Welcome to the Social Psychology Program at Miami University. Our program is comprised of several faculty who teach a variety of undergraduate courses as well as supervise the training of our graduate students in our Social Psychology doctoral program. Above is our Fall 2009 group photo, taken inside our new Psychology Building, which features outstanding research space and teaching facilities. You can view photos from previous years too (2006, 2007, and 2008).

Throughout the year, we have many events, including weekly SPRIG (social psychology research interest group) brownbags, visiting speakers in our department's colloquium series, and numerous conferences that feature strong social psychology components.

Kurt Hugenberg received The Sage Young Scholar Award at the February 2009 meeting of the Society for Personality and Social Psychology in Tampa, FL. The Young Scholar Award recognizes outstanding researchers in personality and social psychology. Each year, five awards are presented to young scholars (who are 3-7 years into their first academic appointment) for excellence in research. The award is based upon the demonstration of exceptional individual achievements in social and/or personality psychology, involving innovation and creativity in the conduct of impactful research. Congrats Kurt!

Also, we're excited about the considerable degree of grant support that our social faculty receive from the National Science Foundation. Most recently, Amanda Diekman was awarded a $338,510 grant to study "The missing piece of the STEM puzzle: The role of communion in women's STEM career decisions." This project, funded through 2011, examines how women's communal, other-oriented goals influence their decisions to enter or leave science and technology careers. Even talented women may select out of STEM careers if they perceive these careers as incompatible with highly-valued communal goals. In a series of studies, she and her students will investigate how an individual's communal goals intersect with beliefs about careers, as well as career-related experience, to predict STEM-related activities.

In addition to this most-recent grant award, several other faculty members in the social area have active NSF support for their research activities:
Susanne Abele and Gary Stasser supporting their on-going research on tacit coordination.
Kurt Hugenberg supporting his continuing work examining cross-race facial identification.
Heather Claypool supporting her program of research on how the experience of familiarity affects judgments and feelings.

Our graduate students are also frequently recognized for their outstanding work. For example, Christina Brown and Don Sacco were both co-recipients of the Capretta Scholarship, recognizing them as the Outstanding Graduate Students of the Year in the department. Don Sacco was also recognized as the Psi Chi Graduate Student of the Year, and Michael Bernstein and Steve Young received Marjorie Post Farrington Scholarships.

If you are considering applying to our doctoral program, you can learn more about our program and its faculty's research interests by reading their homepages and by e-mailing them. Also, you are encouraged to contact our graduate students for their perspectives on our program. If you want to learn more about social psychology in general (e.g., other social programs and other social psychologists from around the world, teaching resources on the web), visit the Social Psychology Network.

Finally, we would like to extend a big welcome to our new graduate students who will be joining us in the 2009-2010 academic year: Pirita See, Tonya Shoda, Mia Steinberg, and Amanda Trask. Welcome to Miami University!