“Social Psychology: How the Kennedy Assassination and The Sixth Floor Museum Affected Dallas” with Dr. James Pennebaker

The Museum presents an evening with social psychologist Dr. James W. Pennebaker on the psychological impact of the assassination of President John F. Kennedy. As a social psychologist at SMU, in 1988 Dr. Pennebaker led a multi-part academic study to investigate the psychological and emotional impact of the Kennedy assassination on Dallas. The study monitored visitors touring the then-empty sixth floor of the former Texas School Book Depository Building and conducted a survey with hundreds of participants. Then in the 90s, he conducted a similar study centered on the newly opened Sixth Floor Museum and its impact on visitors and their views of Dallas and the assassination.

Ticketed guests are invited for a wine reception prior to the program. This event is part of a paired series that includes an event the following evening on Wednesday, November 20, A Child’s View of Dealey Plaza, an Evening with Dr. Toni Glover.  Joint tickets for both programs are $40, individual programs are $25. Museum members receive discounted ticket pricing. Contact membership@jfk.org to learn more.

PURCHASE TICKETS

6:00 p.m. | Check-In Wine Reception

6:30 p.m. | Program Begins

About the Speaker

Dr. Pennebaker is Professor Emeritus of Psychology at The University of Texas at Austin. His research studies the relationship between natural language use, health, and social behavior. In the 1980s and 1990s, he taught at Southern Methodist University and chaired the Psychology Department, and in 1997 he donated his Kennedy-related research materials to The Sixth Floor Museum and recorded an oral history in 2008. The author or editor of twelve books and more than 300 articles, Dr. Pennebaker has received numerous research and teaching awards and honors for his work. Dr. Pennebaker invented the Linguistic Inquiry and Word Count (LIWC), a computerized text analysis program that outputs the percentage of words in a given text that fall into one or more of over 80 linguistic, psychological, and topical categories. The software is considered the gold standard for analyzing word use. It can be used to study a single individual, groups of people over time, or all of social media. Pennebaker and his collaborators have used LIWC to analyze the language of Al Qaeda leaders and of political candidates, particularly in the 2008 United States presidential election.