Dr. Heather C. Lench

Assistant Professor
Ph.D., University of California, Irvine (2007)


Department of Psychology
Texas A&M University
College Station, TX 77843-4235

Office: 255 Psychology Building
email: hlench@psych.tamu.edu
Phone: (979) 845-0377
Fax: (979) 845-4727
Web: http://heatherlench.com



Area(s) of Specialization
Social Psychology

Research Interests

Emotion and cognition
Decision-making
Forecasting
Optimism

Current Research

I am interested in the interactions between cognitions and emotions, including: 1) how thoughts and emotions influence judgments about the likelihood of future events and judgments about emotional reactions to those events, 2) how thoughts before entering a situation influence emotional and behavioral reactions and 3) the implications of forecasts for health, memory and success.

Awards and Honors

Chancellor’s Club for Excellence Fellowship (2006)
Mentor Award, University of California, Irvine (2006)
American Psychological Association Dissertation Research Award (2005)
National Institute of Mental Health Training Fellowship (2002-2004)

Representative Publications

Lench, H.C., & Levine, L.J. (2005). Effects of fear on risk and control judgments and memory:
Implications for health promotion messages. Cognition and Emotion, 19, 1049-1069.

Levine, L.J., Safer, M.A., & Lench, H.C. (2006). Remembering and misremembering
emotions. In L.J Sanna & E.C. Chang (Eds.), Judgments over time: The interplay of thoughts, feelings, and behaviors (pp. 271-290). New York: Oxford University Press.

Price, P.C., Smith, A.R., & Lench, H.C. (2006). Effects of group size on the perceived risk of the average group member: The more, the riskier. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 90, 382-398.

Lench, H.C., Quas, J.A., & Edelstein, R. (2006). My child is better than average: The
extension and restriction of unrealistic optimism. Journal of Applied Social Psychology, 36,
2963-2979.

Lench, H.C., & Ditto, P.H. (in press). Automatic optimism: Biased use of base rate information for positive and negative events. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology.

Courses Taught

Undergraduate
PSYC 107: Introduction to Psychology
PSYC 315: Social Psychology

Research Interest Groups
Personality and Individual Differences Focus Group


This site is best experienced with Microsoft's Internet Explorer 6 brower.

If you have questions or comments concerning this website, please contact the webmaster at:  sgupta@psych.tamu.edu