FSU psychologist earns Rising Star Award from the Association for Psychological Science

A Florida State University faculty member has earned an early career award from an international psychological organization for his research into how people perceive or process threats.  

David March, an assistant professor in the Department of Psychology, received a Rising Star Award from the Association for Psychological Science (APS) this spring alongside 56 other psychologists from around the world for their innovative research, which has already led to advancements in the field of psychology.     

“Being recognized internationally by APS is particularly fulfilling because it means my research has broad appeal,” March said. “This award reinforces my belief that my research can be widely influential inside and outside the field of social psychology.”    

APS is an international non-profit organization that aims to promote and advance the interests of scientific research in psychology, disseminate psychological science to the public and promote the application of psychological science in public policy.  

“My research focuses on the ways that threats uniquely influence how people perceive information, how they store information and how they express this information,” March said. “My own research and the March Research Laboratory’s work explores how an individual’s expression of this information manifests in a wide variety of interesting phenomena, such as biases and fears.”  

“Part of my success is accredited to the environment that has been fomented here at FSU and in FSU’s psychology department.”

– David March, assistant professor in the Department of Psychology

Much of March’s research originates from a project he developed during his graduate studies, examining how processes that often operate outside of our awareness influence attitudes that drive behavior. While earning his doctoral degree from the University of Tennessee in 2019, March developed a theoretical model that challenged existing dual-process models of evaluation, which focused on valence, or the range of positive or negative values associated with a stimulus. The new dual-implicit processing model that March created focused on uncovering a distinction between the influence of negativity and threat in specific situations rather than a narrow focus on perceived positivity or negativity.  

“As a graduate student, I noticed several different negativity-ascribed phenomena that I thought could more specifically be explained by threat instead of negative valence,” March said. “I wanted to clarify the influence of threats beyond negativity by making the distinction that although threats are always negative, not all negative things are threatening.”   

Each year since the association’s establishment in 1988, APS has presented the Rising Star Award to outstanding APS members in the early stages of their research careers. Significant publications, major discoveries and broad impacts are some of the criteria considered by APS in the selection of rising stars.   

“Part of my success is accredited to the environment that has been fomented here at FSU and in FSU’s psychology department,” said March, who joined FSU’s faculty in 2019. “The faculty is fantastic and has been very supportive of my research, and this environment is very helpful in terms of staying productive. FSU is a great place to be a faculty member.”  

Brad Schmidt, Department of Psychology chair and a distinguished research professor of psychology, has seen March’s contributions to the advancement of psychological theory on social cognition firsthand.  

“David is a remarkable young scholar who is doing important work in social psychology,” Schmidt said. “The Association for Psychological Science’s Rising Star Award is one of the top international awards in psychology, so this is an incredible honor and recognition of David’s impact on the field.”  

To learn more about March’s work and research conducted in the FSU Department of Psychology, visit psychology.fsu.edu. 

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