I am a social/personality psychologist and my work has been largely on emotions and other kinds of feelings, how they arise, how they are organized, and their role in behavior. In addition, I have done some work on personal epistomologies, psychological factors in medical adherence and outcome, and on feelings associated with memory and judgement.

The major topic areas of my research are how self-perception processes give rise to emotional and other feelings. Recently, the focus has been on individual differences in self-perception processes, and in the effects of psychophysiological arousal on feelings.

Primary Interests:

Emotion, Mood, Affect
Evolution and Genetics
Group Processes
Health Psychology
Judgment and Decision Making
Neuroscience, Psychophysiology
Person Perception
Personality, Individual Differences
Self and Identity

Emotion, Mood, Affect
Evolution and Genetics
Group Processes
Health Psychology
Judgment and Decision Making

Neuroscience, Psychophysiology
Person Perception
Personality, Individual Differences
Self and Identity

Books:

Flack, W. F. & Laird, J.D. (Eds.) (1998) Emotion and psychopathology: Theory and research. New York: Oxford U. Press.
Laird, J.D. (2007) Feelings: The Perception of Self. New York: Oxford University Press.
R. Bibace, J. Laird, K. L. Noller, & J. Valsiner (Eds). (2005) Science and medicine in dialogue: Thinking through particulars and universals. Westport, CT: Greenwood.

Journal Articles:

Schnall, S., & Laird, J. D. (2007). Facing Fear: Expression of Fear Facilitates Processing of Emotional Information. Social Behavior and Personality, 35(8).
Strout,S.L., Laird,J.D., Shafer, A. & Thompson, N.S. (2005) The Effect of Vividness of Experience on Sex Differences in Jealousy. Evolutionary Psychology. 3, 263-274.
Strout, S.L., Sokol, R.I., Laird, J.D., Thompson, N. S. (2004) The evolutionary foundation of perceiving one’s own emotions. Behavior and Philosophy. 32, 493-502

Other Publications:

Laird, J. D. & Strout, S. (2007) Emotional Behaviors As Emotional Stimuli, In James A. Coan and John J. B. Allen, (Eds). The Handbook of Emotion Elicitation and Assessment New York: Oxford Univ. Press.

Courses Taught:

General Psychology
Psychophysiology
Research in Social Psychology

Research in Social Psychology

Jim Laird
Frances Hiatt School of Psychology
Clark University
950 Main Street
Worcester, MA 01610
United States

Phone: (508) 793-7272