BIOGRAPHY

Nicolas Geeraert obtained his graduate degree in Theoretical & Experimental Psychology at Ghent University, Belgium, in 2000. In his doctoral research he focussed on the ironic consequences of correcting social inferences. He obtained his Ph.D. in Experimental Social Psychology in 2004, from the Catholic University of Louvain, at Louvain-la-Neuve, Belgium. Nicolas joined the Department at the University of Essex in October 2004.

RESEARCH OVERVIEW

My research is situated in the area of Social Cognition. A main interests is the social perception of individuals (e.g. attribution processes), and groups (e.g. stereotyping). It is commonly known that people's perceptions are often heavily biased. I have a particular interest in understanding the grounds for such errors and biases, and the consequences of avoiding them.

Another interest lies in the negative or ironic consequences of mental control. A general finding is whenever people try to avoid certain thoughts (e.g. a white bear, stereotypical information) the suppressed construct will have a higher activation than when it wouldn't have been suppressed (= rebound). I am interested in the issue of procedural rebound, and its role in judgement & decision making.

A third main interest lies in cross-cultural psychology. Having spent quit some time in South East Asia I have developed strong interests in cultural differences in general, and in West-East differences in social cognition in particular.

RECENT PUBLICATIONS

Orbell, S., Lidierth, P., Henderson, C.J., Geeraert, N., Uller, C., Uskul, A.K., Kyriakaki, M. (2009). Social cognitive beliefs, alcohol and tobacco use: A prospective community study of change following a ban on smoking in public places. Health Psychology, 28, 753-761.

Geeraert, N., Van Boven, L., & Yzerbyt, V.Y. (in prep). Bouncing back: Evidence from procedural rebound for the functional modularity of similarity assessment.

Geeraert, N., & Yzerbyt, V.Y. (2007). Cultural Differences in the Correction of Social Inferences: Does the Dispositional Rebound occur in an Interdependent Culture? British Journal of Social Psychology, 46, 423-435.

Geeraert, N., & Yzerbyt, V.Y. (2007). How fatiguing is dispositional suppression? Disentangling the effects of procedural rebound and ego-depletion. European Journal of Social Psychology, 37, 216-230.

Geeraert, N., Yzerbyt, V.Y., Corneille, O., & Wigboldus, D. (2004). The return of dispositionalism: On the linguistic consequences of dispositional suppression. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 40, 264-272.