Karlene Hanko, PhD, designs, conducts, and interprets audience research studies for the full range of Slover Linett’s clients, from arts organizations and museums to colleges and universities. A social psychologist by training, Karlene specializes in understanding judgment and decision-making processes and the role of social dynamics in shaping individuals’ thoughts, emotions, and behaviors.

Karlene joined Slover Linett in mid-2011, bringing advanced skills in quantitative analysis and interpretation to our work in market research, program evaluation, and outcomes assessment. Working with clients such as Loyola University, Lincoln Park Zoo, and the San Francisco Opera, Karlene has contributed fresh insights into how people select among various educational or cultural programs in the marketplace, how they experience those programs when they attend, and how they form relationships with those institutions over time.

Before coming to Slover Linett, Karlene was a research associate at Richard Day Research, where she managed qualitative and quantitative studies for nonprofit and private-sector organizations, including financial services and healthcare companies.

Karlene earned her PhD in social and personality psychology from Cornell University, where she also taught courses in social psychology, personality, happiness, and well-being. She held a postdoctoral research fellowship in the Social Cognition Lab at the University of Cologne in Germany.

She has presented papers at national and international conferences and published in leading journals, including Psychological Science and Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin.

Karlene earned her B.A. in psychology from the University of Pennsylvania in 2002, where she graduated magna cum laude and Phi Beta Kappa.