Contact Information
Professor Emerita
email: stewart_mccann@cbu.ca
Biography
Dr. Stewart J. H. McCann (BA, York; MA, Guelph; PhD, Alberta) is a Professor Emeritus in the Department of Psychology at Cape Breton University in Sydney, Nova Scotia, Canada. His professional interests are in social psychology, personality psychology, political psychology, and geographical psychology. In the past, he also has had professional interests in educational psychology and educational issues. He has taught introductory psychology, social psychology, applied social psychology, advanced social psychology, individual differences, developmental psychology, psychology of adolescence, learning psychology, individual differences in education, educational psychology, and the honours seminar and thesis course.
Research Interests
His research activities largely have fallen into four areas: (1) the geographical dispersion of personality differences and the implications for a number of social indicators such as political attitudes and behavior, health and illness, emotional health, obesity, smoking, and creativity; (2) the relations of social, economic, and political threat to the expression of authoritarian and conservative tendencies; (3) the study of political leadership; and (4) the relations between precocity and longevity, especially the timing of achievement milestones and length of life. Most of his more recent research has been from the emerging perspective of geographical psychology. He has published over 60 refereed journal articles and edited three books.
Selected Sample of 25 Publications
McCann, S. J. H. (2017). Higher USA state resident neuroticism is associated with lower state volunteering rates. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin.
McCann, S. J. H. (2017). USA state resident Big Five personality and work satisfaction: The importance of neuroticism. Cross-Cultural Research.
McCann, S. J. H. (2017). State resident neuroticism accounts for life satisfaction differences between conservative and liberal states of the USA. Psychological Reports.
McCann, S. J. H. (2014). Big Five personality differences and political, social, and economic conservatism: An American state-level analysis. In P. J. Rentfrow (Ed.), Geographical psychology: Exploring the interaction of environment and behaviour (pp. 139-160). Washington, DC: American Psychological Association.
McCann, S. J. H. (2008). Societal threat, authoritarianism, conservatism, and U.S. state death penalty sentencing (1977-2004). Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 94, 913-923.
McCann, S. J. H. (1997). Threatening times, ‘strong’ presidential popular vote winners, and the margin of victory (1824-1964). Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 73, 160-170.
McCann, S. J. H. (1992). Alternative formulas to predict the greatness of U.S. presidents: Personological, situational, and zeitgeist factors. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 62, 469-479.
McCann, S. J. H. (2003). Younger achievement age predicts shorter life for governors: Testing the precocity-longevity hypothesis with artifact controls. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 29, 164-169.
McCann, S. J. H. (2001). The precocity-longevity hypothesis: Earlier peaks in career achievement predict shorter lives. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 27, 1429-1439.
McCann, S. J. H. (1999). Threatening times and annual fluctuations in American church memberships. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 25, 325-336.
McCann, S. J. H. (1995). Schlesinger’s cycles of American history and presidential candidate age (1789-1992): When younger is better. Political Psychology, 16, 749-755.
McCann, S. J. H. (2011). Conservatism, openness, and creativity: Patents granted to residents of American states. Creativity Research Journal, 23, 339-345.
McCann, S. J. H. (2011). Emotional health and the Big Five personality factors at the American state level. Journal of Happiness Studies, 12, 547-560.
McCann, S. J. H. (2010). Suicide, Big Five personality factors, and depression at the American state level. Archives of Suicide Research, 14, 368-374.
McCann, S. J. H. (2010). Subjective well-being, personality, demographic variables, and American state differences in smoking prevalence. Nicotine & Tobacco Research, 12, 895-904.
McCann, S. J. H., & Zawila, C. (2016). American state gun law strength and state resident differences in neuroticism levels. Journal of Social and Political Psychology, 4, 91-113.
McCann, S. J. H. (2015). Life expectancy can explain the precocity-longevity hypothesis association of early career success and early death. Journal of Genetic Psychology, 176, 414-419.
McCann, S. J. H., & Gardner, C. R. (2013). Student personality differences are related to their responses on instructor evaluation forms. Assessment and Evaluation in Higher Education, 39, 412-426.
McCann, S. J. H. (2014). Neuroticism and state differences in partisanship in the USA: Emotional stability, ideological stability, and Republican preference. Journal of Social and Political Psychology, 2, 242-267.
McCann, S. J. H. (2014). Higher resident neuroticism is specifically associated with elevated state cancer and heart disease mortality rates in the USA. SAGE Open, 4.
McCann, S. J. H. (2010). Authoritarianism, conservatism, racial diversity threat, and the state distribution of hate groups. Journal of Psychology: Interdisciplinary and Applied, 144, 15-36.
McCann, S. J. H. (2011). Do state laws concerning homosexuals reflect the preeminence of conservative-liberal individual differences? Journal of Social Psychology, 151, 227-239.
McCann, S. J. H. (2009). Political conservatism, authoritarianism, and societal threat: Voting for Republican representatives in U. S. congressional elections (1946-1992). Journal of Psychology: Interdisciplinary and Applied, 143, 341-358.
McCann, S. J. H. (2014). Happy Twitter tweets are more likely in American states with lower levels of resident neuroticism. Psychological Reports, 114, 891-895.
McCann, S. J. H. (2011). Personality and American state differences in obesity prevalence. Journal of Psychology: Interdisciplinary and Applied, 145, 419-433.
