The Team
Professor Nurit Shnabel
Head of the lab
Broadly speaking, I am interested in understanding the social psychological processes involved in improving social relations, whether it is between individuals or between groups. Within this broad topic, I have two major lines of research.
The first line examines the processes that facilitate or hinder reconciliation, such as the conflicting parties’ tendency to engage in competition over the victim status. I study these processes within the theoretical perspective of the needs-based model of reconciliation.
The second line examines the processes that facilitate or hinder gender equality. For example, I study the circumstances that lead men and women to behave in ways that reinforce traditional gender roles, such as engagement in dependency-oriented cross-gender helping, or enforcement of more stringent beauty standards on women than on men.
My research is based on quantitative methods (usually experiments).
Contact me at: shnabeln@tauex.tau.ac.il
Nadine Knab, PhD
Postdoctoral researcher, an Azrieli Fellow
I am interested in how psychological research can help understand and impact current global challenges in relation to intergroup conflict from a peace-psychological perspective, ranging from social phenomena such as migration and climate change to social inequality and intergroup hierarchies. I am interested to test novel theoretical assumptions and the application thereof in real-world settings to the questions: What are the psychological underpinnings of solidarity-based action? What psychological interventions can be used to transform potential destructive conflicts?
Contact me at: knab@mail.tau.ac.il
More information via www.nadine-knab.com
Boglárka Nyúl, PhD
Postdoctoral researcher, an Azrieli Fellow
My primary research interests encompass gender-based violence and intergroup conflicts. Within the scope of gender-based violence, I mostly concentrate on the social psychology of rape. My focus is on understanding societal perceptions of rape, with the ultimate aim of fostering more supportive behavior towards survivors. This includes examining when people label cases as rape and when they do not, and when they blame the victim and exonerate the perpetrator. Additionally, I am engaged in exploring prejudice and intergroup conflicts, specifically concentrating on sexism and anti-Gypsyism.
Gali Pesin-Michael
PhD candidate
My research examines the psychological and contextual factors that facilitate satisfaction of emotional needs and promote reconciliation in a social exchange between members of victim and perpetrator groups. For this purpose, I examine the effects of individual differences in implicit power motive and of the structural components of intergroup contact. In another line of research, I examine the association between members of historical victim and perpetrator groups' needs for empowerment and moral acceptance and their preferences for abstract (vs. concrete) representations of the historical transgression.
I have completed my BA in psychology and education and my MA in Educational Counselling with summa cum laude at The Hebrew University of Jerusalem.
Michael Shek
PhD candidate
I am interested in identifying factors and circumstances that contribute to openness to the outgroup's narrative, in the context of intergroup conflict. More specifically, my research focuses on whether the affirmation of victim and perpetrator groups’ social identity has the potential to foster a more synchronized, constructive, and open-minded dialogue in real-life dyadic interactions between members of conflicting groups. To examine this research question, I intend to use neuroscientific and other advanced methods for measuring interaction synchrony.
I completed my BA in psychology at City University London and my MA in clinical psychology at Bar-Ilan University. I am curently completing my internship as a clinical psychologist.
Rotem Simhon
PhD candidate
I am interested in understanding how sexual objectification is used to reinforce and maintain the patriarchal social order, and what the psychological mechanisms that enable sexual objectification are.
More specifically, I focus on support for prostitution - which can be conceptualized as an extreme form of sexual objectification. My research examines the relation between support for prostitution and the motivation to maintain the existing gender hierarchy, and the psychological mechanisms (such as dehumanization) that enable support for prostitution despite its well-documented negative consequences for the women who engage in it.
I completed my BA in Psychology and Economics and my MA in Experimental Psychology: Brain and Cognition (Cum Laude) at Ben-Gurion University of the Negev.
