Jan-Willem van Prooijen Ph.D.

Jan-Willem van Prooijen, Ph.D., is an Associate Professor at the department of Experimental and Applied Psychology of VU Amsterdam and a Senior Researcher at the Netherlands Institute for the Study of Crime and Law Enforcement (NSCR). He received his Ph.D. from Leiden University in 2002. Dr. van Prooijen is interested in the dark side of human beings, particularly in the context of politics, law, and society. His research has three main thematic pillars: (1) conspiracy theories, (2) unethical behavior, and (3) radical ideologies.

Dr. van Prooijen has published his work in journals such as Perspectives on Psychological Science, Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, and Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, and published various books including The Psychology of Conspiracy Theories (Routledge, 2018) and The Moral Punishment Instinct (Oxford University Press, 2018). He received research funding from various sources, and was in 2006 awarded the Early Career Contribution Award by the International Society for Justice Research (ISJR). He is currently Associate Editor for Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, has been Associate Editor for European Journal of Social Psychology and Social Justice Research, and has been on the Editorial Board of various prestigious journals, including JPSP-IRGP and Psychological Science. He was president of ISJR from 2016 to 2018.