Psychology Research Facilities and Opportunities

The UW Department of Psychology maintains top-rate research programs for faculty, graduate students, undergraduate students, and K-12 students interested in a variety of topics.  Learn more by perusing this section of our website!

University of Wyoming's Department of Psychology's research labs and opportunities for undergraduate students University of Wyoming Department of Psychology provides science fair opportunities for K-12 students
>> Undergraduate student research opportunities  

 Research Laboratories

 The Department of Psychology maintains active research laboratories, all listed below with more information.

Addictive Behaviors Lab

Principal Investigator: Dr. Alison Looby

  • College student substance use (e.g., prescription stimulants, alcohol, marijuana)
  • Cognitive mechanisms (e.g., expectancies, motives) underlying substance use
  • Prevention and intervention

Anxiety and Trauma Research Group

Principal Investigator: Dr. Joshua Clapp

  • The impact of trauma exposure on emotion regulation and interpersonal functioning
  • Issues related to the conceptualization and assessment of trauma-related psychopathology
  • Lay theories of trauma and its consequences
  • Patterns of response to psychosocial intervention

Attention and Learning Laboratory

Principal Investigator: Dr. Cynthia Hartung

  • Evaluating treatments for ADHD in college students
  • Providing school-based support for secondary student with ADHD
  • Establishing developmentally sensitive criteria for ADHD in emerging adults
  • Understanding bystanders' behaviors in response to bullying

Cognitive Aging & Memory Perceptions Lab

Principal investigator: Dr. Erin Harrington

  • Prospective memory
  • Cognitive aging
  • Predictors of everyday memory & cognition (e.g., age, gender, psychosocial experiences)

Conceptual and Social-Cognitive Development

Principal Investigator: Dr. Karen Bartsch

  • Conceptual development (theory of mind, theory-theory, recognition of learning)
  • Development of social cognition (application to persuasion)
  • Moral development (moral reasoning and environmental issues)

Eating Behaviors Lab

Principal Investigator: Dr. Kyle De Young

  • Eating behaviors, particularly as they are relevant to eating disorders
  • Weight management, and physical activity

ASPIRE Laboratory

Principal Investigator: Dr. Benjamin Wilkowski

  • Goal self-regulation
  • Emotion
  • Personality

Health and Aging Lab

Principal Investigator: Dr. Christine McKibbin

  • Oral health among adults with serious mental illness (SMI)
  • Delivery of mental health services to rural adults with SMI
  • Physical and mental health treatment knowledge and preferences among older adults
  • Knowledge and confidence of Certified Nursing Assistants for the management of behavioral disturbances in nursing home settings

Motivation and Cognition Lab

Principal Investigator: Dr. Sean McCrea

  • Anticipatory thought processes in self-handicapping
  • Constructual level effects on procrastination
  • Effectiveness of planning in the reduction of self-protective behavior
  • The role of expertise in probability judgements
  • Motivational benefits and costs of counterfactual thinking

Legal Decision Making Lab

Principal Investigators: Dr. Narina Nunez

  • Jury decision-making
  • Emotions and decision making
  • Police and judicial legitimacy
  • Social cognitive processes in juror decision making

Legal Judgments Lab

Principal Investigator: Dr. Hannah Phalen

  • Race and Gender in the Legal System
  • Visual Evidence
  • Emotion and Legal Decision-Making

Social Cognition and Law Lab

Principal Investigators: Dr. Kayla Burd

  • Juror perceptions of forensic science evidence
  • The impact of verdict procedures and reasoning on jury decision-making
  • Racial biases in police shooting decisions and investigations
  • Writing interventions aimed at improving shooting decisions and investigations
  • Racial biases in juvenile probation officer decisions

Spatial Cognition Lab

Principal Investigator: Dr. Meredith Minear

  • Spatial Cognition
  • Virtual & Augmented Reality
  • Neural Correlates of Cognition using EEG

Stress and Mood Laboratory

Principal Investigator: Dr. Carolyn Pepper

  • Interpersonal Theory of Suicide
  • Suicide in the Mountain West
  • Functions of non-suicidal Self-injury (NSSI)
  • Perfectionism, rumination and depressed mood

Trauma and Sexual Assault Prevention Laboratory

Principle Investigator: Dr. Matt J. Gray

  • Sexual assault prevention development and evaluation
  • Correlates and consequences of rape myths and rape supportive beliefs
  • Partner violence etiology and intervention
  • Emotional consequences of trauma exposure and perpetration
 
Contact Us

Department of Psychology

1000 E University Ave.

Dept. 3415

Laramie, WY 82071

Phone: 307-766-6303

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