Sarah Clancy

Associate Professor, Health, Aging & Society

Dr. Sarah Clancy is an Associate Professor in the Department of Health, Aging, and Society and the Social Psychology Program. Sarah is an award-winning educator who received the MSU Excellence in Teaching Award (Faculty of Social Sciences) in April 2022. Sarah completed her PhD in Sociology at McMaster University, studying the impact of pop culture and dress styles on the development of children’s identity. Her interests in children are reflected in a course she has developed, titled Small Worlds: Children and Childhood (SOC PSY 3ZZ3).  Sarah's interests in deviance and crime are reflected in another course she created for a fourth-year seminar course on the social psychology of media and crime (SOC PSY 4F03). Sarah recently developed another course in her areas of expertise that explores self and identity in fables and fairytales, music, film, and television as a fourth-year seminar course titled, Express Yourself: Explorations of Self and Identity in Popular Media (SOC PSY 4EY3).  Sarah regularly teaches, instructs and supervises the original research projects that Social Psychology students complete in their final year in the program (SOC PSY 4ZZ6), developed and teaches a course on health and incarceration (HLTH AGE 3T03), teaches inquiry style courses such as introduction to inquiry in the social sciences (SOC SCI 1SS3), as well as supervises fourth year Health, Aging and Society and PNB students completing their independent thesis in their final year of study. Sarah is also the Faculty Advisor for the McMaster Undergraduate Journal of Social Psychology and the creator and Faculty Advisor/Supervisor for the Social Psychology Undergraduate Research Conference since its inception in 2022.

Sarah has a keen interest in teaching and learning pedagogies, as well as fostering opportunities for student research, engagement, and skill building.  As such, Sarah has worked collaboratively with numerous student partners on several projects over the years to enhance the student learning experience outside of the classroom, including the creation of the aforementioned Undergraduate Research Conference that was recently expanded to include both Social Psychology and HAS students, the creation of a social psychology capstone thesis resource guide created for and with students, as well as creating the  ‘ABC’s Skills Workshop and Certificate of Completion’, open to all students in the Faculty of Social Sciences. The ‘ABC’s’ refer to the following: A - Academic writing and article reading; B - Building communication and collaboration skills in groups; and, C – Critical thinking skills.

Sarah's other research and teaching interests include: health and health care; social deviance, social problems and criminology; social psychology of crime; health, aging and well-being; health inequalities; health and incarceration; and historical conceptions of aging. Sarah has taught numerous courses over the years in these subject areas. Additionally, Sarah is a trained qualitative and quantitative researcher.