Within the Social psychology research group, there is a strong focus on group psychology and processes within and between groups, but there is also research with a focus on the individual in different social contexts. The research focuses, directly or indirectly, on authentic, real-life situations and/or groups.
Overall, social psychology research could be described as psychological studies of various forms of social relationships and social interaction. The areas of social psychology that the group members mainly focus on can broadly be described as group processes, intergroup behaviour, social identity, collective processes, discursive psychology, gender psychology, and work and organizational psychology.
Within the research group there is cooperation in various configurations in research and/or education. There is also an extensive collaboration with other researchers. The main part of the research is conducted as externally funded research projects or as PhD projects. There are also other research efforts in the group and research funding is actively applied for in these cases. There are currently two research projects funded by the Swedish Research Council in the research group:
- Assessment of knowledge and skills in group work - an intervention study in the classroom everyday practice (2013-2017, project leader: Eva Hammar Chiriac)
- 'Cooperative learning' in primary care - an intervention study with paediatric nurses as leaders of parent groups in a randomized, controlled study (2017-2019, project leader: Michael Rosander)
At the moment, there are also three PhD projects:
- Psychological change as an outcome of participation in collective action (Sara Vestergren, planned disputation in 2017, supervisor: Eva Hammar Chiriac)
- Assessment of abilities and knowledge learned in group, preliminary title (Johan Forsell, planned disputation in 2020, supervisor: Karin Forslund Frykedal/Eva Hammar Chiriac)
- The causal relationship between organizational factors, people's experience of work, sick leave and bullying occurrence (Stefan Blomberg, planned disputation in 2021, supervisor: Michael Rosander)
Other research and research interests in the research group are:
- Family mealtime interaction
- Discursive construction of eating practices
- PBL tutorial interaction
- Clinical Group Supervision
- Visual Ethnography
- LGBTQ psychology
- LGBTQ families
- Bullying at work
Members of the research group also teach at several of the courses available at the university, for example, courses in the Psychologist programme, the Personnel and Administration programme and Cognitive Science programme. Other courses involve, e.g. Psychology 1-5, and the behavioural science basic course. Group members are also involved in courses in teaching for higher education, postgraduate courses, as well as specific lectures on social psychology, for example at the Medical faculty of Linköping University or at Campus Norrköping.
