Dr Lee de Wit

I trained as an experimental psychologist / cognitive neuroscientist, and my current research and teaching focuses on Political Psychology.

Some of the questions that currently drive my research include:

What are the psychological predictors of attitudes towards immigration, and can we use an understanding of those psychological predictors to develop more effective communication around immigration (this is the focus of Tessa Buchanan's PhD, also supervised by Alan Renwick at UCL).
What are the psychological predictors of attitudes towards inequality and capitalism, and can we use an understanding of those psychological predictors to help bridge the polarized discussion of this topic.
What are the psychological predictors of political engagement, with a particular focus on political knowledge and societal values. Can we use an understanding of these predictors to improve political turnout.
Can we use more data driven techniques to idenitfy different patterns of voting behaviour (rather than relying on simple Left-Right continuums)?
What are the psychological and cognitive characteristics of swing voters compared to other types of voters (this is the focus of Emmanuel Mahieux's PhD, also supervised by Joe Devlin at UCL).

To see my lab page, visit: Political Psychology Lab

Biography

I have previously served as a Teaching Fellow (2016-2018), and Senior Teaching Fellow (2018-2019) at University College London, and as the Academic Director for Psychology at the Institute of Continuing Education at the University of Cambridge (2016-2017).

I originally studied Experimental Psychology at the University of Bristol (2002-2005), and then did an Economic and Research Council–funded Masters (2005-2006, with Charles Fernyhough) and PhD (2006-2009, with David Milner FRS and Robert Kentridge) at Durham University. I then worked as a post-doctoral researcher at the University of Leuven working on the Gestalt Revision program of Johan Wagemans (2010-2015). I have also spent time as a visiting researcher with Geraint Rees at the Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience (University College London), Glyn Humphreys at the University of Oxford, and Catherine Tallon-Baudry at the University Hospital Pitié-Salpêtrière in Paris.

Publications

Key publications:

For a full list of my publications, see Google Scholar

Selected Publications Since 2014

Lewis, G. & de-Wit L. (2019). How many ways to say goodbye? The latent class structure and psychological correlates of European Union sentiment in a large sample of UK adults. Journal of Social and Political Psychology, 7 (1), 556-576.

Moors, P., Wagemans, J., & de-Wit, L. (2017). Causal events enter awareness faster than non-causal events. PeerJ, 5, e2932.

de-Wit, L., Alexander, D., Ekroll, V., & Wagemans, J. (2016). Is neuroimaging measuring information in the brain? Psychonomic Bulletin & Review, 23(5), 1415–1428.

Vancleef, K., Acke, E., Torfs, K., Demeyere, N., Lafosse, C., Humphreys, G., Wagemans, J., & de‐Wit, L. (2015). Reliability and validity of the Leuven Perceptual Organization Screening Test (L‐POST). Journal of Neuropsychology, 9(2), 271-298.

Van de Cruys, S., Evers, K., Van der Hallen, R., Van Eylen, L., Boets, B., de-Wit, L., & Wagemans, J. (2014). Precise minds in uncertain words: Predictive coding in autism. Psychological Review, 121(4), 649.

Teaching and Supervisions

Teaching:

I serve as the Director of the Psychology and Behavioural Sciences BSc, the co-ordinator of PBS7 (Social and Applied Psychology), and I teach the following topics:

PBS1: Political Psychology

PBS3: Morals, evolution and culture

PBS7: Applied Behavioural Insights

Department of Psychology

Biography

Publications

Teaching and Supervisions

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