Robert Hepach
Associate Professor of Developmental Psychology
- Tutorial Fellow, New College, Oxford
I am a developmental psychologist who studies social cognition and motivation in early ontogeny from the first year of life to school-age: How young children’s understanding of the social world shapes their own behaviour to initiate, maintain, and repair cooperative relationships with others.
Together with my colleagues we have designed integrative experimental paradigms that allow us to assess children’s internal states and subtle emotional expressions while they engage with their peers in naturalistic study designs. We use eye tracking, pupillometry, and depth sensor imaging to capture the internal mechanisms that underlie young children’s (pro)social motivation.
Recently completed projects
The affective mechanisms underlying joint attention and joint action in infancy and toddlerhood (Co-PI: Dr. Christine Michel)
German Research Foundation, DFG (2020 - 2023)
Recent publications
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Altercentric Memory Error at 9 Months But Correct Object Memory by 18 Months Revealed in Infants' Pupil.
Journal article
Tebbe A-L. et al, (2025), Dev Sci, 28
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Body posture as a measure of emotional valence in young children: a preregistered validation study
Journal article
Gerdemann SC. et al, (2025), Frontiers in Developmental Psychology, 3
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Learning new words via reading: The influence of emotional narrative context on learning novel adjectives.
Journal article
Dong Y. et al, (2024), Q J Exp Psychol (Hove)
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Children's risk preferences vary across sexes, social contexts, and cultures.
Journal article
Stengelin R. et al, (2024), Commun Psychol, 2
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Do dogs preferentially encode the identity of the target object or the location of others' actions?
Journal article
Lonardo L. et al, (2024), Anim Cogn, 27