Psychology

Psychology student named Athlete of the Week

Shir Levy, freshman forward on the WSU women’s basketball team, might not pop off the stat sheet, but her defensive presence has kept her in the starting lineup and earned her “Athlete of the Week” from the Daily Evergreen. Levy’s international experience, along with her freshman standing, makes her a very intriguing piece for the […]

Students analyze data, volunteer to aid homeless

Eyes were opened and hearts touched as students in a WSU Tri‑Cities psychology statistics course recently worked with homeless people at Tri‑City Union Gospel Mission. Each semester, Janet Peters, clinical assistant professor of psychology, has her students work with a local service-based organization to provide a real-world experience and “a practical look into how they […]

Faculty receive Office of Research Awards

The WSU Office of Research presented awards to three faculty in the College of Arts and Sciences for their outstanding achievements in research as part of opening ceremonies for WSU Research Week. Read more about Kim Christen (English), Tammy Barry (psychology), and Peter Reilly (chemistry) >>

McNair scholar bridges cultures in life, research

It’s fall 2014. New freshman Lysandra Perez, the first in her family to attend college, sits on the bed in her Streit-Perham Hall dorm room. The emotional farewells are done, and her parents are driving back home to the small town of Moxee, near Yakima. Her roommates won’t be arriving for another few days. She […]

Crimson Spirit Award: Sheryl DeShields

Sheryl DeShields, secretary senior in the Department of Psychology, received the September 2018 Crimson Spirit Award. DeShields’ colleagues honored her for her noteworthy extra efforts and commitment to the unit. One nominator described her as “the heart and soul of our talented and close-knit department.” Another noted she is “outstanding in every way. I have […]

Psychology professor named Group Psychologist of the Year

David Marcus, professor and chair of the Department of Psychology, was named Group Psychologist of the Year by the American Psychological Association’s (APA) Society of Group Psychology and Group Psychotherapy (Division 49). The award recognizes Marcus’s fundamental contributions to the understanding of how people behave within the groups to which they belong and how they are […]

What’s at the core of a dark personality?

Dark personality traits such as narcissism, Machiavellianism, and psychopathy are socially aversive personality styles that are often confused because of their similarities. Using a quantitative technique called network analysis, WSU psychologists David Marcus and Jonathan Preszler, along with their colleague Virgil Zeigler-Hill at Oakland University, are investigating the behaviors that make up the common core of dark personality traits.

Researchers see gene influencing performance of sleep-deprived people

Washington State University researchers have discovered a genetic variation that predicts how well people perform certain mental tasks when they are sleep deprived. Their research shows that individuals with a particular variation of the DRD2 gene are resilient to the effects of sleep deprivation when completing tasks that require cognitive flexibility, the ability to make […]

Affordable Learning Grants save WSU students thousands

Washington State University faculty members are passing on more than $250,000 in savings to WSU students this fall, using funds from five Affordable Learning Grants and another funded through Academic Outreach and Innovation to develop open-source classroom materials, or OERs. The University funded the grants over the summer, and the faculty members worked to develop […]

Online psychology degree ranks among nation’s best

WSU recently was recognized for excellence in psychology education among colleges and universities nationwide. Affordable Colleges Online (ACO) ranked WSU’s online degree program in psychology among the 12 “Best Online Psychology Degrees for 2016.” Only one other Pac-12 school made the list of 50 top programs among the thousands of colleges offering online psychology degrees. […]