The Psi Chi Research Grants Committee, the Psi Chi National Council, and the American Psychological Society are pleased to announce the winner of the 2005-06 Psi Chi/APS Albert Bandura Graduate Research. Lisa E. Hasel of Iowa State University submitted a proposal entitled, "Catching the Bad Guy: Morphing Composite Faces Helps." Ms. Hasel was awarded travel expenses up to $1,000 to attend the 2006 APS National Convention to receive her award; a three-year membership in APS, including subscriptions to all APS journals; and two engraved plaques, one for herself and one for her psychology department as a permanent honor.

Bio: Lisa Hasel was born in Phoenix, Arizona and graduated summa cum laude with highest thesis honors from Tufts University (MA) in 2004, with a BA in psychology and Spanish. She received the Priscilla N. Dunne Prize for showing promise in the field of psychology from Tufts University and was inducted into Phi Beta Kappa in 2006. Lisa is currently a graduate student in social psychology at Iowa State University and plans to receive her MS in 2006, and her PhD in 2008. Her research interests encompass the broad field of psychology and law, but she is currently most interested in eyewitness psychology and the psychology of alibis. She holds the positions of Experimental Psychology Liaison for the student section of the American Psychology-Law Society, Campus Representative for the APS Student Caucus, and Campus Representative for the APA of Graduate Students Advocacy Coordinating Team. After graduation, Lisa plans to continue her research while educating undergraduate and graduate students about different aspects of social psychology. She also hopes to be involved with educating police departments across the country about the best practices to utilize while conducting lineups and to become involved with other policy-related issues that are informed by psychological research.

Catching the Bad Guy: Morphing Composite Faces Helps
Lisa E. Hasel and Gary L. Wells, Iowa State University

Abstract: When there are multiple witnesses to a crime an opportunity exists to morph the composite faces built by eyewitnesses.  Even when a prototype effect and a morph-attractiveness effect were controlled for, morphs were rated as more similar to the target face than were the mean ratings of the individual composites.