Shelby Peterson and Alex Bellows present at Eastern Psychological Association annual conference

Senior psychology majors Shelby Peterson ('14) and Alex Bellows ('14) recently presented on research that they are currently conducting with Julie Longua Peterson, Ph.D., assistant professor in the Department of Psychology, at the annual conference for the Eastern Psychological Association in Boston.
 

The presentation, titled "The Benefits of Perspective-taking in Close Relationships," examined how implicit self-esteem influences perceptions of relationship closeness after a perspective-taking manipulation. Results indicated that participants low (vs. high) in implicit self-esteem reported significantly lower closeness in the control condition. However, in the perspective-taking condition, people low and high in implicit self-esteem did not differ in closeness. This was due to a significant increase in closeness among low implicit-self-esteem participants.

Results suggest perspective-taking is one method by which relationship closeness can be improved among people with low implicit self-esteem.