Faculty Research Interests

 Dr. Corrine Bertram - FSC 117 x1298

Research Interests:

• Currently working on a critique and expansion of research on rape avoidance behaviors (verbal and physical responses). Including: girls’ and women’s understanding, decision making, and others’ responses of self-defense and rape avoidance.
• Power and privilege in the context of disabilities.
• Research on sexualities: women’s sexual identities, lesbian, gay, bisexual, and/or queer identities.

Students’ Role:

May assist with ongoing projects or develop new projects. Gather research literature; write literature reviews; develop/design research questions/projects; data collection/transcribing (interviews and/or focus groups); analyze quantitative data; code qualitative data; write and present research articles, reports, or posters; and/or submitting manuscripts for publication.

Requirements:

Students should have taken and done well in my courses, and have taken PSY 410 Psychology and Women or PSY 365 Multicultural Psychology. Students must make a one-year commitment and meet bi-weekly with me and/or research team members.

Willing to work with:

• Undergraduate students receiving credit
• Undergraduates who are volunteering
• Graduate students who are volunteering

Dr. Jamonn Campbell - FSC 123  x1146

Research Interests: 

• Computer-mediated Communication  interests include problem solving, decision making, impression formation and social identity in CMC groups
• Psychology of the internet interests include privacy, computer usage (e.g. gender gap, digital divide, etc.), and unrealistic optimism
• Sport Fans - interests include sport fan identification, gender differences in motivation and behaviors of sport fans

Students Roles: 

Students participating as a member of the research team will be responsible for

• Research theory and development
• Writing research proposals
• Data collection
• Data entry and analysis
• Presenting results at university, regional, and national conferences

Requirements: 

Students who are thinking about joining the research team should be interested in one or more of the project areas. Students should be: self motivated, comfortable working in groups, and familiar with computers and major statistical packages (e.g. SPSS, Excel, etc.).

Willing to work with: 

Undergraduate students who are interested in gaining research experience (volunteers and those receiving credit)
Graduate students who are volunteering

Student roles: 

Requirements: 

Willing to work with: 

• Undergraduate students who are receiving credit
• Undergraduates who are volunteering
• Graduate students who are volunteering

Dr. James Griffith - FSC 101   477-1374

Topics, projects: 

• Research Methodology. I work on research questions across a variety of topics and am primarily interested in applying multivariate analyses to answer these questions. I typically work with secondary data or I collect data online.
• Program Evaluation  I conduct evaluation (e.g., process, outcome, cost) on small scale programs (more are at the local level).

Students roles: 

Students who work with me will be working on my ongoing projects. Students will have the opportunity to participate in all of the research process that includes:

• Preparing conference presentations
• Preparing journal manuscripts
• Project design
• Literature Reviews
• Stimuli development
• Data analysis
• Data collection and entry

Requirements: 

I prefer to work with students who are familiar with SPSS or JASP, have taken one year of research design and statistics, and who intend to go to a graduate or professional program of study. In addition, my expectation is for students in my lab to put in 5-8 hours/week.

Willing to work with: 

• Undergraduate students who are receiving credit
• Undergraduates who are volunteering
• Graduate students who are volunteering

Dr. Steve Haase - FSC 115   x1160

Topics, projects: 

• Conscious vs. Unconscious Perception  examining the relationship between conscious and unconscious perception. Main contributions on this project would be with data collection, at least initially.
• Attention  studying how the processing of a stimulus changes as a function of focusing ones concentration on or allocating processing resources to a stimulus.
• Other  most topics in the broad area of cognition and perception, including real-world applications.

Students roles: 

Requirements: 

Willing to work with: 

• Undergraduates who are receiving credit (student will need to draft a project goals statement prior to the start of the project)
• Undergraduates who are volunteering
• Graduates students who are volunteering

Dr. Robert Hale - FSC 219  x1177

Topics, projects: 

• Shunning as Evolutionary Adaption
• The Stress Response as measured by salivary cortisol
• Emotion Regulation as measured by heart rate variability (HRV)
• Binge drinking in college students

Students roles: 

Requirements: 

Willing to work with: 

• Undergraduate students as Advanced Research (Psy 374/375) supervisor
• Undergraduate students as Honors Thesis supervisor

Dr. Thomas Hatvany - FSC 111   x1514

Research interests:

My research interests are focused on how certain aspects of our lives, such as goals or groups, become “fused” with the self-concept and how this influences motivation. I am also interested in different motivationally relevant individual differences, such as differences in what one finds tempting, self-control, motivational intensity, etc. influence motivation.

Student Roles:

• Generating research questions
• Literature reviews
• Research design and preparation (which may include IRB preparation and grant writing)
• Data collection and entry
• Data analysis
• Reporting results (preparing publications and presentations at conferences)
• Productive students can earn co-authorship on presentations and publications.

Requirements:

• Prefer students who have taken RD&S II and received an B or higher
• Prefer undergraduates who plan on pursuing graduate work
• Prefer students making multiple semester commitments
• Must be willing to make a 6 hour a week commitment
• Must be self-motivated and consistently responsible

Willing to work with:

• Undergraduate students who are receiving credit
• Undergraduates who are volunteering
• Graduate students who are volunteering

Dr. Sue Morin - FSC 114   x1538

Topics, projects: 

Students roles: 

Requirements:

• Prefer students who have taken RD&S II and received an A or B.
• Must commit for two or more semesters.
• Must be prepared to present at conferences.
• Students will have to do a semester of readings on the topic before they are able to actively participate in other phases of the project (such as data collection, etc.).

Willing to work with:

• Undergraduate students who are receiving credit
• Undergraduates who are volunteering
• Graduate students who are volunteering

Dr. Amber Norwood - FSC 121   x1581

Research interests: 

My research interests fall within a few different, but related, areas of study:

*Severe mental illness (SMI) – treatment outcome effectiveness studies, especially those that incorporate mindfulness and/or motivational interviewing as an intervention component; substance use cessation and treatment (emphasis on tobacco for this population)

*Forensic psychology – factors influencing community reintegration for incarcerated individuals and/or those adjudicated NCR/NGRI, other areas: public perception of mentally ill offenders, criminal competency to stand trial, criminal responsibility, treatment of intimate partner violence offenders

*Health behavior change – the transtheoretical model of intentional health behavior change, particularly tobacco/nicotine cessation, motivational interviewing as an intervention tool, integrative screening for health concerns, training of behavioral and medical health providers

I am open to investigating new ideas that fall broadly within one of these or a related realm!

Student roles: 

When possible, students will work with me as part of a research group/cohort and we will meet together to discuss projects and set associated goals.  Student roles will vary and will be determined on an individual basis.  Potential roles include, but are not limited to: literature review, research design (may include IRB preparation/submission), data collection & entry, data analysis, interpretation of findings, and reporting of results.

There is a potential for students to present at conferences and/or co-author research papers for submission.

Requirements: 

Students must have a genuine interest and enthusiasm for one of the above-mentioned project areas.  It is my expectation that students commit to 5-8 hours per week in research-related activities.  Students must also be self-motivated and able to manage deadlines.

Additionally, I have a preference to work with:

*Students who have taken RD&S II and received a B or higher

*Students interested in pursuing graduate work

*Students willing to commit to 2 consecutive semesters of research

Willing to work with: 

• Undergraduate students who are receiving credit
• Undergraduate and graduate students who are volunteering

Dr. Kathryn Potoczak - FSC 225   x1372

Research Interests: 

• The experimental functional analysis of aberrant behavior
• The deceleration of aberrant behavior using extinction or capitalization on the schedule of reinforcement currently in effect
• The use of behavior analysis in the teaching of college students

Students roles: 

Requirements: 

Willing to work with: 

• Undergraduate students who are receiving credit
• Undergraduates who are volunteering
• Graduate students who are volunteering

Dr. Toru Sato - FSC 213   x1352

Topics, projects: 

Students are welcome to study personality and consciousness from the perspective of Depth and Transpersonal Psychology.  We will have weekly meetings, research the media, explore our own minds through introspection, and share creative work in the form of writing or other forms of art.  Undergraduate students may receive 3 credits for PSY 374 or 375 after completing 2 semesters of work (i.e., student enrolls in PSY 374 or PSY 375 in the second semester).  Students are also welcome to collaborate on presenting at a conference as a co-author if new and interesting discoveries are made. 

Students roles: 

• Literature and media search, reading, viewing, listening
• Introspection (e.g. meditation, exploration of dreams)
• Sharing introspections and creative works (e.g. poetry, stories, drawing and discussing how they relate to personality and consciousness
• Presenting at conferences (rarely but occurs occasionally)

Requirements:

• Must be committed to spending TR 2:00-3:30 pm in meetings and another 3.5 hours per week on work outside the meetings

Willing to work with: 

• Undergraduate students receiving credit for PSY 374 or PSY 375 (3 credits may be granted for 2 semesters of work)
• Graduate students who are volunteering

Dr. Ashley Seibert - FSC 119 x1203

Research Interests:

My research interests are focused on children’s social and emotional development. I am particularly interested in how parent-child relationships impact children’s emotional development as well as their peer relationships and friendships. I am currently interested in exploring emotion regulation as a possible mechanism that may explain how parent- child relationships and peer relationships are associated with one another.

 Students’ Role:

 Students may either assist me with an ongoing project or conduct a project of their own (individually or in a research group).

Student roles typically include:

• Literature review
• Forming a research question
• Research design
• Data collection
• Data analysis
• Interpreting results
• Presentation or written report of results

Requirements:

I prefer to work with students who have taken a class with me and received an A or B. Students should have an interest in research, be motivated and responsible. Students must be willing to attend research meetings and be available for data collection.

Willing to work with:

• Undergraduate students who are receiving credit
• Undergraduate students who are volunteering
• Graduate students who are volunteering

Kim Weikel - FSC 125   x1482

Topics, projects: 

• Goal Setting  investigation of ways to set goals in order to increase chances of goal attainment
• Therapy Effectiveness  investigation of factors influencing therapy effectiveness
• Narcissism  investigation of the consequences of narcissistic personality and factors influencing the development of narcissism

Students roles: 

Requirements: 

Willing to work with: 

• Undergraduate students who are receiving credit
• Undergraduates and graduate students who are volunteering