Author Description

Conducting research to understand and formulate viable solutions are crucial in saving lives and bettering global communities. Because of our interest and passion for research, we felt an urge to create change in the state of this modern world with our own skills. This year, Ashley Yewon Nam researched ‘Do Synesthetes have a General Advantage in Visual Search and Episodic Memory’. Curious about the famed "sixth "sense", Ashley studied how the neurological phenomena could benefit visual search and episodic memory. Similarly, Hye Jung Shin conducted a peer-survey exploring "the Outcome of the Stroop Effect with Negative, Positive, and Neutral Words". Here, Hye Jung elevated her research by conducting live experiments with her peers. Shee directly gathered and recorded relevant data while exploring the impact of word genres on reaction times. This is just an example of the inquisitive mind that we hope to inspire and develop in high school students. The compiled research does not focus only on health-related studies. Daniel Shin, another curious-minded student, researched ‘Effectiveness of CeO2/Mn3O4 Nanocrystals on Reducing DNA Damage by Space Radiation’, while James Kim wrote a paper on ‘The Correlation Between Brix and Sugar Content in Common Beverages’. Other students researched topics such as ‘Testing Effective De-Icing Agents and Experimental Data for Current Road Salts’, ‘The Effects of Drag on a Home-built Small Paper Airplane', ‘Racism in American Society and its Effects on the Asian Immigrants’, and ‘Predicting a Stock's Price by Creating Multiple Machine Learning Algorithms’. The Top Journal is a peer-reviewed international journal by high school students that uses the social sciences to reflect on learning and teaching in the changing context of education. The journal is heavily dedicated to providing students with mentorship throughout their research and creative activities and providing opportunities to expand their knowledge and insights.