We are Always Learning

Research is an important component of learning about Psychology. At St. Cloud State, students have the opportunity to participate in the research process in one of the following ways:

• Be a “participant” in Psychological studies.
• Assist professors in conducting studies.

The results of this research is frequently disseminated through campus events and professional conferences.

Psychology students interested in becoming a research assistant may contact one of the faculty members below.

Faculty Research Interests

Dr. Amanda Hemmesch

• Improving health, well-being, and quality of life for older adults and individuals with chronic conditions
• How health and psychosocial factors, especially social relationships, influence development and well-being throughout adulthood

Dr. Hemmesch is always looking for motivated research assistants who share an interest in social and developmental psychology, especially aging.

Dr. Jody Illies

• Organizational problem solving and decision making, creativity and innovation, leadership, and the use of biographical data as an assessment tool
• In his most recent studies, he has been exploring the influence of individual differences and situational characteristics on leader emergence and employee creativity

If you find any of his research areas intriguing, or just want to talk about I-O or research in general, please contact Dr. Illies.

Dr. Maegan Jones

     Disordered Eating Prevention and Healthy Image (DEPHI) Lab goals: 

• Understand what factors provide children, adolescents, and emerging adults with barriers against the development of maladaptive eating habits and negative beliefs about the body, and how that information can be best used to create prevention and intervention programs
• Examine how families can encourage balanced eating and positive self-image, specifically in terms of the parent-child relationship
• Examine eating disorder comorbidities, such as depression and PTSD

Contact Dr. Jones if you’re interested in getting involved in this area of research, or would just like to learn more about it in general!

Dr. Joseph Melcher

• Cognitive psychology

Dr. Jamie Opper

• Human visual perception and its impact on behavior (e. g., effects of color on memory)
• Perceptual abnormalities in clinical populations (e. g., depth perception abnormalities in schizophrenia)
• How aging affects human sensory systems, particularly vision and/or color perception

• Content- and criterion-related selection measure development and evaluation
• Personality influences on organizational, team, and individual outcomes
• Cross-level off-the-job interactions
• Team selection methods on work-team outcomes
• Psychometric techniques and theory
• Training and organizational development
• His most recent project explored the impact of current mood states on the accuracy and generalizability of Angoff cutoff score judgments using a generalizability framework

Students interested in any of these avenues of research, or with personal interests in research related to any aspect of organizational functioning and/or members of organizations are encouraged to contact Dr. Protolipac. He is always looking to create new research teams and projects.

Dr. Marcy Young Illies

• People in organizations, most notably workplace mentoring, leadership, and values

Dr. Young Illies is more than happy to talk to students about her research, or help them develop their own research projects that focus on people in organizations.