Congratulations to Suyi Leong, winner of the 2024 McClintock Award, which recognizes annually the social psychology graduate student who exemplifies the qualities cherished in Chuck McClintock, who was the first social psychologist on the UCSB faculty. Those qualities are:
   (1) scholarship -- excellent scholarship and a solid research record
   (2) education -- a commitment to education and contributing to the educational function of the program
   (3) service -- a genuine concern for others and generous contribution to the functioning of the social psychology program (including being there to help someone on the fringe or who needed a little extra help/attention)

Pictured below is Suyi, along with Professor Nancy Collins, who presented the award at the 2024 Mini-Con.

Congratulations Suyi!

David Sherman delivered a Keynote Address on "Self-Affirmation and Educational Interventions: Theory, Outcomes, Process, and Questions” on 18 April 2024 at Humboldt University in Berlin. The talk was part of the two-day workshop, sponsored by the Society for the Psychological Study of Social Issues (SPSSI) and the Berlin Institute for Integration and Migration Research. The conference was organized by Dr. Müller, and titled "Promoting positive social outcomes in diverse contexts: The potential of social psychological approaches and interventions.” Below is David pictured outside Humboldt University and giving his talk, along with the rest of the conference participants.

David Sherman presented a talk, “The Fierce Urgency of Now”: Intergroup Conflict and the Social Psychology  of Climate Change Policy” at Leuphana University Lüneburg, Germany. David presented to an audience of students and professors at the Institute for Sustainability Psychology on 16 April 2024. The talk occurred in a remarkable lecture hall, The Central Building.

https://news.ucsb.edu/in-focus/russell-sage-foundation-taps-ucsb-social-scientists-fellowships

https://psych.ucsb.edu/news-events/news/2024/david-sherman-named-2024-2025-russell-sage-foundation-visiting-scholar

David Sherman and Connor Gibbs organize Veteran Transitions Research Lab Summit.

PhD candidate Connor Gibbs presented his research on military veterans' transition to civilian employment at the European Association of Social Psychology (EASP) general meeting in Krakow, Poland.

Connor Gibbs publishes his first first author journal article in Social and Personality Psychology Compass titled "Who needs control? A cultural perspective on the process of compensatory control".   

https://doi.org/10.1111/spc3.12722

Suyi Leong published her first first author journal article in PLOS One title "Individual costs and community benefits: Collectivism and individuals’ compliance with public health interventions". 

https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0275388

Congratulations to Priscilla Diaz-Gonzalez who has accepted a job offer as a research coordinator at Dr. Stephanie Fryberg’s lab, the Culture Collaboratory, at the University of Michigan! She will be graduating in Spring 2022 and starting her position in Summer. She has been working in the lab with PhD student Suyi Leong. Congratulations, Priscilla, we are so proud of you, and we look forward to the great things you will do in the future!

David Sherman and Connor Gibbs attend inaugural meeting of Veteran Transitions Research Initiative (VTRI) at Duke University.

VTRI Website: https://sites.fuqua.duke.edu/vtri/

Dr. David Sherman, Lauren's advisor, notes the following about her time here at UCSB:

Congratulations to Lauren Ortosky who successfully defended her dissertation, “The Psychological Impact of Normalizing Nationalism in a Transnational World.” Lauren’s dissertation tackled the question of how people’s evaluations of transnational problems such as climate change are impacted by both their own levels of nationalism as well as the situation where they see that nationalism is becoming more normalized. Her findings that higher levels of nationalism are associated with increased derogation of issues that require international cooperation raise important questions for science and society. Throughout her time at UCSB, where she was supported by a National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship, Lauren has been committed to understanding and aiding people in important life  transitions. In her research, she examined this with military veterans and their transition to the workforce and STEM PhD students and their transition from graduate school to industry and the professorate. This commitment also emerges in her extensive mentoring work, for which Lauren received the Fiona & Michael Goodchild Graduate Mentoring Award in 2020. Not only a dedicated mentor to the undergraduate research assistants she supervises, Lauren fostered mentoring opportunities for others by co-creating the program, Access Grads. This program, which was the recipient of a major CARES Act Grant in 2021 connects psychology undergraduates interested in graduate school with graduate student mentors, and aims to increase access to research careers for students from diverse backgrounds. I have no doubt that the passion and energy that Lauren brought to social issues and mentoring throughout her time at UCSB will carry forth in her professional endeavors. With a sincere “Woo-hoo,” and warmest wishes for fulfillment and joy in all the trails that she will traverse, I congratulate Dr. Lauren Ortosky on earning her doctoral degree.

Congratulations, Dr. Ortosky!

Congratulations to Michelle Handy on completing the PhD program.

Dr. David Sherman, Michelle's advisor, notes the following about her time here at UCSB:
 

Conference on Climate Change Solutions to be organized by David Sherman, Leaf Van Boven and Sarah Anderson.

A forthcoming special issue of the Journal of Social Issues has been published online: Self-affirmation Theory in Educational Contexts: Exploring whether, when, why and how self-affirmation interventions are effective at reducing educational inequalities. The special issue was co-edited by Prof. Peter Harris (Sussex), Prof Matthew Easterbrook, and Professor David Sherman. The special issue was created after a meeting sponsored by the European Association of Social Psychology and the Society for the Psychological Study of Social Issues. The meeting, held at University of Sussex, UK in June 2019 entitled, “Self-affirmation in Education: Why, when, and how are self-affirmation interventions effective at reducing educational inequalities?” formed the basis for this special issue. The introductory article can be read here:

Easterbrook, M. J., Harris, P. R., & Sherman, D. K. (2021). Self-affirmation theory in educational contexts. Journal of Social Issues. doi.org/10.1111/josi.12459

Congratulations to social psychology graduate student Connor Gibbs, who is the recipient of a National Science Foundation's (NSF) Graduate Research Fellowship. Connor is one of 2,074 award winners in 2021, who received a three-year fellowship to pursue his research. Connor, who earned his B.A. with Honors in Psychology at Westmont College, is a second year PhD student in the social psychology area, working with advisor David Sherman. He describes his research interests: “My research broadly addresses how we respond to various forms of threat and interventions to mitigate the negative effects of those threats. The program of research I will be developing as part of my NSF work includes investigating methods to improve military veterans' transitions to civilian life and employment.”

APS’s Charles Blue interviews David Sherman and Steven Shepherd about their recently published paper, “The Challenges of Military Veterans in Their Transition to the Workplace: A Call for Integrating Basic and Applied Psychological Science." 

Click here to listen to the interview.

We are thrilled to congratulate our lab member Lauren Ortosky on the Fiona and Michael Goodchild Graduate Mentoring Award, ​honoring graduate students who have distinguished themselves in the area of undergraduate research supervision. 

Professor David Sherman launches interview series about Health Psychology and COVID-19.

Psychological Science’s Contribution to a Sustainable Future: 

Eom, Papadakis, Sherman, & Kim (2019) paper featured in Teaching Current Directions in Psychological Science

Congratulations to Emily La, a junior Psychological & Brain Sciences and Environmental Studies double major, who was chosen as the second-place winner of the Library Award for Undergraduate Research in the Social Sciences category. She will receive a $500 award for her paper: "Understanding Psychological Buffers to Health Adversities Within Sustainable Communities.” Emily is a research assistant in the Sherman Lab working with Professor David Sherman and PhD student Michelle Shteyn on sustainability.

Does Awareness Of Environmental Problems Guarantee Environmental Actions? Maybe More For Those Privileged

Lauren Ortosky was accepted to a competitive program based at the IDC Herzliya outside of Tel Aviv, Israel for an intensive two-week study of negotiation and conflict resolution. The institute is led every year by Columbia Business School Professor Adam Galinsky and NYU Social Psychology Professor Yaacov Trope. While in Israel, Lauren held multiple in depth meetings on potential research collaborations with Professor Eran Halperin of IDC. After giving her final presentation at the institute, she spent about 10 days traveling solo through small towns in the Galilee, Jerusalem, and hiking the deserts in the south of the country. It was a tremendously enriching experience academically, culturally, politically, and socially!

Social Psychology doctoral students Kimin Eom and Phillip Ehret were both awarded the 2018 Charles McClintock Award. The McClintock Award is given to a senior graduate student for excellence in scholarship, education, and service.

Congratulations to social psychology graduate student Lauren Ortosky, who is the recipient of a National Science Foundation's (NSF) Graduate Research Fellowship. Lauren is one of 2000 award winners in 2018, who received a three-year fellowship to pursue her research.

For his excellence in and contributions to undergraduate research supervision and for encouraging others to become involved in these research efforts. 

Provides funding for continued graduate research at UCSB. 

The Graduate Student Poster Awards recognize graduate poster presentations characterized by excellence in research, clarity in presentation, and personal knowledge in a discussion with the judges at the annual convention.