Mikhail Lyubansky, Ph.D Dept. of Psychology Lecturer    Psychology 734     217-333-7740 lyubansky@uiuc.edu           http://www.psych.uiuc.edu/~lyubansk

• Ph.D.: Michigan State University, 2000, Clinical Psychology 
• M.A.: Michigan State University, 1996 
• B.A.:  University of Pennsylvania, 1992 
 
 

Came to University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in:

 2005
 
 

Professional History

1/05 - present    Lecturer, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign 8/00 - 5/04        Assistant Professor, Kenyon College, Gambier, OH  8/99 - 8/00        Doctoral Intern: MSU Counseling Center, East Lansing, MI  6/97 - 12/98      Instructor,  Michigan State University, East Lansing, MI  8/96 - 5/97        Instructor, Lansing Community College, Lansing, MI

 

Teaching Interests

I am a clinical psychologist, but my primary teaching (and research) interests are in race and culture. I teach the Psychology of Race and Ethnicity in the Fall semester and Theories of Psychotherapy in the Spring. In addition, I am currently supervising the graduate students in the department who are teaching Abnormal Psychology. At one time or another, I have taught Research Methods in Cross-Cultural Psychology, Psychology of Ethnic Conflict, Child Psychopathology, Introduction to Psychology, and an interdisciplinary course on the Holocaust (co-taught with a religion historian). I have also taught applied workshops on using SAS, a statistics application used by many social scientists. At some point, I'd like to teach a course on the psychology of science fiction.

 

Research Interests

I am interested in exploring factors and conditions associated with changes in beliefs about race, ethnicity, and nationalism.  To that end, I have been studying how acculturation strategies and cultural involvement affect psychological adjustment and core beliefs in immigrant and minority populations (see "current projects" below). I also enjoy supervising student projects pertaining to race and culture. Two recent ones include a study examining gender roles in Honduras and an independent study on the impact of film on racial attitudes. More detailed descriptions and short research reports can be found on my research homepage.

 

Recent Research Publications

Ben-Rafael, E., Lyubansky, M., Glockner, O., Harris, P., Schoeps, J., Israel, Y., & Jasper, W. (2006). Building a diaspora: Russian Jews in Israel, Germany, and the USA. Leiden, The Netherlands: Brill Academic Publishers. Shpungin, E. & Lyubansky, M. (2006). Navigating social class roles in community research. American Journal of Community Psychology, 37, 227-235. Lyubansky, M. & Eidelson, R.J. (2005). Revisiting Du Bois: African American double consciousness and its relationship to beliefs about one's racial and national groups. Journal of Black Psychology, 31, 3-26. Lambert, M.C., Rowan, G.T., Lyubansky, M., & Russ, C.M. (2002). Do Problems of Clinic-Referred African-American Children Overlap with the Child Behavior Checklist? Journal of Child and Family Studies, 11(3), 271-285.

 
 

Current Projects

Together with several colleagues (Paul Harris, William Baker, and Cameron Lippard), I am working on a study of Latino migration (legal and undocumented) to Georgia. Carla Hunter and I are also planning a study examining the racial socialization of Black and White immigrants in the U.S. We plan to begin data collection in May, 2007. I am completing a series of studies with Roy Eidelson, executive director of the Solomon Asch Center for Study of Ethnopolitical Conflict, and other colleagues examining race group differences in beliefs Americans have about their racial group and their national group (see results summary), and the extent to which these beliefs explain attitudes and behaviors associated with group conflict. As an example, we are presently writing up our findings from a study examining conflict between prison inmates and corrections officers (see abstract). I just finished a book project with Paul Harris and other colleagues in Germany and Israel titled "Building a diaspora: Russian Jews in Israel, Germany and the USA". The purpose of this research was to measure the social and linguistic integration of Russian speaking Jews in the three countries of interest and and to idenitfy factors associated with immigrant engagement in the host country's Jewish community (see project homepage). More details about all of the above are available on my research homepage.

Popular writing

In addition to academic writing, I also like to write for a general audience about psychology in popular culture.        Lyubansky, M. (in press).  How group prejudice forms and other race-related lessons from the Xavier Institute.  In R. Rosenberg (Ed.). The psychology of superheroes: An unauthorized exploration. Dallas, TX: Ben Bella Books.         Lyubansky, M. (in press).  Buffy’s Search for Meaning.  In J. Davidson (Ed.). The psychology of Joss Whedon: An unauthorized exploration. Dallas, TX: Ben Bella Books.        Lyubansky, M. (2007). Harry Potter and the word that shall not be named. In N. Mulholland (Ed.). The psychology of Harry Potter: An unauthorized examination of the boy who lived. Dallas, TX: Ben Bella Books.        Lyubansky, M. (2007). A few laps around the non-tenure track. In R. Eidelson, J. Laske, & L. Cherfas (Eds.). Peacemaker 101: Careers confronting conflict. Philadelphia, PA: Solomon Asch Center for Study of Ethnopolitical Conflict.

Hobbies and favorite things

Playing and watching basketball (and occassionally other sports); watching movies; reading science fiction; exploring the web.