Mercedes Munoz

Mercedes Muñoz is a PhD student in the department of Psychology & Neuroscience working in the Duke Identity & Diversity Lab and the Duke Culture Lab. Broadly, she is interested in using both social and developmental psychology theories and methods to investigate how children and adults develop an understanding of racial categories. Specifically, racial self-identification in groups that have a more ambiguous and complex racial categorization process—such as Latino individuals. Additionally, her research focuses on investigating whether different racial/ethnic groups within the U.S. differ in their use of norm-enforcing language. 

Before coming to Duke, Mercedes earned her B.A. in Psychology with Honors from Boston University.

Key words: identity development, race, ethnicity, Latino, generic language, social development