Psychology | Self Regulation
Self Regulation | Crossareas
Self Regulation
If you answered "yes" to these questions, you are not alone. For example, the popular press and everyday common sense suggest that people are more likely to do something (e.g., volunteer to live on an island with a group of strangers) when they expect a reward. In fact, however, psychologists believe that the best answer to this first question is "it depends."
For more information about this topic and other research questions -- and a preview of current faculty research interests and projects--, please surf our list of self-regulation topics. This list presents a subset of our shared research interests, but there is much more (see individual faculty web pages for complete listings of ongoing projects, grants, and classes).
About the Self-Regulation Interest Area
Self-regulation, broadly defined, is the set of processes through which people work toward their goals. Collectively, we examine personality, emotional, social, developmental, and environmental or situational factors that influence the goals people choose, how they think about them and pursue them, how they react to difficulties in goal pursuit, and how all of these processes are influenced by other people's opinions and behaviors over the lifespan.
A Common Framework
At the University of Utah, a critical core of faculty across clinical, developmental, social and health areas is interested in understanding not just whether and when external events or individual characteristics affect someone's behavior, but *how* they do so. Although faculty may differ in the particular process or outcome they are most interested in studying, they share a common view of human agency -- that people are active beings who not only react to their environments, but also act on them. That is, we believe that people are both affected by their context and creators of that context. The context can be the physical environment, other people, or even internal states, such as mood. Thus, we focus on affective, cognitive, motivational, and social processes that underlie people's regulation of themselves and others, with a special interest in diverse social and physical environments across the life span. This common focus leads to several active collaborative research programs within and across areas in the department. Click here for a list of such collaborations. Many of us are actively involved in the interpersonal processes, health, developmental-social, and diversity interest areas as well.
Additionally, we are developing an annual interdisciplinary Utah Symposium on Self-Regulation (please check the site in the future for more details).
The following sections describe the research programs of individual faculty, list recent faculty books, provide links to our graduate students, and describe graduate seminars in self-regulation.
Faculty
Lisa Aspinwall
Timothy w. Smith
Carol Werner
Self Regulation in the Curriculum
- It's not my problem it's ours: Interdependence in problem appraisal and strategies for solving everyday problems
- Once a boring task always a boring task?
- Wake up and smell the coffee: Optimism helps people pay attention to useful negative information.
- Does talking with your partner affect the way your body responds to stress?
If you answered "yes" to these questions, you are not alone. For example, the popular press and everyday common sense suggest that people are more likely to do something (e.g., volunteer to live on an island with a group of strangers) when they expect a reward. In fact, however, psychologists believe that the best answer to this first question is "it depends."
For more information about this topic and other research questions -- and a preview of current faculty research interests and projects--, please surf our list of self-regulation topics. This list presents a subset of our shared research interests, but there is much more (see individual faculty web pages for complete listings of ongoing projects, grants, and classes).
About the Self-Regulation Interest Area
Self-regulation, broadly defined, is the set of processes through which people work toward their goals. Collectively, we examine personality, emotional, social, developmental, and environmental or situational factors that influence the goals people choose, how they think about them and pursue them, how they react to difficulties in goal pursuit, and how all of these processes are influenced by other people's opinions and behaviors over the lifespan.
A Common Framework
At the University of Utah, a critical core of faculty across clinical, developmental, social and health areas is interested in understanding not just whether and when external events or individual characteristics affect someone's behavior, but *how* they do so. Although faculty may differ in the particular process or outcome they are most interested in studying, they share a common view of human agency -- that people are active beings who not only react to their environments, but also act on them. That is, we believe that people are both affected by their context and creators of that context. The context can be the physical environment, other people, or even internal states, such as mood. Thus, we focus on affective, cognitive, motivational, and social processes that underlie people's regulation of themselves and others, with a special interest in diverse social and physical environments across the life span. This common focus leads to several active collaborative research programs within and across areas in the department. Click here for a list of such collaborations. Many of us are actively involved in the interpersonal processes, health, developmental-social, and diversity interest areas as well.
Additionally, we are developing an annual interdisciplinary Utah Symposium on Self-Regulation (please check the site in the future for more details).
The following sections describe the research programs of individual faculty, list recent faculty books, provide links to our graduate students, and describe graduate seminars in self-regulation.
Faculty
Lisa Aspinwall
Timothy w. Smith
Carol Werner
Self Regulation in the Curriculum
- Beyond coping: Self-regultion, adaptation, and health.
- Diversity and Motivation
