Michele Acker

Professor & Director of the Honors Program

Michele Acker is a professor of psychology, with emphases in social psychology, industrial organizational psychology, and personality. She received her doctorate in social psychology from the University of Michigan. Dr. Acker’s areas of expertise are in close personal relationships, social stereotyping, the scholarship of teaching, and social influences involving the internet. Some of her research examines perceptions of intimacy between relationship partners and the role that suspicion and trust play in relationships. She teaches courses in general psychology, social psychology, industrial and organizational psychology, psychology of women, personality, and research methods. In 2000, she won the junior faculty teaching award.

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Meredith C. Frey

Professor & Department Chair

Meredith Frey is an associate professor and experimental/quantitative psychologist with research interests in human intelligence. Two basic questions guide her work: 1) Why are some people more intelligent than others, and 2) How can we fairly measure intelligence, without also measuring learned information? She has received a grant from the U. S. Army Research Institute to develop a battery of fairly simple reaction time tasks that can be used to predict complex outcomes, like academic achievement or job performance, and can be used in place of traditional, more culturally laden, assessments. Dr. Frey teaches classes in Research Methods, Statistics, General Psychology, and Intelligence. Dr. Frey received the 2009 New Teacher of the Year award. Read theOpportunities Abound for Researcharticle fromTowers Magazineabout Meredith’s research.

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Denise Hatter-Fisher

Professor

Denise Y. Hatter-Fisher is a professor of psychology. She received her doctorate from The Ohio State University’s Department of Psychology in the area of counseling psychology. As a licensed psychologist, Dr. Hatter-Fisher has provided service for a diverse clientele, including the elderly. Her academic research addresses alexithymia and self-regulation as well as quality of life issues for people of color. Her areas of expertise include women’s issues, multicultural psychology, and psychophysiology. She teaches courses in abnormal psychology, psychotherapy, personality, human stress, advanced research, and multicultural psychology.

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Cynthia Laurie-Rose

Professor

Cynthia Laurie-Rose is a professor of experimental psychology, with expertise in perception, physiological psychology, research methods, and the history of psychology. She earned her Ph.D. from the University of Cincinnati in the area of experimental psychology, with an emphasis in perception and cognition. Dr. Laurie-Rose has published articles in the areas of form perception and sustained attention and is currently pursuing research in factors associated with both adult and childhood attention. She teaches courses in general psychology, experimental methods, physiological psychology, perception, advanced research, and history & systems.

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Meredith Meyer

Professor

Dr. Meyer is a developmental psychologist, with a focus on cognitive development in the early childhood years. After receiving her Ph.D., she worked as a post-doctoral researcher in the psychology department at the University of Michigan. Dr. Meyer researches the ways in which typically-developing children categorize the social- and non-social world, and how this categorization influences other cognitive processes like stereotyping, gender development, and language use. She also researches how children’s and adults’ beliefs about talent (e.g., assuming it is natural and unchangeable vs. flexible) impact achievement. Dr. Meyer teaches classes in Child and Adolescent Development, Lifespan Development, and Research Methods.

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Noam Shpancer

Professor

Noam Shpancer is a professor of psychology. He received his Ph.D. at Purdue University, with specialty areas in clinical and developmental psychology. Dr. Shpancer’s research interests center on various dimensions of the home-daycare link, including parent-caregiver relations, people’s childcare attitudes and perceptions, and children’s adaptation across contexts. He is a licensed, practicing clinical psychologist, with a clinical specialty in the assessment and treatment of anxiety disorders. He teaches introductory psychology, child development, personality, abnormal psychology, human sexuality, assessment, advanced research, and health psychology. In 2001, he won the junior faculty teaching award.

Follow Dr. Noam Shpancer’s blogon PsychologyToday.com

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Katie Wissman

Associate Professor

Dr. Wissman (she/her) is an Associate Professor trained in cognitive psychology, with a specific focus in the learning sciences. She received her Ph.D. from Kent State University (2016), worked as a postdoctoral research fellow at Skidmore College (2016-2018), and was a faculty member at North Dakota State University (2018-2024). Dr. Wissman’s research investigates how to support student success and inform pedagogical instruction by examining evidence-based learning practices for inside and outside of the classroom. She also explores collaborative memory, mind-wandering, creativity, and metacognition. Dr. Wissman teaches classes in General Psychology, Research Methods, and Cognition.

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