Association of Jewish Psychologists Research Group
Our Mission:
The AJP Research Group was established to bring together scientists, practitioners and students who are interested in contributing to the emerging psychological science of Jewish identity, socialization, and antisemitism.
Our work to date:
The group meets bi-weekly to listen to scientific presentations, discuss new research directions, and embark on new scientific projects.
Members of the Group initiated work toward the creation of an American Psychological Foundation (APF) Award for research on antisemitism. They also reached out to staff at the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering and Medicine (NASEM) and suggested a now-approved plan for a consensus conference on antisemitism.
Members of the group initiated three research projects which are currently at different stages of development. These are: 1) Parent-child conversations about Jewish identity and antisemitism (Jonathan D. Lane, Vanderbilt University, is the lead investigator), (2) Defining antisemitism from a psychological perspective (Jeffrey Sherman, University of California, Davis, lead investigator), and (3) research on Jewish identity (Rob Weisskirch, California State University, Monterey Bay, lead investigator). In addition, a review paper on the topic of antisemitism growing out of the work of investigators who are members of the group is under review. Students have been encouraged to be involved in ongoing projects.
The Executive Committee:
The Executive Committee of the Research Group includes Sarah L. Friedman of the George Washington University (chair), Jonathan D. Lane (Vanderbilt University), Jeffrey Sherman (University of California, Davis), and Judith G. Smetana (University of Rochester).
Sarah L. Friedman, Ph.D.
Chair
Sarah L. Friedman is Research Professor at the Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences of the George Washington University where she earned her Ph.D. in developmental and experimental psychology. She is a Fellow of the Association for Psychological Science, and of three Divisions of the American Psychological Association. During her career at intramural and extramural NIH and at CNA, a nonprofit research and analysis corporation, she focused on a wide range of factors affecting children’s development, on longitudinal research strategies, and on the development of executive function skills. She authored 132 publications, edited 8 volumes, and a special double issue of the Journal of Applied Developmental Psychology (JADP). She is currently on the Editorial Board of JADP, the Journal of Developmental and Behavioral Pediatrics and Review of General Psychology. Formerly, she served on the Editorial Board of Child Development and Developmental Psychology. She presented at scientific conferences nationally and internationally and was interviewed for print and TV media. As a scientist-administrator, she stimulated scientific research by initiating numerous US Government solicitations for research applications and by organizing scientific workshops. For many years now, she has promoted scientific teamwork.
Jonathan Lane, Ph.D.
Associate Professor
Associate Professor of Psychology & Human Development, Vanderbilt University
Jonathan Lane is an Associate Professor of Psychology & Human Development at Vanderbilt University. His research is focused on social-cognitive development—how children make sense of people's mental states, who children decide to trust, and how children learn about and understand intergroup dynamics. Dr. Lane earned his bachelor's degree from Florida International University in 2005 and his Ph.D. in Psychology from the University of Michigan in 2011, before completing a post-doctoral fellowship at Harvard's Graduate School of Education. He joined Vanderbilt University in 2015.
Jeffrey Sherman, Ph.D.
B.A. in Psychology, University of California, Berkeley Ph.D. in Social Psychology, University of California, Santa Barbara
Dr. Sherman is a Professor of Psychology at the University of California, Davis. His research investigates the cognitive processes underlying stereotyping and prejudice. Funded by NIH and NSF, he has authored more than 125 scientific publications on these topics. Dr. Sherman is past Editor of the journal Social Cognition and past-president of the Society of Experimental Social Psychology. He is a Fellow of the Association for Psychological Science, the Society of Personality and Social Psychology (SPSP), and the Society for Experimental Social Psychology. He won the Theoretical Innovation Prize presented by SPSP and is a recipient of the Anneliese Maier Research Award from the Alexander von Humboldt Foundation in Germany, honoring researchers whose scientific achievements have been internationally recognized.
Judith Smetana
B.A. at the University of California, Berkeley and her M.S. and Ph.D. at the University of California, Santa Cruz
Judith Smetana has spent her professional career at the University of Rochester and in 2025 moved from her Professor appointment in the Department of Psychology to a research professor position. She obtained her B.A. at the University of California, Berkeley and her M.S. and Ph.D. at the University of California, Santa Cruz. She completed a NICHD post-doctoral fellowship at the University of Michigan. Her research focuses on children’s moral and social-cognitive development, adolescent-parent relationships, and parenting beliefs and practices in ethnic/racial and cultural contexts; She has published more than 200 articles and chapters on these topics. She is the author of Adolescents, Families, and Social Development: How Teens Construct their World (2011, Wiley), co-editor of three editions of the Handbook of Moral Development (2006, 2014, 2023), and coeditor of The Cambridge Handbook of Parental Monitoring and Adolescent Information Management During Adolescence (Cambridge University Press, 2025).
Dr. Smetana’s research has been funded by the National Science Foundation, the National Institute of Mental Health, and numerous foundations, including the Foundation for Child Development, the William T. Grant Foundation, and the Fetzer Institute. She served two terms as Associate Editor of Child Development and was Editor-in-Chief of Child Development Perspectives from 2017-2023. She has received numerous awards, including the John P. Hill Memorial Career Award from the Society for Research on Adolescence in 2018 and the award for Distinguished Contributions to Developmental Science from the Jean Piaget Society in 2023. She is currently collaborating with other AJP Research Committee members on research on parent-child conversations about Jews and being Jewish,
