Miami Presents: Pets, Health, and Well-being

Allen McConnell is University Distinguished Professor and Chair of the Department of Psychology at Miami University. His research examines (1) how relationships with family and pets affect health and well-being, (2) how people decode others’ nonverbal displays, and (3) how self-nature representations influence pro-environmental action, with this work supported over the years by National Institutes of Health (NICHD and NIMH) and National Science Foundation grants. He has published more than 70 peer-reviewed papers in top scientific journals, and his Psychology Today blog “The Social Self" receives more than 10K visitors for each article posted. This webinar will focus on his research around pets and their effect on health and well-being. Dr. McConnell will also take questions during the hour. McConnell has served as Editor in Chief of Social Psychological and Personality Science, Associate Editor of Journal of Personality and Social Psychology and of Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, and President of the Midwestern Psychological Association and of the Society of Experimental Social Psychology. He teaches courses in social psychology, positive emotions and well-being, psychology of conservation, the self, and judgment and decision making at the graduate and undergraduate levels. Finally, his expertise has been applied to environmental conservation, to consumer and medical behavior, to trial and jury consulting, and his research has been presented in many legal venues including in briefs argued before the U.S. Supreme Court.