Summer Institutes in Social and Personality Psychology

Society For Personality And Social Psychology, Annandale VA

Investigators

Abstract

In the past two decades, the cutting edge of social and personality psychological research has become significantly more complex in theory, methodology, and statistics. These scientific advances are due, at least in part, to increasingly connected and diverse academic and professional networks amongst faculty. This project will support the continuation and extension of the highly successful program of Summer Institutes in Social and Personality Psychology. Graduate students from social psychology and personality graduate programs attend the advanced two-week intensive training program, led by the best scholars in the field. The summer training institute helps to ensure that the training of graduate students sustains advances and innovations in these fields. This training institute is helpful for advancing the field and also for broadening the opportunity for training of graduate students who, although are well-trained in the content and methods represented at their institutions, they may not have intensive access to scholars in other areas of the fields of Social and Personality Psychology. Evaluation of the previous training institutes reveals that graduate students who participate are successful in obtaining academic positions, peer-reviewed publications and funding for their research. Further, affording graduate students with cutting-edge theoretical and methodological training enhances their ability to participate in interdisciplinary and international collaborations, which are becoming increasingly important across all of science. This project will support the continuation of the highly successful program of Summer Institutes in Social and Personality Psychology (SISPP). Scheduled every two years, the SISPP provides an opportunity for approximately 80 advanced graduate students in social and personality psychology Ph.D. programs to obtain intensive experience and instruction into cutting-edge theories, research, and methods. Graduate programs have strengths in different areas, and preference for attendance is given to students whose home institution does not offer strengths in the topics covered during a particular Summer Institute. SISPP has been successful in fostering diversity in the field, both in terms of promoting the careers of members of historically underrepresented groups and enhancing the graduate training of students from programs with different emphases and resources. SISPP has also been successful in fostering research collaboration and communication networks among individuals from different laboratories, universities, regions, and nations, and creating a collaborative scholarly community for a new generation of researchers. These diversifying experiences enabled by SISPP are critical for fostering creativity, innovation, and flexible scientific practices in knowledge and for expanding social and personality psychology's scientific potential to provide solutions for important societal problems.