Undergraduate Accomplishments
The Psychology Department is proud of the accomplishments of our undergraduate students. Check out some of the highlights from this year:
On May 15, most of our Psychology Honors students as well as a large number of their colleagues -- 80 students in all -- participated in the campuswide Undergraduate Research Symposium.
Congratulations to the ten psychology majors who were named Mary Gates Scholars this year. Our Leadership Scholar is Bailey Warrior. Research Scholars are: Sarah Colombo, Karalyn Holten, Georgia Judd, Greta Kaese, Abigail Lim, Baihan Lin, Aida Mohamed Zain, Makenzie Muilenburg, and Sullivan Swift.
This year, we offered the first round of Psychology Department Honors Travel Awards. Our 2015 awardees (listed with their faculty sponsors) are: Lucy Dong (Peter Vitaliano, Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences), Veronica Kang (Sara Jane Webb, Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences), Elyse Postlewaite (Deborah McCutchen, Education), Shane Snyder (Peter Vitaliano, Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences), Allisa Song (Charles Chavkin, Pharmacology), Aida Mohamed Zain (Susan Joslyn, Psychology), and Emily Zeng (Peter Vitaliano, Psychiatry and Behavioral Sciences).
The 2015 Guthrie Prize was awarded to two of our graduating seniors, Sarah Colombo and Lucie Saether. Named for the late psychology professor Edwin R. Guthrie, the prize was established to encourage excellent writing about psychology that is both broad in scope and accessible to the non-specialist. Sarah won in the Best Empirical Paper category. Her paper, "Gender Identity Denial in Children," was sponsored by Assistant Professor Kristina Olson. Lucie's paper, "Do Infants Differentiate Moral and Conventional Transgressions?," was sponsored by Associate Professor Jessica Sommerville and won in the Best Research Proposal category.
Each spring, the College of Arts and Sciences awards the Dean's Medal to a top student in each academic division. Alex Kale was the Psychology Department's nominee for the Dean's Medal in the Natural Sciences Division. Alex will graduate Magna Cum Laude with a Bachelor of Science degree in psychology and minors in both philosophy and music. A member of Phi Beta Kappa and a trumpet player in the UW Studio Jazz Ensemble, Alex completed his psychology honors work under the direction of Professor Steve Buck. Alex was also the recipient of the 2014 Guthrie Prize for the best conceptual/review paper. Read more about Alex here.
In addition to being our Dean's Medal nominee, Alex was selected by the Arts and Sciences Dean's Office to represent the College at Commencement as a gonfalonier. The gonfaloniere (as they are called collectively), are outstanding graduating seniors who represent their colleges by carrying large banners -- gonfalons -- into the Commencement Ceremony. We are proud to have such an outstanding student representing our department!
The following students were invited to join Phi Beta Kappa this year: Emily Bunch, Katherine Caldwell, Grace Choi, Julie Chung, Sarah Colombo, Natali Coronel, Hannah Davich, Carly Fritz, Meyer Gorelick, Judy Han, Chenxu Hao, Benjamin Holman, Luke Hong, Ahn Huynh, Alex Kale, Haley Kerchman, Mitchell Krawczyk, Chu-Hsuan Kuo, Shu Lo, Zoe Miles, Mykelle Morrison, Stephanie Mundt, Carol Nishikawa, Leah Ogier, Riley Perdue, Elyse Postlewaite, Yingxue Rao, Lauren Selby, Victoria Slaven, Lorena Smith, Tyler Tanguchi, Annika Veis, Kelsey Wallach, Mitchell Walton, Jasmine Yip, and Vera Zaytsev.