Forschung am ZPID > Science Acceptance > Social Influence Lab

Welcome to the Social Influence Lab!

We are interested in understanding human cognition and social behavior deviating from rationality or scientific grounds. This includes but is not limited to conspiracy beliefs and their antisocial outcomes (e.g., norm violations), acceptances of misinformation, and biases such as stereotyping or scientific misconduct. We are keen on understanding the causes and processes underlying it, its social consequences, and the means to change thoughts and behavior in accordance with scientific reasoning. To this end, we apply methods and theories from social, motivational, and cognitive psychology. Still, our work also speaks to applied subdisciplines of psychology and metascience.

The Social Influence Lab brings together scientists at the Professorship for Psychology at Trier University and scientists working at the Leibniz Institute for Psychology (ZPID).

Lab Spotlights

  • Svenja Frenzel, in cooperation with researchers from the University of Oslo and Goethe University Frankfurt, launched a study on social identification and chronic illnesses. The goal is to understand how the social network of people with Diabetes mellitus affects chronic disease management. You can find more information on the study here. 
  • Lena Hahn and Claudia Araya presented their research at the Integrative Perspectives on Conflict and Control symposium in Tübingen, Germany.

Who we are

Dr. Claudia Araya

Senior Researcher

+49 (0) 651 201-2048

Dr. Svenja Frenzel

Senior Researcher

+49 (0) 651 201-2861

Dr. Lena Hahn

Senior Researcher, Associate employee in the Department for Psychology, Trier University

+49 (0) 651 201-2031

Fabian Hindelang

Research Assistant

Lisa Küpper

Research Assistant

Emilia Rappold

Research Assistant

Recent Lab Publications (selection)

  • Pummerer, L., Gkinopoulos, T., Douglas, K. M., Jolley, D. & Sassenberg, K. (in press). The Appraisal Model of Conspiracy Theories (AMCT): Applying appraisal theories to understanding emotional and behavioral reactions to conspiracy theories. Psychological Inquiry.
  • Till, F. J., Heimrich, J., Frenzel, S. B., van Dick, R., Mojzisch, A., Junker, N. M., & Häusser, J. A. (2025). Social identification in times of crisis: How need to belong, perspective taking, and cognitive closure relate to changes in social identification. Journal of Applied Social Psychology, 55, 38-51. https://doi.org/10.1111/jasp.13077
  • Doré, A., Grammes, J., Egri, E., Priesterroth, L., Frenzel, S. B., Spörkel, O. & Kubiak, T. (2024). Identification with characters of a national narrative health communication campaign targeting type 2 diabetes. Health Communication, 1-8. https://doi.org/10.1080/10410236.2024.2378256
  • Glöckner, A., Gollwitzer, M., Hahn, L., Lange, J., Sassenberg, K., & Unkelbach, C. (2024). Quality, replicability, transparency in research in social psychology: Implementation of recommendations in Germany. Social Psychology, 55, 134-147. https://doi.org/10.1027/1864-9335/a000548
  • Hahn, L., Glöckner, A., Gollwitzer, M., Hellmann, J. H., Lange, J., Schindler, S., & Sassenberg, K. (2024). More Than Box-ticking? Assessing Preregistration Quality in Psychological Research. Preprint available via https://doi.org/10.31219/osf.io/wc7qr
  • Hahn, L., Buttlar, B., Künne, R. & Walther, E. (2024). Introducing the trier univalence neutrality ambivalence (TUNA) database: A picture database differentiating complex attitudes. PLoS ONE, 19(5), e0302904. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0302904
  • Sassenberg, K. & Winter, K. (2024). Intraindividual conflicts reduce the polarization of attitudes. Current Directions in Psychological Science, 33, 190-197. https://doi.org/10.1177/09637214241242452
  • Winter, K., Hornsey, M. J., Pummerer, L. & Sassenberg, K. (2024). Public agreement with misinformation about wind farms. Nature Communications, 15, 8888. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41467-024-53278-2

Current Projects and Cooperations (selection)

  • Understanding and fighting the impact of conspiracy mentality: Conspiracy beliefs have negative consequences (e.g., lower health and environmental protection behaviors). This project aims to answer two fundamental research questions: (1) What influence do conspiracy beliefs have on health behavior and environmental protection behavior? (2) How can the adverse effects of conspiracy beliefs be counteracted? In addition, we aim to identify mechanisms that promote or reduce conspiracy beliefs. To answer these questions, we place a particular focus on the source of communication ("Who is sharing the information?") and the trust in it ("Does the person have sincere motives?"). 
  • Psychological implications of co-opetition: Cooperation and competition tend to be perceived as opposite poles of one dimension. However, many real-world situations involve both situations simultaneously. For example, employees on a team must cooperate while competing for promotion or recognition from superiors, or team athletes practice together while competing for a place on the team in the next game. The intraindividual conflict created by co-opetition might positively affect cognitive flexibility and reduce biases. By studying the underlying cognitive processes, we aim to understand better the effects of everyday situations characterized by co-opetition. 
  • Metascience: Research using scientific methods to study science itself (i.e., metascience) has long been rare, but seen a substantial increase as an outcome of the replication crisis. We are broadly interested in Metascience and the acceptance of methodological changes within psychology as an outcome of the replication crises and researchers' strategic behavior in response to policy changes. Specifically, we have ongoing projects assessing the quality of preregistrations and the FAIRness of data sharing.