معرفی
Sharon G. Goto is a Professor of Psychological Science and Asian American Studies at Pomona College, serving as Intercollegiate Department Chair of Asian American Studies (IDAAS) since joining the institution in 1995. Her interdisciplinary work bridges psychological science with critical examinations of Asian American experiences within organizational and societal contexts.
Her academic foundation includes a Ph.D. in Social Psychology with minors in Industrial/Organizational Psychology and Quantitative Psychology from the University of Illinois, complemented by an M.A. from the same institution and a B.A. from UCLA.
Professor Goto's research program centers on culturally mediated cognitive processes, demonstrating through neural and behavioral measures how interdependent versus independent self-construal shapes attention to contextual information. Her work reveals that collectivists process background context more deeply than individualists, with significant implications for bicultural cognition and workplace dynamics. She investigates Asian American experiences of discrimination, the glass ceiling phenomenon, and intergroup relations through both laboratory and field studies.
Analysis of her publication record shows consistent methodological innovation using event-related potentials (particularly N400) to quantify cultural influences on cognition, while expanding into organizational psychology through studies of workplace discrimination and culturally congruent mentoring models. Her work demonstrates how cultural frames dynamically affect information processing in bicultural individuals.
Her scientific recognition includes:
- Sontag Award (2015-2016) for developing N400 protocols to measure cultural context effects
- Research Fellowship at Doshisha University (2011)
- Irvine Faculty Fellowship for Student Mentoring (2002-2003)
- Wig Distinguished Professorship for Teaching Excellence (1998)
Professor Goto maintains an active undergraduate research program evidenced by numerous co-authored publications with students, and has secured major funding including an NSF grant establishing Pomona's ERP laboratory and UCSF-funded research on workplace discrimination against Asian Americans.
She directs a cognitive neuroscience laboratory at Pomona College that employs neural and behavioral methodologies to investigate cultural influences on information processing, with particular emphasis on bicultural cognition and Asian American populations in organizational settings.
