I jointly direct the MadGuy lab with my colleague Dr. Stephanie Madon.  The MadGuy lab includes current graduate students as well as 20 - 30 undergraduate students who assist with ongoing research studies.  The lab's primary function is to investigate phenomenon related to police interrogation, confessions, eyewitness identification, and forensic science.  

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The psychology and law faculty at Iowa State University include: Dr. Jason Chan (cognitive psychology), Dr. Max Guyll (social psychology), Dr. Stephanie Madon (social psychology), Dr. Chris Meissner (cognitive psychology), Dr. Andrew Smith (cognitive psychology), and Dr. Gary Wells (social psychology).  Scroll down for additional information about the social psychology program and psychology and law faculty research interests. Information for the psychology and law concentration can be found here.

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STUDYING PSYCHOLOGY AND LAW AT IOWA STATE UNIVERSITY

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Graduate students looking to study psychology and law at Iowa State University will have the opportunity to work alongside several distinguished researchers in the field.  In addition, students will present their research to other graduate students with similar interests, and attend guest lectures by psychology and law researchers from other institutions around the world.

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At Iowa State University, "psychology and law" is a research concentration - not an academic area. Graduate students enroll in either the social psychology area or the cognitive psychology area, and thereby acquire specialized training in the theories and methods of the area they select. Thus, we first and foremost train graduate students to be social psychologists or cognitive psychologists, though they apply their training to research topics within psychology and law. On the graduate application, applicants should indicate whether they seek to be in the social psychology area or in the cognitive psychology area. As noted above, each faculty is associated with a particular area. In their application statement, applicants normally identify one or two faculty as potential major advisors. Accordingly, applicants are typically expected to seek admission to the academic area that corresponds to the area with which a potential major advisor is affiliated. If an applicant is interested in multiple faculty who are in different areas, the applicant may indicate an interest in both areas.

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​​​GRADUATE STUDY IN SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGY AT IOWA STATE UNIVERSITY

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The social psychology program at ISU is highly competitive. Current students have high GRE scores and strong records of academic achievement in college.  Most of our Ph.D. students acquired extensive research experience at their undergraduate institutions prior to coming to Iowa State University.

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Students who graduate from the social psychology doctoral program are qualified to work at colleges and universities conducting research and teaching at the graduate and undergraduate level.  Graduates of the program have been highly successful in obtaining academic jobs.  A Ph.D. in social psychology also qualifies one for more applied work (e.g., market research), although the social psychology program does not specifically train students for such positions.

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Students applying to the doctoral program in social psychology at Iowa State University who wish to work in the MadGuy lab should have research interests in psychology and law.  Graduate students in the MadGuy lab coordinate lab activities, contribute heavily to all on-going research projects, manage and organize the involvement of undergraduate research assistants, and are authors on publications and conference presentations.  Graduate students are also encouraged to develop their own research studies in the area of psychology and law.

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