My work integrates psychological and biological levels of analysis by applying theories of social and emotional processes to the context of stress and disease. My research examines how social-evaluative threat and accompanying self-conscious emotional responses affect immune and neuroendocrine outcomes, and how individual differences may heighten vulnerability to these psychological and physiological changes.
Bower, J. E., Ganz, P. A., Dickerson, S. S., Petersen, L., Aziz, N., & Fahey, J. L. (2005). Diurnal cortisol rhythm and fatigue in breast cancer survivors. Psychoneuroendocrinology, 30(1), 92-100.
Davison, K. P., Pennebaker, J. W., & Dickerson, S. S. (2000). Who talks? The social psychology of illness support groups. American Psychologist, 55, 205-217.
Dickerson, S. S. (2008). Emotional and physiological responses to social-evaluative threat. Social and Personality Psychology Compass, 2(3), 1362-1368.
Dickerson, S. S., Gable, S. L., Irwin, M. R., Aziz, N., & Kemeny, M. E. (2009). Social-evaluative threat and proinflammatory cytokine regulation: An experimental laboratory investigation. Psychological Science, 20, 1237-1244.
Dickerson, S. S., Gruenewald, T. L., & Kemeny, M. E. (2009). Psychobiological responses to social self threat: Functional or detrimental? Self & Identity, 8(2), 270-285.
Dickerson, S. S., Gruenewald, T. L., & Kemeny, M. E. (2004). When the social self is threatened: Shame, physiology, and health. Journal of Personality, 72(6), 1192-1216.
Dickerson, S. S., & Kemeny, M. E. (2004). Acute stressors and cortisol responses: A theoretical integration and synthesis of laboratory research. Psychological Bulletin 130(3), 355-391.
Dickerson, S. S., Kemeny, M. E., Aziz, N., Kim, K. H., & Fahey, J. L. (2004). Immunological effects of induced shame and guilt. Psychosomatic Medicine, 66(1), 124-131.
Dickerson, S. S., Mycek, P. J., & Zaldivar, F. (2008). Social evaluation – but not mere social presence – elicits cortisol responses to a laboratory stressor task. Health Psychology, 27(1), 116-121.
Lam, S., Dickerson, S. S., Zoccola, P. M., Zaldivar, F. (2009). Emotion regulation and cortisol reactivity to a social-evaluative speech task. Psychoneuroendocrinology, 34, 1355-1362.
Stetler, C., Dickerson, S. S., & Miller, G. E. (2004). Uncoupling of social zeitgebers and diurnal cortisol secretion in clinical depression. Psychoneuroendocrinology, 29(10), 1250-1259.
Zoccola, P. M., Dickerson, S. S., & Lam, S. (2009). Rumination predicts longer sleep onset latency following an acute psychosocial stressor. Psychosomatic Medicine, 77, 771-775.
Zoccola, P. M., Dickerson, S. S., & Zaldivar, F. (2008). Rumination and cortisol responses to laboratory stressors. Psychosomatic Medicine, 70, 661-667.
Other Publications:
Dickerson, S. S. (in press). Physiological responses to experiences of social pain. To appear in G. MacDonald and L. Jenson-Campbell (Eds.), Social Pain: A Neuroscientific, Social, and Health Psychology Analysis. Washington DC: American Psychological Association.
Gruenewald, T. L., Dickerson, S. S., & Kemeny, M. E. (2007). A social function for the self-conscious emotions: Social-self preservation theory. In J. Tracy, R. Robins, & J. Tangney (Eds.), Self-Conscious Emotions 2nd Ed. (pp. 68-87). New York: Guilford Press.
Courses Taught:
Health Psychology
Human Stress
Psychobiology of Stress
Health Psychology
Human Stress
Psychobiology of Stress
Sally Dickerson Department of Psychology and Social Behavior
4558 Social and Behavioral Sciences Gateway
University of California, Irvine
Irvine, CA 92697-7085
United States
Phone: (949) 824-4556
Fax: (949) 824-3002
Last edited by profile holder: November 9, 2010
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