Hi, my name is Olivia!

In my research, I'm interested in better understanding the risky choices we face in life: What these choices are and how we decide whether to take a risk. This includes considering risky choices from multiple perspectives: from laypeople, from experts in the field of behavioral science, and from the perspective of measurable life outcomes. To what degree do the choices from these different perspectives overlap? What are the situational and psychological drivers that come into play when facing these choices? With this research, I hope to better understand the types and drivers of risky choices we as psychologists should investigate more closely. Furthermore, I am intrigued by the current discourse surrounding the topic of 'polarization'. I investigate the many ways we can operationalize it and how we can make more nuanced claims about polarization in societally relevant issues.

Education

• 2022 - today PhD, University of Zurich, Switzerland
• 2019 - 2021 Msc Psychology, University of Basel, Switzerland
• 2015 - 2018 Bsc Psychology, University of Zurich, Switzerland

Resources and social media

Scientific writing with LaTeX is a game changer. If you'd like to get started, you can find a tutorial and some templates here: https://github.com/oliviafischer/latex_tutoria

You can find me on Twitter/X as @moliviafischer and on Mastodon as @oliviafischer@mastodon.online

Publications and preprints

Fischer, O., Jeitziner, L. T., & Wulff, D. U. (2024). Affect in science communication: A data-driven analysis of TED Talks on YouTube. Humanities and Social Sciences Communications, 11, Article 80. https://doi.org/10.1057/s41599-023-02247-z

Fischer, O., & Frey, R. (2023). The many operationalizations of polarization: A case study focusing on people’s risk perceptions in a global state of emergency. PsyArXiv. https://doi.org/10.31234/osf.io/bv496