Siamese fighting fish, Betta splendens" at the annual ABS meetings in Bloomington, Indiana this July. This study enhances our understanding of how communication operates in a network setting and is the first to combine to phenomena that affect social interactions, audience effects and familiarity, into one study. Christina is presently working with Dr. Dzieweczynski to write up this research for publication in a scientific journal.

Christina will attend the University of Southern Mississippi's doctoral program in experimental psychology in the fall where she will study dolphin behavior and cognition.

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