Social Psych & Religion Postdoc & PhD opportunity

An outstanding opportunity from Dr. Vassilis Saroglou: Social psychological research on positive emotions and spirituality: Two research positions at the University of Louvain Two research positions, one for a Postdoc and the other for a Ph. D. student, in the (social) psychology of positive emotions and religion/spirituality are open at the University of Louvain, Department of Psychology, Centre for Psychology of Religion (www.uclouvain/psyreli). The positions are full time, last two years, start from October/November 2012, and imply working in Louvain-la-Neuve (University’s town). The research focuses on the understanding of the emotion of awe, comparatively to other emotions, and implications of awe for spirituality and related individual and social outcomes (humility and prosociality). It implies the use of experimental methodology typical of social psychology and psychology of emotions. The project is funded by a John Templeton Foundation grant. The monthly net is about 1,600 euros (PhD student) and 2,100 euros (Postdoc) and the fellowships additionally include social security. Publications in international journals are a prerequisite for the postdoc position applications. French is welcomed but not indispensable. Applications (CV and letter of motivation) are to be sent to Prof. Vassilis Saroglou (vassilis.saroglou /at/ uclouvain.be) by September 30, 2012. You can use the same email address for more information.

Associate Professors Less Happy than Assistant or Full Profs

If you are in academia, take a moment to read this report from Inside Higher Ed, detailing satisfaction levels of academicians. Being an associate professor can be more difficult once one has become tenured, as institutions sometimes offer reduced levels of support for research at the same time that service expectations increase. The overarching finding of this report is that on most measures, associate professors show lower levels of satisfaction or happiness than do assistant- and full-professors, who report roughly equal levels. This is true in terms of feeling appreciated and recognized; research support; service-related; and overall rates of satisfaction. Read more about the challenges of being a mid-career academic.

Visiting Professor: Clinical Psychology

The Department of Psychology at Georgia Southern University invites applications for the position of Visiting Professor of Psychology (Rank Open). Georgia Southern University is a residential university serving 20,000 students located in Statesboro, near historic Savannah. The Psychology Department offers bachelor’s, M.S. (experimental emphasis), and Psy.D. (clinical psychology) degrees. The individual in this position will teach graduate and undergraduate courses, and have the opportunity to conduct research. Teaching responsibilities will include Psychotherapy Skills, Rural Practicum, and related clinical courses, as well as undergraduate courses.

Required Qualifications:
Earned Ph.D. or Psy.D. in Psychology by August 1, 2012
Evidence of potential for teaching excellence
Effective communication skills

Applications will be accepted until the position is filled. The position starting date is August 1, 2012. A complete application consists of a letter of application; a current cv; a statement of teaching philosophy; teaching evaluations and/or sample syllabi; and names of three professional references. Other documentation may be requested. Finalists will be required to submit to a background investigation. Inquiries should be sent to:

Dr. Michael Nielsen
Psychology Department
P.O. Box 8041
Georgia Southern University
Statesboro, GA 30460
912-478-5539
Email: MNielsen@GeorgiaSouthern.edu

More information is available at http://class.georgiasouthern.edu/psychology. Georgia Southern University seeks to recruit individuals who are committed to working in diverse academic and professional communities and who are committed to excellence in teaching, scholarship, and professional service within the University and beyond. Georgia is an Open Records state. Georgia Southern University is an AA/EO institution. Individuals who need reasonable accommodations under the ADA to participate in the search process should contact the Associate Provost.

Post Doctoral Research Fellowship at Indiana State University Center for the Study of Health, Religion, and Spirituality

The Center for the Study of Health, Religion, and Spirituality has an opening for a one to two year Post-Doctoral Research Assistant (Fellow). The Post-Doc position begins September 1, 2012 and requires a doctoral degree in one of the Social or Life Sciences. The Post-Doc will work with Center Affiliated faculty to design, conduct, and publish research on topics related to religion/spirituality and health, positive psychology, and/or holistic and integrative medicine. Center Faculty have ongoing research on a variety of topics including spirituality and addiction, religion and coping, measurement of spirituality and religiousness, spiritual experiences in natural environments, prayer, compassion and helping behavior, and contemplative practices.

The Center for the Study of Health, Religion, and Spirituality supports interdisciplinary research and dialog on how religious and spiritual beliefs, practices, values, and experiences are related to physical, mental, emotional, and social health. The work of the Center is compatible with the perspectives of positive psychology and holistic and integrative medicine. The Center also attempts to address societal needs for enhanced health care and increased cooperation among faith traditions by offering educational and training programs for students, professionals, and the public. The Center has been awarded enhancement funds through ISU's Unbounded Possibilities Initiative.

ISU is a comprehensive university with an enrollment of approximately 11,000 students located in West Central Indiana, an area that enables a high quality of life with a low cost of living. Terre Haute is the regional center for health care, commerce, the arts, and education for the surrounding areas; it has four colleges and universities. For more information, go to www.indstate.edu/psychology.

Applicants must apply online (http://www.indstate.edu/humres/) and submit a cover letter including statements of their teaching and research interests, vita, graduate transcripts, representative publications, and three letters of recommendation to: Dr. Thomas Johnson, Search Committee Chair, Department of Psychology, Indiana State University, Terre Haute, IN 47809. Review of applications will begin on June 15, 2012 and will continue until the position is filled. "ISU is an affirmative action/equal opportunity employer with a strong institutional commitment to the achievement of diversity among its faculty, staff, and students."

Job opening: Director, Center for the Study of Health, Religion and Spirituality

The Center for the Study of Health, Religion, and Spirituality has an opening for a full time Director beginning September 1, 2012. The position requires a Master’s Degree in Psychology, Sociology, Life Sciences, Education, Theology, Religion, Anthropology, or a Health Related Profession (e.g., Public Health, Nursing, Social Work, etc.). A Doctoral degree is preferred. The Director will provide leadership in developing research, outreach, and educational programs of the Center by coordinating academic, research, day-to-day operations, and student activities. The successful candidate will also provide evidence of research, teaching, interpersonal, supervisory, and/or administrative skills.

The Center for the Study of Health, Religion, and Spirituality supports interdisciplinary research and dialog on how religious and spiritual beliefs, practices, values, and experiences are related to physical, mental, emotional, and social health. The work of the Center is compatible with the perspectives of positive psychology and holistic and integrative medicine. The Center also attempts to address societal needs for enhanced health care and increased cooperation among faith traditions by offering educational and training programs for students, professionals, and the public. The Center has been awarded enhancement funds through ISU’s Unbounded Possibilities Initiative.

ISU is a comprehensive university with an enrollment of approximately 11,000 students located in West Central Indiana, an area that enables a high quality of life with a low cost of living. Terre Haute is the regional center for health care, commerce, the arts, and education for the surrounding areas; it has four colleges and universities. For more information, go to www.indstate.edu/psychology.

Applicants must apply online (http://www.indstate.edu/humres/) and submit a cover letter including statements of their teaching and research interests, vita, graduate transcripts, representative publications, and three letters of recommendation to: Dr. Thomas Johnson, Search Committee Chair, Department of Psychology, Indiana State University, Terre Haute, IN 47809. Review of applications will begin on May 1, 2012 and will continue until the position is filled. “ISU is an affirmative action/equal opportunity employer with a strong institutional commitment to the achievement of diversity among its faculty, staff, and students.”

Religion in Poli Sci, Psychology, and our Social World

Over the years, psychologists of religion have bemoaned the neglect of religion's role in people's behavior. A new report shows that psychology is not alone in this. Religion is ignored in political science, too. In some ways this seems a bit surprising, given the high profile religion has in US politics. Religion is often a part of presidential elections, and especially so in this cycle with numerous stories about whether Evangelical Republicans can/should/will support Mitt Romney, who seems objectionable to them both for his 'flip-flopping' stance on social issues, and for his Mormonism. The subject of religion has come up in other ways, too. For instance, there have been recent polls finding that voters in most districts would be loathe to elect an atheist or a Muslim, or Newt Gingrich's conversion to Catholicism, or Santorum or Perry's stance on issues connected with the evangelical vote. But, in terms of popular press, those stories take a distant second to Mitt's Mormonism.

So, it is interesting that the topic has been neglected in political science research in spite of its relevance to current events.

We face a similar problem in the psychology of religion. Much of our research and work deals with interesting theoretical questions. Another common topic concerns the much-less-interesting effort to devise new scales, which Gorsuch and others have bemoaned for decades. What we could use, however, is more current, socially-relevant research. Religion and spirituality are vital parts of many people's everyday lives. Religion and spirituality impact us on many levels, from how we process information, to how we interact with other individuals, to what we direct our social institutions to do.

I would argue that when we improve our discipline's connection with the world around us, we will also increase our stature within psychology. The embrace of health psychology is a good example of this change. Whereas two or three decades ago it was unusual for an introductory textbook to have a chapter devoted to health psychology, it has become common now. Psychology has much to contribute to our understanding of health, and health is an area of life that interests many of our students (as well as society at large). The same is true of religion, and if psychologists of religion investigate socially relevant aspects of our field, we will facilitate the growth and development of the psychology of religion.

Position at Uppsala University

Uppsala University seeks to hire a researcher or postdoc in the psychology of religion. The ad indicates "The position as researcher/postdoc in Psychology of Religion involves primarily pursuing empirical research related to one or more of the following areas of the research programme: health, wellbeing, migration and ritual studies. Both cultural- and gender analysis are an integral part of all research projects included in the research programme." View the ad for more details.

Q & A about Life as a Professor

I received an email from Mark, a student who is interested in pursuing a career in academia, studying the psychology of religion. Here are his questions, along with my responses.


Mark: What is a typical work day like?


Me: I normally arrive at work by 8:00, and deal with email and administrative matters. Currently, these involve making plans for next year's graduate assistants (determining which assistant will work with which faculty members), planning the Spring 2012 semester curriculum, and dealing with student and faculty concerns. During the day I will also do some reading for a research project that I'm working on. (At the moment, it is putting the finishing touches on an article I've written. Other times, it might be doing library research, collecting data, or analyzing data.) Depending on the semester, I teach one or two classes as well. I usually leave the office by 5:30.

Mark: What are some of the rewarding/gratifying aspects and negative sides to your career?


Me: It is a privilege to be able to study things that I am naturally curious about, and to do this as part of my job. I have many questions about why people do what they do, and believe what they believe, and being able to investigate these kinds of questions as part of my daily work life is absolutely intriguing.

I also enjoy working with people who are interested in related questions, whether they are fellow faculty members or students. This helps create a stimulating intellectual environment. I have also found it to be very rewarding to work with scholarly journals, whether as reviewer, editorial board member, or coeditor. In this way I can learn what other people are studying, and help them improve their work for publication. I greatly enjoy doing this.

The negative aspect is that there are sometimes students attending classes because they are avoiding work, which makes it frustrating. They do not realize how fortunate they are to have the opportunity to learn; fewer than 1% of the world's population has a college degree, I am told, but too often we take it for granted. This is quite aggravating at times, but the benefits of this career outweigh these kinds of frustrations.

A different negative aspect of my work is that the nature of higher education is changing. It is becoming more routinized, and people in general seem to discount the role of educators in improving society. Instead, I am seeing more cases of students (and their parents) expecting good grades for mediocre work, or credit merely for showing up in class. This is disappointing, as the main benefit of education comes when the individual pursues knowledge. It isn't received, it is pursued.

Mark: How is you day to day work different from what you expected when in school?


Me: When I was a student, I was relatively clueless about what a professor or teacher actually did. I was blissfully ignorant about administrative matters, in particular. While in college my first major was music education; I planned to teach band. Two things led me away from that career. One was the realization that high school band teachers needed to be good at "crowd control", and that this was not my strength. The other was taking education classes. In one class, we spent 3-4 days learning minutiae regarding different systems for recording class attendance. It was mind-numbingly tedious, and after that class I changed my major to psychology. I have since learned that administrative matters are important, although there are far more important things than whether to use a single hash-mark or a large X to indicate a student's absence in a roll book.

More substantively, I learned that I don't spend nearly as much time as I'd like engaged in research. Preparing to teach a class takes more time than I expected, especially when grading exams, etc. Committee meetings also intrude on the time that I'd like to devote to research. Committee work is important -- it is how educational institutions get work done -- but they can be agonizingly slow.


Mark: How did you pursue your career?


Me: I was interested in why people do what they do, and decided to study it in graduate school. I selected my graduate school based on a combination of factors, including the faculty research interests (at the time I was interested in moral development, and the faculty member's research was intriguing to me), cost of living, and the availability of graduate assistantship support. Once I arrived at that university, I learned that the person I intended to study with was about to leave for a year's sabbatical, and communication was not very easy in those pre-email days. I was fortunate, however, in that another faculty member's research was interesting to me, and he was very good to work with for my master's thesis. Chuck Miller's work in group decision-making remains interesting to me to this day. During that time I became more interested in the psychology of religion, and a new faculty member, Jim Fultz, arrived on campus. He had studied with Dan Batson, and was agreeable to supervising a dissertation in the psychology of religion even though he had worked with Dan on his altruism/helping research, rather than his religion research. Jim was an excellent mentor, and gave me a good start.

As I say in my piece on Graduate Study in the Psychology of Religion, it is very important to study religious behavior and belief from the perspective of one of psychology's more dominant sub-disciplines. Job openings specifically targeting the psychology of religion are rare, but if you study religion from a social-, developmental-, clinical-psychology (or other) perspective, you will find it much more feasible. I was also fortunate in teaching statistics and research methods in my first job after graduating. This allowed me to apply for more faculty positions, and ultimately led to my getting a one-year position at Georgia Southern University. Now, 18 years later, I am still here and am serving as department chair. It all became possible because I was absolutely fascinated by psychology, actively researched the field, and sought out opportunities to teach and publish research. It has been a very rewarding career.

I hope that this helps you understand what is involved in university teaching and research!

Best wishes
Michael Nielsen

Tenure Problems at a Religiously-Affiliated College

As a quick follow-up to interviewing at a religious college, you might find this report of problems at Erskine College interesting. It seems that the denomination may have impacted the outcome of a tenure decision there.

Interviewing at a Religious College

If you are (or expect to be) searching for an academic job, here is useful advice on interviewing at a religiously-affiliated college. My one experience at this, nearly 20 years ago, would have been enhanced had I given it more thought beforehand. It was at a Catholic college, and the interview seemed to be going well until I was asked to respond to the following situation. Suppose, the interviewer asked, that an unmarried student of mine found herself pregnant, and wanted my advice on what to do. I replied that she should talk to her priest for advice. Follow-up questions came, probing further into what my own personal feelings were on this hot-button issue. I replied that it was between the individual, and God. He apparently wanted me to say that I was personally opposed to abortion. I failed the college's litmus test, and ended up teaching at another college. The ironic thing is that three years earlier my wife and I were faced with the choice of whether to continue a pregnancy with complications, or not, and our choice would have made the interviewer proud. But I objected to his probing on a personal issue, and decided it was none of his business. I have no regrets now, but job-hunting is stressful and I was probably not as prepared as I might have been for such questions.

Basic Essay Help

Students may find help with essays at essay-on-psychology.com. It helps guide students through basic writing steps, including planning, research, writing and proof-reading. It also includes a list of good sites for material. Your high school and college students may find it useful.

The Most Difficult Journal (Humor)

If you think your work is truly better than the best, don't send it to Psychological Science or American Psychologist. For that matter, don't even try Nature or Science. Instead, consider submitting it to The Journal of Universal Rejection.

Kudos to Caleb Emmons for the clever idea!

Educating Students

Heather Wilson writes an excellent opinion piece about the spotty education undergraduates receive in the U.S. Too much specialization, and too little reflection on the big picture implications of undergraduates' studies, are contributing to graduates who are "less able to grapple with issues that require them to think across disciplines or reflect on difficult questions about what matters and why". Very worthwhile reading.

Evolution in Hiring Decision

Astronomer Martin Gaskell applied for a faculty position at University of Kentucky in 2007, and was apparently a leading candidate for the job. That all changed, however, when the search committee began to question him about evolution. When he didn't get the job, he sued the university; the case is now headed to court. Read more in this story from The Courier-Journal.

Catholic Universities

The intersection of doctrinal purity and academic freedom is in the news in this article from Inside Higher Ed. At question is a religious institution's concern over theology being taught in a manner consistent with its beliefs, and what -- if any -- latitude faculty have in pursuing questions related to doctrine. If you are interested in such questions, the article is worth a read. My own experience with the matter is limited to a job interview I had, many years ago, at a Catholic college. A couple of different times, during two separate interviews, the interviewer asked how I would respond to a student who sought advice about abortion. A look at my c.v. will reveal that I have never taught at a Catholic-affiliated college, so I am left to conclude that my answer (that it was a matter between her and God) wasn't sufficiently orthodox. It would be interesting to know how that school would handle an interview for a theology position.

SPSP - Psych of Religion Pre-Conference Events

2011 SPSP Pre-conference on Psychology of Religion-Spirituality

8am-4:30pm, Thursday, January 27, 2011, Room 213 Concourse Level, San Antonio Convention Center, San Antonio, Texas, USA

Final Call for Posters: We have space for only about 15 more posters that present psychology of religion research, preferably from a social-personality perspective. The next 15 reasonable submissions will likely be accepted. Decisions will be made on a rolling basis. To submit a poster for consideration, please send a pdf file containing title, 250 word abstract, author(s), affiliation(s), and email address of presenter to Kevin L. Ladd (kladd@iusb.edu). Data must be collected and analyzed before submission; we will not consider abstracts for incomplete studies. If the first or sole author is a student, please indicate whether or not you would like to be considered for the student poster award.

PRELIMINARY PROGRAM (presenter order may change) (updated September 15, 2010)

8:00 - 8:55: Continental breakfast (coffee, juice, fruit, pastries)
9:00 – 9:30: Ian Hansen (John Jay College of Criminal Justice, CUNY)
9:30 – 10:00: Eric Hill (Arizona State University)
10:00 - 10:30: Michael Inzlicht (University of Toronto-Scarborough)
10:30 - 11:00: Break with snack/drinks
11:00 - 11:30: Larisa Heiphetz (Harvard University)
11:30 – 12:00: Margaret Evans (University of Michigan)
12:00 – 2:00: Box lunch and poster session
1:00 – 2:00: Assigned SPSP check-in time
2:00 – 2:30: Ariel Malka (Yeshiva University)
2:30 – 3:00: Karina Schumann (University of Waterloo)
3:00 – 3:30: David Rosmarin (McLean Hospital/Harvard Medical School)
3:30 – 4:00: Christopher Ellison (University of Texas - San Antonio, Sociology)
4:00 - 4:30: Edward Slingerland (University of British Columbia, Asian Studies)

The Five Stages of Grading

Now that colleges are in the midst of midterm exams and the papers are pouring in, it is time for The Five Stages of Grading, a very clever spoof on Kubler-Ross. Brought to you by Not That Kind of Doctor.

Academic Freedom Decision in Religion Case

Inside Higher Ed reports a decision in a high-profile case involving the academic freedom of an adjunct faculty member teaching religion courses. The faculty member taught at a course on Catholicism at a state university, University of Illinois. After sending an email that some considered offensive he was dismissed. The story is well worth reading if you have interest in religious issues or academic freedom.

Spirituality in Journal of College and Character

The current issue of Journal of College and Character is a special issue on spirituality in college. If you are interested in religion and education, or in religious or spiritual development, check out this issue (Vol. 11, No. 3).

Limits of Understanding

If, like me, you are unable to attend the World Science Festival in New York City now underway, you can still enjoy some of the session by viewing the webcast they are providing. Click http://www.worldsciencefestival.com/live-intro to enjoy the sessions online. I am particularly interested in the session Friday evening, on The Limits of Understanding. Included on the panel will be Marvin Minsky, whose work I remember enjoying in grad school. It should be a fascinating session.