Expertise

Mary’s research interests focus on developing and testing theories about how people’s social identities and group memberships interact with the contexts they encounter to affect their thoughts, feelings, behaviors, physiology, and motivation.

Current Research Projects

  • The Cues Hypothesis: Reshaping Academic and Organizational Settings to Support Underrepresented Groups
  • What Concerns Do People Have in Identity Threatening Settings?
  • Organizational Mindsets: Creating Cultures of Growth and Innovation
  • Interracial Interaction and Friendship
  • The College Transition Collaborative (CTC): Improving Equity in Higher Education

Areas of Study

  • Social Psychology

Research Topics

  • Self and social identity threat
  • Stereotype threat
  • Stereotyping and prejudice
  • Intergroup dynamics
  • Interracial interaction and friendship
  • Organizational lay theories
  • Structural and psychological barriers for underrepresented groups (women in STEM, students of color in academia)

One aspect of my research program focuses on how situational cues in academic, organizational, and group environments affect people’s cognition, motivation, performance, and physiology.

Another line of research examines how organizations' philosophies of intelligence-whether organizations believe that intelligence is a fixed trait, or that it malleable and expandable by hard work and effort-shape the motivation of workers. Current work in this area examines representations of intelligence and genius in society and measures their effects on people's creativity, performance, and motivation in various work settings.

A final line of research examines situational cues in inter- and intra-racial interactions that affect people's levels of identity threat, emotional experiences, cognitive performance, and motivation to build friendships.

Research Interests

  • self and social identity threat; stereotype threat; stereotyping and prejudice; intergroup dynamics; interracial interaction and friendship; organizational lay theories; structural and psychological barriers for underrepresented groups
Past Affiliations

Associate Professor, Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences, College of Arts and Sciences, Indiana University Bloomington

Assistant Professor, Department of Psychology, College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, University of Illinois at Chicago (past)

Assistant Professor, Social & Personality Psychology Program, Department of Psychology, College of Liberal Arts and Sciences, University of Illinois at Chicago (past)

Assistant Professor, Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences, College of Arts and Sciences, Indiana University Bloomington

Communities
Gender Studies, Cognitive Science, Psychology
Degrees
PhD, Stanford University, Social Psychology, 2007
MA, Stanford University, 2002
BA, University of Texas at Austin, Psychology, 2000