Angelo Romano
Assistant Professor
- Name
- Dr. A. Romano
- Telephone
- +31 71 527 2727
- a.romano@fsw.leidenuniv.nl
- ORCID iD
- 0000-0002-7502-9268
Angelo Romano is an Assistant Professor at the unit Social, Economic and Organisational Psychology at the Institute of Psychology. He is interested in understanding the psychology of conflict and cooperation among people, groups, and nations.
Angelo Romano is an Assistant Professor at the unit Social, Economic and Organisational Psychology at the Institute of Psychology. He is interested in understanding the psychology of conflict and cooperation among people, groups, and nations.
Research on conflict and cooperation
Romano applies theory and methods from social psychology, evolutionary biology, and experimental economics to investigate: (a) the ecological and institutional factors that promote conflict and cooperation across societies, (b) cross-cultural differences in cooperation and conflict, and (c) the relation between ingroup favoritism, reciprocity, and reputation-based cooperation. He mostly focuses on two lines of research.
In one line of research, Romano uses experimental methods (in the lab and in the field) to test prominent hypotheses on the mechanisms promoting cooperation and conflict between individuals and groups. Relatedly, he is also very interested in understanding the ubiquity, forms, and variation of trust, cooperation, and conflict across countries.
In a 17-society study, Romano tested hypotheses on why, who and where people trust more ingroup members, compared to outgroup members. Then, in a 42-society project, he tested theories on the variation of national parochialism in cooperation, finding that ingroup favoritism in cooperation is ubiquitous around the globe.In the last years in Leiden, Angelo continued developing this line of research by investigating conflict around the globe in a large-scale study involving 51 countries and more than 18,000 participants.
Recently, he also extended this line of research by applying computational techniques (i.e., agent-based modelling) to understand how prominent mechanisms such as reciprocity can evolve across different socio-ecological systems.
Education
- Social Animals at Work
Short CV
As part of his PhD and postdoc experience, Romano had the privilege to focus on these topics across three different institutions (VU Amsterdam, MPI Bonn, and in Leiden). These experiences have helped him integrate theories and methods from social psychology, experimental economics, and evolutionary biology to test relevant hypotheses on conflict and cooperation using a vast set of complementary methodologies and advanced statistical techniques.
He got his PhD in Social Psychology at Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam and University of Turin. His dissertation focused on the power of direct and indirect reciprocity to promote cooperation among individuals and groups.
After his PhD (January 2018), he moved to the Max Planck Institute for Research on Collective Goods in Bonn as a senior researcher, where he continued his empirical work to test hypotheses on cross-cultural variation of cooperation and ingroup favoritism across societies.
In January 2020, he moved to Leiden as a post-doc, and extended his line of research to the understanding of asymmetric conflict among individuals and groups.
Grants and awards
• APS Rising Star (2023)
• Otto Hahn Medal (Max Planck Society; 7,500€; 2019)
• ASPO Award for Best Dissertation in the Netherlands (ASPO; 500€; 2018)
• Junior Career Award (Vrije Universiteit Amsterdam; 500€; 2018)
• Best Dissertation in Social Psychology in Italy (Italian Association of Psychologists - AIP; 250€; 2018)
• Best Presentation Award (17th International Conference on Social Dilemmas; 2017)
• Travel grant from San Paolo bank (500€; 2015)
• MIUR PhD Scholarship for three years (University of Turin; 40,914€; 2013)
• Scholarship from University of Turin (5,600€; 2013)
In the media
Contact
Assistant Professor
- Faculteit der Sociale Wetenschappen
- Instituut Psychologie
- Soc., Econom. en Organisat Psych.
- Romano A., Gross J. & Dreu C.K.W. de (2024), The nasty neighbor effect in humans, Science Advances 10(26): .
- Romano A., Gross J. & Dreu C.K.W. de (2024), Peace as prerequisite rather than consequence of cooperation, Behavioral and Brain Sciences 47: e25.
- Dreu C.K.W. de, Gross J. & Romano A. (2023), Group formation and the evolution of human social organization, Perspectives on Psychological Science : .
- Gross J., Méder Z.Z., Dreu C.K.W. de, Romano A., Molenmaker W.E. & Hoenig L.C. (2023), The evolution of universal cooperation, Science Advances 9(7): eadd8289.
- Romano A., Saral A.S. & Wu J. (2022), Direct and indirect reciprocity among individuals and groups, Current Opinion in Psychology 43: 254-259.
- Dreu C.K.W. de., Farina A., Gross J.A.J. & Romano A. (2022), Prosociality as a foundation for intergroup conflict, Current Opinion in Psychology 44: 112-116.
- Doesum N.J. van, Murphy R.O., Gallucci M., Aharonov-Majar E., Athenstaedt U., Au W.T., Bai L., Böhm R., Bovina I., Buchan N.R., Chen X.-P., Dumont K.B., Engelmann J.B., Eriksson K., Euh H., Fiedler S., Friesen J., Gächter S., Garcia C., González R., Graf S., Growiec K., Guimond S., Hřebíčková M., Immer-Bernold E., Joireman J., Karagonlar G., Kawakami K., Kiyonari T., Kou Y., Kyrtsis A.-A., Lay S., Leonardelli G.J., Li N.P, Li Y., Maciejovsky B., Manesi Z., Mashuri A., Mok A., Moser K.S., Moták L., Netedu A., Platow M.J., Raczka-Winkler K., Reinders Folmer C.P., Reyna C., Romano A., Shalvi S., Simão C., Stivers A.W., Strimling P., Tsirbas Y., Utz S., Meij L. van der, Waldzus S., Wang Y., Weber B., Weisel O., Wildschut T., Winter F., Wu J., Yong J.C. & Lange P. A.M. van (2022), Reply to Nielsen et al: social mindfulness is associated with countries’ environmental performance and individual environmental concern, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 119(9): e2122077119.
- Doesum N.J. van, Murphy R.O., Gallucci M., Aharonov-Majar E., Athenstaedt U., Au W.T., Bai L., Böhm R., Bovina I., Buchan N.R., Chen X.-P., Dumont K.B., Engelmann J.B., Eriksson K., Euh H., Fiedler S., Friesen J., Gächter S., Garcia C., González R., Graf S., Growiec K., Guimond S., Hřebíčková M., Immer-Bernold E., Joireman J., Karagonlar G., Kawakami K., Kiyonari T., Kou Y., Kyrtsis A.-A., Lay S., Leonardelli G.J., Li N.P., Li Y., Maciejovsky B., Manesi Z., Mashuri A., Mok A., Moser K.S., Moták L., Netedu A., Platow M.J., Raczka-Winkler K., Reinders Folmer C.P., Reyna C., Romano A., Shalvi S., Simão C., Stivers A.W., Strimling P., Tsirbas Y., Utz S., Meij L. van der, Waldzus S., Wang Y., Weber B., Weisel O., Wildschut T., Winter F., Wu J., Yong J.C. & Lange P. A.M. van (2022), Reply to Komatsu et al: from local social mindfulness to global sustainability efforts?, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 119(4): e2119303118.
- Romano A., Gross J. & Dreu C.K.W. de (2022), Conflict misperceptions between citizens and foreigners across the globe, PNAS Nexus 1(5): pgac267.
- Spadaro G., Molho C., Prooijen J-W. van, Romano A., Mosso C.O. & Lange P.A.M. van (2022), Corrupt third parties undermine trust and prosocial behaviour between people, Nature Human Behaviour 7: 1-9.
- Doesum N.J. van, Murphy R.O, Gallucci M., Aharonov-Majar E., Athenstaedt U., Au Wing T., Bai L., Böhm R., Bovina I., Buchan N.R., Chen X.-P., Dumont K.B., Engelmann J.B., Eriksson K., Euh H., Fiedler S., Friesen J., Gächter S., Garcia C., González R., Graf S., Growiec K., Guimond S., Hřebíčková M., Immer-Bernold E., Joireman J., Karagonlar G., Kawakami K., Kiyonari T., Kou Y., Kuhlman D.M., Kyrtsis A.-A., Lay S., Leonardelli G.J., Li N.P., Li Y., Maciejovsky B., Manesi Z., Mashuri A., Mok A., Moser K.S., Moták L., Netedu A., Pammi C., Platow M.J., Raczka-Winkler K., Reinders F.Ch.P., Reyna C., Romano A., Shalvi S., Simão C., Stivers A.W., Strimling P., Tsirbas Y., Utz S., Meij L. van der, Waldzus S., Wang Y., Weber B., Weisel O., Wildschut T., Winter F., Wu J., Yong J.C. & Lange P.A.M. van (2021), Social mindfulness and prosociality vary across the globe, Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences 118(35): e2023846118.
- Romano A., Sutter M., Liu J.H., Yamagishi T. & Balliet D. (2021), National parochialism is ubiquitous across 42 nations around the world, Nature Communications 12: 4456.
- Romano A., Spadaro G., Balliet D., Joireman J., Lissa C. van, Jin S., Agostini M., Bélanger J., Gützkow B., Kreienkamp J. & Leander N.P. (2021), Cooperation and trust across societies during the Covid-19 pandemic, Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology 52(7): 622-642.
- Romano A., Bortolotti S., Hofmann W., Praxmarer M. & Sutter M. (2021), Generosity and cooperation across the life span: a lab-in-the-field-study, Psychology and Aging 36(1): 108-118.
- Romano A., Sutter M., Liu J.H. & Balliet D. (2021), Political ideology, cooperation and national parochialism across 42 nations, Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences 376(1822): 20200146.
- Jin S., Balliet D., Romano A., Spadaro G., Lissa C.J. van, Agostini M., Bélanger J.J., Gützkow B., Kreienkamp J., Pontus Leander N. & PsyCorona Collaboration (2021), Intergenerational conflicts of interest and prosocial behavior during the COVID-19 pandemic, Personality and Individual Differences 171: 110535.
- Romano A., Giardini F., Columbus S., Kwaadsteniet E.W. de, Kisfalusi D., Triki Z., Snijders C. & Hagel K. (2021), Reputation and socio-ecology in humans, Philosophical Transactions of the Royal Society B: Biological Sciences 376(1838): 20200295.