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About
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• Early Decision II and Regular Decision: Saturday, Feb. 15About
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Academics
First-Year Application Deadlines
Don't miss your chance to apply to Marist!
• Early Decision II and Regular Decision: Saturday, Feb. 15Academics
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Admission & Financial Aid
First-Year Application Deadlines
Don't miss your chance to apply to Marist!
• Early Decision II and Regular Decision: Saturday, Feb. 15Admission & Financial Aid
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Student Life
First-Year Application Deadlines
Don't miss your chance to apply to Marist!
• Early Decision II and Regular Decision: Saturday, Feb. 15Student Life
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Dr. Kimery Reed Levering
Associate Professor of Psychology
Bio
Kimery Levering teaches and conducts research in the field of cognitive psychology, exploring how we think about the world. Her research interests center on advancing theories and models of how we learn, represent, and apply mental concepts. For example, how does one form a concept of dog from an assorted collection of experiences with dogs? The topic is interconnected with many areas of cognition (e.g., perception, memory, learning, language) but is also positioned to make valuable contributions to fields outside of cognitive psychology (e.g., educational and social psychology, artificial intelligence).
She is primarily interested in the role of contrast in how we learn and abstract. For example, to what extent does someone think differently about dogs depending on whether they learned about them in the context of cats (e.g., dogs are loyal) or in the context of giraffes (e.g., dogs have short necks)? How does context affect what features are believed to be important or central and how do those beliefs influence the way we interact with the world? Recent work has focused on application to social categories, addressing questions like: How does what you know about one social group influence your perceptions while learning about a new social group? How much does what you think about someone depend on similar people you have met versus theories about their social group or characteristics that co-occur?
Research Interests:
- Concept/category learning
- Visual perception
- Learning and memory
- Social cognition
- Computational modeling
Education
Ph.D. Cognitive Psychology - Binghamton University, Binghamton, NY
M.S. Psychology - Binghamton University, Binghamton, NY
B.A. Psychology - The Colllege of New Jersey, Ewing, NJ
Selected Publications
Killian, T., Levering, K. R., & Brottem, L. (2021). Understanding conflict between religious/spiritual and queer identities. Journal of Counseling and Values, 66, 145-162.
Levering, K. R., Conaway, N., & Kurtz, K. J. (2020). Revisiting the linearly separable constraint: New implications for models of human category learning. Memory, & Cognition, 48, 335-347.
Levering, K. R. & Kurtz, K. J. (2019). Concepts: Structure and acquisition. In R. J. Sternberg & J. Funke (Eds.), The psychology of human thought: An introduction, pp. 55-70. Heidelberg, Germany: Heidelberg University Publishing.
Levering, K. R. & Kurtz, K. J. (2015). Observational versus classification in supervised category learning. Memory & Cognition, 43, 266-282.
Kurtz, K. J., Levering, K. R., Romero, J., Stanton, R.D., & Morris, S.N. (2013). Human learning of elemental category structures: Revising the classic result of Shepard, Hovland, and Jenkins (1961). Journal of Experimental Psychology; Learning, Memory, & Cognition, 39, 552-572.
Levering, K. R. & Kurtz, K. J. (2009). Generalization in higher-order cognition: Categorization and analogy as bridges to stored knowledge. In MT Banich & DC Cavendish (Eds.), Generalization of Knowledge: Multidisciplinary Perspectives. (pp. 175-196). Los Angeles, CA.
Selected Presentations
Levering, K. R., *Mross, B., *Bills, N., *Cannon, M., *Farrell, E., *Cassano, J., & *Satin, E. (2020, July). The effect of contrast category on illusory correlations when learning social groups. Poster presented at the Annual Meeting of the Eastern Psychological Association, Boston, MA.
*Mross, B., *Satin, E., *Cannon, M., & Levering, K. R. (2020, July). Sexual double standards in college hookup behavior. Poster presented at the Annual Meeting of the Eastern Psychological Association, Boston, MA.
*Bills, N. & Levering, K. R. (2019, March). The effect of phone notifications on memory retention. Poster presented at the Annual Meeting of the Eastern Psychological Association, New York, NY.
*Hampton, B., *Bills, N., *Farrell, E., *McElheny, E., *Heck, M. & Levering, K. R. (2019, March). The role of religiosity in college hookup behavior and attitudes. Poster presented at the 124th Annual Meeting of the Eastern Psychological Association, New York, NY.
*McElheney, E. & Levering, K. R. (2019, March). Dimensional representations of abstract pictures. Poster presented at the 124th Annual Meeting of the Eastern Psychological Association, New York, NY.
*Corbett, J. & Levering, K. R. (2019, November). Mindfulness and metacognition and it’s role in insight and non-insight problem solving. Poster presented at the Annual Meeting of the New England Psychological Association, Manchester, NH.
*Cochis, N. & Levering, K. R. (2018, March). Implicit associations between race and drugs. Poster presented at the 123rd Annual Meeting of the Eastern Psychological Association, Philadelphia, PA.
*James, T. & Levering, K. R. (2018, March). Doodling compared to note taking during a lecture and memory retention. Poster presented at the 123rd Annual Meeting of the Eastern Psychological Association, Philadelphia, PA.
*Schiffhauer, M., Jay, K. & Levering, K. R. (2018, March). The effects of sensory deprivation on perceptual awareness in HSPs. Poster presented at the 123rd Annual Meeting of the Eastern Psychological Association, Philadelphia, PA.
*Heck, M. & Levering, K. R. (2018, March). Gender differences in hookup behaviors. Poster presented at the 123rd Annual Meeting of the Eastern Psychological Association, Philadelphia, PA.
*Maguire, R., *Delaney, A., *Hampton, B., *Miller, L., Jay, K., & Levering, K. R. (2018, March). The effects of thought suppression strategies on intrusive thoughts, anxiety, and pain. Poster presented at the 123rd Annual Meeting of the Eastern Psychological Association, Philadelphia, PA.
*Maguire, R., *Delaney, A., *Hampton, B., *Miller, L., Jay, K., & Levering, K. R. (2018, March). The effects of thought suppression strategies on intrusive thoughts, anxiety, and pain. Poster presented at the 123rd Annual Meeting of the Eastern Psychological Association, Philadelphia, PA.
*Heck, M. & Levering, K. R. (2017, March). Social media and cheating behavior. Poster presented at the 122nd Annual Meeting of the Eastern Psychological Association, Boston, MA.
*Poinan, M., Levering, K. R. & Jay, K. (2017, August). The effects of binaural beats on inhibition. Poster presented at the 39th Annual Meeting of the Cognitive Science Society, London, UK.
*Corbett, G. & Levering, K. R. (2016, March) The impact of music tempo on verbal memory. Poster presented at the 121st Annual Meeting of the Eastern Psychological Association, New York, NY.
*Eberle, G. & Levering, K. R. (2016, October). The relationship between poverty and mental health in the Hudson Valley. Poster Presented at the 56th Annual Meeting of the New England Psychological Association, Worcester, MA.
*Poinan, M., Levering, K. R., & Jay, K. (2016, October). Auditory perception and attention. Paper presented at the 56th Annual Meeting of the New England Psychological Association, Worcester, MA.
*Hicks, E. & Levering, K. R., *Moran, A., *Argiro, K., & *Salerno, K. (2016, October). Exploring the relationship between music genre and exercise intensity. Paper presented at the 56th Annual Meeting of the New England Psychological Association, Worcester, MA.
Levering, K. R., Conaway, N., & Kurtz, K. J. (2016, August). Linear separability and human category learning: Revisiting a classic study. Poster presented at the 38th Annual Meeting of the Cognitive Science Society, Boston, MA.
Kurtz, K. J., Conaway, N. B., Levering, K. R., & Eisenberg, E. (2013, November). Learning categories by generating examples. Poster Presented at the 54th Annual Meeting of the Psychonomics Society, Toronto, ON, Canada.
Levering, K. R. & Kurtz, K. J. (2011, July). Observational category learning as a path to more robust generative knowledge. Proceedings of the 33rd Annual Cognitive Science Society (pp. 631-636). Boston, MA.
Levering, K. R. & Kurtz, K. J. (2011, November). Eliciting generative versus discriminative modes of human category learning. Poster presented at the 52nd Annual Meeting of the Psychonomics Society, Seattle, WA.
Levering, K. R. & Kurtz, K. J. (2010, August). Beyond binary: One small step across the artificial-naturalistic divide in understanding human category learning. Poster presented at the 32nd Annual Meeting of the Cognitive Science Society, Portland, OR.
Kurtz, K. J. & Levering, K. R. (2009, July). Toward a new benchmark for models of category learning. Poster presented at the 31st Annual Meeting of the Cognitive Science Society, Amsterdam, Netherlands.
Kurtz, K. J. & Levering, K. R. (2009, November). Inference learning under uncertainty. Poster presented at the 52nd Annual Meeting of the Psychonomics Society, Chicago, IL.
Levering, K. R. & Kurtz, K. J. (2008, July). Mode shifts during category learning. Poster presented at the 30nd Annual Meeting of the Cognitive Science Society, Washington, DC.
Levering, K. R. & Kurtz, K. J. (2007, July). Learning-based constraints on graded structure in category representation. Poster presented at the 29th Annual Meeting of the Cognitive Science Society, Nashville, TN.
Levering, K. R. & Kurtz, K. J. (2006, July). The influence of learning to distinguish categories on graded structure. Proceedings of the 28th Annual Cognitive Science Society (pp. 1681-1686). Vancouver, BC.
