E-mailSam C. Karpen
Graduate Student of Social Psychology
Bio
Sam is currently in his 6th year in the Hirtlab. Before coming to Indiana University, he attended St. Francis College in Loretto, Pennsylvania where he majored in psychology (minors in biology and neuroscience). Sam became interested in self-regulation research during his senior year and was thus drawn to the Hirtlab.
While at Indiana, most of Sam's research has focused on judgment/decision making and self-regulation, with occasional forays into self-handicapping and attitudinal ambivalence. His current judgment and decision making work is focused on association-based biases like the planning fallacy, the first instinct fallacy, and overconfidence. Specifically, he is interested in the impression formation implications of the first instinct fallacy (the incorrect belief that it is better to stick with one's original response than to switch to an alternative response when in doubt). He is also investigating thought's role in various association-based biases, and the effectiveness of using lay theories to debias association-based biases. Finally, Sam is interested in the mechanisms underlying optimistic completion time predictions for open versus closed tasks.
Sam's self-regulation interests are mainly in the domain of ego depletion. Specifically, he is interested in the vicarious restoration of self-control resources, and the relationship between mental and physical depletion. When he is not being a psychologist, Sam is an angler (bass), cook (north-eastern Italian/northern French/Lebanese), and lyric baritone.