Dr Myrto Pantazi

Myrto is a social psychologist with a background in psycholinguistics. She uses experimental methods to study social cognition. She is particularly interested in how people process and validate information as well as in their (conspiracy) beliefs.

Email: myrto.pantazi@oii.ox.ac.uk
  • Profile
  • Research
  • Publications

My background is variable and interdisciplinary. I received a BA in Greek Philology from Aristotle University of Thessaloniki and an MA in Linguistics from Utrecht University. In 2017 I received a Ph.D in Social Psychology from the Université libre de Bruxelles.

I currently hold a joint postdoctoral researcher position at the Oxford Internet Institute and the Oxford-Emirates Data Science Lab.

My main research interests lie broadly in the area of Social Psychology and Social Cognition, and specifically focus on how available information affects people’s beliefs and behaviour.

My Ph.D thesis was an experimental assessment of the human tendency to believe information we encounter (the truth-bias), combining a social psychological and a

linguistic approach. This video may give you an idea of the work I conducted in the context of my thesis [ http://cescup.ulb.be/JudgeStephen/] and also allows you to test your own gullibility should you wish to try!

My current research focuses on the social, cognitive and evolutionary factors that affect the truth-bias, as well as on its socio-political consequences, especially in the digital era.

I’m also interested in misinformation transmission and Conspiracy Beliefs, both from a cognitive and from a socio-political perspective.

Before coming to Oxford, I was a research associate at the University of Cambridge, where I worked in a project investigating the effects of sustainability information on investor decision-making.

Research Interests:

Social Psychology, Social Cognition, Truth-bias, Misinformation, Fake News, Epistemic Vigilance, Beliefs, Conspiracy Beliefs

Position held at the OII:

  • Postdoctoral Researcher, May 2018 –

Current projects

  • Political Volatility

    Participants: Professor Helen Margetts, Dr Scott Hale, Dr Chico Camargo, Dr Myrto Pantazi, Professor Peter John

    This project seeks to quantify trends and changes in the volatility of public opinion before and after widespread use of social media, and to study how social information can drive public opinion.

Publications

Chapters

  • Klein, O., Van der Linden, N., PANTAZI, M. and Kissine, M. "Behind the screen conspirators: paranoid social cognition in an online age" In: The psychology of conspiracy Bilewicz, M., Cichocka, A. and Soral, W. (eds.). Routledge. 162-182.

Journal articles