Doctor of Philosophy (Ph.D.)

Social Psychology
Ohio State University
2005

Master of Arts (M.A.)

Psychology
Ohio State University
2001

Bachelor of Arts (B.A.)

Psychology
Grinnell College
1997

Undergraduate Courses

Social Psychology

Research Design and Analysis

Strategies for Human-Centered AI

Graduate Courses

General Research Methods

Intergroup Dynamics and Race Relations

Group Dynamics

Basic and Contemporary Issues in Attitudes and Persuasion

Attitudes and Social Cognition

Howard Statistics and Evaluation Institute 2012-2024 (Co-PI)

Each summer, ETS funded statistics and reasearch methods workshops for 70 graduate students from across Howard's schools.  Total students: 910, Total funding: $850,000.

Racial Identity Development as a Self-Regulatory Process 2007-2009 (PI)

NSF Funded Research Grant, $190,000.

Strategies for Human-Centered AI (PSYC 039) New Course

Proposed new psychology course, which is also a part of the Fundamentals of AI Certificate.  

Social and Individual Religious Orientations Exist within Both Intrinsic and Extrinsic Religiosity

Social and Individual Religious Orientations Exist within Both Intrinsic and Extrinsic Religiosity

This research presents the development of a measure of religiosity that includes social intrinsic religiosity as distinct from extrinsic religiosity and from the typical conceptualization of intrinsic religiosity as an individual orientation.

Stereotype validation

Stereotype validation: The effects of activating negative stereotypes after intellectual performance

With regard to intellectual performance, a large body of research has shown that stigmatized group members may perform more poorly when negative, self-relevant stereotypes become activated prior to a task. However, no research to date has identified the potential ramifications of stereotype activation that happens after—rather than before—a person has finished performing. Six studies examined how postperformance stereotype salience may increase the certainty individuals have in evaluations of their own performance. In the current research, the accessibility of gender or racial stereotypes was manipulated after participants completed either a difficult math test (Studies 1–5) or a test of child-care knowledge (Study 6).

Face recognition in the presence of angry expressions

Face recognition in the presence of angry expressions: A target-race effect rather than a cross-race effect

Reported here are two studies, using first White and then Black participants, that used a novel stimulus set that avoided earlier confounds. Participants studied and later attempted to recognize White and Black faces, varying in their emotional expression (angry versus neutral) both at encoding and testing. Both experiments showed a pro-ingroup CRE. However, contrary to prior research, both participant races had relatively more difficulty recognizing angry Black faces, such that when the faces were angry, the pro-ingroup CRE was strengthened for White participants and weakened for Black participants. We discuss theoretical explanations for these results which substantially qualify past conclusions about the role of facial emotions in cross-race facial recognition.

Order of actions mitigates hypocrisy judgments for ingroup more than outgroup members

Order of actions mitigates hypocrisy judgments for ingroup more than outgroup members

Compared to the conventional order of hypocritical actions—saying one thing and then doing another—merely reversing the order of these actions can mitigate whether an individual is judged to be a hypocrite (Barden, Rucker, & Petty, 2005). The present research examines how factors extraneous to a target’s own actions—specifically, group membership—influence hypocrisy judgments. Three experiments provided consistent evidence that reversing the order of statement and behavior mitigated hypocrisy judgments to a greater extent when observers judged ingroup targets compared to outgroup targets. This pattern was observed across two distinct groups (i.e., gender and political party). In addition, mediational evidence suggested that the greater mitigation for ingroup targets stemmed from the observer’s greater tendency to make attributions that ingroup targets had genuinely changed for the better.

Elaboration and Attitude Strength: The New Meta-cognitive Perspective

Elaboration and Attitude Strength: The New Meta-cognitive Perspective

This article provides a new look at this relationship. After reviewing support for the notion that structural processes (i.e., knowledge acquisition, structural consistency, and attitude accessibility) drive the effect of elaboration on attitude strength, we examine recent work investigating the role of meta-cognitive factors in this domain. Based on recent evidence, we propose that the effect of elaboration on attitude strength depends largely on people's perceptions of their own elaboration and their beliefs that more elaboration produces better judgments that can be held with greater certainty.