Research News

2025-04-10 - New research published by Assistant Professor Benedek Kurdi examined data from 1.4 million participants across 33 countries from 2009 to 2019, finding that while explicit, self-reported bias decreased, the picture for implicit bias was more varied. Click here to read more

2024-11-21 - Assistant Professor Violeta J. Rodriguez has been selected to receive the American Psychological Foundation's (APF) Springfield Grant. This recognition highlights Dr. Rodriguez's impactful work exploring parenting experiences and health in LGBTQIA+ families from diverse racial and ethnic backgrounds. Supported by APF funding and with collaborator Dr. Qimin Liu at Boston University, Dr. Rodriguez...

2024-10-08 - Assistant Professor Violeta J. Rodriguez has been awarded the National Institutes of Health (NIH) Director’s DP5 Early Independence Award from the NIH Common Fund’s High-Risk, High-Reward Research program.  The Early Independence Award is designed for exceptional junior scientists who have recently completed their doctoral degrees, allowing them to bypass traditional postdoctoral training...

2024-09-09 -     Assistant Professor Susu Zhang has received funding under an Institute of Education Sciences (IES) research grant awarded to Digital Promise and UIUC to conduct a project entitled, "Analysis of NAEP Mathematics Process, Outcome, and Survey Data to Understand Test-Taking Behavior and Mathematics Performance of Learners with Disabilities". The National Assessment of Educational...

2024-09-03 - Associate Professor Dan Hyde and co-investigator Assistant Professor Bo Zhang have received a 5-year, $2.4 million grant from the National Science Foundation to study the relationship between brain and cognitive development in the context of early numeracy in children from 3 to 6 years of age. We asked Professor Hyde to tell us more about this exciting and ambitious project...

2024-09-03 - Professor Kimberly Rios, PhD student Alexis Morales, and collaborator Michael Zarate at the University of Texas at El Paso have received a grant from the University of Pennsylvania's Adversarial Collaboration Project. Funded originally by the Koch Foundation (which gave a sub-award to UPenn), the project brings together researchers who have competing/opposing hypotheses...

2024-08-20 - Professor Eleanor Seaton is a Co-Investigator on a grant from the NIH’s National Institute on Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism examining the etiology of alcohol use among racially-ethnically diverse populations using data from the Adolescent Brain Cognitive Development (ABCD) study. The team is using a developmentally and culturally informed approach to study gene-environment interaction (G x E)...

2024-08-20 - Assistant Professor Dominik Mischkowski has received a National Science Foundation grant to study the role of physical pain sensitivity in regulating intimate relationship processes, specifically, perceptions of a partner being understanding, validating, and caring. The grant will support two studies (one lab experiment, one longitudinal field experiment) to test the hypothesis that...

2024-01-29 - Social Psychology PhD student Erica Nack has received a grant from the Society for the Psychological Study of Social Issues to assess the impact of different holiday decorations on perceptions of inclusion and level of care by new patients of various religious backgrounds. Receiving the grant will allow Erica to recruit a religiously diverse group of participants. What do you hope will...

2024-01-29 - Social Psychology PhD student Mazyar Bagherian has received an APA Division 36 Social Justice Task Force Research Grant, to support research conducted by underrepresented students and early career psychologists to support research on underrepresented populations within the psychology of religion area. His proposal titled "The Impact of Non-Religious Demographic Shifts on Attitudes Toward...

2024-01-26 - The Advanced Research Opportunity Honors Scholarship is intended to enable research opportunities for students who face financial and time constraints that otherwise might prevent them from participating in the in-depth research process associated with completing a Bachelor’s thesis. This scholarship provides financial support over three semesters of undergraduate research toward completing a...

2023-12-27 - Associate Professor Catharine Fairbairn and Professor Kara Federmeier have been awarded a 5-year R01 grant from the National Institute of Alcohol Abuse and Alcoholism. They will use EEG and ERP hyperscanning to look at how alcohol might impact brain processes in social contexts. This means they will be able to simultaneously record brain activity in two participants at once. They will look at how...

2023-11-15 - Eight University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign researchers have been named to the 2023 Clarivate Analytics Highly Cited Researchers list. The list recognizes research scientists and social scientists who have demonstrated exceptional influence – reflected through their publication of multiple papers frequently cited by their peers during the last decade. Prof. Roberts specializes in...

2023-08-23 - Industrial-Organizational Psychology PhD student Chu Chu recently received the Meredith P. Crawford Fellowship from the Human Resources Research Organization (HumRRO). The HumRRO Meredith P. Crawford Fellowship is awarded annually to a graduate student in I/O Psychology or related doctoral programs who demonstrates exceptional research skills. The fellowship provides a stipend to the student...

2023-08-23 - Industrial-Organizational Psychology PhD candidate Lingyue Li recently won the 2023 James C. Johnson Student Paper Competition. This competition, organized by the International Personnel Assessment Council (IPAC), acknowledges the contributions of students in the field of personnel assessment. The competition recognizes research efforts that contribute to the assessment field and align with IPAC'...