As today's climate of identity driven politics and social divisions has highlighted for us, identity processes are central to the link between a society's social structure and the behaviors and motives of the individuals within it. Stets and Serpe's edited volume offers us a valuable new look at how these linkages work out in everyday contemporary life.
Jan E. Stets is Professor and Co-Chair of the Department of Sociology and Director of the Social Psychology Research Laboratory at the University of California, Riverside. She is past Director of the Sociology Program at the National Science Foundation, and past Co-Editor of Social Psychology Quarterly. Professor Stets is a sociological social psychologist who works in the areas of self and identity, emotions, morality, and social exchange.
She is the author of a dozen books and over 80 papers. She is the recipient of NSF grants, a Fellow of the American Association for the Advancement of Science, Fellow of the Society for Experimental Social Psychology, and a member of the Sociological Research Association. She received the Lifetime Achievement Award from the
ASA Emotions Section.
Richard T. Serpe is Professor and Chair of the Department of Sociology at Kent State University. He is past Co-Editor of Social Psychology Quarterly and Sociological Perspectives. Professor Serpe
is a sociological social psychologist who has been working in identity theory for the past forty years. His recent research is designed to further contextualize identity processes in terms of differential placement within the social structure. He has conducted or directed over 270 research projects funded by several private foundations, public and private organizations, local, state, and federal agencies.