Class of 2004

East Side Community H.S.

Topic: The Effects Of Media on Urban Adolescent Girls' Perception of Body Image

About:

My name is Theresa Lugo. I am a junior at East Side Community High School. My science teachers Lyn Neely and Jim Wallace told me about the Harlem Children Society’s Science Internship program. They asked me if I was interested, that this program was to be taken seriously, and that I would learn a lot. I was nervous when I found out that I got picked by Dr. Bhattacharya to participate in this program. I met my mentor Dr. Roseanne Flores. She was serious and ready to get down to work.

This program had me working in the Psychology Department at Hunter College. My mentor taught us a lot about psychology. My friend and partner Dressy Villar and I started our project by doing a lot of reading on psychological development. We learned how to construct a survey, a professional report the way it ís done in the psychology department, and how to construct the slides for our presentation. Our project title was The Effects of the Media on Urban Adolescent Girls Perception on Body Image.

Our project was split in two parts. Dressy concentrated on the ethics in psychology meanwhile I concentrated on the methodology. Dressy and I wrote our reports, hers on the ethics and mines on the method. I was nervous about presenting but I did great. I want to give thanks to Dr. Bhattacharya for this opportunity, my mentor for sharing what she does as a psychologist, and Dressy Villar for being the best partner.