Director: Brittany Cassidy, Ph.D.

People form enduring impressions from glimpses of faces. These impressions are biased by facial characteristics (e.g., “a person with an attractive face is good”) and categorical stereotypes (e.g., “a Black face is less trustworthy than a White face”). Biased impressions contribute to longstanding societal inequities. Characterizing how facial cues drive impressions is important to understand these inequities as well as a core aspect of social cognition. The Social Cognition Lab team researches how people perceive, evaluate, and remember others based on the cues they receive when seeing faces. 

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Our research treats person perception as a complex and dynamic process. To this end, the the lab takes a multi-level approach to best characterize mechanisms underlying person perception. Research in our lab incorporates multiple methods (e.g., behavioral studies, eye-tracking, and brain imaging) and populations (e.g., younger and older adults) to provide converging evidence for mechanisms underlying how people evaluate, understand, and remember other people.

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Dr. Cassidy is recruiting MA and PhD students for the 2025-2026 academic year.

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Dr. Cassidy is recruiting undergraduate research assistants to begin in Spring 2025. To apply, please complete this form.