Caitlin Mahoney

Recent and upcoming courses

Spring 2025

• PSYC 334: Peace Studies and the Psychology of Peace
• PSYC 347: Positive Psychology

Fall 2025

• PSYC 313: Family Systems
• PSYC 347: Positive Psychology

Biography

Caitlin O. Mahoney is a social psychologist, whose research focuses on empathy, emotion, and responses to suffering.

Mahoney leverages her skills as an educator and researcher to help local and international organizations more effectively deliver on their missions to promote human rights and social justice. As program evaluator, she worked with the The Auschwitz Institute for the Prevention of Genocide and Mass Atrocities (AIPG), for nearly a decade, to assess the effectiveness of human rights training programs delivered to international leaders in government and military, as well as United States law enforcement. These efforts helped to strengthen the education received by people developing and enacting policy that impacts the well-being of individuals across the globe. In the Twin Cities, and in partnership with the organization Happy with Work, she designed and facilitated psychosocial educational workshops for individuals and organizations. These trainings supported those on the ground in caring for their own well-being while advocating for others. Most recently, Mahoney served as co-organizer and editor of a multi-year project on 'Public Health, Mental Health, and Mass Atrocity Prevention.' This project involved organizing an in person cross disciplinary workshop, editing a published anthology, and facilitating digital dialogues.

Mahoney earned her PhD in social psychology, with a concentration in peace and conflict, from Clark University in 2008. As a professor of Psychology at Metropolitan State, she teaches classes in Group Dynamics, Motivation and Emotion, Positive Psychology, and the Psychology of Peace, Conflict, and Violence. Mahoney is an active member of Metropolitan State's Career Readiness Workgroup (Learn more: https://www.metrostate.edu/faculty-staff/career-center). She served for eight years on the Executive Board of the Society for the Study of Peace, Conflict, and Violence, Div. 48 of the American Psychological Association and is a current member of the Peace Psychology Education Group—an international group of psychologists working to build a free, structured database of resources for teaching about peace psychology. Explore or contribute resources at: https://peacepsychology.peace-ed-campaign.org/

Selected Presentations and Publications

Symposia Organized

Kestenbaum, J. G., Mahoney, C. O., Meade, A. E., & Fuller, A. F . (Chairs). Dialogue Series: Public Health, Mental Health, and Mass Atrocity Prevention [Webinars].

https://youtube.com/playlist?list=PLCvA9Ze5qChz5J37yW9tvArQQLMxF65p7&si=CJkkCoZqF23noZN3

• (2022, Feb). Ways forward for public health, mental health, and mass atrocity prevention.
• (2022, Jan). (Moderator) Group identity, victim impact, and community relationships in atrocity contexts.
• (2021, Nov). Supporting mental and public health prevention work in pre-atrocity, atrocity, and post-
  atrocity, settings.
• (2021, Oct). Linking concepts of public health, mental health, and mass atrocity prevention.
  

Edited Works

Kestenbaum, J. G., Mahoney, C. O., Meade, A. E., & Fuller, A. F. (Eds.). (2021). Public Health, Mental Health, and Mass Atrocity Prevention. Routledge.
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Kestenbaum, J.G., Fuller, A., Mahoney, C.O., & Meade, A. (Eds.) (2021). Public and Mental Health, Human Rights, and Atrocity Prevention. [Special Section]. Health and Human Rights Journal, 23 (1). Available from: https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/issues/384568/

Peer Reviewed Articles and Invited Book Chapters

de Rivera, J. & Mahoney, C.O. (2018, Aug). Promoting a Sense of Global Community. Peace and Conflict: Journal of Peace Psychology, 24(3) DOI: 10.1037/pac0000323
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Mahoney, C. O., & Harder, L. M. (2017). Emotions, the Inner Lives of Those Who Work Toward Suffering Relief. In R.E. Anderson (Ed.), Alleviating World Suffering (pp. 131-145). Springer International Publishing.