Social Psychology Faculty

The interplay among motivation, emotion, and social cognition; evolutionary psychology; individual differences.

Why do people take risks? Why do certain people grab our attention? Why do some people desire power, and what are they willing to do to get it? My lab's research addresses questions like these, exploring ways in which social motives and emotions influence a range of cognitive and perceptual processes such as attention, memory, person perception, and risky decision-making. Much of our current work focuses on: romantic attraction and close relationships, power and dominance, affiliation-seeking, prosocial behavior, and anxiety.

Maner, J. K., & Mead, N (in press). The essential tension between leadership and power: When leaders sacrifice group goals for the sake of self-interest. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology.

Maner, J. K., Miller, S. L., Schmidt, N. B., & Eckel, L. A. (in press). The Endocrinology ofExclusion: Rejection Elicits Motivationally Tuned Changes in Progesterone. Psychological Science.

Miller, S. L., & Maner, J. K. (in press). Scent of a Woman: Male TestosteroneResponses to Female Olfactory Ovulation Cues. Psychological Science.

Maner,J. K., Gailliot, M. T., & Miller, S. L. (2009). The implicit cognition of relationshipmaintenance: Inattention to attractive alternatives. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 45, 174-179.

Baker, M. D., & Maner, J. K. (2009). Male Risk-Taking as a Context-Sensitive SignalingDevice. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 45, 1136-1139.

Maner, J. K., Miller, S. L., Schmidt, N. B., & Eckel, L. A. (2008). Submitting to Defeat:Social Anxiety, Dominance Threat, and Decrements in Testosterone. Psychological Science, 19, 264-268.

Maner, J. K., Gailliot, M. T., Rouby, D. A., & Miller, S. L. (2007). Can’t take my eyes offyou: Attentional adhesion to mates and rivals. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 93, 389-401.

Maner, J. K., DeWall, C. N., Baumeister, R. F., & Schaller, M. (2007). Does socialexclusion motivate interpersonal reconnection? Resolving the “porcupine problem.” Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 92, 42-55.

Maner, J. K., Gailliot, M. T., Butz, D., & Peruche, B. M. (2007). Power, risk, and thestatus quo: Does power promote riskier or more conservative decision-making? Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 33, 451-462.

Maner, J. K., Kenrick, D. T., Neuberg, S. L., Becker, D. V., Robertson, T., Hofer, B., Delton, A., Butner, J., & Schaller, M. (2005). Functional projection: How fundamental social motives can bias interpersonal perception. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 88, 63-78.