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Deconstructing Decision Making
We make decisions all the time and often in uncertain circumstances. Elke Webers research focuses on how we judge those choices, the decisions we end up making, and individual and cultural differences in risk-taking. Specifically, her research examines behavioral models of decision making and how to measure and model risk-taking behavior. Her work has tied together psychology and economics, by examining risky financial decision making. Additionally, she studies environmental decision making, for example, how people respond to climate change and ways in which policymakers can present programs to the public to make them most effective.
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Managing Stress the Healthy Way
Shelley E. Taylors research explores our ability to perceive some stressful situations in ways that have both psychological and biological benefits. Taylors research shows that in some circumstances, we can develop “positive illusions” – such as an illusion of personal control or unrealistic optimism about the future – to handle stressful situations. Taylors tend-and-befriend model illustrates how people, especially women, will come together support one another in stressful situations.
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Understanding the Power of Stereotypes
Throughout his career Claude Steele has been interested in processes of self-evaluation, in particular in how people cope with threatening self-images. This work has led to a general theory of self-affirmation processes. A second interest, growing out of the first, is a theory of how group stereotypes—such as stereotypes about African Americans in academic domains and women in quantitative domains—can influence intellectual performance and academic identities.
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The Creative Workplace
The work day can often be somewhat predictable and routine, but Christina E. Shalley is attempting to enhance the creativity of employees. Shalleys research focuses on how a variety of social and contextual factors affect individuals and teams creativity. Her research combines psychology and management, using a variety of survey and experimental techniques. Specifically, she is investigating how to make jobs and work environments more conducive for creativity. Shalley has also studied group behavior and found that having a lot of personal ties and a diverse social network makes individuals more creative when they are working with others, increasing the teams overall creativity.
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Uncovering the Embodiment of Communication
Gün R. Semin's general research interests center on language, social cognition and communication. He edited the book, Embodied Grounding, focuses on the emerging view that language and other cognitive processes must be understood in terms of the bodily states to which they are bound. This embodiment perspective focuses on the whole being not just one isolated information processing system and brings together research from neuroscience, cognitive science and social psychology.
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Learning and Memory
Henry L. “Roddy” Roediger, III has spent a career studying human learning and memory, particularly processes of memory retrieval. His recent research has focused on the power of retrieval as a mechanism for improving learning and retention and in applying this work to educational settings. His research has demonstrated that students retain more material when they retrieve it via tests than from restudying it, and Roediger and his collaborators are conducting field studies to determine whether their test-enhanced learning intervention is effective under actual classroom conditions. (It is). Roediger is also interested in illusions of memory.
