Greetings from the Industrial/Organizational Psychology Program
at Colorado State University
Fall 2024
Message from the Program Coordinator
Dr. Gwen Fisher
Hello from Colorado State University!
We are excited to welcome and introduce you to our outstanding new cohort of graduate students (Malory Bostwick, Luiza Flores, and Allie Kom), all of whom hit the ground running during their first semester at CSU.
We are thrilled to share some exciting news about our students. Congratulations to 3rd year doctoral student,Kesea Nutter, and her partner, Jake, on the birth of their son, Kaleb, who was born on November 24.
Congratulations to our most recent graduates, Dr. Annika Benson, now a Senior Training/Organization Development Analyst at Placer County in California, and Dr. Kemol Anderson, Senior Management Consultant at Deloitte Consulting. Kinjal Chheda, a third-year PhD student, will begin a position as a Data Science Intern at Hogan Assessments starting in January. Roz Stoa, 5th year PhD student, recently accepted a position with The Aldridge Group(TAG), a Fort Collins-based assessment and development consulting firm. Brittany Lynner and Chloe Goldman are interns in the U.S. Office of Personnel Management Pathways program where they anticipate working after completing the doctoral program. Rebecca Clancy is a Human Capital Consultant at Lodestone People Consulting. Kelsie Colley is an Organizational Design Consultant at State Farm. Congratulations to alumni on new positions: Dr. Julia Beckel – Engineering Research Psychologist at the Federal Aviation Administration in Oklahoma City; Dr. Jaclyn Menendez – Consulting Manager at Hogan Assessments; If you have a new position or any other news you would like to share with our program, please contact Dr. Keaton Fletcher, our CSU I-O Psychology communications chairperson, at keaton.fletcher@colostate.edu.
Since 2001, CSU has offered a program in occupational health psychology (OHP) that complements the I-O psychology doctoral program by providing additional coursework and training related to worker safety, health, and well-being. We are grateful to Drs. Peter Chen and Lorann Stallones for initiating this program, and it is currently stronger than ever, with tremendous help and support from I-O faculty (Drs. Bryan Dik, Kim French, Keaton Fletcher, Alyssa Gibbons, and Danni Gardner) and our other Psychology colleagues (Drs. Lorann Stallones, Dan Graham, and Chris Wickens). As Program Director, I am thrilled to welcome Dr. Keaton Fletcher as the new Assistant Director. This fall we completed the competing renewal proposal to request five more years of extramural funding from the National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (NIOSH) to support OHP graduate student training. All 1st, 2nd, and 3rd year CSU I-O students and almost all senior students participate in the OHP program. Since July 2020 OHP faculty and students have 125 publications and 144 presentations at national and international conferences. I-O students have earned 8 M.S. degrees and 7PhDs since 2020.
We hope for a positive outcome of the review and funding decision process,especially with some uncertainty about the federal budget in the new year.
As many of you may know, the next Society for I-O Psychology Annual Conference will be in Denver April 2-5,2025. We are planning a big party to connect with as many of you as possible here in Colorado!
Please stay tuned for the details.
Many thanks to Luiza Flores and Keaton Fletcher for putting this newsletter together! Please read on for more information and updates, and best wishes to you and your significant others during the holiday season and into the new year!
Thank you,
Gwen
Donate to Support I-O Students at CSU
Did you know that the Department of Psychology has two dedicated scholarships for I-O doctoral students? In your time at CSU, perhaps you benefited from the Charles & Martha Neidt Award (named for former CSU Academic Vice President Dr. Chuck Neidt, active in Human Factors research and methodology, and his wife Martha) or the I-O Graduate Fellowship (intended to support I-O students more generally). These scholarships have been an important source of supplemental funding for students for years, but the endowments are starting to run low, and we are currently able to award only token amounts to our deserving students. Can you help us replenish them?
To donate, start from https://advancing.colostate.edu/CNS/PSYCH/GIVE; before you indicate an amount, click the “Support Another Fund” link and then choose “Charles and Martha Neidt Graduate Award” or “Industrial/Organizational Psychology Graduate Fellowship” from the drop-down menu. Click on the amount you’d like to give in the second set of green boxes to ensure that it goes directly to the scholarship you choose. You can also contact any of the program faculty, we’re happy to help! We appreciate your generosity in paving the way for the next generation of CSU I-O psychologists!
Meet the New Cohort
Malory Bostwick
Research Interests: Work-family stress,meaning & purpose, burnout, and motivation
Advisor: Dr. Kim French
Undergraduate Institution: Auburn University
Outside of Work: Hiking, hanging out with my dog, and reading
Luiza Flores
Research Interests: Work-family conflict,occupational health psychology, and employee wellbeing
Advisor: Dr. Kim French
Undergraduate Institution: Purdue University
Outside of Work: Photography and reading
Allie Kom
Research Interests: Leadership, teams, and occupational health psychology
Advisor: Dr. Keaton Fletcher
Undergraduate Institution: Valparaiso University
Outside of Work: Running, reading, and drinking coffee
Lab Updates
RISE Lab
Pictured (from left): Danni Gardner, Danielle West, Shelby Davis, Joselle Gyamfi, Kinjal Chheda, Jade Loerzel
Researching Identity & Stigma in Employment (RISE) Lab
Dr. Danni Gardner
The RISE lab continues to conduct, present, and publish research related to identity and marginalization at work. The past year has brought many reasons for celebration for our members, including the graduation of two undergraduate research assistants (Jade Loerzel and Joselle Gyamfi, now a doctoral student at George Washington University), and the welcoming of Emilia Morao as our new undergraduate lab member. Our graduate members have advanced in their milestones and earned notable recognition: Danielle West received the Top OHP Poster Award at the 2024 MAP ERC Research Day Symposium,Kinjal Chheda passed her comprehensive exams, and Shelby Davis earned a Blacks in Industrial and Organizational Psychology Visibility and Innovation Scholarship! Finally, we celebrate Dr. Julia Beckel, who successfully defended her dissertation and is continuing her career as an Engineering Research Psychologist at the Federal Aviation Administration- we are so proud of all of our members’ accomplishments!
Work Family Health Lab
Dr. Kim French
The Work Family Health Lab examines how managing work and family affects individual and family health and wellbeing. We welcomed two new graduate student members this year, Malory Bostwick and Luiza Flores.We’ve been working on an NSF funded grant to understand employee health and wellbeing benefits access and communications in collaboration with the LION lab. Preliminary data show there are gaps in which benefits employees know about, and that common communication channels are not ideal for learning about benefit offerings. Shout out to Malory for jumping in to help run this project and to undergraduate research assistants Garrett Castleberry, John Poturalski, Tony Ramirez, Sarah Rose, and Sam Willency who have played an integral role in developing, running, and writing up the study. Building on some recent published work from the lab, Luiza is beginning to explore how support and work-family spillover are experienced among working single parents. Kim has also been busy making new connections and giving invited talks this year. Her favorite was a TED-like talk for the Work Family Researchers Network “Big Ideas” keynote series. Her talk debunked “Three lies we tell ourselves about work-family conflict.”
You can watch the talk and all the “Big Ideas” in work-family here.
Kim French – Three Lies We Tell Ourselves About Work-Family Conflict
Work Family Health and LION Lab
Pictured Left to Right: Luiza Flores, Malory Bostwick, Kim French,Keaton Fletcher, and Allie Kom
LION Lab
Dr. Keaton Fletcher
The LION (leadership in organizational networks) lab is chugging along! New graduate student Allie Kom has hit the ground running and taken on leadership roles with ease. Undergraduate lab manager, Gino Sechi, has been instrumental in getting the massive undertaking of an NSF-funded team-based data collection including psychophysiological recording back underway. Our lab has submitted to SIOP, Work Stress & Health, and Rocky Mountain Psychological Association conferences with papers that include both graduate and undergraduate student authors! Cooper Drose (a LION lab graduate student still at Georgia Tech) has helped onboard and guide the new lab leadership in their roles and is managing data collection on an NSF-funded experience sampling study, and Claire Burnett (also a LION lab student still at Georgia Tech) has started a full-time position at Russel Reynolds Associates and is moments away from defending her dissertation.
Prasad Lab
Dr. Josh Prasad
The Prasad Lab includes Kelsie Colley, Hannah Finch, Annika Benson, Brittany Lynner, and Kesea Nutter. This year marks the beginning of many of our members’ next steps in their careers. Having defended her dissertation, Annika Benson is working for Placer County as a Senior Training/Organizational Development Analyst.Kelsie Colley proposed her dissertation and is working as an Organizational Design Consultant at State Farm. Brittany Lynner also proposed her dissertation and is working for the U.S. Office of Personnel Management as a Personnel Research Psychologist (Student Trainee). Hannah Finch has taken a faculty position at Front Range Community College as she works towards her dissertation. Finally, Kesea Nutter is diligently preparing for her comprehensive exam. Our research continues to focus on promoting neurodiversity through evaluating online asynchronous video interviews, authenticity at work, and applications of machine learning in talent management. We also continue to support the NSF-funded Rocky Mountain Alliance for Minority Participation in STEM, where Josh serves as a co-Principal Investigator and recent recipient of additional NSF funding for research related to that work.
Calling and Meaningful Work Lab
Dr. Bryan Dik
Members of the Calling and Meaningful Work Lab (“Dik lab” for short) include a mix of Counseling and I-O students: Malory Bostwick, Missy Ferland, Alexa Jayne, Dylan Marsh, Roz Stoa, Nyima Tenzin, and Bailey Underill. Our work spans a range of topics related to eudaimonic wellbeing at work, including meaning and purpose, calling and vocation, and religion and spirituality in the workplace. This spring the lab participated together in an 8-hour intervention designed to foster a sense of purpose in life, facilitated by Dr. Brad Wright (University of Connecticut). We are currently wrapping up a test of an online intervention designed to promote purposeful work in undergraduate career development, and preparing to launch an incremental validity study examining the predictive utility (or lack thereof) of commonly used measures of workplace spirituality.
Fisher Lab
Dr. Gwen Fisher
Gwen and students in the Fisher lab have been working on a handful of occupational
health psychology projects. They published a paper in the American Journal of
Occupational Therapy (Lynner, Stoa, Fisher, del Pozo, & Lizerbram, in press) entitled
Feel the Burn, Heal the Burn: Job Crafting and Burnout Among Occupational
Therapists. The study investigated the relative importance of job demands (e.g.,
workload, emotional labor, role ambiguity), job resources (e.g., professional identity,
autonomy, perceived support), and burnout and examined job crafting as a strategy
for reducing burnout. Burnout varied across occupational therapy positions and
practice areas and was most strongly associated with excessive workload.
Occupational therapy professionals who engaged in job crafting reported less
burnout. Several positive job resources, including meaningful work, job involvement,
and perceived organizational support, were positively correlated with job crafting.
Students in the lab have been focused on their dissertation research on topics like
new employee socialization and workplace safety (Roz), masking and worker well-
being among neurodivergent workers (Becca), email incivility and task performance
(Chloe), the Sunday Scaries, psychological recovery from work, and worker well-being (Della), and work-related flow (Ryan). They are also working on some research examining job characteristics and health and well-being outcomes in a nationally representative sample of middle-age and older adults using data from the Occupational Information Network and the Health and Retirement Study.
In May, Olivia Detry (undergrad RA) graduated from CSU and began the Master’s program in I-O psychology at Minnesota State – Mankato this fall.Current undergrad lab assistant, Morgan Wright, has been accepted to law school at her first choice: Regent University in Virginia. Congratulations, Morgan! Other graduating seniors have applied to various graduate programs in I-O psychology and we look forward to hearing where they will be heading!
Work Updates
Publications
Finsel, J. A., Matthews, R. A,, & Fisher, G. G. (in press). Family, work and the retirement process: A review and new directions. In M. Wang (Ed.), The Oxford handbook of retirement (2nd ed)). New York, NY: Oxford University Press.
Fisher, G. G. & Willis, R. (in press). Retirement research methods. In M. Wang (Ed.),The Oxford handbook of retirement (2nd ed)). New York, NY: Oxford University Press.
Fisher, G. G., French, K. A., & Prasad, J. (in press). Secondary analysis: Large, archival databases and big data: In N. Bowling, M. Shoss, & Z. Zhou (Eds.) How to Get Published in the Best Industrial-Organizational Psychology Journals. Northampton,MA: Edward Elgar Publishing.
Fletcher, K. A. Think of the children: A call for mainstream organizational research on child employment and labor. Occupational Health Science (In Press). (Q3)
Fletcher, K. A., Summers, J.K., Bedwell-Torres, W.L., Humphrey, S., Thomas, S.E., &Ramsay, P.S. (2024). Initial development of perceptions of ability and intent factorsof (un)trustworthiness in short-term teams. Journal of Organizational Behavior, 45,1025-1046. (Q1)
Fletcher, K. A., Friedman, A., & Wongworawat, D. M. (In Press). Understanding emotional intelligence to enhance leadership and individualized wellbeing. HandClinics.
Gardner, D. M., & Ryan, A. M. (2024). Does identity distancing beget work-life boundary segmentation? An examination of lesbian, gay & bisexual employees. Occupational Health Science, 1-22.
Goldman, C. M., Rider, T. R., Fisher, G. G., Loder, A. L., Schwatka, N. V., & Van Dyke, M.V. (2024). Designing LTC physical work environments to support worker well-being: A review and recommendations. Journal of the American Medical Directors Association, 105326.
Hughes, R. T., Prasad, J. J., Razavian, N. B., Ververs, J. D., Snavely, A. C., Nightingale, C. L., … & Farris, M. K. (2024). “If you’re talking, I think you’re muted”: Follow-up analysis of weekly peer review discussion and plan changes after transitioning from virtual to in-person format. Clinical Oncology.
Sheppard, L. D., Trzebiatowski, T. M., & Prasad, J. J. (2024). Paternalism in the performance context: evaluators who feel social pressure to avoid exhibiting prejudice deliver more inflated performance feedback to women. Journal of Business and Psychology, 1-16.
Spoelma, T., & Fletcher, K. A. (2024) Leader financial stress results in abusive leadership for men. Journal of Occupational Health Psychology. 29(5), 317-341. (Q1) *media coverage Human Resource Development America, Phys.org, HRReporter, Kiowa County Press
van Zyl, L., Dik, B. J., Donaldson, S. I., Klibert, J. J., di Blasi, Z., van Wingerden, J., & Salanova, M. (2024). Positive organizational psychology 2.0: Embracing the technological revolution. Journal of Positive Psychology, 19, 699-711.
van Zyl, L., Gaffaney, J., van der Vaart, L., Dik, B. J., & Donaldson, S. I. (2024). The critiques of positive psychology: A systematic review. Journal of Positive Psychology, 19, 206-235.
Upcoming Publication for January 2025
Lynner, B., Stoa, R., Fisher, G.G., Del Pozo, E., Lizerbram, R.S. (2025). Feel the burn, heal the burn: Job crafting and burnout among occupational therapists. American Journal of Occupational Therapy, 79(1).
Selected Presentations
Dik, B. J., van Zyl, L., & Wright, B. (2024, November). The Holistic Life Crafting model: A practitioner’s guide to meaning-making. Invited workshop presented for the
Optentia Research Unit, North-West University, Vanderbiljpark, South Africa.
Dik, B. J. (2024, November). On discerning and living a calling. Invited lecture presented at the University of Padua, Italy.
Dik, B. J. (2024, November). Work as a calling: What is it, and whom is it for? Invited lecture presented at the University of Padua, Italy.
Dik, B. J. (2024, September). How to help students discern and live their callings. Invited workshop presented at Southwestern Adventist University, Keane, TX.
Dik, B. J. (2024, September). Redeeming work. Invited workshop presented at Southwestern Adventist University, Keane, TX.
Dik, B. J. (2024, September). Using PathwayU to understand your gifts, and the difference they make. Invited presentation at Southwestern Adventist University, Keane, TX.
Dik, B. J. (2024, May). How to find and live your calling. Invited keynote lecture presented at the 4D Experience Symposium, University of Denver, Denver, CO.
Dik, B. J. (2024, May). Strategies for fostering purpose (in you and your students). Invited workshop presented at the 4D Experience Symposium, University of Denver,Denver, CO.
Dik, B. J. (2024, April). On living a calling: A few brief lessons from well-lived lives.Invited keynote presented at Hardin-Simmons University, Abeline, TX.
Dik, B. J. (2024, April). Careers and callings: A clinician’s guide to helping clients find purposeful work. Invited workshop presented at Cynthia Ann Parker College of Liberal Arts banquet at Hardin-Simmons University, Abeline, TX.
Dik, B. J. (2024, April). Understanding work as a calling: Spiritual and psychologica lperspectives. 2024 Scandrette Lecture presented at Wheaton College, Wheaton, IL.
Dik, B. J. (2024, April). The role of assessment in career counseling. Invited presentation at Wheaton College, Wheaton, IL.
Dik, B. J. (2024, April). Using PathwayU to make wise career choices, wisely. Working luncheon workshop presented at Wheaton College, Wheaton, IL.
Awards
Shelby Davis
Dr. Josh Prasad: NSF Award #2439991 EAGER:Understanding STEM Majors as Ecosystems using a LargeCorpora of Student Narratives Rec
Shelby Davis: Blacks in Industrial Organizationa lPsychology (BIOP) Visibility and Innovation Scholarship
Dr. Gwen Fisher: Analysis of HRS and O*NET Dataset to Advance Productive Aging. U.S. Centers for Disease Control and Prevention – National Institute for Occupational Safety and Health (CDC-NIOSH), Contract #75D30123P16495.
Milestones
Annika Benson (Defended PhD. Dissertation)
“Predicting the Paycheck: Using Machine Learning to Understand Determinantsof Income.”
Brittany Lynner P.E.O ScholarshipJames Kunz (Defended PhD. Dissertation)
“Examining Science/Knowledge Gaps within Occupational Health Psychology, Organizational Training, and Performance Feedback”
Kinjal Chheda
Passed Comprehensive Exam Spring ‘24
Data Science SP25 Internship at Hogan
Ryan Lizerbram (Defended Master’s Thesis)
“Going with the Flow: Employee Flow Experiences Across the Creative Profession Spectrum”
Annika Benson
Kinjal Chheda
Ryan Lizerbram
Brittany Lynner
Congratulations to all our faculty and students!
Volunteer Work
This semester, our IO students bundled up and got their hands dirty! IOPAC volunteered at Twin Silos Park where they prepared the gardens for winter. This included mulching the flower beds and cleaning out the vegetable gardens. We appreciate all your hard work!
Back from left: Ryan Lizerbram, Roz Stoa, MaloryBostwick, Danielle West Front from Left: Bailey, Luiza Flores, Kinjal Chheda
