Welcome

Welcome to the homepage of the Social and Environmental Psychology Area at Ruhr-University Bochum!

Social and environmental psychology explore the dynamic interplay between individuals and their surroundings—both social and physical. These fields examine how people perceive, influence, and are influenced by their environments, spanning from interpersonal interactions to broader societal structures and ecological contexts.

Social psychology investigates the interplay between individuals and their surrounding social world from three major perspectives: social cognition, interpersonal relations, and group interactions. Core topics include social perception, stereotyping and prejudice, intergroup relations, social influence, decision-making, morality, and prosocial behavior. Because social aspects are pervasive in so many spheres of life, social psychology is a broad and increasingly multidisciplinary discipline with many connections to neighboring fields, including work and industrial psychology, motivation and personality science, health psychology, environmental psychology, and behavioral public policy. Research in this field informs applications and interventions targeting societal problems, such as prejudice and intergroup conflict, unhealthy lifestyles, and individual and collective responses to the climate crisis and other pressing issues.

Environmental psychology examines the reciprocal relationship between individuals and their environments, exploring how people shape their surroundings and how, in turn, their behavior, well-being, and decision-making are influenced by environmental factors. A core focus of the field is understanding how individuals perceive, evaluate, and communicate about their environments, as well as how social and cultural contexts shape these interactions at both individual and collective levels. The field also draws on insights from environmental sociology, sustainability science, political science, architecture, and urban planning to address pressing issues such as climate change, resource conservation, and the design of human-centered spaces.

Our approach at Bochum represents both fields, while increasingly addressing issues at their intersection. Whether examining the psychological drivers of pro-environmental behaviors or public policy support for climate policies, we aim to integrate rigorous experimental methods with real-world behavioral data from everyday life to generate insights that inform both theory and practice. In doing so, we recognize that individual cognitions and behaviors are not formed in isolation but are shaped by broader structural factors—economic policies, cultural narratives, and systemic constraints and opportunities. Moving beyond a solely individualistic lens, our work aims to also highlight how societal structures influence behavioral choices and how fostering awareness about such influences can help advance effective and equitable solutions to vexing societal problems such as climate change.

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