People

Christina M. Garasky, MA

Christina is a third-year graduate student in the Behavioral Neuroscience doctoral program. She earned a BS in Neuroscience from the University of Minnesota and an MA in Behavioral Neuroscience from UMSL. Her research interests include implicit bias, stigma, confronting prejudice, and stress reactivity.

Current Projects:  Experiences of stigma during COVID-19; Effects of threatening virtual environments.

Current work:

Casad, B. J., Franks, J. E., Garasky, C. E., Kittleman, M. M., Roesler, A. C., Hall, D. Y., & Petzel, Z. W. (2020). Gender inequality in academia: Problems and solutions for women faculty in STEM. Journal of Neuroscience Research.

Garasky, C. E., E. Gul, T., Jancetic, T. R., Brown, A. K., & Casad, B. J. (2021, February). Anxious responses to sexism cause poorer self-control and avoidance motivation among women. Poster accepted for presentation at the 22nd annual conference of the Society for Personality and Social Psychology. Virtual.

Garasky, C. E., Petzel Z. W., Kittleman, M. M., & Casad, B. J. (2020, May). External motivation predicts inhibition and lower self-control among women who do not confront sexism. Poster presented at the 32nd annual conference of the Association for Psychological Science. Chicago, Illinois.

Casad, B. J., Petzel, Z. W., Kittleman, M. M., Garasky, C. E., & Franks, J. E. (2020, February). Motivation to confront prejudice predicts women’s approach, challenge, and threat responses to sexism. Poster presented at the Gender Pre-Conference of the 21st annual conference of the Society for Personality and Social Psychology. New Orleans, Louisiana.

Koellner, E. A., Kittleman, M. M., Garasky, C. E., Petzel, Z. W., & Casad, B. J. (2020, February) Gender stigma consciousness buffers the effects of sexism. Poster presented at the Gender Pre-Conference of the 21st annual conference of the Society for Personality and Social Psychology. New Orleans, Louisiana.

Manuscripts in Preparation:

Casad, B. J., Petzel, Z., Garasky, C.E., Kittleman, M. M., & Franks, J. E. Effects of sexism on motivational responses.

Casad, B. J., Garasky, C. E., Petzel, Z., Kittleman, M. M., & Franks, J. E. How we confront sexism and the consequences we face.

Casad, B. J., Garasky, C. E., Kittleman, M. M., Franks, J. E., & Petzel, Z .W. Mapping language, physiology, and brain activity to women’s emotional and motivational responses to sexism.

Jillian E. Franks, BS

Jillian is a second-year student in the Behavioral Neuroscience MA program. She earned her BS in Neuroscience from Rhodes College in Memphis, TN. Her research interests include neural synchronization, performance, implicit racial bias, and empathy.

Current Projects: The other-race effect and emojis: A memory and ERP study using diverse emojis (thesis); Effects of threatening virtual environments; and confronting prejudice

Current Work:

Casad, B. J., Franks, J. E., Garasky, C. E., Kittleman, M. M., Roesler, A. C., Hall, D. Y., & Petzel, Z. W. (2020). Gender inequality in academia: Problems and solutions for women faculty in STEM. Journal of Neuroscience Research.

Casad, B. J., Sullivan, E. T., Kittleman, M. M., Garasky, C. E., Franks, J. E., & Fague, M. Calling-out or calling in? Confrontation style affects evaluations of allies. Manuscript in preparation.

Casad, B. J., Garasky, C. E., Kittleman, M. M., Franks, J. E., & Petzel, Z. W. Motivation to confront sexism affects women’s cognitive performance after experiencing sexism. Manuscript in preparation.

Casad, B. J., Garasky, C. E., Kittleman, M. M., Franks, J. E., & Petzel, Z. W. Mapping language, physiology, and brain activity to women’s emotional and motivational responses to sexism. Manuscript in preparation.

Casad, B. J., Sullivan, E. T., Kittleman, M. M., Garasky, C. E., Franks, J. E., & Fague, M. Calling-out or calling in? Confrontation style affects evaluations of allies. Manuscript in preparation.

Bethany Friedman, BA

Bethany is a first year PhD student in the Behavioral Neuroscience program. She earned her BA in Psychology from Salisbury University. Her research interests include stereotype threat and implicit bias related to minority groups.

Current Projects: Effects of threatening virtual environments; confronting prejudice; microaggressions and health in LGBTQ people.

Current work:

Franks, J. E., Bach, C. R., Friedman, B. S., Redding, D. A. T., & Casad, B. J. (2021, February). STEM majors’ cardiovascular reactivity following sexism in a mixed gender group. Poster accepted for presentation at the 21^st annual convention of the Society for Personality and Social Psychology. Virtual conference.

Taylor Jancetic, BS

Taylor is a first year student in the Behavioral Neuroscience MA program. She earned her BS in Psychology from the University of Missouri-Columbia where she worked in the Cognitive and Clinical Neuroscience lab studying unconscious processing of words. Her research interests include cross-cultural communication, long- term health implications of neural activation, and social identity .

Current Projects: African American vernacular and face processing; effects of threatening environments on women in STEM.

Current Work:

Garasky, C. E., Gul T., Jancetic, T. R., Brown, A. K., & Casad, B. J. (2021, February). Anxious responses to sexism cause poorer self-control and avoidance motivation among women. Poster accepted for presentation at the 22nd annual conference of the Society for Personality and Social Psychology. Virtual.

Casad, B. J., Franks, J. E., Jancetic, T. R., Petzel, Z. W., Kittleman, M. M., & Garasky, C. E., & Casad, B. J. Effects of sexism on women STEM majors during a science group problem solving case. Manuscript in preparation.

Zachary W. Petzel, PhD

Zach earned his PhD in Psychology with an emphasis in Behavioral Neuroscience in December 2018. From 2018-2020 he was a post-doctoral scholar at Queen's University in Belfast, Northern Ireland. Effective January 2021, Dr. Petzel is Assistant Professor at the University of Newcastle, United Kingdom. His dissertation research examined effects of alcohol priming on implicit racism.

Lab Related Publications:

Petzel, Z. W., & Casad, B. J. (in press). Take a chance on STEM: Risk-taking buffers negative effects of stereotype threat. Journal of Experimental Education.

Casad, B. J., Franks, J. E., Garasky, C. E., Kittleman, M. M., Roesler, A. C., Hall, D. Y., & Petzel, Z. W. (2020). Gender inequality in academia: Problems and solutions for women faculty in STEM. Journal of Neuroscience Research.

Petzel, Z. W., Noel, J. G., & Casad, B. J. (2019). I’m tired and feel like drinking: Viewing alcohol cues after exerting self-control increases approach motivation among individuals lower in alcohol sensitivity. Psychology of Addictive Behaviors, 33(7), 626-636.

Petzel, Z. W., & Casad, B. J. (2019). Sexism predicts alcohol use and motivations among college women with stronger alcohol identity. Social Cognition, 37, 341-354.

Casad, B. J., Petzel, Z. W., & Ingalls, E. A. (2019). A model of threatening academic environments predicts women STEM majors' self-esteem and engagement in STEM. Sex Roles, 80, 469-488.

Casad, B. J., & Petzel, Z. W. (2018). Heart rate variability moderates challenge and threat responses to sexism among women in STEM. Social Psychology, 49(4), 191-204.

Melinda M. (Siebert) Kittleman, PhD

Mindy earned her PhD in Psychology with an emphasis in Behavioral Neuroscience in May 2020. She is currently a full-time teacher for a private school in Clayton, MO. Her dissertation research examined social media and effects of racism on physical and mental health.

Lab Related Publications:

Casad, B. J., Franks, J. E., Garasky, C. E., Kittleman, M. M., Roesler, A. C., Hall, D. Y., & Petzel, Z. W. (2020). Gender inequality in academia: Problems and solutions for women faculty in STEM. Journal of Neuroscience Research.

Casad, B. J., Manwarring, A. M., Kittleman, M. M., & Ventouratos-Fotinatos, R. United in economic crisis? Greek-European identity integration predicts positive intergroup relations. Targeted journal: International Journal of Psychology. Under revision.

Casad, B. J., Ventouratos-Fotinatos, R., Manwarring, A. M., & Kittleman, M. M. Group status threat predicts highly identified Britons’ Brexit voting and intergroup relations. Targeted journal: European Journal of Social Psychology. Under revision.

Casad, B. J., Kittleman, M. M., Garasky, C. E., Franks, J. E., Petzel, Z. W., Sullivan, E. T., & Manwarring, A. M. Development and validation of a motivation to confront prejudice scale. In preparation.

Anne M. Manwarring, MA

Anne earned her MA in Psychology with an emphasis in Behavioral Neuroscience in May 2018. She is currently a Clinical Research Coordinator with Synexus and was previously Clinical Research Coordinator with Midwest Research Group.

Lab Related Work:

Casad, B. J., Manwarring, A. M., Kittleman, M. M., & Ventouratos-Fotinatos, R. United in economic crisis? Greek-European identity integration predicts positive intergroup relations. Targeted journal: International Journal of Psychology. Under revision.

Casad, B. J., Ventouratos-Fotinatos, R., Manwarring, A. M., & Kittleman, M. M. Group status threat predicts highly identified Britons’ Brexit voting and intergroup relations. Targeted journal: European Journal of Social Psychology. Under revision.

Casad, B. J., Kittleman, M. M., Garasky, C. E., Franks, J. E., Petzel, Z. W., Sullivan, E. T., & Manwarring, A. M. Development and validation of a motivation to confront prejudice scale. In preparation.