Research
Torn. Uncertain. Regretful.
Ever wrestled with a decision—unsure what the right choice was, or if you made the wrong one?
This is cognitive conflict.
Cognitive conflicts are motivating forces that influence people’s feelings, thoughts and actions. In my research, I outline how people resolve cognitive conflicts, like ambivalence or dissonance, and how it affects their decisions. Building on this, I investigate how tailored communication can promote behavior change. My research thus changes the way we view conflict as a central factor in decisions that are not sustainable, healthy, financially sensible or ethically justifiable and shows how to motivate behavior change.
Judged. Excluded. Forgotten.
Ever felt the sting of being unfairly judged or left out by others; have you been reminded that life doesn’t last forever?
This is threat.
People are regularly confronted with threatening situations, and I am interested in how people perceive and deal with such situations. Therefore, I conduct online, laboratory, field, and virtual reality experiments to investigate the boundary conditions and consequences of social evaluative stress, social exclusion, and existential threat. In this way, my research helps to understand when and why situations are perceived as threatening and how this affects cognition, emotions and behavior.
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