Melissa T. Buelow, Council Member Nominee

Institutional affiliation: The Ohio State University at Newark          

Area of specialization: Clinical Neuropsychology

Summary of professional interests:

The field of decision making combines contributions from multiple domains of psychology and neuroscience, including clinical, cognitive, social, and neuropsychological. As such, my research program blends each of these domains as I assess: (1) the reliability, validity, and clinical utility of neuropsychological assessment measures; (2) personality and mood predictors of decision making; and (3) manipulations of different forms of decision making. My primary goal is to understand factors that can affect decision making in research and clinical settings, allowing for accurate assessment of the construct. I am also a licensed psychologist in the State of Ohio. As part of my service to the profession, I serve on the Ohio Psychological Association’s Mandatory Continuing Education committee (2015-present), where I evaluate and approve continuing education opportunities for psychologists in the state.

Representative publications:

Buelow, M.T., Wirth, J.H., & Kowalsky, J.M. (in press). Poorer decision-making during a pandemic: Evidence for “pandemic-brain.” Journal of American College Health.

Barnhart, W.R., & Buelow, M.T. (2022). The performance of college students on the Iowa gambling task: Differences between scoring approaches. Assessment 29, 1190-1203.

Buelow, M.T., & Wirth, J.H. (2017). Decisions in the face of known risks: Ostracism increases risky decision making. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 69, 210-217.

Buelow, M.T., & Blaine, A.L. (2015). The assessment of risky decision making: A factor analysis of performance on the Iowa gambling task, balloon analogue risk task, and Columbia card task. Psychological Assessment, 27, 777-785.

Buelow, M.T., & Suhr, J.A. (2009). Construct validity of the Iowa gambling task. Neuropsychology Review, 19, 102-114.

Representative honors or awards:

  • Fellow, American Psychological Association (2021)
  • Fellow, Midwestern Psychological Association (2019)
  • Ohio State Newark Research Mentor Award (2018)
  • Ohio State Newark Scholarly Accomplishment Award (2016)

Involvement in MPA:

I have been a member of MPA since 2011 and a Fellow since 2019. I attended the conference every year, only missing more recent meetings due to the COVID-19 pandemic. I served as an author or faculty sponsor for 41 posters/presentations (2013-present). As the Midwestern VP for Psi Chi, I organized the Psi Chi programming at MPA in 2016-2018. I served on the MPA Program Committee from 2015-2018 and was the MPA Program Chair for 2019-2020.