Kip Williams
Department of Psychological Sciences
Purdue University
703 Third Street
West Lafayette, Indiana 47907-2081
U.S.A.
Home Page
Phone: (765) 494-0845
Fax: (765) 496-1264
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My interests lie broadly in group processes and social influence. My specific research topics include ostracism, social loafing and social compensation, stealing thunder, Internet research, and psychology and law.
OSTRACISM: I am working primarily on ostracism-being ignored and excluded-and how it affects individuals and groups. Our studies indicate that the initial reaction to ostracism is pain, which is similarly felt by all individuals regardless of personality or social/situational factors. Ostracism then instigates actions aimed at recovering thwarted needs of belonging, self-esteem, control, and meaningful existence. Our thinking is that control and existence-fortification can lead to anti-social behaviors, belonging and self-esteem-fortification often leads to social attentiveness and pro-social behaviors. However, a possible dysfunctional consequence of enhancing one's inclusionary status is heightened social susceptibility. We are currently investigating the effects of ostracism on social susceptibility, pro-social behaviors, and aggression. I am pleased to provide you complimentary one-time access to my Annual Reviews article as a PDF file (see link below), for your own personal use. Any further/multiple distribution, publication, or commercial usage of this copyrighted material would require submission of a permission request addressed to the Annual Reviews Permissions Department, email permissions@AnnualReviews.org.
CYBERBALL. I have a free downloadable program called "Cyberball" that can be used in research on ostracism, social exclusion, rejection, bullying, discrimination, etc. Click the Cyberball link under Online Studies, above. The newest version, Cyberball v.3, works on both PCs and Macs.
SOCIAL PAIN. Ostracism, like betrayal, humiliation, and interpersonal loss, causes pain. Recent researchers and theorists have argued compellingly that social pain built upon the neural architecture of physical pain, which evolved first. We are currently examining important differences between social and physical pain. One such difference is that social pain can be re-lived over and over again, causing pain on each remembered instance. Physical pain can be recalled as being painful, but is not painful to relive. Four experiments demonstrate this difference in a forthcoming Psychological Science article, "When Hurt Won't Heal: Exploring the Capacity to Relive Social and Physical Pain" (Chen, Williams, Fitness, & Newton, in press).
SYDNEY SYMPOSIUM OF SOCIAL PSYCHOLOGY. I co-convened (with Joseph Forgas, Bill von Hippel, and others) the annual Sydney Symposium of Social Psychology series (www.sydneysymposium.unsw.edu.au). The last one I was involved on was the 2004 Symposium, on "The Social Outcast: Ostracism, Social Exclusion, Rejection, and Bullying."
http://www.psych.purdue.edu/~kip/Announce/SSSP2004.htm
PSYCHOLOGY AND LAW. I have a long-standing interest in psychological processes that occur before, during, and after a trial. In addition to teaching psych & law, I have testified numerous times as an eyewitness expert, and more recently on ostracism in the workplace. I have examined prejudicial judge's instructions, eyewitness accuracy and confidence, stealing thunder-a social influence tactic, and most recently, the ability of mock-jurors to discount obvious confidence inflation when an eyewitness's in trial confidence far exceeds their initial identification confidence. See our recent article, "'I had a confidence epiphany!': Obstacles to combating post-identification confidence inflation" (Jones, Williams, & Brewer, N. (Law & Human Behavior, in press).
Editor of SOCIAL INFLUENCE. It is with excitement and humility that I take the position of Editor-In-Chief of Social Influence. I would first like to thank and extend my strongest appreciation to Anthony Pratkanis who, as founding editor, had the foresight, energy, and enthusiasm to start this journal. I would also like to thank Anthony’s excellent consulting board that gave instant credibility because of their breadth and expertise. I would also like to thank Mary Phillips, Rohays Perry, of Taylor Francis who have been an enormous help to me in helping me reshape the journal and its mission, and to Duncan Nicholas, who has and will continue to serve as editorial assistant.
First, a little about me: I am a social psychologist whose primary interest is in social influence. I have conducted research on social loafing and social compensation, two phenomena that deal with social influence and motivation for individuals in groups. I also have published in the psychology and law area, again dealing with issues of social influence: on eyewitness memory and testimony, biasing judges instructions, stealing thunder (a tactic used to deflate negative impact of damaging testimony), and most recently, on influencing jurors to scrutinize confidence inflation. My main research interest is on ostracism, the effects of being ignored and excluded. Some regard this as group research, but I regard it as a very basic social influence phenomenon. Not looking at someone, not talking to them, not responding to them all have an enormous impact on the individual’s emotions, motivations, and subsequent social susceptibility. Thus, the topic of social influence is central to my self-definition and my interest in social psychology. To me, the heart of social psychology is social influence.
There are some major changes that I am announcing here for Social Influence. First, I am strongly committed to a journal of brief reports (i.e., 5000 words or fewer) rather than JPSP- or PSPB-length articles. Good research and long papers are not synonymous, and in many ways, writing succinctly is a difficult yet rewarding process that communicates more effectively to more people. Consumers are willing to read a short paper than a long paper. Reviewers are willing to review a short paper than a long paper. Editors are more likely to devote time now (rather than later) for a short than long paper. All this is very attractive to authors, who would like a quicker turn-around time and a broader audience.
Second, I want to strongly encourage researchers to use actual behaviors as dependent variables, rather than relying solely on paper- and-pencil self-reports, or key-presses on a computer. A recent article by Baumeister, Vohs, and Funder (2008) entitled, “Psychology as the science of self-reports and finger movements,” in Perspectives on Psychological Science underscores the importance of examining real behaviors that occur in the real world. When one thinks about classic studies in social influence, what comes to mind is the public judging of line lengths, pressing a shock lever, abusing power in a mock-prison, agreeing to erect a billboard in one’s yard, donating time to clean up the local zoo, giving money to a charity. Behaviors are interesting and memorable.
Third, Social Influence will now have Associate Editors who will be the action editors for the submissions they are assigned. As of this writing, not all Associate Editors are in place, but my aim is to have experts in a broad range of disciplines in which social influence is studied. These include social psychology, political psychology, consumer psychology, communication science, sociology, and related disciplines.
Fourth, because of shorter articles and additional action editors, I will strive to have all submitted manuscripts reviewed and returned within 3 weeks. This is a bold claim, but one to which I believe we can adhere. Because of this, we will encourage our reviewers to give short, broad- stroke reviews that indicate their overall evaluation and the main reasons. This means that reviewers will not be proofing and editing, finding minor problems or correcting grammar or style. Reviews should be approximately three paragraphs in length. They should be decisive and constructive. Editors, too, will be instructed to write short decision letters, again addressing the big picture rather than the details.
I hope to make Social Influence a journal that readers from many disciplines will turn to, not only for excellence in research and theory, but for readability and interest value. I have modeled the structure and aims of this journal after the original intent for Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, created by Bibb Latané as a short report journal. I remember as a graduate student leaving my copy of PSBP in the bathroom where I could routinely read an article during my visits. I hope this journal finds its way to your bathrooms, as well (for all the right reasons, of course!)
For a copy of this editorial, go to: http://www.informaworld.com/smpp/title~content=t716100705~db= all~tab=sample
 Books:
 Brewer, N., & Williams, K. D. (Eds.) (2005). Psychology and law: An empirical perspective. New York: Guilford Publications.
- Williams, K. D. (2001). Ostracism: The power of silence. New York: Guilford Publications.
- Williams, K. D., Forgas, J. P., & von Hippel, W. (Eds). (2005). The social outcast: Ostracism, social exclusion, rejection, and bullying. New York: Psychology Press.
Journal Articles:
- Chen, Z., Williams, K. D., Fitness, J., & Newton, N. (in press). When hurt won't heal: Exploring the capacity to relive social and physical pain. Psychological Science.
- Eisenberger, N. I., Lieberman, M. D., & Williams, K. D. (2003). Does rejection hurt? An fMRI study of social exclusion. Science, 302, 290-292.
- Gonsalkorale, K., & Williams, K. D. (2007). The KKK won’t let me play: Ostracism even by a despised outgroup hurts. European Journal of Social Psychology, 37, 1176-1186.
- Jones, E. E., Williams, K. D., & Brewer, N. (in press). "I had a confidence epiphany!": Obstacles to combating post-identification confidence inflation. Law & Human Behavior.
- Oaten, M. R., Williams, K. D., Jones, A., & Zadro, L. (in press). The effects of ostracism on self-regulation in the socially anxious. Journal of Social and Clinical Psychology.
- Smith, A., & Williams, K. D. (2004). R U there? Ostracism by cell phone messages. Group Dynamics: Theory, Research, and Practice, 8, 291-301.
- van Beest, I., & Williams, K. D. (2006). When inclusion costs and ostracism pays, ostracism still hurts. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 91, 218-228.
- Warburton, W. A., Williams, K. D., &. Cairns, D. R. (2006). When ostracism leads to aggression: The moderating effects of control deprivation. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 42, 213-220.
- Williams, K. D. (2007). Ostracism. Annual Review of Psychology, 58, 425-452.
- Williams, K. D. (2007). Ostracism: The kiss of social death. Social and Personality Compass, 1, 236-247.
- Williams, K. D., & Jarvis, B. (2006). Cyberball: A program for use in research on ostracism and interpersonal acceptance. Behavior Research Methods, Instruments, and Computers, 38, 174-180.
- Zadro, L., Williams, K. D., & Richardson, R. (2004). How low can you go? Ostracism by a computer lowers belonging, control, self-esteem, and meaningful existence. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 40, 560-567.
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