Headshot of Cameron Hecht.

Cameron Hecht

Assistant Professor of Psychology

Accepting new graduate students for the 2025-2026 academic year

Office Location
403 Meliora Hall

Office Hours: By appointment

Research Overview

Professor Hecht will be accepting applications for graduate students entering during the 2025-2026 academic year.

My research seeks to identify psychological processes that contribute to societal problems, develop theory-based interventions that target these processes, and identify the features of contexts that enable these interventions to be effective. I draw on theories of identity, motivation, and persuasion to understand and change how individuals experience social environments, such as schools and workplaces, and examine how these environments might be adapted to help people thrive.

I test my research questions and evaluate psychological interventions using a combination of laboratory and field experiments. Using this approach, I have developed interventions that have successfully addressed group-based disparities in academic motivation and performance, mental health and stress, political polarization, and more. My work also frequently applies modern, Bayesian machine-learning methods to model and understand the heterogeneous effects of interventions across contexts.

Selected Publications

  • Hecht, C. A., Buontempo, J., Boylan, R., Crosnoe, R., & Yeager, D. S. (2024). Mindsets, contexts, and college enrollment: Taking the long view on growth mindset beliefs at the transition to high school. Journal of Research on Adolescence. https://doi.org/10.1111/jora.13002
  • Asher, M. W., Harackiewicz, J. M., Beymer, P. N., Hecht, C. A., Lamont, L. B., Else-Quest, N. M., Priniski, S. J., Thoman, D. B., Hyde, J. S., & Smith, J. L. (2023). Utility-value intervention promotes persistence and diversity in STEM. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 120(19), https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2300463120
  • Demszky, D., Yang, D., Yeager, D. S., Bryan, C. J., Clapper, M., Chandhok, S., Eichstaedt, J. C., Hecht, C. A., Jamieson, J., Johnson, M., Jones, M., Krettek-Cobb, D., Lai, L., JonesMitchell, N., Ong, D. C., Dweck, C. S., Gross, J. J., & Pennebaker, J. W. (2023). Using large language models in psychology. Nature Reviews Psychology. https://doi.org/10.1038/s44159-023-00241-5
  • Harackiewicz, J. M., Hecht, C. A., Asher, M. W., Beymer, P. N., Lamont, L. B., Wheeler, N. S., Else-Quest, N. M., Priniski, S. J., Smith, J. L., Hyde, J. S., & Thoman, D. B. (2023). A prosocial value intervention in gateway STEM courses. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 125(6), 1265–1307. https://doi.org/10.1037/pspa0000356
  • Hecht, C. A., Bryan, C. J., & Yeager, D. S. (2023). A values-aligned intervention fosters growth mindset–supportive teaching and reduces inequality in educational outcomes. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 120(25), e2210704120. https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2210704120
  • Hecht, C. A., Dweck, C. S., Murphy, M. C., Kroeper, K. M., & Yeager, D. S. (2023). Efficiently exploring the causal role of contextual moderators in behavioral science. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.https://doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2216315120
  • Hecht, C. A., Gosling, S. D., Bryan, C. J., Jamieson, J. P., Murray, J. S., & Yeager, D. S. (2023). When do the effects of single‐session interventions persist? Testing the mindset + supportive context hypothesis in a longitudinal randomized trial. JCPP Advances, e12191. https://doi.org/10.1002/jcv2.12191
  • Hecht, C. A., Murphy, M. C., Dweck, C. S., Bryan, C. J., Trzesniewski, K. H., Medrano, F. N., Giani, M., Mhatre, P., & Yeager, D. S. (2023). Shifting the mindset culture to address global educational disparities. npj Science of Learning, 8(1), 29. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41539-023-00181-y
  • Hecht, C. A., Latham, A. G., Buskirk, R. E., Hansen, D. R., & Yeager, D. S. (2022). Peer-modeled mindsets: An approach to customizing life sciences studying interventions. CBE—Life Sciences Education, 21(4), ar82. https://doi.org/10.1187/cbe.22-07-0143
  • Hecht, C. A., Grande, M. R., & Harackiewicz, J. M. (2021). The role of utility value in promoting interest development. Motivation Science, 7, 1-20. https://doi.org/10.1037/mot0000182
  • Hecht, C. A., Priniski, S. J., Tibbetts, Y. & Harackiewicz, J. M. (2021). Affirming both independent and interdependent values improves achievement for all students and mitigates cultural mismatch for first-generation college students. Journal of Social Issues, 77, 851-887. https://doi.org/10.1111/josi.12416
  • Rosenzweig, E. Q., Harackiewicz, J. M., Hecht, C. A., Priniski, S. J., Canning, E. A., Tibbetts, Y., Asher, M. W., & Hyde, J. S. (2020). College students’ reasons for leaving biomedical fields: Disenchantment with biomedicine or attraction to other fields? Journal of Educational Psychology, 113, 351-369. https://doi.org/10.1037/edu0000456
  • Rosenzweig, E. Q., Hecht, C. A., Priniski, S. J., Canning, E. A., Asher, M. W., Tibbetts, Y., Hyde, J. S., & Harackiewicz, J. M. (2021). Inside the STEM pipeline: Changes in students’ biomedical career plans across the college years. Science Advances, 7, eabe0985. https://doi.org/10.1126/sciadv.abe0985
  • Hecht, C. A., Harackiewicz, J. M., Priniski, S. J., Canning, E. A., Tibbetts, Y., & Hyde, J. S. (2019). Promoting persistence in the biological and medical sciences: An expectancy-value approach to intervention. Journal of Educational Psychology, 111, 1462-1477. https://doi.org/10.1037/edu0000356
  • Priniski, S. J., Rosenzweig, E. Q., Canning, E. A., Hecht, C. A., Tibbetts, Y., Hyde, J. S., & Harackiewicz, J. M. (2019). The benefits of combining value for the self and others in utility-value interventions. Journal of Educational Psychology, 111, 1478-1497. https://doi.org/10.1037/edu0000343