2008 SPSP Diversity Fund Award Recipients

A total of 67 graduate students applied for a Diversity Fund Graduate Travel Award to attend the 2008 SPSP conference. Of these applicants, 29 received an award of $500 for conference-related expenses, and a complimentary copy of "The Compleat Academic: A Career Guide," courtesy of the Diversity Fund and the American Psychological Association. This page contains a profile of each award winner.

2008 Diversity Fund Award Recipients

Omoniyi Adekanmbi was born and raised in southern Maryland. She received her B.S. in Psychology from Lafayette College in Pennsylvania. Omoniyi is currently a fourth year Social Psychology Ph.D. student at Tufts University. Under the guidance of Dr. Keith Maddox and Dr. Sam Sommers, Omoniyi examines differential perceptions of discrimination attributions and the role of Black female stereotypes on race differences in fat stigmatization. She is currently researching the influence of modern prejudice on differential social costs for discrimination attributions. After obtaining her Ph.D., Omoniyi plans to become involved in applied research and public policy, focusing on issues related to racial and ethnic minorities, gender, and sexuality.

Thomas Allen was born and raised in Bakersfield, CA. He received his B.A. in psychology from California State University, Bakersfield and is a second year Ph.D student at the University of California, Davis under the supervision of Dr. Jeff Sherman. His research interests fall into three primary areas: the self-regulation of automatic responses, the effects of stereotypes on perception and memory, and how self-evaluation motives influence the expression of prejudice. He is currently investigating how contextual cues facilitate the regulation of implicit bias. Under the guidance of Dr. Greg Herek, he is also studying the mediators underlying the relationship between intergroup contact and prejudice. After receiving his Ph.D, Thomas plans to teach and conduct research at a major research university.

Susan A. Andrzejewski was born and raised in Buffalo, New York. She received her B.S. in psychology from Bethany College and is a Ph.D. student in her fourth year at Northeastern University. Her current research program focuses on how people communicate with each other nonverbally and the amount of skill one has at decoding other's nonverbal communication, as well as different correlates of interpersonal sensitivity. Current research projects she is working on with advisor Judith Hall look at the relation between prejudice and interpersonal sensitivity; how one's emotional state may affect ability to decode nonverbal cues in another individual; and meta-analyses on interpersonal sensitivity and nonverbal displays of prejudice. Upon completion of her dissertation, Susan intends to pursue a career in academia to further her research and teaching interests in nonverbal communication and prejudice.

Brian Armenta, a native of Southern California, received his B.A. from California State Polytechnic University, Pomona and his M.A. from the University of Nebraska-Lincoln (UNL). He will receive his Ph.D. in social psychology from UNL in 2008. His research focuses on two sets of questions. First, what individual and situational factors lead European Americans to perceive ethnic minorities as threatening and what factors mediate the relationship between these perceptions of threat and prejudice towards ethnic minorities? Second, how should scholars conceptualize ethnic identity and how does ethnic identity interact with individual and contextual factors to influence the psychological well-being and social behavior of ethnic minorities? Upon completing his graduate studies, Brian plans to pursue a career in academia.

Jillian Banfield was born and raised in Halifax, Nova Scotia. She obtained her B.A. in Psychology from the University of Waterloo in 2006. Jillian is now a second-year PhD student at the University of Waterloo, where she studies a variety of justice issues. In collaboration with Mike Ross, Jillian is investigating how disadvantaged groups can obtain help from majority groups, with a focus on the plight of Aboriginal Canadians. In collaboration with Aaron Kay, Jillian also studies how the system justification motive leads people to endorse the powerful in society. In another line of research, Jillian and her collaborators study when the system justification motive causes people to reject redress for historical injustices. Finally, Jillian is also interested in understanding the factors that promote prosocial behaviour, especially in the realm of the environment. Upon completion of her doctorate, Jillian intends to pursue a career at a research-oriented university.

Jamil Palacios Bhanji was born and raised in a mixed Mexican-American and Indian- American family in northern Virginia. He received his B.S. in Symbolic Systems from Stanford University and is a third year student at the University of California at Davis. He is a trainee in the Bay Area Affective Science Predoctoral Training Consortium and is interested in influences of emotion on decision making and self regulation. Jamil is currently conducting research with Jennifer Beer using social psychology, behavioral economic, and neuroscience research methods at the University of Texas at Austin. He studies how higher order goals influence simple preference-based decisions, and how systems that invoke and maintain higher order goals may interact with affective processes to result in a choice. Jamil plans to pursue a future career in academia and promote psychological science to a diverse audience.

Courtney Bonam must love her hometown Ann Arbor, MI. She lived there until she received her B.A. in Psychology from the University of Michigan in 2004. Bonam is currently, however, enjoying much warmer weather in her fourth year of working toward a Ph.D. in Social Psychology at Stanford University. With her advisor Dr. Jennifer Eberhardt, Bonam studies the causal role racial bias plays in the unequal distribution of environmental pollution. Her dissertation title is Polluting Black Space: Physical Locations as Targets of Environmental Racism. Bonam's other research interests include 1) the way in which White Americans experience their own racial identities and how that experience impacts their interracial interactions, and 2) the experience of being multiracial in the U.S. Bonam will pursue an academic career at a research-oriented university upon completing her degree.

Kerra Bui received her B.A. from UCLA and subsequently taught English in Japan. Her enthusiasm for travelling abroad and exploring research questions led her to Viet Nam, where she conducted a field study as a Fulbright Fellow and volunteered with the international nongovernmental organization CARE. As a second year graduate student at Yale University and an NSF Graduate Research Fellow, Kerra is examining immigrant ethnic identity and political behavior with Dr. Valerie Purdie-Vaughns (Interpersonal Relations and Diversity Lab), conducting field experiments with Dr. Don Green (Yale Institute for Social and Policy Studies), and exploring effects of psychological distance and culture on consumer preferences with Dr. Ravi Dhar (Yale School of Management). Kerra pursues cultural and political psychology in the hope that someday her research might inform public policy.

Matthew Paolucci Callahan was born in Salem, Massachusetts. He received a Bachelor of Fine Arts in Musical Theater from the Boston Conservatory of Music in 1992. His interests shifted to Psychology and he subsequently obtained a Bachelor of Science in Psychology from Salem State College in 1999. Matthew is currently a Ph.D. student in Social Psychology at the Pennsylvania State University. With his mentor, Dr. Theresa Vescio, Matthew conducts research on sexual prejudice and sexism. Central to this investigation is a focus on the felt experience of prejudice toward gay men and lesbian women. Matthew's dissertation research examines how masculinity, when measured or manipulated increases moral emotions (such as disgust and anger) toward gay men. After finishing his dissertation, Matthew plans to continue conducting research on sexual prejudice at a research-oriented institution.

Melody Manchi Chao was born in Macau. She received her B.A. from the University of California, Berkeley and is a Ph.D. student at the University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign. Her current program of research focuses on how lay beliefs about social groups influence individuals' self and identity processes in a diverse society, and how various socio-cultural factors shape and reinforce individuals' beliefs and perceptions towards different racial groups. Specifically, with her advisor Ying-yi Hong, Melody has examined the social and psychological implications of endorsing essentialist beliefs about race among ethnic majority and minority group members. In addition, Melody works with Chi-yue Chiu to examine how the mass media might shape individuals' intergroup perceptions. Upon completion of her graduate studies, Melody would like to pursue a career in academia to continue her research work, and to train and mentor students, who have the interest and potential, to become future researchers.

John Christensen is a fourth-year doctoral student in Social Psychology at the University of Southern California where he also received a BA and MA in Psychology. He currently holds a fellowship from the American Psychological Association Minority Fellowship Program. Broadly, his primary academic interests focus on the processes that underlie the impact of emotion on decision-making in risky social situations. Additionally, he is interested in how technology (e.g., artificially intelligent virtual agents, interactive gaming) might influence these processes. Under the direction of Lynn Miller and Stephen Read, he is currently assessing an interactive video, HIV- prevention intervention designed for MSM. The intervention takes a SOLVE (Socially Optimized Learning in Virtual Environments) approach to risk-reduction, addressing conscious and deliberative cognitions and behaviors, while also training more automatic, affect-based decision-making (i.e., anticipatory affective cues). Other interests include personality in intelligent virtual agents, possible selves, and health communication within ethnic and sexual minority populations.

Mesmin Destin was born in New York City to Haitian American heritage and raised in Omaha, Nebraska. In 2005, he earned a B.A. with honors from Northwestern University, in Chicago, Illinois, specializing in Psychology and Sociology. Under the funding of a National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship, Mesmin is currently a third year Ph.D. student in Social Psychology at the University of Michigan. Working primarily with Daphna Oyserman and James Jackson, his research investigates a) the ways in which the perception of societal obstacles influences self-regulation and b) the complex implications of social class for racial minorities. Mesmin plans to pursue an academic career, continuing to develop research that experimentally addresses how interactions between factors at the structural/environmental and personal level shape people's choices and lives.

Kristin Dukes was born and raised in Greenville, Texas. She graduated with a B.A. in Psychology from Rice University in 2005 and received a M.S. in Psychology from Tufts University in 2007. Kristin is a third-year student pursuing a Ph.D. in Social Psychology at Tufts University. Working with her primary advisor, Dr. Keith Maddox, her current work explores Afrocentric bias and the role of peripheral category cues as moderators of Afrocentric bias. Additionally, Kristin is working on research exploring possible socioeconomic status differences in obesity stigma, the comparison of self-report and media representations of Black women, and stigmatized individuals' reactions to chronic prejudice and discrimination. Upon completion of her doctorate, Kristin plans to pursue an academic career at a research-oriented university.

Dina Eliezer grew up in Maryland. She received her BA in psychology from the University of Virginia in 2006. Dina is now a second year PhD student at the University of California, Santa Barbara and a recipient of the Jacob K. Javits Fellowship. With her advisor, Dr. Brenda Major, Dina researches individuals' psychological and physiological responses to racial and gender discrimination. She is currently working on projects to explore the process of confronting discrimination and the role of in-group identification and social support in shaping responses to discrimination. In addition, she is investigating discrepancies between implicit and explicit attitudes about the in-group. After completing her PhD, Dina hopes to continue her research on the experience of stigmatized individuals and to teach and mentor graduate and undergraduate students.

Kathleen Fortune was raised in Winnipeg, Manitoba and received her B.A. and M.A. from the University of Manitoba. A recipient of a Canada Graduate Scholarship from the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council, Kathleen is currently a second year Ph.D. student under the supervision of Dr. Michael Inzlicht. Kathleen is currently working on two lines of research. The first explores the unique experiences of individuals with concealable stigmas, such as those who identify as gay, lesbian, or bisexual. Kathleen is interested in how concealing one's sexual orientation can lead to intrusive thoughts and quantifiable cognitive, emotional, and health consequences. Kathleen's second line of research focuses on the long-lasting negative impact of growing up in a low socioeconomic status household on judgment and decision making. After obtaining her Ph.D., Kathleen plans to conduct research, teach, and mentor undergraduate and graduate students at a major research university.

Julie Hall was born in Lynchburg, Virginia and received her B.A. in Psychology with highest honors from the University of Virginia. An NSF Graduate Research Fellowship recipient, Julie is currently a doctoral student at the University of Michigan working with Phoebe Ellsworth, Rich Gonzalez, Stephanie Preston, Oliver Schultheiss, and Stephan Taylor. Julie's research combines theories from personality and social psychology with methods from cognitive neuroscience to better understand the psychological and neural processes involved in emotion, cognition, and motivation. Her current research focuses on affective influences on cognition and decision making in healthy and depressed populations. In addition, Julie is conducting several fMRI studies to investigate the neural bases of empathy, implicit motivational and affective processes, and investment and shopping decisions. After completing her Ph.D., Julie aspires to obtain a faculty position at a research university and to serve as a mentor for women and other underrepresented groups in neuroscience.

Suman ("Sue") Lam was born and raised in California. She received BAs in Psychology and History from the University of California, Los Angeles in 2005. Working with Dr. Sally Dickerson, Sue is currently a second year Ph.D. student at the University of California, Irvine. Broadly speaking, she is interested in applying social psychological theories of culture, emotion, and emotion regulation to a stress physiology context. Currently, Sue is pursuing three inter- related lines of research, which examine individual differences in stress reactivity. The first focuses on cultural differences in emotion during stressful situations. Her second line of research centers upon emotion regulatory styles (e.g., suppression and reappraisal) and physiological reactivity to acute stressors in the laboratory. Sue's last area of research seeks to understand the relationship between implicit measures of emotion and physiological reactivity to challenging tasks. Upon completing her Ph.D., Sue plans on pursuing a career as a research professor.

Jolie Martin is originally from Minneapolis, and completed her B.A. at Northwestern University in 2001 (with four majors in Computing & Information Systems, Integrated Science, International Studies, and Mathematics). After traveling for a year, she returned to graduate school and received her M.B.A. from Harvard Business School. Jolie is currently a fourth-year Ph.D. candidate in Information, Technology & Management, which is a joint program between Harvard Business School and Computer Science department. Her research employs a variety of experimental and computational methods to explore online consumer decision making, and specifically the way that individuals integrate abundant or conflicting information in their use of online ratings and recommendations. In addition to working toward the completion of her dissertation, Jolie serves as a Resident Tutor to undergraduates at Dunster House and teaches several Economics courses. She hopes that her community involvement will help to inform her academic research and vice versa.

Kenneth Matos was born in Brooklyn, New York. He obtained a B.A. in Psychology from Amherst College in 1998 and a Masters in Industrial and Labor Relations from Cornell University in 2003. Kenneth is currently a 4th year Ph.D. student in Industrial/ Organizational Psychology at The George Washington University in Washington, D.C. With the advice of his advisor Lynn Offermann, Kenneth's dissertation research addresses the recent increase in Spanish-speaking workers in the U.S. and whether the reactions of employees to working in multi-lingual worksites vary depending on their preferred language and how common that preference is in their worksite. After finishing his dissertation, Kenneth plans to pursue a career focused on bridging the divide between academic research and industry practice.

Matthew Maxwell-Smith was born and raised in Toronto, Ontario. He received his B.A. in psychology from the University of Waterloo in 2002, worked in the private sector for a few years, then returned to school and completed his M.Sc. in Social Psychology from the University of Western Ontario in 2006. In his first year as a Ph.D. student in social psychology at Western, Matthew works with his supervisor, Dr. Victoria Esses, on a number of different lines of research. One is focused on investigating the effects of social competition on people's tendency to activate and apply ethnic stereotypes and prejudice. Another examines individual differences in the extent to which people are committed to their beliefs, and the implications this commitment has for their attitudes and behaviour. Matthew's career goal is to obtain an academic position at a research-oriented university to teach, and conduct research in social psychology.

David Myles was born in Chicago, IL and was raised in both Chicago and Atlanta. He earned a B.S. from Morehouse College. As a second year social psychology graduate student at Yale (and a sixth-year MD/PhD student), David works primarily with Valerie Purdie-Vaughns. His major research interests revolve around analyzing the factors and constraints influencing the perception of choice among adolescents. A second major theme is to understand how such perceptions influence psychological and physiological outcomes. Upon earning the MD and PhD degrees and completing residency training, David plans to affiliate with an academic research institution as a physician-scientist.

Robert Outten was born and raised in Toronto, Ontario. He received his B.A. in Psychology and History from York University in 2005. Currently, he is a second-year graduate student in Social Psychology at Simon Fraser University working with Dr. Michael Schmitt. His research has included studying coping processes in response to perceptions of devaluation among members of disadvantaged groups and exploring the relationship between collective identity content and perceptions of discrimination. These interests have been investigated using a Social Identity Theory framework. Currently he is studying the ability of group identification to foster coping appraisals which in turn predict psychological well-being among members of disadvantaged ethnic groups. Another line of research examines how collective representations of multiple interrelated social identities can change when confronted with realistic threatening future social identities. After obtaining his Ph.D. he would like to pursue a career as an educator and researcher at a major research-oriented university.

Destiny Peery hails from Minneapolis, MN, where she also obtained her B.A. in psychology from the University of Minnesota in 2005. Destiny is currently a second-year social psychology graduate student at Northwestern University and is enrolled in the joint-degree Ph.D/JD program there. She is currently pursing research in two major areas 1) perception, categorization, and stereotyping of racially ambiguous faces (i.e., multiracial faces) with her advisor Dr. Galen Bodenhausen and 2) the effects of varied racial/ethnic representativeness on jury functioning and outcomes with her advisor Dr. Shari Diamond. After finishing her Ph.D/JD, Destiny plans to pursue a career in academia at a research-oriented institution that will allow her to continue to pursue her interdisciplinary research interests, as well as teach courses in the field of social psychology.

Nick Rule investigates questions related to how we perceive people and form impressions about them. He is particularly interested in the accuracy of these perceptions and impressions. Currently, his work is organized around two primary themes: The first examines how our perceptions and judgments of others relate to those targets' actual behaviors. For instance, in one study (Rule & Ambady, in press; Psychological Science, 19, 109-111), he found that participants' naive judgments of personality traits of Fortune 500 CEOs correlated with the amount of profit those CEOs' companies made (see his poster; session E (#146) from 8-9:30am on Saturday, February 9th). The second research theme examines perceptions and cognitions relating to perceptually ambiguous groups (e.g., male sexual orientation). In some of this work he has shown that individuals can accurately judge male sexual orientation from static photos of the face when exposure is limited to just 50 milliseconds (Rule & Ambady, in press; Journal of Experimental Social Psychology). He has also found that these perceptions of sexual orientation occur incidentally (i.e., without external motivation) and affect individuals' memory for the faces with a bias toward the ingroup (Rule, Ambady, Adams, & Macrae, 2007; Psychonomic Bulletin & Review, 14, 687-692).

Phia Salter, a "military brat", was mostly raised in Goldsboro, North Carolina. She received her B.S. in Psychology from Davidson College in 2005, and is currently a third- year graduate student in the Social Psychology program at the University of Kansas. Her primary research interests include investigating collective memory and identity from a sociocultural perspective. In collaboration with her advisor, Glenn Adams, she is investigating cultural constructions of the historical past (e.g., 'Black History Month' displays) and, in turn, their influence on identity and motivation. Related, her work also explores racial group differences in perceptions of racism from a sociocultural perspective, as well. Upon completion of her Ph.D., Phia plans to seek a career in academia, where she hopes to encourage students from diverse communities to pursue research and/or careers in social psychology.

Ahmet Uysal was born in Bursa, Turkey. After receiving his B.Sc. in mechanical engineering from Middle East Technical University in 2002, he completed his M.S. degree in social psychology at the same university in 2004. Currently he is a second year Ph.D. student in social psychology at University of Houston. He is a member of Interpersonal Relations and Motivation Lab and he is studying self and interpersonal processes under the supervision of Dr. C. Raymond Knee. Specifically, he is interested in ego defensive strategies and behaviors. Currently, he is investigating the role of self- control in self-handicapping. Upon completion of his Ph.D., Ahmet plans to return to Turkey and pursue an academic career.

Nicole Walden grew up in New York's Capital District. She received her B.A. in psychology from Stanford University, where she became a proselyte of social psychology after taking courses such as Zimbardo's "Mind Control" and Bandura's "Human Aggression." After Stanford, Nicole worked in Paris, France for four years as a market researcher and English teacher. This experience solidified her drive to pursue research professorship, and she is currently a 4th year Ph.D. student in social/personality psychology at the University of Albany, State University of New York. With her primary advisor, Ronald Friedman, Nicole investigates the origins of achievement goals and implicit theories, as well as their contribution to the experience of performance situations. Under the guidance of Monica Rodriguez, Nicole also investigates social development factors that relate to achievement in minority and disadvantaged populations. After obtaining her Ph.D., Nicole plans to pursue an academic career at a major research university.

Russ Webster was born in San Dimas, California, and grew up outside of Chicago. In 2003, Russ earned his B.A. in Psychology and French from North Central College in Naperville, Illinois. In 2006, he earned his M.A. in Cognitive and Social Processes from Ball State University in Muncie, Indiana. Russ is currently a doctoral student in Kansas State University's Social/Personality program in Manhattan, Kansas, studying under the mentorship of Donald Saucier. In his primary line of research, Russ investigates how terror management processes (i.e., managing the fear of death) exacerbate prejudice toward minority group members, in particular gay men, lesbians, and Arabs. In secondary lines of research, Russ examines how sociopolitical ideologies (right-wing authoritarianism and social dominance orientation) differentially justify the expression of prejudice, and whether implicitly priming honesty can elicit more truthful responses on self-report measures. After completing his doctorate, Russ plans to apply for a research professorship.

Clara Wilkins grew up in Berkeley, California. She graduated from Stanford University with a B.A. in 2005, where she completed an honors thesis on social class and biracial identity under the mentorship of Dr. Hazel Markus. A Ford Foundation Predoctoral Fellow and a Bank of America Minority Fellow, she is currently a second-year Ph.D. student at the University of Washington where she works with her primary advisor Dr. Cheryl Kaiser. Clara's research interests include social identity, stereotyping, prejudice, and cultural psychology. Clara is pursuing a number of lines of research including examining how social class stereotypes influence racial memory, the relationship between perceptions of racial identity and physical appearance, and minorities' reactions to positive intergroup feedback. Upon completing her graduate studies, Clara plans to pursue a career in academia at a major research university.