I am Benjamin Meagher, currently an associate professor in the Department of Psychology at Hope College. I earned my Ph.D. and M.A. at the University of Connecticut and my B.A. from Gordon College. Prior to coming to Hope, I was a postdoctoral researcher in the Department of Psychology and Neuroscience at Baylor University and taught in the Psychology Departments of Franklin & Marshall College and Kenyon College.

I conduct research in Environmental, Social, and Personality psychology. These distinct sub-disciplines, focusing respectively on the physical, interpersonal, and intrapersonal world, intercept in a variety of interesting ways. For example, I have been investigating how individual differences in belief, motivation, and personality lead to different impressions of the same physical environment, whether being in a particular type of physical environment can help people perform, cope, or self-regulate in more effective ways, and in what way the composition or diversity of a group or community–in terms of personality, attitudes, or virtues–impacts the success or experience of individual members when they are together. The primary question that I ask is: How does an individual best fit within his or her immediate physical and social context?

If you are a student interested in working with me, please fill out the Psychology Department’s common application and select me as a potential mentor! To learn more about the research projects that I am currently working on, or to find papers that I have published, please follow the links in the top menu.

News About My Research

• • Learn about the research project that won Hope College’s Social Sciences Young Investigator Award: “Research on Connection Between Students’ Dorm Room and Mental Health Wins Hope Social Sciences Award”
  • Read my empirical paper on the effects of place identity on undergraduate flourishing in the Journal of College and University Student Housing: “Seeing Yourself in Your Room”
  • Read a write-up by Hope College of my research with Alyssa Cheadle on the restorative capacity of home environments: “How Home Attachment Helps Mental Health”
  • Read my blog post for the Changing Attitudes in Public Discourse Project: “Am I Humble? Are You Humble?”
  • I was awarded a research grant by the Calvin Institute of Christian Worship to study the effect of religious environments on congregations. Read a press release about the program here: “Teacher-Scholars awarded Vital Worship Grants for 2020”
  • Read a write-up about my article in Personality and Social Psychology Review by the Society for Personality and Social Psychology: “From couples to communities: The built environment shapes us as much as we shape it”
  • Watch my session at the Humility and Conviction in Public Life Capstone Workshop on renewing public discourse, alongside great work by Alessandra Tenesini, Greg Maio, and Philip Fernbach: “Groups, Extremism, and Attitudes”
  • Read my blog post for the Humility and Conviction in Public Life Project summarizing the work my lab is doing to understand how intellectual humility is manifested behaviorally: “When is intellectual humility revealed to others?”
  • Read my interview with Dr. Eleanor Reeds about the challenges of communicating research to the public: “A Cautionary Tale in the Age of Click Bait”. Here are links to selected media coverage of the research on intellectual humility that I discuss with Dr. Reeds: The Huffington Post, Inside Higher Ed, Independent, Daily Mail, City A.M.
  • I was interviewed by New Yorker writer Dawn Chan discussing my research on virtual environments: “The Virtual-Reality App That Turns Your Office Into a Vacation Paradise”
  • I was awarded a research grant by the Humility and Conviction in Public Life Project to study the effects of intellectual humility on group performance and outcomes. Here is a press release about this research initiative: “10 Projects, 1 Audacious Goal: Find Solutions to Help Cultivate Healthier Debate and Dialogue in America”