Mioara Cristea

Mioara Cristea is an Associate Professor at Heriot-Watt University's School of Social Sciences (Psychology Department). She specializes in social psychology with a focus on social representations, polarization, and pandemic-related behavioral research. Her work contributes to UN Sustainable Development Goals addressing inequality and peace.

Research Interests: Dr. Cristea investigates far-right narratives, gender disparities in emotions, cognitive dissonance replication, societal polarization frameworks, and vaccine hesitancy dynamics. She employs cross-cultural and longitudinal methodologies, often collaborating internationally on pandemic studies.

Key Contributions: Recent studies include systematic reviews of far-right online discourse and multilab cognitive dissonance experiments. Her work bridges psychological theory with real-world issues like public health crises and social fragmentation.

Awards: Recipient of Excellence Scholarship (2008) and Postdoctoral Fellowship (2011) for research contributions.

Media Engagement: Regularly discusses leadership burnout, workplace gratitude's career impact, and mental health during crises via media outlets.