We are pleased to announce that our undergraduate student, Ms. Teo Min Yu (pictured, left), has won the Most Promising Research Award at the Singapore Psychological Society’s (SPS) Student Research Awards 2018 for her IRP research conducted under the supervision of Dr. Michelle See (pictured, right).
Titled “Effects of Culture and Membership Status on Transgressor Evaluations”, Min Yu’s IRP studied how individual differences in cultural tendencies moderated the leniency with which leaders were evaluated with, over their group members, when they transgressed.
Min Yu commented, “I compared people who prioritised group-superiority (i.e., vertical collectivism) over self-superiority (i.e., vertical individualism) and the converse on how leniently (i.e., amount of idiosyncrasy credits given) they judged a group leader versus a group member when either individual was involved in match fixing (i.e., transgressed). I expected people who prioritised group-superiority over self-superiority to judge the transgressive leader more leniently than the transgressive group member, because they were more motivated to see the group leader as central to the group image, which was important to their own self-image. Conversely, I expected people who prioritised self-superiority over group-superiority to judge the transgressive leader more harshly than the transgressive group member, because they were more likely to see the group leader’s transgressions to negatively impact the group and therefore reflect badly on them more so than when the group member transgressed. As predicted, this was the pattern of results I obtained. These results have potential implications for our understanding of whistle-blowing and tackling corruption. For example, we could stress the importance of whistle-blowing to individuals and organisations that are more group-oriented and how it is actually helpful for the group because it could help effectively weed out the bad apples.”
Min Yu also recently presented her IRP at the 20th annual meeting of the Society for Personality and Social Psychology (SPSP) 2019 in Portland, Oregon held from 7 – 9 February 2019, during which she was shortlisted as a finalist for the Undergraduate Student Poster Award and competed in the oral poster presentation during the convention.
We extend our heartiest congratulations to Min Yu and Dr. See!