Meet Visiting Professor Jim Fryer

Meet Jim Fryer, a visiting professor in the psychology department.  Liz Ronty interviewed Professor Fryer, and here is what she learned.

* What universities have you attended?
Both my undergraduate and graduate work were at the University of Rochester - my B.S. is in Molecular Genetics, and my Ph.D. (just about finished) is in Social and Personality Psychology. I almost did a psych minor in college, but when I went to a faculty advisor's office to register, he told me (gruffly) that he didn't have time. I never went back. (I suppose I should thank him for giving me an example of how NOT to interact with students ...)

* Was there a specific experience that sparked your interest in psychology?
My favorite non-fiction book is "Working," by the late Studs Terkel. He sat down with a bunch of people in various occupations, set out a tape recorder, and simply asked them to talk about what they do all day and how they feel about it. On the surface, it seems like a really mundane topic - who wants to read about work? However, the people really get into it, and their stories say a lot about what we love, what we hope for, what makes us human. I first read "Working" in middle school, and since then, I found a way to make a career out of asking these kinds of questions. (My goodness, I love this job.)

* Do you have any future plans? Traveling?
Most of my major travel revolves around conferences. I was in Las Vegas earlier this semester, I'll be in Maryland after Spring Break, and I'm flying out to Denver right before finals. My wife and I do a lot of smaller road trips on a regular basis - my family lives near Albany, her family lives near Utica, and we still have friends in Rochester. As for my future plans, I'll be at SLU next year, but I'm really looking forward to finding out what's in store beyond then.

* Do you have any specific research interests?
My primary line of research focuses on different aspects of the achievement goal approach to motivation, particularly in classroom settings - how we determine that we've done well at something, the reasons why we choose the goals that we do, how competence information affects our patterns of goals over time, how the educational context influences our personal goals, etc. (If this sounds interesting, keep an eye on the fall course schedule!) Recently, I've started extending this work into health-related behaviors. I'm also very interested personal narratives, especially how themes of redemption and contamination are used in certain life story scenes to develop and maintain identity.

* How are you coping with Canton's cold weather?
Actually, I love this kind of weather! I've lived throughout upstate New York my whole life, and I really like having four distinct seasons.

* What's your favorite part about St. Lawrence or the Psych Dept.?
One excellent thing I've noticed about SLU (and Canton in general) is that when you pass by someone, most of the time you'll get a nod, or a hello, or some sort of recognition. There's a camaraderie up here that you don't find in a lot of other places. Plus, it doesn't hurt that I've been able to work with some absolutely fantastic students so far. It's a whole lot easier to teach when you're surrounded by students that really want to learn. I also have practically no restraint whatsoever when it comes to buying and eating the cookies at Northstar.

* Any other fun facts?
Some final points in list format:
- If my training goes well this summer, I'm planning on running my first marathon in September. I've done a bunch of half marathons, and it's time to step up.
- When I was growing up, the most influential words I read were written by Bill Watterson. If you don't already own them, do yourself a favor and go buy every single "Calvin and Hobbes" book you can find.
- My all-time favorite movie ever is "Bill and Ted's Excellent Adventure."
- In general, I'm pretty psyched about things.