ABINGTON, Pa. -- Marianna McBride said her "lightbulb moment" came last fall. The biosocial criminology course riveted her, and the Penn State Abington senior immediately knew this was the area she wanted to specialize in when she begins her graduate studies next year.
Coincidentally, Eric Connolly, assistant professor of criminal justice, noticed Marianna's insightful questions during class "made it clear she had a burning fire" for research.
And so another dynamic student-faculty research team was born at Abington. The team is so accomplished and engaged that the project McBride spearheaded on early employment and adolescent delinquency was selected for the Undergraduate Research at the Capitol conference in Harrisburg.
McBride presented her findings to state legislators and other key decision makers in the Capitol Rotunda. She and Connolly were joined by students and faculty from more than 100 colleges and universities throughout the state. Connolly mentored McBride's research through the Abington College Undergraduate Research Activities program, popularly known as ACURA.
For Connolly, who taught McBride in his first semester at Abington, it was his initial experience working with an undergraduate, and he was impressed McBride's curiosity and work ethic.
"Marianna was prepared and interested and wanted to contribute to understanding more about the link between early employment and delinquency and anything tied to biosocial criminology," he said.
McBride's project developed from earlier research that found adolescents who work 20 or more hours per week are more likely to wind up in legal trouble. Realizing that previous studies didn't account for biosocial (biological and environmental) factors, she jumped into analyzing data from the National Longitudinal Survey of Youth, provided by the U.S. Bureau of Labor Statistics.
"Why do these juveniles select into jobs where they work more than 20 hours a week?" McBride said. "We wanted to look into the influence of genetics."