Larry Rosen knows he has a problem. Headed home from work, the psychology professor said his heart skipped a beat when he glanced at his iPhone and suddenly realized his battery was at 7%. He had no charger. “You get this feeling: Oh my God, I’m lost,” he said. Prof. Rosen, a past chairman of the psychology department at California State University, Dominguez Hills, knows whereof he speaks. He is a leading researcher in a new field of scientific inquiry that is attracting dozens of researchers across the globe and is increasingly being treated by clinical psychologists: smartphone anxiety. Does your heart rate jump when your iPhone battery dips below 20%? You could be suffering from ... Read More
Journalism
Alumna Sofia Pop Tunes in to Breaking News for Telemundo
One moment she is fact checking a story online, seconds later she is sending reporters into the field, all the while she has one eye trained on her email, and an ear tuned into two police scanners for breaking news. It’s all in a hectic day’s work for Sofia Pop, assignment editor for KVEA-TV Telemundo 52. Pop (’01, B.A., communications) often finds herself in a well-orchestrated frenzy while sitting at her assignment desk for the Los Angeles-based Spanish language television station, where the California State University, Dominguez Hills (CSUDH) alumna has worked since 2014. Her main duties include following up on and researching news leads, and dispatching reporters and news ... Read More
’60 Minutes’ Taps Professors’ Expertise on Smartphone Behavior, Anxiety
Anderson Cooper, television personality and correspondent for “60 Minutes,” the nation’s longest-running television newsmagazine, visited California State University, Dominguez Hills (CSUDH) to interview communications professor Nancy Cheever and psychology professor Larry Rosen for a story about the effects of habit-forming smartphone applications on people’s behaviors and lives. The “60 Minutes” story, which aired April 9, featured former Google product manager Tristan Harris, who since leaving the tech giant has spoken out nationally about the development of smartphone apps—some of which he helped design—that he claims are purposefully designed by software companies to be addictive. ... Read More
Danny Brassell Reads Between the Lines to Inspire
Danny Brassell is big on reading, but he is no book snob. The California State University, Dominguez Hills professor of teacher education pointed out that there are myriad forms of reading materials, from newspapers and magazines, to electronic readers as well as the Internet, emails and even text messages. It doesn’t matter to him what people read, he just wants them to get turned on to reading. “Reading doesn’t just mean it’s in a really old book,” said Brassell, a librarian’s son. “If people want to read Sports Illustrated on the toilet, that’s what they should be reading.” He also absolves readers from books they aren’t enjoying. “If you don’t like the first ... Read More
Alumnus Thabiti Asukile Urges Recognition of Black Intellectuals
For California State University, Dominguez Hills alumnus Thabiti Asukile (Class of ’95, B.S. Africana studies), learning to read critically revealed deeper, more comprehensive insights into American history – including contributions of great African American thinkers. In learning more about American history, Asukile, who has an M.A. in African American studies from Temple University and a Ph.D. in American history from University of California, Berkeley, discovered a wealth of black intellectuals who had been forgotten or intentionally marginalized. “Today, it’s hard to know who the black intellectuals are, because they aren’t talked about in the media. Academic scholars know who they ... Read More
