Kellogg Intergroup Relations Lab (KIRL)
Current Lab Members
Kylie Davis
While at the University of Colorado, Kylie served as a Research Assistant focused on understanding the relationship between cognitive development, financial literacy, and financial skills. Before joining Kellogg, she held a Lab Manager role at the Roman Family Center for Decision Research at Booth, supporting behavioral economics research and behavioral science.
She intends to pursue a PhD in Behavioral Science with a focus on social inequality, social networks, and diversity at a macro level.
Kathy Vo
Kathy is a PhD student in Management & Organizations at Kellogg School of Management, Northwestern University. Kathy studies how individuals think about inequality, discrimination, and bias. She is also interested in uncovering the organizational- and individual-level factors that can improve organizational outcomes for those from marginalized communities. In her free time, Kathy likes to rock climb and hunt for the best ramen restaurant in Chicago.
Trevor Spelman
Trevor Spelman is a Ph.D. candidate in the Management & Organizations department at the Kellogg School of Management, Northwestern University. Trevor uses experimental, survey, and archival research methods to study topics related to conflict resolution, confidence and humility in judgement and decision making, and intergroup dynamics.
Trevor completed has B.A. at Butler University in 2016 with a double major in Psychology and Philosophy. Prior to graduate school, Trevor worked as a Research Associate at Harvard Business School.
Kelly Harrington
Kelly Harrington is a PhD student in Management and Organizations at the Kellogg School of Management. She received her B.A. in Neuroscience from Vassar College and her M.Ed. in Mind, Brain, and Education from the Harvard Graduate School of Education. Her research interests include emotions, structure, and gender. Specifically, she studies how people feel towards structure embedded in various facets of their lives and how these structures can mitigate gender differences in subjective experiences and objective outcomes across both work and home spheres. In her spare time, she enjoys dancing, playing French horn and piano, and doing jigsaw puzzles.
Victoria Liu
Victoria is a PhD student in Management & Organizations at the Kellogg School of Management, Northwestern University, with a B.A. in Psychology from Reed College. Her research explores how environmental factors impact motivation and how psychological science can be leveraged to help individuals sustain their motivation and achieve their goals when facing challenges. She is also deeply interested in designing interventions that foster a sense of belonging and enhance the well-being of gender and racial minorities within organizational settings.
Yumeka Hirayama
Yumeka is a Ph.D. Student in the Management and Organizations program at Kellogg. She received her B.A. in Cognitive Science from the University of Pennsylvania. She is broadly interested in how national and organizational cultures influence perceptions and experiences of diversity and social inequality. In her free time, she enjoys running, lifting, and exploring new restaurants with friends.
Hannah Song
Before joining Kellogg as a lab manager for Dr. Nicole Stephens, Hannah was an analyst at Mercer and Marsh, where she worked closely with clients to implement and manage employee benefit programs that attract and retain employees. She also worked as a research assistant on projects related to social class, race, gender, workplace discrimination, and motivation for professors at Kellogg, Wharton, and Harvard.
She plans to pursue a PhD in management and is interested in DEI initiatives in higher education and the workplace.
Past Lab Members
Yin Li
Yin was the KIRLab manager and a Behavioral Research Fellow at the Kellogg School of Management. She received her B.A in Economics from the University of California, Berkeley and M.A. in Social Sciences from the University of Chicago. Yin is pursuing a PhD at Yale School of Management.
Jennie Kim
Jennie was a member of the KIRLab as PhD student in Management & Organizations at Kellogg School of Management, Northwestern University. Jennie’s research interests lie at the intersection of business, education, policy, and technology, seeking to understand why inequality persists in organizations and looking for ways to improve educational, professional, and life outcomes for those from marginalized communities.
Emily Chan
Emily was a research assistant for the KIRLab while being an undergraduate student Northwestern University, and studied Economics and Data Science.
Valeria Rodriquez
Val was a KIRLab research assistant when she was an undergraduate student Northwestern University and studied social policy and psychology.
Koji Takahashi
Koji earned his Ph.D. in Psychology from the University of Michigan and was a Social Impact Postdoctoral Fellow at the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University. Koji currently is a postdoctoral fellow at Duke University.
Joselle Carrillo
Joselle was a Behavioral Research Fellow at the Kellogg School of Management. She is now a PhD student at University College London. Her research interests include intergroup relations in a variety of settings, specifically surrounding diversity and inclusion policies, and reactions to inequality.
Jessica Brice
In her senior thesis, Jessica examined how language patterns in college and university statements on racial incidents can influence readers’ perceptions of these institutions. She also worked as a project research assistant for the National Academies of Sciences, Engineering, and Medicine’s report on advancing antiracism, diversity, equity, and inclusion in STEMM organizations
Hannah Klein
Hannah graduated from Northwestern University in June 2022, and studied Social Policy and International Studies. She is now working at a law firm in Chicago, as a Finance Law Development Analyst.
Elizabeth Huppert
Elizabeth was a postdoctoral fellow at the Kellogg School of Management at Northwestern University, affiliated with the Dispute Resolution Research Center (DRRC). Elizabeth uses an interdisciplinary approach to study morality by combining theory and methods from social and developmental psychology, organizational behavior, and behavioral economics. Much of her research focuses on the psychology of moral inconsistency with the goal of understanding how people navigate complex moral phenomena across the lifespan. Prior to joining the DRRC, Elizabeth earned her PhD (joint degree in Psychology and Business) from the University of Chicago and Booth School of Business.