Dr. Mario Baldassari

Assistant Professor of Psychology mbaldassari@sf.edu

Bio

I am an experimental cognitive psychologist and a devoted and curious teacher. Most of my research is done in applied memory domains, where students and I ask questions about what makes someone a good eyewitness, how false memories can sway important personal decisions, and how people generate meaning from their memories. I aim to be as empathic of a teacher as I can be, and I strive to design challenging, accessible courses from the introductory to the upper levels. My truest joy at work is in grappling with big ideas with students, come by during drop-in hours to chat about research or class any time!

Areas of Interest

Eyewitness memory
Classroom memory
Metacognition and metamemory, and various basic memory
Attention
Decision-making research questions

Publications (*Undergraduate collaborator)

^1stBaldassari, M. J., ^1stMoore, K. N., Hyman, I. R, Hope, L., Mah, E. & Lindsay, D. S. (Registered Report Stage 1, accepted). The Effect of Pre-Crime Instructions on Eyewitness Identification. Cognitive Research: Principles and Implications, Pre-print: https://osf.io/8kbqu/

Baldassari, M. J., Kantner, J., & Lindsay, D. S. (2019). The importance of decision bias for predicting eyewitness lineup choices: Toward a lineup skills test. Cognitive Research: Principles & Implications, 4(2). https://doi.org/10.1186/s41235-018-0150-3

Ito, H., Barzykowski, K., Grzesik, M., Gülgöz, S., Gürdere, C., Janssen, S. M. J., Khor, J., Rowthorn, H., Wade, K. A., Luna, K., Albuquerque, P. B., Kumar, D., Singh, A. D., Cecconello, W. W., Cadavid, S., *Laird, N., Baldassari, M. J., Lindsay, D. S., & Mori, K. (2018). Eyewitness Memory Distortion Following Co-Witness Discussion: A Replication of Garry, French, Kinzett, and Mori (2008) in Ten Countries. Journal of Applied Research in Memory and Cognition, 8(1), 68-77. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jarmac.2018.09.004

Selected Conference Presentations (*Undergraduate collaborator)

Baldassari, M. J., *Rowland, A. S., Michael, R. B., Azad, T., *Agnew, T. J., *Grischke, T. K., *Horine, M. A., *Laux, M. J., *Omar, D. M., *Pedretti, J. R., *Servin, V., *Welty, T. D., *Young, J. L., & *Zent, J. M. (2022). Truthiness effects in the context of COVID-19 misinformation. Poster presented at the 94th annual meeting of the Midwest Psychological Association, Chicago, IL.

Baldassari, M. J., Moore, K. N., Lindsay, D. S., Hope, L., Hyman, I. E., & Mah, E. Y. (2021). The effect of pre-crime instructions on eyewitness identification. Paper presented at the virtual meeting of SARMAC.

*Rios, A., *Cabrera, A., *Hinojosa, N., & Baldassari, M. J. (2021, Apr). Testing N250 amplitude as an indicator of hidden face familiarity in an ERP-CIT. Poster presented at the annual Student Research Symposium, Texas A&M University – San Antonio. (*Outstanding Poster winner*)