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.

More information about Angelo Romano

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

• Cooperation driven by reciprocity, not conformity - Science Daily 

• Trust and cooperation across societies - MindBlog

• National Parochialism is Ubiquitous Around the World - This View of Life 

Publications