Ursula Sanborn
M.S.R. Experimental Psychology

Having spent most of my life in California, when the time came to apply to graduate school I was determined to expand my perspective and pursue my graduate education in a different part of the country. The city of St Louis is an ideal city which offers diversity, culture and other resources found in large cities with a rich history as the city which links the east and west.

The reputation of an education in the Jesuit tradition as a program of study that challenges the student to grow into a complete person and doesn’t focus entirely on academic learning, but rather the development of the entire human being played an integral part of my decision to apply to and attend St Louis University.

As a new graduate student pursuing a PhD in Experimental Psychology I am excited to start working with the psychology faculty. St Louis University’s Psychology program offers me an opportunity to work with multiple professors and pursue topics of study that cross-over the various concentrations within the field. At St. Louis University I hope to pursue my interest in the study of gender stereotyping.  I am specifically interested in the research being done by Dr. Kim Powlishta, who is examining when and how gender roles develop and how a violation of gender roles is viewed at different stages of development. I am also interested in Dr. Judith Gibbon’s research on cross-cultural and cross-national research on gender roles and psychology of women.

In terms of my own future research, I’d like to study how societal expectations contribute to the construction of gender stereotypes and leadership roles in the workplace, how behavior is viewed differently depending on gender, and how people are perceived by society if they do not follow traditional gender roles. I also want to see if there are differences in how gender roles are viewed and the impact of violated gender roles in individualistic versus collectivistic cultures.  I am also interested in examining how well and to what extent traditional gender roles fit within the context of modern industrial societies in which male and female capabilities and responsibilities have become more equal.