image of LAURA student and Professor Steve Windisch standing informs of a backdrop

The College of Liberal Arts’ student body is driven by curiosity and questioning. We encourage all our students to participate in research and help create knowledge. The College of Liberal Arts offers funding opportunities each semester, including summer, to afford students to undertake critical and impactful work. Our Liberal Arts Undergraduate Research Awards (LAURAs) are College funded awards with bi-annual calls for proposals.

The Liberal Arts Undergraduate Research Awards (LAURAs). The LAURAs grant $2,000 each to undergraduate student-faculty member duos to conduct a research project over the course of a semester. Each student earns a $15/hour stipend from the grant while spending 100 hours on the project, which enables students to dedicate their time to developing research skills without having to worry about their financial wellbeing.

The Liberal Arts Undergraduate Research Awards (LAURA) creates more opportunities for undergraduate students to develop research skills by working with faculty mentors on faculty-led research projects while increasing support for faculty research in the College of Liberal Arts. 

LAURA Scholars Teams Share Experiences

Student-faculty teams worked together over the course of a semester or summer on a research project of mutual interest. Visit our LAURA Scholars Testimonials page and watch the videos to see some of the experiences from our faculty and students! 

Faculty and Student Research Teams

The College of Liberal Arts is pleased to announce the Fall 2022 and Spring 2023 LAURA Scholar Awards:

Fall 2023

  • Eunice Chen (Psychology and Neuroscience) and student Mahanoor Rafi for Changes in cognitive, and emotional functioning with increasing physical activity in young adults
  • Nyron N. Crawford (Political Science) and student James L. Gray for Strike from the Record: Administrative Burden in Expungement of Criminal Records
  • Tania Giovannetti (Psychology and Neuroscience) and student Melissa Rosahl for Relations between Language Production and the Performance of Everyday Tasks in Older Adults
  • Tania Giovannetti (Psychology and Neuroscience) and student Adaeze Uwaomah for Improving Everyday Action in People with Dementia
  • Donald A. Hantula  (Psychology and Neuroscience) and student Julia Zortea for Human Robot Interaction
  • Johanna Jarcho (Psychology and Neuroscience) and student Thais Costa Macedo de Arruda for Childhood maltreatment and memory bias for social and non-social events: Exploring neural mechanisms that promote risk for mental health problems
  • Michael A. Leeds (Economics) and student Owen Hurley for Recruiting and Reproduction: Do Female Athletes Consider Abortion Laws When Deciding on a College?
  • Alan McPherson (History) and student Matthew Friedman for Vengeance in American Foreign Relations
  • Melissa E. Noel (Criminal Justice) and student Anna Palillero-Benito for The Double-Edged Sword: A Qualitative Examination of Parental Incarceration and Parental Immigration Detention
  • Ingrid Olson (Psychology and Neuroscience) and student Caroline George for How the “little brain” may play a key role in modulating socioemotional thought and behavior 
  • Victor M. Pueyo Zoco (Spanish and Portuguese) and student Meira Galapo for The Literature of the Commons. Reading the Early Modern Spanish Canon  Otherwise (1450-1700)
  • Leslie A. Reeder-Myers (Anthropology) and student Abasi Nicholson for Immigration and the Philadelphia Dream, 1750-1850
  • Eileen Ryan (History) and student Olivia Blake for Racialization of Italian Immigrants in the Americas
  • Michael W. Sances (Political Science) and student Jaydyn Doebler for District Attorney Web Site and Social Media Collection
  • Thomas F Shipley (Psychology and Neuroscience) and student Abby Losey and Neuroscience for Understanding the Unspoken: Comprehension and Communication of Uncertainty in Gestures
  • David V. Smith (Psychology and Neuroscience) and student Matthew Drayton for Characterizing Risk Factors for Financial Exploitation
  • Kimberly D. Williams (Anthropology) and student Eitan Runyan for Exploring Dental Anthropology with a Future Dentist
  • Mathieu Wimmer (Psychology and Neuroscience) and student Camryn Krumbhaar for The role of the hippocampus in the intensification of drug craving using animal models of substance use

Spring 2024

  • Lisa A. Briand (Psychology and Neuroscience) and student Matthew Piniero for Sex Differences in the Post-Translational Modification O-GlcNAcylation
  • Jason Chein (Psychology and Neuroscience) and student Harry Green for Does the Brain's Sensitivity to Social Feedback Predict Social Memory?
  • Eunice Y. Chen (Psychology and Neuroscience) and student Laura Walker for Understanding the Multilevel Correlates of the Overconsumption of Ultraprocessed Food
  • Elise Chor (Political Science) and student Sarah Blackman for Literacy-Rich Neighborhoods in Philadelphia
  • Nyron N. Crawford (Political Science) and student Jayla Collison for Strike from the Record: Administrative Burden in Criminal Record Expungement
  • Tania Giovannetti (Psychology and Neuroscience) and student Anna Callahan for Validating a Novel Performance-based Measure of Everyday Function for Older Adults with Suspected Cognitive Decline
  • Travis Glasson (History) and student Charlotte Mansfield for The Trans-Atlantic Peace Movement During the American Revolution
  • Matt Graham (Political Science) and student Binh Hoang for Bridging Disparate Approaches to the Study of Partisan Bias
  • Alexandra Guisinger (Political Science) and student Emily Starks for The Gender Gap in Economic Policy Preferences: Does Structural-Level Inequality Explain Cross-National Differences?
  • Victor Gutierrez-Velez (Geography and Urban Studies) and student Maggie Roseto for Mapping Wildfire Under Contrasting Drought Conditions and Their Impacts on Tropical Dry Ecosystems
  • Michael Hagen (Political Science) and student Gianni Quattrocchi for Political Parties in the Greater Philadelphia Region
  • Donald A. Hantula (Psychology and Neuroscience) and student Alexandra Capalbo for Human Robot Proxemics
  • Chelsea Helion (Psychology and Neuroscience) and student Lauren Ewell for Identifying Markers of Good Conversation in Intergenerational Dyads
  • Kevin Henry (Geography and Urban Studies) and student Nathaniel Shaw for Examining the Role of Social Infrastructure on Breast Cancer Stage at Diagnosis among Hispanic Women in New Jersey 
  • Matthew Hiller (Criminal Justice) and student Lea Readinger Canta for Risk-Need-Responsivity Probation Officer Training: A Meta-Analysis
  • Brian Hutler (Philosophy) and student Yuliya "Jo" Liberman for Mapping the Field of Neuroethics
  • Johanna Jarcho (Psychology and Neuroscience) and student Alexis Bendl for Social Anxiety and Emoji Use: Exploring the Influence of Mental Health Issues on Digital Communication
  • Philip C. Kendall (Psychology and Neuroscience) and student Sara Leik for Parent-child Communication And Emotion Expression in Youth Receiving Anxiety Treatment
  • Karen E. Klaiber Hersch (Greek and Roman Classics) and student Harrison (Indy) Calig for Tanaquil Rex
  • Judith A. Levine (Sociology) and student Kyla McDermott for Landing a Job: Moving from College to Employment in the New Economy
  • Kevin Loughran (Geography and Urban Studies) and student Andrea Aguilar for Countercultural Spaces and the Reproduction of Racial Inequality
  • Hilary Lowe (History) and student Hailey Rounsaville for Fannie and Amelia J. Allen Diaries Project
  • Alan McPherson (History) and student Nolan Greenways for Vengeance and American Foreign Relations 
  • Vishnu P. Murty (Psychology and Neuroscience) and student Ashley Hawk for Leveraging Conceptual Knowledge in Service of Event Memory
  • Melissa Noel (Criminal Justice) and student Cass Tilley for The Double-Edged Sword: A Qualitative Examination of Parental Incarceration and Parental Immigration Detention
  • Mark Pollack (Political Science) and student Hanna Lee for Teaching International Law in the Liberal Arts Curriculum
  • Leslie A. Reeder-Myers (Anthropology) and student Abasi Nicholson for Immigration and the Philadelphia Dream, 1750-1950
  • Adam Shellhorse (Spanish and Portuguese) and student Robyn Kerachsky for The Modalities of Affect: Language, Feeling, and Intensity in Latin American Film and Art (1924-2021)
  • Thomas F Shipley (Psychology and Neuroscience) and student Diuto Anyanwu for Understanding Types of Common Causal Structures in Feedback Loops
  • David V.  Smith (Psychology and Neuroscience) and student Enes Yanilmaz for Characterizing the Causal Influence of Noninvasive Brain Stimulation on Reward Processing
  • Miriam Solomon (Philosophy) and student Lucas Jackson for An Ameliorative Replacement for the Concept of Psychiatric Disorder
  • Amarat Zaatut (Criminal Justice) and student Joao Goncalves for An Examination of the Integration Experiences of Muslim Refugees in Traditional and Non-Traditional Immigrant Destinations 
  • Janire Zalbidea (Spanish and Portuguese) and student  Maya Halma for Linguistic Profiles and Communicative Competence in Spanish Foreign and Heritage Language Writing
image of a student testimonial on a table tent for the 2022 LAURA ceremony

Past LAURA Scholar Awards