About
Rene Mottus is a Professor in the Department of Psychology within the School of Philosophy, Psychology and Language Sciences at the University of Edinburgh. He joined the university in 2013 as a lecturer, was promoted to Reader in 2019, and attained full Professorship in 2024. His office is located in Room S5 of the Psychology Building at 7 George Square, Edinburgh, with contact email rene.mottus@ed.ac.uk.
Professor Mottus completed his BSc (2003), MSc (2005), and PhD (2009) at the University of Tartu, Estonia. Prior to his academic career, he worked as a clinical psychologist in a psychiatry clinic and served as a post-doctoral researcher with the University of Edinburgh Centre for Cognitive Ageing and Cognitive Epidemiology (2010-2013).
His research centers on personality and well-being, with specific expertise in:
- Efficient representation of human personality through personality nuances
- Predicting life outcomes using personality traits
- Personality development and behavior genetics
- Intelligence as a dimension of individual differences
Professor Mottus actively supervises PhD students on personality and well-being topics, with current projects leveraging the Estonian Biobank. He teaches undergraduate courses on human personality and postgraduate core courses for the Psychology of Individual Differences MSc program.
He hosts the Personality Psychology Podcast, contributes to Psychology Today, and has received media coverage from The Times, The Guardian, The Telegraph, and the BBC for his research.
