The SCALE LAB
Social and Cognitive Applications to Law and Education
Welcome!
The SCALE Lab is led by Dr. Alison Kelly, an Associate Professor in the General/Experimental and Forensic Psychology graduate programs at the University of North Dakota
Our Research
The research we do in the SCALE Lab broadly falls within two areas:
The Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (SoTL)
Psychology and Law
In both areas, we focus on applying social or cognitive psychological theories to topics of interest.
Scholarship of Teaching and Learning
Our SoTL projects mostly focus on the impact of inclusive and equity-based pedagogy on student perceptions and outcomes, including things like learning, motivation, and sense of belonging. The overarching goal of this research is to provide empirical support for these pedagogical practices and highlight the ways they benefit students.
Examples of recent projects:
Improving gender and racial equity and representation in the undergraduate psychology curriculum
How open pedagogical practices (i.e., practices centering students as knowledge co-creators vs. knowledge consumers) impact students’ motivation and sense of belonging
Using motivational interventions to improve students’ perceptions of active learning
Psychology and Law
Our Psychology and Law projects mostly focus on factors impacting eyewitness memory accuracy and perceptions of gender and sexual minority victims and defendants.
Examples of recent projects:
The effects of co-witness misinformation on memory for negative events
The impact of social anxiety on co-witness suggestibility
The effects of defendant gender identity and type of crime on juror judgments