VCU Social Psychology Program

Jessica Barber

I earned my undergraduate degree from Lebanon Valley College and in 2007, I entered VCU’s Social Psychology program. My research interests lie at the intersection of social psychology and politics.  Building upon work competed for my master’s thesis, I am currently investigating how the strength of a given argument and the specific type of language it contains influence a message’s persuasiveness. In addition, I am examining the linguistic strategies employed within actual political speeches and to better understand how these techniques are used to persuade would-be voters. With these studies serving as a foundation, I plan to continue investigating the link between language and attitude change in more applied political contexts in the future.  I am also involved with an ongoing project that examines the link between reality television and narcissism.

View more information on Jessica's Shook Lab page.

Publication

Kuhle, B. X., Barber, J. M., & Bristol, A. S. (2009). Predicting students’ performance in introductory psychology from their psychology misconceptions. Journal of Instructional Psychology, 36(2), 119-124.

Presentations

Barber, J. M., Horton, R. H., & Green, J. D. (2009, February and April). The reality of narcissism: Is there a link between TV-viewing and self-love? Poster presented at 1) the annual meeting of the Society for Personality and Social Psychology, Tampa, Florida and 2) the annual Virginia Commonwealth University Graduate Student Research Symposium, Richmond, VA.

Kuhle, B. X., & Barber, J. M. (2006). Predicting students’ performance in introductory psychology from their psychology misconceptions. Poster presented at the annual meeting of the Eastern Psychological Association, Baltimore, MD.

• Application of Statistics to Psychology, teaching assistant, undergraduate level
• Social Psychology, primary instructor, undergraduate level