Serena Chen

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Serena Chen (b. July 16, 1970 [1] ) is an American social psychologist known for her work on the self and interpersonal relationships. She is Professor of Psychology at the University of California, Berkeley and currently serves as Chair of the Psychology Department. [2] Her research utilizes a social-cognition framework and has been featured in The New York Times , [3] The Wall Street Journal, [4] and other news outlets. [5]

Contents

Serena Chen
Born
New York City, U.S.
NationalityAmerican
Education New York University
Cornell University
Academic career
DisciplineSocial psychology
Website Official website

Education

Chen completed her undergraduate degree in psychology at Cornell University, where she graduated magna cum laude. [6] At Cornell, Chen worked under the supervision of Thomas Gilovich on the topic of cognitive dissonance. [7]

Chen continued her education at New York University (NYU), completing her PhD in Social Psychology in 1997. [8] Her dissertation, titled Making sense of significant others: "Theories" about significant others and their role in transference, was supervised by Susan M. Andersen. [9] [10] As a graduate student, Chen collaborated with Shelly Chaiken, [11] [12] Alice Eagly, [13] and John Bargh. [14] Although Chen's education at NYU largely focused on social cognition, she was more interested in studying the self and relationships.

Research and career

One of Chen's main research areas is focused on the self. She has written numerous articles and publications that focus on concepts of self and how an individual perceives themselves in terms of close relationships and intergroup relations. [15] [16] [17] She also utilizes a social-cognition approach towards these concepts due to her background.

Chen first worked at University of Michigan in Ann Arbor, Michigan. In January 2001, she became a Professor of Psychology at University of California, Berkeley, where she is currently the Marian E. and Daniel E. Koshland, Jr. Distinguished Chair for Innovative Teaching and Research. [18] Chen is also the Chair of the Psychology Department. [19] In this department, she also runs the 'Self, Identity, and Relationships' (SIR) laboratory, which conducts ongoing research. [19] Chen's research on identity formation was utilized by TJ Maxx in 2018 to create the Maxx You Project, which hosts workshops that focus on empowering women and celebrating their differences. [20] She has also co-authored a social psychology text book, Social Psychology, with Thomas Gilovich, Dacher Keltner, and Richard E. Nisbett. [21]

Honors and awards

In 2006, Chen won the Early Career Award from the International Society for Self and Identity, which is an award given to an individual who has made advancements in the field within 10 years of obtaining their PhD. [22] In 2007, she was named as a ‘Rising Star’ by the Association for Psychological Science. [23] She also won the Distinguished Teaching Award from the Social Sciences Division of the University of California, Berkeley, in 2010. [24]

Related Research Articles

<span class="mw-page-title-main">Fundamental attribution error</span> Psychological phenomenon

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Attitude (psychology)</span> Concept in psychology and communication studies

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Thomas Gilovich</span> American psychologist (born 1954)

Thomas Dashiff Gilovich is an American psychologist who is the Irene Blecker Rosenfeld Professor of Psychology at Cornell University. He has conducted research in social psychology, decision making, and behavioral economics, and has written popular books on these subjects. Gilovich has collaborated with Daniel Kahneman, Richard Nisbett, Lee Ross and Amos Tversky. His articles in peer-reviewed journals on subjects such as cognitive biases have been widely cited. In addition, Gilovich has been quoted in the media on subjects ranging from the effect of purchases on happiness to people's most common regrets, to perceptions of people and social groups. Gilovich is a fellow of the Committee for Skeptical Inquiry.

Moral psychology is a field of study in both philosophy and psychology. Historically, the term "moral psychology" was used relatively narrowly to refer to the study of moral development. Moral psychology eventually came to refer more broadly to various topics at the intersection of ethics, psychology, and philosophy of mind. Some of the main topics of the field are moral judgment, moral reasoning, moral sensitivity, moral responsibility, moral motivation, moral identity, moral action, moral development, moral diversity, moral character, altruism, psychological egoism, moral luck, moral forecasting, moral emotion, affective forecasting, and moral disagreement.

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">In-group and out-group</span> Sociological notions

In social psychology and sociology, an in-group is a social group to which a person psychologically identifies as being a member. By contrast, an out-group is a social group with which an individual does not identify. People may for example identify with their peer group, family, community, sports team, political party, gender, sexual orientation, religion, or nation. It has been found that the psychological membership of social groups and categories is associated with a wide variety of phenomena.

William B. Swann is a professor of social and personality psychology at the University of Texas at Austin. He is primarily known for his work on identity, self and self-esteem, but has also done research on relationships, social cognition, group processes, accuracy in person perception and interpersonal expectancy effects. He received his Ph.D. in 1978 from the University of Minnesota and undergraduate degree from Gettysburg College.

Susan Tufts Fiske is an American psychologist who serves as the Eugene Higgins Professor of Psychology and Public Affairs in the Department of Psychology at Princeton University. She is a social psychologist known for her work on social cognition, stereotypes, and prejudice. Fiske leads the Intergroup Relations, Social Cognition, and Social Neuroscience Lab at Princeton University. Her theoretical contributions include the development of the stereotype content model, ambivalent sexism theory, power as control theory, and the continuum model of impression formation.

John A. Bargh is a social psychologist currently working at Yale University, where he has formed the Automaticity in Cognition, Motivation, and Evaluation (ACME) Laboratory. Bargh's work focuses on automaticity and unconscious processing as a method to better understand social behavior, as well as philosophical topics such as free will. Much of Bargh's work investigates whether behaviors thought to be under volitional control may result from automatic interpretations of and reactions to external stimuli, such as words.

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<span class="mw-page-title-main">Stereotype</span> Generalized but fixed and oversimplified image or idea of a particular type of person or thing

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Impression formation in social psychology refers to the processes by which different pieces of knowledge about another are combined into a global or summary impression. Social psychologist Solomon Asch is credited with the seminal research on impression formation and conducted research on how individuals integrate information about personality traits. Two major theories have been proposed to explain how this process of integration takes place. The Gestalt approach views the formation of a general impression as the sum of several interrelated impressions. As an individual seeks to form a coherent and meaningful impression of another individual, previous impressions significantly influence the interpretation of subsequent information. In contrast to the Gestalt approach, the cognitive algebra approach asserts that individuals' experiences are combined with previous evaluations to form a constantly changing impression of a person. A related area to impression formation is the study of person perception, making dispositional attributions, and then adjusting those inferences based on the information available.

Heuristics is the process by which humans use mental shortcuts to arrive at decisions. Heuristics are simple strategies that humans, animals, organizations, and even machines use to quickly form judgments, make decisions, and find solutions to complex problems. Often this involves focusing on the most relevant aspects of a problem or situation to formulate a solution. While heuristic processes are used to find the answers and solutions that are most likely to work or be correct, they are not always right or the most accurate. Judgments and decisions based on heuristics are simply good enough to satisfy a pressing need in situations of uncertainty, where information is incomplete. In that sense they can differ from answers given by logic and probability.

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References

  1. ↑ Chen, Serena (2018), "Chen, Serena", in Zeigler-Hill, Virgil; Shackelford, Todd K. (eds.), Encyclopedia of Personality and Individual Differences, Springer International Publishing, pp. 1–2, doi:10.1007/978-3-319-28099-8_399-1, ISBN   978-3-319-28099-8, S2CID   239490429
  2. ↑ "Department Administration". psychology.berkeley.edu. Retrieved 26 August 2020.
  3. ↑ Pattee, Emma (2019-11-20). "How to Have Closer Friendships (and Why You Need Them)". The New York Times. ISSN   0362-4331 . Retrieved 2020-01-12.
  4. ↑ Hotz, Robert Lee (2014-07-22). "Why Power in the Workplace Makes People Feel They Control Time". Wall Street Journal. ISSN   0099-9660 . Retrieved 2020-01-12.
  5. ↑ Abate, Tom; Writer, Chronicle Staff (2009-10-15). "Insecure bosses likelier to bully, study says". SFGate. Retrieved 2020-01-12.
  6. ↑ "Serena Chen Ph.D." Psychology Today. Retrieved 2018-11-09.
  7. ↑ Gilovich, Thomas; Medvec, Victoria Husted; Chen, Serena (1995). "Commission, Omission, and Dissonance Reduction: Coping with Regret in the "Monty Hall" Problem". Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin. 21 (2): 182–190. doi:10.1177/0146167295212008. ISSN   0146-1672. S2CID   146500989.
  8. ↑ "Serena Chen". chen.socialpsychology.org. Retrieved 2018-11-09.
  9. ↑ "Susan Andersen".
  10. ↑ Chen, Serena; Andersen, Susan M.; Hinkley, Katrina (1999-09-01). "Triggering Transference: Examining the Role of Applicability in the Activation and Use of Significant-Other Representations in Social Perception". Social Cognition. 17 (3): 332–365. doi:10.1521/soco.1999.17.3.332. ISSN   0278-016X.
  11. ↑ Chen, Serena; Shechter, David; Chaiken, Shelly (1996). "Getting at the truth or getting along: Accuracy- versus impression-motivated heuristic and systematic processing". Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. 71 (2): 262–275. doi:10.1037/0022-3514.71.2.262. ISSN   1939-1315. S2CID   16095759.
  12. ↑ Chen, Serena; Duckworth, Kimberly; Chaiken, Shelly (1999-01-01). "Motivated Heuristic and Systematic Processing". Psychological Inquiry. 10 (1): 44–49. doi:10.1207/s15327965pli1001_6. ISSN   1047-840X.
  13. ↑ Eagly, Alice H.; Chen, Serena; Chaiken, Shelly; Shaw-Barnes, Kelly (1999). "The impact of attitudes on memory: An affair to remember". Psychological Bulletin. 125 (1): 64–89. doi:10.1037/0033-2909.125.1.64. hdl: 10983/25967 . ISSN   1939-1455. PMID   9990845. S2CID   2438408.
  14. ↑ Chen, Serena; Lee-Chai, Annette Y.; Bargh, John A. (2001). "Relationship orientation as a moderator of the effects of social power". Journal of Personality and Social Psychology. 80 (2): 173–187. doi:10.1037/0022-3514.80.2.173. ISSN   1939-1315. PMID   11220439. S2CID   6061469.
  15. ↑ Zhang, Jia Wei; Chen, Serena (2017-03-31). "Self-compassion promotes positive adjustment for people who attribute responsibility of a romantic breakup to themselves". Self and Identity. 16 (6): 732–759. doi:10.1080/15298868.2017.1305985. ISSN   1529-8868. S2CID   96440807.
  16. ↑ Chen, Serena; Tharp, Jordan A.; Kuehn, Maya M. (October 2017). "They Love Me, They Love Me Not?: Social Power Shapes Expectations of Acceptance and Concerns about Rejection". Social Cognition. 35 (5): 563–584. doi:10.1521/soco.2017.35.5.563. ISSN   0278-016X. S2CID   149027084.
  17. ↑ Gan, Muping; Heller, Daniel; Chen, Serena (2018-05-08). "The Power in Being Yourself: Feeling Authentic Enhances the Sense of Power". Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin. 44 (10): 1460–1472. doi:10.1177/0146167218771000. ISSN   0146-1672. PMID   29739292. S2CID   13698789.
  18. ↑ "Serena Chen: Marian E. and Daniel E. Koshland, Jr. Distinguished Chair for Innovative Teaching and Research | UC Psych". psychology.berkeley.edu. Retrieved 2018-11-14.
  19. 1 2 "Psychology Department Directory Listing". UC Psych. Retrieved 2020-10-10.
  20. ↑ T.J.MAXX. "T.J.Maxx Partners With Debra Messing to Encourage Women to Embrace Their Individuality". www.prnewswire.com (Press release). Retrieved 2018-11-09.
  21. ↑ "Social Psychology | W. W. Norton & Company" . Retrieved 2018-11-09.
  22. ↑ "Society of Self and Identity - Awards". www.issiweb.org. Retrieved 2018-11-09.
  23. ↑ "Rising Stars". APS Observer. 20 (9). 2007-10-01.
  24. ↑ "Social Sciences: Distinguished Teaching and Service Awards | College of Letters & Science". ls.berkeley.edu. Retrieved 2018-11-09.
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