Erin Cooley
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.
Brown-Iannuzzi, J. L., Cooley, E., Caluori, N. (in press). The Racialization of Social Class. The Handbook of Experimental Social Psychology.
Cooley, E., Brown-Iannuzzi, J. L., & Dinero, R. (2024). Using the culture cycle to teach stereotyping, prejudice and discrimination. In Teaching Social Psychology (pp. 83-95). Edward Elgar Publishing.
*Indicates student author
**Indicates both authors contributed equally
Cooley, E.,** Brown-Iannuzzi, J. L.,** Calouri, N., Elacqua, N.,* Cipolli, W., Lisnek, J. (2024). Feeling last place when your group is in first: The subjective status profile of White Americans drawn to alt-right extremism. Nature Communications Psychology.
Galvan, M. J., Alvarez, G. M., Cipolli, W., Cooley, E., Muscatell, K. A., & Payne, B. K. (2024). Is Discrimination Widespread or Concentrated? Evaluating the Distribution of Anti-Black Discrimination in Judicial, Hiring, and Housing Decisions. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin.
Evans, C., Reinhart, A., Cooley, E., & Cipolli, W. (2024). Learning while learning: Psychology case studies for teaching regression. The Journal of Statistics and Data Science Education.
Caluori, N.,** Cooley, E.,** Brown-Iannuzzi, J. L., Lei, R., Philbrook, L., Cipolli, W., Klein, E.* (2024). Perceptions of falling behind “most White people”: 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/
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’ attitudes toward welfare recipients and policy. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin. https://doi.org/10.1177/
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—especially 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 one, 15(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’ 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—But, 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 Psychology, 82, 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 Bulletin, 45(5), 754–766.
Cooley, E., Lei, R. F., & Ellerkamp, T.* (2018). The mixed outcomes of taking ownership for implicit racial biases. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 44(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 Psychology, 74, 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 Science, 9(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 hierarchy. Social 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 Bulletin, 43(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 Bulletin, 41(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 Science, 5, 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.
Brown-Iannuzzi, J. L., Cooley, E., Espinel, S., Lisnek, J., Cipolli, W., McClelland, S. (in prep). Who is allowed to have an abortion? Investigating whether racism, sexism, and classism underpin abortion policy attitudes and exacerbate racial and gender inequality. Target Journal: PNAS.
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.
Lei, R., Philbrook, L., Cooley, E., Brown-Iannuzzi, J. L., Cipolli, W. (in prep). Examining the consequences of shifting representations of social class on children’s 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.
Deep Midwest Politics and Culture OpEd (September 20, 2024). "."
Character and Context blog post for the Society for Personality and Social Psychology (June 10, 2021). “?”
UC Berkeley’s Interdisciplinary Institute of Personality and Social Research. Talk given virtually (April 14, 2021). "."
Character and Context blog post for the Society for Personality and Social Psychology (October 31, 2020). “”
Invited Symposium and Panel Member for the Society for Personality and Social Psychology 2019 Annual Meeting. ""
Character and Context blog post for the Society for Personality and Social Psychology (June 10, 2019). “”
OpEd for Vice (May 7, 2019). “.”
Character and Context blog post for the Society for Personality and Social Psychology (April 15, 2019). “.”
The Academic Minute: A WMAC National Production (August 31, 2017). “”
PsyPost (February, 2024). “”
PsyPost (July, 2021). “”&˛Ô˛ú˛ő±č;
The Conversation (August 6, 2020). “”
Voice of America (June 17, 2020). “"
PsyPost (June 6, 2020). “.”&˛Ô˛ú˛ő±č;
Pacific Standard (May 30, 2019). “.”&˛Ô˛ú˛ő±č;
Reason Magazine (May 29, 2019). “.”&˛Ô˛ú˛ő±č;
Quillette (May 23, 2019). “.”&˛Ô˛ú˛ő±č;
The Greater Good Science Center (May 20th, 2019). “.”&˛Ô˛ú˛ő±č;
Big Think (May 12, 2019). “”
The Tobin Project Scholar Network Newsletter (April 18, 2019). “.”
Â鶹Porn News (December 6, 2017). “.”&˛Ô˛ú˛ő±č;
The Scene, Â鶹Porn (July 20, 2017). “.”&˛Ô˛ú˛ő±č;
Vox (April, 11, 2017). “.”