Mendocino College Psychology Professor Roger Hock will travel to Pennsylvania later this month to speak at a psychology conference. Courtesy photo.

UKIAH – Mendocino College Psychology Professor Roger Hock will be this year’s keynote speaker at the 37th Annual Western Pennsylvania Undergraduate Psychology Conference (WPUPC) at Robert Morris University in Pittsburg, PA on Saturday April 25.

The topic of Hock’s talk is “Pavlov's Metronome: How We Got Here from There: Tales of Elegant, Ingenious, and Sometimes Bizarre Psychological Research.”

“The foundation of psychology is scientific research,” Hock said. “Throughout more than a century of innovative, ground-breaking studies, our knowledge and understanding of human behavior have been expanded and refined to the level of sophistication that exists today. Many of these studies played a major role in shaping modern psychology and helped set the stage for countless subsequent research projects and new fields of psychological exploration.”

According to Hock, even when the original results of some of these pivotal studies have been met later with questions, challenges, and controversies, their influence in historical terms never diminishes. They continue to be cited in new research articles, to be referenced in hundreds of textbook chapters, and to hold a special place in the minds of psychologists.

Since its inception in 1973, WPUPC has been attended by undergraduate students from over 100 colleges and universities and has grown to host well over 200 psychology students each year. Past keynote speakers at this conference include well-known psychologist such as, Michael Gazzaniga, Leon Festinger, Richard Solomon, Martin Seligman, Cynthia Deutsch, David Goldstein, Robert Cialdini, David Meyers, James Nairne, & Kathie Olsen.

For additional information on the Mendocino College Psychology Department, contact Roger Hock at (707) 468-3135 or visit the Psychology Program web page at www.mendocino.edu.