香蜜影视

Erin Cooley

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Erin Cooley

Associate Professor of Psychological and Brain Sciences

Department/Office Information

Psychological and Brain Sciences
  • T 1:00pm - 2:00pm (119 Olin Hall)
  • R 11:10am - 1:10pm (341 Olin Hall)
  • BS in Psychology, University of Florida, 2009
  • BA in Spanish, University of Florida, 2009
  • MA in Social Psychology, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, 2011
  • PhD in Social Psychology with a Formal Concentration in Quantitative Psychology, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill, 2015

Aron, A., Coups, E. L., Aron, E. N., & Cooley, E. (2022). Statistics for Psychology. (7th ed.). Pearson.

Hierarchy, Health, & Policy Lab

Research from our lab explores how the persistence of hierarchies in the United States (i.e., racism, classism, sexism and their intersections) influence people's policy attitudes, as well as their mental and physical health. For example, we have found that high economic inequality leads many Americans, even those with objectively high income and education, to feel as if they are falling behind. And, these feelings of falling behind have important implications for predicting their policy attitudes (e.g., welfare support, beliefs about police use of force, etc.) as well as their own mental (i.e., depression) and physical health (i.e., sleep quality and heart health). We also explore how interventions that teach people about hierarchy and power, such as lessons about white privilege and implicit bias trainings, interact with these processes--at times, in unanticipated ways.

Together our lab is focused on understanding how shifting U.S. racial demographics and growing U.S. levels of economic inequality intertwine with salient societal issues such as racism, classism, and growing political polarization. By understanding these processes, we hope to identify evidence-based practices that will improve people's quality of life.

*Indicates student author
**Indicates both authors contributed equally

Caluori, N.,** Cooley, E.,** Brown-Iannuzzi, J. L., Lei, R., Philbrook, L., Cipolli, W., Klein, E.* (2024). Perceptions of falling behind 鈥渕ost White people鈥: Within-group status comparisons predict fewer positive emotions and worse health over time among White (but not Black) Americans. Psychological Science

Tran, A.,* ** Cooley, E., ** Brown-Iannuzzi, J. L., Lisnek, J. (2023). Racialized sexism: Nonverbal displays of power in the workplace are evaluated as more masculine when displayed by White (vs. Black) women with negative implications for their experience of sexism and hiring.  Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin. https://doi.org/10.1177/01461672231216041

Cooley, E., ** Brown-Iannuzzi, J. L., ** Lei, R., Cipolli, W., & Philbrook, L. (2022). Beliefs that White = poor, above and beyond beliefs that Black = poor, predict White (but not Black) Americans鈥 attitudes toward welfare recipients and policy. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin. https://doi.org/10.1177/01461672221139071

Cooley, E., Brown-Iannuzzi, J.L., Payne, K.B., Steele, J.* (2022). Groups amplify the perceived threat and justification for using force against Black people protesting for racial equality鈥攅specially among social conservatives. Group Processes and Intergroup Relations. https://doi.org/10.1177/13684302221119982

Brown-Iannuzzi, J. L., Cooley, E., Cipolli, W., & Payne, B.K. (2021). Who gets to vote? Racialized mental images of legitimate and illegitimate voters. Social Psychological and Personality Science. https://doi.org/10.1177/19485506211039408

Cooley, E., ** Brown-Iannuzzi, J. L., ** Lei, R., Cipolli, W., & Philbrook, L. (2021). The policy implications of feeling low versus high status within a privileged group. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General. https://doi.org/10.1037/xge0001051

Brown-Iannuzzi, J. L., Cooley, E., Cipolli, W., & Mehta, S. (2021). Race, ambivalent sexism, and perceptions of situations when police shoot Black women. Social Psychological and Personality Science. https://doi.org/10.1177/1948550620987659

Brown-Iannuzzi, J. L., Cooley, E., Marshburn, C., McKee, S., & Lei, R. (2021). Investigating the interplay between race, work ethic stereotypes, and attitudes toward welfare recipients and policies. Social Psychological and Personality Science. https://doi.org/10.1177/1948550620983051

Vuletich, H., Kurtz-Costes, B., Cooley, E., & Payne, B. K. (2020). Math and language gender stereotypes: Age and gender differences in implicit attitudes and explicit beliefs. Plos one15(9), e0238230.

Cooley, E., ** Brown-Iannuzzi, J. L., ** Lei, R., Philbrook, L., Cipolli, W., & McKee, S. E. (2020). Investigating the health consequences for white Americans who believe white Americans are wealthy. Social Psychological and Personality Science.

Cooley, E., ** Hester, N., ** Cipolli, W., Rivera, L., Abrams, K., * Pagan, J., Sommers, S., & Payne, B. K. (2019). Racial biases in officers鈥 decisions to frisk are amplified for Black people stopped among groups leading to similar biases in searches, arrests, and use of force. Social Psychological and Personality Science

Cooley, E., Brown-Iannuzzi, J., Cottrell, D.* (2019). Liberals perceive more racism than conservatives when police shoot Black men鈥擝ut, reading about White privilege increases perceived racism, and shifts attributions of guilt, regardless of political ideology. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology

 

Cooley, E., Brown-Iannuzzi, J. L., Lei, R. F., & Cipolli, W. III. (2019). Complex intersections of race and class: Among social liberals, learning about White privilege reduces sympathy, increases blame, and decreases external attributions for White people struggling with poverty. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General. Advance online publication.

 

Cooley, E., ** Brown-Iannuzzi, J. L., ** & Boudreau, C.* (2019). Shifting stereotypes of welfare recipients can reverse racial biases in support for wealth redistribution. Social Psychological and Personality Science.

Brown-Iannuzzi, J. L., Cooley, E., McKee, S. E., & Hyden, C. (2019). Wealthy Whites and poor Blacks: Implicit associations between racial groups and wealth predict explicit opposition toward helping the poor. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology82, 26-34. 

Cooley, E., Lei, R., Brown-Iannuzzi, J., & Ellerkamp, T.* (2019). Personal prejudice, other guilt: Explicit prejudice toward Black people predicts guilty verdicts for White officers who kill Black men. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin45(5), 754鈥766. 

Cooley, E., Lei, R. F., & Ellerkamp, T.* (2018). The mixed outcomes of taking ownership for implicit racial biases. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin44(10), 1424-1434.

Cooley, E., & Payne, B. K. (2018). A group is more than the average of its parts: Why existing stereotypes are applied more to the same individuals when viewed in groups than when viewed alone. Group Processes & Intergroup Relations, 1368430218756494.

Cooley, E., Winslow, H.,* Vojt, A.,* Shein, J.,* & Ho, J.* (2018). Bias at the intersection of identity: Conflicting social stereotypes of gender and race augment the perceived femininity and interpersonal warmth of smiling Black women. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology74, 43-49.

Cooley, E., Brown-Iannuzzi, J., Agboh, D., Enjaian, B.,* Geyer, R.,* Lue, N.,* & Wu, S.* (2018). The fluid perception of racial identity: The role of friendship groups. Social Psychological and Personality Science9(1), 32-39. doi: 10.1177/1948550617703171

Cooley, E., Brown-Iannuzzi, J, Brown, C.S., & Polikoff, J.* (2018). Black groups accentuate hypodescent by activating threats to the racial hierarchySocial Psychological and Personality Science. doi: 10.1177/1948550617708014

Cooley, E., Payne, B.K., Cipolli, W., Cameron, D, Berger, A.,* & Gray, K. (2017). The paradox of group mind: "people in a group" have more mind than "a group of people."Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 146(5), 691.

Cooley, E., & Payne, B. K. (2017). Using groups to measure intergroup prejudice. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin43(1), 46-59. doi:10.1177/0146167216675331.

Brown-Iannuzzi, J., Dotsch, R., Cooley, E., & Payne, B. K. (2016). The relationship between mental representations of welfare recipients and attitudes toward welfare. Psychological Science, 28(1), 1-12. doi: 10.1177/0956797616674999.

Lai, C. K., Skinner, A. L., Cooley, E., Murrar, S., Brauer, M., Devos, T., Calanchini, J., Xiao, Y. J.,  Pedram, C., Marshburn, C. K., Simon, S., Blanchar, J. C., Joy-Gaba, J. A., Conway, J., Redford, L., Klein, R. A., Roussos, G., Schellhaas, F. M. H., Burns, M., Hu, X., McLean, M. C., Axt, J. R., Asgari, S., Schmidt, K., Rubinstein., R, Marini, M., Rubichi, S., Shin,. J. L., & Nosek, B. A. (2016). Reducing implicit racial preferences: II. Intervention effectiveness across time. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 8, 1001-1016.

Cooley, E., Payne, B.K., Loersch, C., & Lei, R. (2015). Who owns implicit attitudes? Testing a meta-cognitive perspective. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin41(1), 103-115.

Cooley, E., Payne, B.K., & Phillips, J. K.* (2014). Implicit bias and the illusion of conscious ill will. Social Psychological and Personality Science5, 500-507.

Cooley, E., Rea, A. J., Insko, C. A., & Payne, B. K. (2013). Perceived relevance of honesty and agreeableness to situations with non-correspondent and correspondent outcomes: an interdependence perspective. European Journal of Social Psychology, 43, 593-599.

Payne, B.K., Brown-Iannuzzi, J., Burkley, M., Arbuckle, N., Cooley, E., Cameron, C.D., & Lundberg, K.B. (2013). Intention invention and the affect misattribution procedure: Reply to Bar-Anan and Nosek (2012). Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 39, 375-386.

Cooley, E., Brown-Iannuzzi, J. L., Dinero, R. (in press). Using the Culture Cycle to Teach Stereotyping, Prejudice, and Discrimination. Teaching Social Psychology.

Brown-Iannuzzi, J. L., Cooley, E., Caluori, N. (in press). The Racialization of Social Class. The Handbook of Experimental Social Psychology.

Evans, C., Reinhart, A., Cooley, E., & Cipolli, W. (revised and resubmitted). Learning while learning: Psychology case studies for teaching regression. Target Journal: The Journal of Statistics and Data Science Education.

Cooley, E.,** Brown-Iannuzzi, J. L.,** Calouri, N., Elacqua, N.,*  Cipolli, W., Lisnek, J. (under review). Feeling last place when your group is in first: The subjective status profile of White Americans drawn to alt-right extremism. Target Journal: Nature Communications Psychology.

Cooley, E.,** Brown-Iannuzzi, J. L.,** Vlasak, D.*, Lei, R., Philbrook, L., Cipolli, W., Lisnek, J. (under review). Using a novel measure of subjective within- and between-group status to predict White Americans health via feelings of "falling behind." Target Journal: Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin.

Galvan, M., Alvarez, G. M., Cipolli, W., Cooley, E., Muscatell, K. A., Payne, B.K. (under review). Is discrimination widespread or concentrated? Evaluating the distribution of hiring and housing discrimination against Black Americans. Target Journal: Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin.

Lei, R., Philbrook, L., Cooley, E., Brown-Iannuzzi, J. L., Lei, R., Cipolli, W., & Philbrook, L. (in prep). Examining the consequences of shifting representations of social class on children鈥檚 stereotypic race-class associations and social mobility beliefs. Target Journal: Journal of Experimental Child Psychology.

Lei, R., Cohen, A., Davis, E. R., Cooley, E. (in prep). Children automatically encode race and gender simultaneously. Target Journal: Psychological Science.

Character and Context blog post for the Society for Personality and Social Psychology (June 10, 2021). 鈥淎re all women perceived as equally deserving of protection from police violence?鈥 

UC Berkeley鈥檚 Interdisciplinary Institute of Personality and Social Research. Talk given virtually (April 14, 2021). "Living up to Whiteness: Why group-based privilege leaves many White Americans, ironically, feeling unprivileged."

Character and Context blog post for the Society for Personality and Social Psychology (October 31, 2020). 鈥淲hen safety in numbers becomes racism in numbers鈥

Invited Symposium and Panel Member for the Society for Personality and Social Psychology 2019 Annual Meeting. "Implicit Bias Training and Beyond: A critical examination and discussion of implicit bias training" 

Character and Context blog post for the Society for Personality and Social Psychology (June 10, 2019). 鈥淲ho is to blame when police officers shoot Black men?鈥

OpEd for Vice (May 7, 2019). 鈥淭he disturbing thing I learned studying white privilege and liberals.鈥

Character and Context blog post for the Society for Personality and Social Psychology (April 15, 2019). 鈥淏eliefs that Black people are poor predict opposition toward welfare.鈥

The Academic Minute: A WMAC National Production (August 31, 2017). 鈥淕roups and sympathy鈥

PsyPost (February, 2024). 鈥淕ender, race, and power: Unpacking the dynamics of workplace perceptions鈥

PsyPost (July, 2021). 鈥淲hite, but not Black, women benefit from benevolently sexist beliefs during violent interactions with police鈥  

The Conversation (August 6, 2020). 鈥淲hy diversity training on campus is likely to disappoint鈥

Voice of America (June 17, 2020). 鈥淲hat is 鈥榳hite privilege鈥 and whom does it help?

PsyPost (June 6, 2020). 鈥淲hite privilege lessons alter perceptions of racism when a Black man is shot by police.鈥

Pacific Standard (May 30, 2019). 鈥淭alking about white privilege can reduce liberals鈥 sympathy for poor white people.鈥

Reason Magazine (May 29, 2019). 鈥淟iberals who learned about white privilege became less sympathetic to poor whites.鈥

Quillette (May 23, 2019). 鈥淲hat does teaching about white privilege actually accomplish (not what you might think or hope).鈥

The Greater Good Science Center (May 20th, 2019). 鈥淲hat happens when you educate liberals about White privilege.鈥

Big Think (May 12, 2019). 鈥淪tudy: Teaching liberals about white privilege reveals 鈥榮tartling鈥 blind spot.鈥

The Tobin Project Scholar Network Newsletter (April 18, 2019). 鈥淲ealthy Whites and poor Blacks: Implicit associations between racial groups and wealth predict explicit opposition toward helping the poor.鈥

香蜜影视 News (December 6, 2017). 鈥淪tephanie Wu 鈥18 brings a personal view to research on race and prejudice.鈥

The Scene, 香蜜影视 (July 20, 2017). 鈥淧rofessor Cooley鈥檚 research has implications for moral decision-making involving groups.鈥

Vox (April, 11, 2017). 鈥淭his one small language tweak could change our view of refugees.鈥