Psychology is the scientific study of behavior, cognition and emotion. The Santa Clara psychology department believesactions, thoughts and feelings are best understood as the result of psychological, neurological, developmental, social and cultural influences. The composition of the faculty reflects this broad approach, with members who specialize in clinical psychology, cognitive psychology, developmental psychology, educational psychology, health psychology, industrial/organizational psychology, learning, neuropsychology, and social psychology.
The psychology department places a strong emphasis on empirical methods of inquiry. All faculty members have active research programs, and we encourage undergraduates to get involved. Each year a large number of our majors present papers at professional conferences, and many students co-author articles in professional journals. Permanent laboratories maintained by the department include a health psychology lab, an animal lab, and a sleep lab.
Submissions from 2021
The integration of Roman Catholic traditions and evidence-based psychological services, Thomas G. Plante
Using the Examen, a Jesuit Prayer, in Spiritually Integrated and Secular Psychotherapy, Thomas G. Plante
I Feel Less Blue When I Read With You: The Effect of Reading Aloud With a Child on Adult Readers’ Affect, Sara Rabinowitz, Christina Pavlov, Brianna Mireku, Katrina Ying, Jiaqi Zhang, and Kirsten Read
¿Read Conmigo?: The Effect of Code-switching Storybooks on Dual-Language Learners’ Retention of New Vocabulary, Kirsten Read, Paloma D. Contreras, Bianca Rodriguez, and Jessica Jara
Tres formas: Reading aloud with three types of Spanish and English dual-language learning preschoolers, Kirsten Read, Paloma Contreras, and Hector Martinez
Attachment Style and Jealousy in the Digital Age: Do Attitudes About Online Communication Matter?, Kieran T. Sullivan
Submissions from 2020
Where for what: A meta-analysis for the category-specific activations for living/nonliving concepts in the past two decades, Kimberly D. Derderian, Xiaojue Zhou, and Lang Chen
Neural correlates of cognitive variability in childhood autism and relation to heterogeneity in decision-making dynamics, Teresa Iuculano, Aarthi Padmanabhan, Lang Chen, Jonathan Nicholas, Samantha G. Mitsven, Carlo de los Angeles, and Vinod Menon
Seeing the Whole Picture? Avoided Negative Affect and Processing of Others’ Suffering, Birgit Koopmann-Holm, Kathryn Bartel, Maryam Bin Meshar, and Huiru Evangeline Yang
Compassion meditation increases optimism towards a transgressor, Birgit Koopmann-Holm, Jocelyn Sze, Thupten Jinpa, and Jeanne L. Tsai
Can Reading Personalized Storybooks to Children Increase Their Prosocial Behavior?, Ellen Kruse, Isabelle Faller, and Kirsten Read
A Review of Spiritual Development and Transformation among College Students from Jesuit Higher Education, Thomas G. Plante
Clericalism Contributes to Religious, Spiritual, and Behavioral Struggles among Catholic Priests, Thomas G. Plante
St. Ignatius as psychotherapist? How Jesuit spirituality and wisdom can enhance psychotherapy, Thomas G. Plante
E-books for children with autism: Best read alone or with a therapist?, Erin Soares, Therese Miller, Kathleen Ciffone, and Kirsten Read
Online communication and dating relationships: Effects of decreasing online communication on feelings of closeness and relationship satisfaction, Kieran T. Sullivan, Jessica Riedstra, Brenda Arellano, Bonnie Cardillo, Vanessa Kalach, and Amrita Ram
Submissions from 2019
Comparing to ingroup and outgroup members: Do we assimilate, contrast, or neither?, Kathryn Bruchmann and Meghan C. Evans
Quantitative Analysis of Heterogeneity in Academic Achievement of Children With Autism, Lang Chen, Daniel A. Abrams, Miriam Rosenberg-Lee, Teresa Iuculano, Holly N. Wakeman, Sandhya Prathap, Tianwen Chen, and Vinod Menon
The visual word form area (VWFA) is part of both language and attention circuitry, Lang Chen, Demian Wassermann, Daniel A. Abrams, John Kochalka, Guillermo Gallardo-Diez, and Vinod Menon
Clergy sexual abuse in the Roman Catholic Church: Dispelling eleven myths and separating facts from fiction, Thomas G. Plante
Possible Next Steps in APA’s Civility Efforts: Moving from Civility to Hospitality, Solidarity, and to Kinship, Thomas G. Plante
Relationship between Religion, Spirituality, and Psychotherapy: An Ethical Perspective, Thomas G. Plante
Further Developments of the Santa Clara Ethics Questionnaire, Thomas G. Plante and Anna McCreadie
The Santa Clara Ethics Scale, Thomas G. Plante and Anna McCreadie
Using strategic pauses during shared reading with preschoolers: Time for prediction is better than time for reflection when learning new words, Kirsten Read, Erin Furay, and Dana Zylstra
Submissions from 2018
Mechanisms of interactive specialization and emergence of functional brain circuits supporting cognitive development in children, Christian Battista, Tanya M. Evans, Tricia J. Ngoon, Tianwen Chen, Lang Chen, John Kochalka, and Vinod Menon
Seeing beyond political affiliations: The mediating role of perceived moral foundations on the partisan similarity-liking effect, Kathryn Bruchmann, Birgit Koopmann-Holm, and Aaron Scherer
Positive Attitude Toward Math Supports Early Academic Success: Behavioral Evidence and Neurocognitive Mechanisms, Lang Chen, Se Ri Bae, Christian Battista, Shaozheng Qin, Tianwen Chen, Tanya M. Evans, and Vinod Menon
The effects of health frame and target relevance in appearance social comparisons, Maggie L. Head and Kathryn Bruchmann
Ethical issues and challenges working with religious individuals and organizations: Providing culturally competent professional mental health services, Thomas G. Plante
Promoting Hope, Healing, and Wellness: Catholic Interventions in Behavioral Health Care, Thomas G. Plante and Gerdenio Manuel S.J.
Perceived Fitness and Exercise Intensity Can Predict Exercise Enjoyment, Thomas G. Plante, Marily Oppezzo, Brendan Tran, and L. Aislinn Diaz
Rhyme and Word Placement in Storybooks Support High-Level Verb Mapping in 3- to 5-Year-Olds, Kirsten Read and Jacqueline Quirke
The cat has a… : Children’s use of rhyme to Guide sentence completion, Kirsten Read and Madeline Regan
Asian Americans respond less favorably to excitement (vs. calm)-focused physicians compared to European Americans, Tamara Sims, Birgit Koopmann-Holm, Henry Young, Da Jiang, Helene Fung, and Jeanne L. Tsai
Examining the academic motivation of a diverse student population: A consideration of methodology, Tim Urdan and Kathryn Bruchmann
Submissions from 2017
Compared to What? The Importance of Control Groups in Social Comparison Research, Kathryn Bruchmann
A unified model of human semantic knowledge and its disorders, Lang Chen, Matthew A. Lambon Ralph, and Timothy T. Rogers
The cultural shaping of compassion, Birgit Koopmann-Holm and Jeanne L. Tsai
A Survey of Ethics Training in Undergraduate Psychology Programs at Jesuit Universities, Thomas G. Plante and Selena Pistoresi
Pie, fry, why: Language play in 3- to 5-year-old children, Kirsten Read, Sarah James, and Andrew Weaver
Sleep Benefits Memory for Semantic Category Structure While Preserving Exemplar-Specific Information, Anna C. Schapiro, Elizabeth A. McDevitt, Lang Chen, Kenneth A. Norman, Sara C. Mednick, and Timothy T. Rogers
Responses to intimate partners’ attempts to change health behavior: The role of readiness, Kieran T. Sullivan, Lauri A. Pasch, Meredith Schreier, and Melissa Healy
Exposure to Extrinsic Stressors, Social Defeat or Bisphenol A, Eliminates Sex Differences in DNA methyltransferase expression in the Amygdala, Emily C. Wright, Sarah A. Johnson, Rebecca Hao, Alex S. Kowalczyk, Gian D. Greenberg, Evelyn Ordoñes Sanchez, Abigail Laman-Marang, Brian C. Trainor, and Cheryl S. Rosenfeld
Distinct influences of affective and cognitive factors on children’s non-verbal and verbal mathematical abilities, Sarah S. Wu, Lang Chen, Christian Battista, Ashley K. Smith Watts, Erik G. Willcutt, and Vinod Menon
Submissions from 2016
Evaluation of “Out-of-the-Box” textbook technology supplements on student learning, Matthew C. Bell, Patricia M. Simone, and Lisa C. Whitfield
Implementation of best practices in online learning: A review and future directions, Matthew C. Bell, Patti Simone, and Lisa C. Whitfield
Spacing effect in older and younger adults: Does context matter?, Katherine E. Bercovitz, Matthew C. Bell, Patricia M. Simone, and Melody Wiseheart
Seeing as Understanding: The Importance of Visual Mathematics for our Brain and Learning, Jo Boaler, Lang Chen, Cathy Williams, and Montserrat Cordero
Compassion Predictors in Undergraduates: A Catholic College Example, Erin S. Callister and Thomas G. Plante