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Dr. William Klein, Ph.D.
University of Pittsburgh
Associate Professor
Department of Psychology
University of Pittsburgh
3105 Sennott Square
210 South Bouquet Street
Phone: 412-624-8267
Fax: 412-624-4428
e-mail: wmklein@pitt.edu
William Klein, Ph.D., examines (1) how social comparisons influence self-judgments and behavior, (2) the way in which people construct self-judgments (such as risk perceptions), and (3) the extent to which self-judgments are related to information processing and behavior. He is particularly interested in the role that self-enhancement motives play in each of these areas, and the way in which these processes speak to health-related behaviors such as cancer screening. Early on, Dr. Klein showed that overestimations of ability undermine productive behavioral choices in both health and academic contexts. He later found that people may cope with challenging social comparison information by altering a priori beliefs about the comparison dimensions, disassociating their comparative standing from related consequences, and processing the information more defensively. Through this research, Dr. Klein has also demonstrated that people are sensitive to social comparison information even in the presence of more objective information, and that comparisons with aggregated targets (e.g., the average person) influence behavioral intentions and prosocial behavior more than comparisons with single targets (e.g., a friend). In addition, it was discovered that people are most self-enhancing in performance comparisons when they possess ambiguous information about their own performance and unambiguous information about others’ performance.
Dr. Klein’s current research centers on effects of social comparison information, effects of self-enhancement and self-threat, and construction and implications of risk perceptions.
Select publications
Klein, W. M. P., & Cerully, J. L. (2007). Health-related risk perception and decision-making: Lessons from the study of motives in social psychology. Social and Personality Psychology Compass, 1, 334-358.
Lipkus, I. M., & Klein, W. M. P. (2006). Effects of communicating social comparison information on risk perceptions for colorectal cancer. Journal of Health Communication, 11, 391-407.
Klein, W. M. P. (2003). Self-prescriptive, perceived, and actual attention to comparative risk information. Psychology and Health, 18, 625-643.
Radcliffe, N. M., & Klein, W. M. P. (2002). Dispositional, unrealistic, and comparative optimism: Differential relations with knowledge and processing of risk information and beliefs about personal risk. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 28, 836-846.
Klein, W. M. (1996). Maintaining self-serving social comparisons: Attenuating the perceived significance of risk-increasing behaviors. Journal of Social and Clinical Psychology, 15, 120-142.
Klein, W. M., & Kunda, Z. (1994). Exaggerated self-assessments and the preference for controllable risks. Organizational Behavior and Human Decision Processes, 59, 410-427.
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