Posselt's research is aimed understanding and mitigating institutionalized inequalities in higher education. Her current research examines the implications of status competitions and faculty decision making for student access, attainment, and wellbeing. Having worked for four years with the McNair Scholars Program, she has strong interests in research methods and graduate education. Posselt is author of Inside Graduate Admissions: Merit, Diversity, and Faculty Gatekeeping (2015, Harvard University Press), and other work has been published in American Educational Research Journal, Research in Higher Education, Higher Education: Handbook of Theory and Research, and the Chronicle of Higher Education, among others.