Dr Elena Geangu
Senior Lecturer (Associate Professor)

Profile

Biography

• 2017 –now – Lecturer, University of York, UK
• 2012-2017 – Lecturer, Lancaster University, UK
• 2011-2012 - Postdoctoral Research Fellow, Milano-Bicocca University, Italy
• 2010-2011 – Teaching Fellow, Durham University, UK
• 2008-2009 – Postdoctoral Research Fellow, St Francis Xavier University, Canada
• 2003-2008 – PhD Developmental Psychology, Babes-Bolyai University, Romania
• 2002-2003 – MSc Psychological Counselling and Psychotherapy, Babes-Bolyai University, Romania
• 1998-2002 – BSc Psychology, Babes-Bolyai University, Romania

Research

Overview

My research broadly concerns early social and emotional development. In particular, I am interested in investigating how infants and toddlers develop the ability to resonate empathically with others, as well as how they develop a complex understanding of the fact that others’ behaviors are driven by mental states like emotions and intentions. To address these important issues in developmental psychology, my research program combines a variety of behavioral, neuroimaging and psychophysiology methods (e.g., EEG/ERP, eye-tracking, electrophysiology).

https://emodevlab.wordpress.com/

https://pure.york.ac.uk/portal/en/researchers/elena-geangu(eaf33650-b423-45c5-b5ea-de02eb3f1c83).html

Projects

• Early empathy development
• The development of emotion information processing in infancy and toddlerhood
• Mental state understanding in infancy and toddlerhood
• Multi-sensory action processing in infancy

Grants

• 2017-2018, EPSRC IAA Researcher Mobility Grant – Technologies for studying human development in the wild (PI. Elena Geangu; Co-I. Hugo Gamboa – PluX)
• 2016-2020, European Commission ITN Grant. Project title: AFFECTIVA - Personalize Technologies for Mental Health. (CoInvestigator; PI. Sas Corina - Lancaster University).
• 2015-2016, British Academy/Leverhulme Small Research Grant. Project Title: Infants facial muscular responses to static emotional expressions. PI. Geangu E. (£ 9994)
• 2013-2015, The Great Britain Sasakawa Foundation Research Grant. Project Title: Investigating cross-cultural differences in emotional face processing in infancy. PI. Geangu E. (£ 2500).
• 2008-2009 - Postdoctoral Research Fellowship (NSERC Research Capacity Development Grant) (Awarded to Geangu E., 16.000 Canadian Dollars)
• 2007-2008 - Research Grant for Young PhD Students (CNCSIS – Romanian Ministry of Education) (100/100 points, Ranked 1st). Project Title: The development of empathy in infancy – contagious crying and its correlates. PI. Geangu E. (14700€).
• 2006 - DAAD Stipendienurkunde for young researchers (Awarded to Geangu E., 6275€).

Collaborators

Available PhD research projects

I would be interested to supervise PhD students on research projects related to any of the broader topics listed above.

Publications

Selected publications

• Kaiser, J., Crespo-Llado, M. M., Turati, C., & Geangu, E. (2017). The development of spontaneous facial responses to others’ emotions in infancy. An EMG study. Scientific Reports. DOI: 10.1038/s41598-017-17556-y
• Geangu, E., Ichikawa, H., Lao, J., Kanazawa, S., Yamaguchi, M. K., Caldara, R., & Turati, C. (2016). Culture shapes 7-month-olds’ perceptual strategies in discriminating facial expressions of emotion. Current Biology, 26(14), R663-R664.
• Geangu, E., Quadrelli, E., Conte, S., Croci, E., & Turati, C. (2016). Three-year-olds’ rapid facial electromyographic responses to emotional facial expressions and body postures. Journal of experimental child psychology, 144, 1-14.
• Geangu, E., Quadrelli, E., Lewis, J. W., Cassia, V. M., & Turati, C. (2015). By the sound of it. An ERP investigation of human action sound processing in 7-month-old infants. Developmental cognitive neuroscience, 12, 134-144.

Full publications list

See Google Scholar or the York Research Database for full list of publications. 

Teaching

Undergraduate

• Third year advanced module: Developmental Social Neuroscience

Postgraduate

• MSc in Development, Disorders and Clinical Practice: Current Questions in Developmental Research

External activities

Editorial duties