At Yale, she briefly worked with Mettee but their interests and personal styles were not a match. She wanted to work with Richard Nisbett but his laboratory was full. She eventually did her dissertation research on attribution theory with John McConahay. Her dissertation focused on Daryl Bem's self-perception theory and addressed whether or not people infer their attitudes from their behavior. She found that false feedback of one's behavior is accepted as a basis for one's attitudes if it is consistent with pre-existing attitudes.