Professor Adam Rutland – DIP Lab Director
Adam’s research focuses generally on social-cognitive development. His areas of expertise in a developmental context are: Prejudice, intergroup processes and relationships, social reasoning and morality; Peer exclusion, rejection, group dynamics and victimization; Cross-group friendships, intergroup attitudes, psychological well being; Interventions to reduce prejudice, intergroup contact; Children’s acculturation, ethnic and national identification.
Dr Ayşe Şule Yüksel – Postdoctoral Research Associate & DIPlab Manager
Dr Ayşe Şule Yüksel is a postdoctoral research associate on the ESRC Bystander Project at the University of Exeter and manages the activities and administration of the lab. She completed her PhD in social developmental psychology at the University of Exeter. Ayse holds a Masters from UCL, Institute of Education and a Masters from Istanbul University. She is interested in exploring mechanisms promoting prosocial behaviour and social inclusion in educational settings. Her research focuses on children and adolescents’ behavioural and hypothetical reactions as bystanders to bullying and social exclusion in intergroup and intragroup peer group contexts. She particularly examines how intergroup factors such as group membership, group norms, stereotypes and social-moral reasoning influence school-aged young people’s evaluations of and actual bystander reactions to bullying and social exclusion.
Dr Tracey Anne Warren – Postdoctoral Research Associate
Dr Tracey Anne Warren has had over 30 years’ experience across the primary and special education sector in the UK and internationally as a teacher, leader and founding director of a private special needs centre in the UAE. She is currently a postdoctoral research associate on the ESRC Bystander Project at the University of Exeter. She completed her EdD in special needs and inclusive education at the University of Exeter spotlighting parents and their perspectives on inclusive education in private schools in Dubai. She is interested in participatory research focusing on inclusion, diversity and equity in education and enjoys her time researching in schools, talking with parents and other stakeholders about their experiences within the education sector.
Dr Mengya Zhao – Postdoctoral Research Fellow
Mengya is currently working as a research fellow on the STEM Teens Project. She is specifically interested in how psychosocial factors (e.g., parenting, self-compassion, self-esteem, peer relationships) affect mental health in children and young people, as well as how cultural differences can influence child development and mental health. She has used a wide variety of quantitative methods (e.g., cross-sectional survey, longitudinal data analysis) and qualitative methods (e.g., focus groups, interviews) in her research. Her work has proposed a conceptual model of depression from a developmental and culturally-informed perspective, which she hopes will be able to guide assessment and intervention in support of parents and young people.
Dr Luke McGuire – Lecturer
Luke’s research explores social and moral development in middle childhood and adolescence. His areas of expertise include how resource allocation is influenced by social norms and group processes; STEM learning and gender stereotyping; peer inclusion and exclusion based on gender identity, as well as children’s attitudes to environmental and animal rights as moral issues.
Fidelia Law – Final year PhD Student
Fidelia’s research explores young people’s engagement, motivation and gender stereotypes in science, technology, engineering & mathematics (STEM). Her current research specifically focuses on informal science learning sites such as science centres and museums. She is in her final year of her PhD and her work is funded by the Wellcome Trust Science Learning+ project research grant. She holds an MA in International Development and Education from Newcastle University and has conducted research exploring the educational and occupational aspirations of children living in poverty in Accra, Ghana. Besides working on her research, she also works as a teaching assistant at the university.
Aqsa Farooq – Final year PhD Student
Aqsa’s research focuses on children and adolescent’s moral decision making in intergroup contexts, specifically when outgroup and ingroup members spread misinformation. She is interested in investigating if the group membership of the individual spreading misinformation influences children and adolescent’s moral evaluations. She is also exploring whether norms that induce a mindset of thinking critically about information can influence children and adolescents’ support of group members who spread misinformation and group members who support misinformers. Aqsa is a second year PhD student and holds a Masters in Applied Social Psychology from Royal Holloway, University of London.
Eirini Ketzitzidou Argyri – 1st year PhD Student
Eirini is doing her PhD in the Department of Psychology, University of Exeter. She also works as a Graduate Research Assistant on the Bystander project. The project investigates the development of norms across childhood and adolescence, looking at children’s and adolescents’ evaluations of and reasoning about the challenging of social exclusion. Eirini is interested in understanding the cognitive and emotional mechanisms behind prejudice, perspective change, and open-mindedness. Her philosophical psychological novel ‘To Pithano’, is an exploration of the subjective nature of our perceived reality, presenting memory and dreams as storytellers, and was published in Greece in 2014. She holds a MSc in Psychology of Education from UCL and a Degree in Philosophy, Education & Psychology, from the University of Ioannina, Greece.
Daniel Jones – Research Assistant
Daniel is a 3rd year placement student from Cardiff University currently working as a research assistant in the DIP Lab. He is interested in all aspects of developmental and social psychology, and is assisting with multiple projects involving STEM learning, misinformation, and intergroup exclusion.
Eva McCabe – Research Assistant
Eva is a 3rd year placement student from Cardiff University currently working as a research assistant in the DIP Lab. She is interested in all aspects of developmental psychology as well as a keen interest in neuropsychology. She is assisting with multiple projects this academic year involving STEM learning, misinformation, and intergroup exclusion.