Prof. Dr. Aileen Oeberst

Academic career

• Since 04 / 2024 Professor of Social Psychology at the University of Potsdam
• 03/19 - 03/2024 Professor of (Media) Psychology in Hagen
• 2017 - 2021 Head of the research group “Collaborative Biases” (IWM, Tübingen)
• 2016 - 2019 Junior Professor of Forensic Psychology, Johannes Gutenberg University Mainz
• 2011 - 2016 Research associate (PostDoc) at Leibniz Institut für Wissensmedien Tübingen
• 2008 - 2011 Research assistant (Social Psychology), University of Osnabrück
• 2005 - 2008 Doctoral scholarship holder in the DFG-funded research training group “Integrative Kompetenzen und Wohlbefinden" [Integrative Competencies and Well-being], University of Osnabrück [06/2006-05/2007 parental leave]

Research interests

• Biases in information processing
• Media representation (of events, crimes, criminals)
• Collective memories
• Recognition and reversal of social influences on memory
• Credibility assessment

Links

• ResearchGate
• AcademiaNet
• Google Scholar
• OSF

Publications

Full list of publications (pdf, 258 KB)

Journal papers (peer reviewed) as at September 2024

• Blank, H., & Oeberst, A. (in press). Exploring common ground in the repressed vs. false memories debate. Legal and Criminological Psychology.
• Wachendörfer, M. M., & Oeberst, A. (in press). Differences between true and false memories using the Criteria-Based Content Analysis. Applied Cognitive Psychology, 38, e4246. doi.org/10.1002/acp.4246
• Oeberst, A. & Oberlader, V. (in press). Degrees of Freedom as breeding ground for biases – a threat to forensic practice. Law and Human Behavior.dx.doi.org/10.1037/lhb0000579
• Oeberst, A., Wachendörfer, M. M., & Suchotzki, K. (2024). Falsche Erinnerungen in der Forschung und Glaubhaftigkeitsbegutachtung: Replik zum Beitrag von Jäckel & Orth (2021) [False memories in research and credibility assessment: Reply to the article by Jäckel & Orth (2021)]. Rechtspsychologie, 2, 205-226. doi.org/10.5771/2365-1083-2024-2-205
• Imhoff, R., Meuer, M., Oeberst, A. & Mokros, A. (2024). Gibt es organisierten rituellen Kindesmissbrauch? [Is there organized ritual child abuse?]. InMind, 2. de.in-mind.org/article/gibt-es-organisierten-rituellen-kindesmissbrauch 
• Mokros, A., Schemmel, J., Körner, A., Oeberst, A., Imhoff, R., Suchotzki, K., Oberlader, V., Banse, R., Kannegießer, A., Gubi-Kelm, S., Lehmann, R. & Volbert, R. (2024). Rituelle sexuelle Gewalt: Eine kritische Auseinandersetzung mit fragwürdigen empirischen Belegen für ein fragliches Phänomen [Ritual sexual violence: A critical appraisal of dubious empirical evidence for a doubtful phenomenon]. Psychologische Rundschau [Vorab-Onlinepublikation].  https://doi.org/10.1026/0033-3042/a000663
• Oeberst, A. & Ridderbecks, T. (2024). Self-selection: How article category in Wikipedia determines the heterogeneity of its authors. Scientific Reports, 14, 740. doi.org/10.1038/s41598-023-50448-y 
• Krebs, M.-C., Oeberst, A.* & von der Beck, I. (2024). The wisdom of the crowd is not a foregone conclusion. Effects of Self-Selection on (collaborative) knowledge construction. Topics in Cognitive Science, 16(2), 206-224. doi.org./10.1111/tops.12647  *shared first authorship 
• Wachendörfer, M. M., & Oeberst, A. (2023). Distinguishing between true and false memories: A scoping review. European Psychologist, 28(4), 247-264. doi.org/10.1027/1016-9040/a000513 
• Oeberst, A., & Imhoff, R. (2023). Towards parsimony in bias research. Proposing a common framework of belief-consistent information processing. Perspectives in Psychological Science, 18(6), 1464-1487. doi.org/10.1177/17456916221148147
• Meuer, M., Nestler, S., & Oeberst, A. (2023). What determines hindsight bias in written work? One field and three experimental studies in the context of Wikipedia. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Applied, 29(2), 239-258. doi.org/10.1037/xap0000445  
• Meuer, M., Oeberst, A., & Imhoff, R. (2022). How do conspiratorial explanations differ from non-conspiratorial explanations? A content analysis of real-world online articles. European Journal of Social Psychology, 53(2), 288-306. doi.org/10.1002/ejsp.2903
• Oeberst, A., & Goeckenjan, I. (2022). May a witness challenge the conviction? (Some) Confirmation bias in law students and judges. Forensische Psychiatrie, Psychologie, Kriminologie, 16, 293-299. doi.org/10.1007/s11757-022-00738-4  
• Oeberst, A., Wachendörfer, M., Imhoff, R., & Blank, H. (2021). Rich false memories of autobiographical events can be reversed. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences of the United States of America, 118(13), e2026447118. doi.org/10.1073/pnas.2026447118
• Meuer, M., Imhoff, R., & Oeberst, A. (2021). Believe it or not – No support for an effect of providing explanatory or threat-related information on conspiracy theories’ credibility. International Review of Social Psychology, 34, 1-13. doi.org/10.5334/irsp.587 
• Meuer, M., von der Beck, I., Nestler, S., & Oeberst, A. (2021). What drives increases in hindsight impressions after the reception of biased media content? Journal of Experimental Psychology: Applied, 27, 461-472. doi.org/10.1037/xap0000353
• Meuer, M., Nestler, S., & Oeberst, A. (2021). Debiasing Media Articles – Reducing Hindsight Bias in the Production of Written Work. Journal of Applied Research in Memory and Cognition, 10, 453-443. doi.org/10.1016/j.jarmac.2020.12.006
• Oeberst, A., von der Beck, I., Ihme, T. A., Matschke, C., & Cress, U. (2020). Collectively biased representations of the past: Ingroup bias in Wikipedia articles about inter-group conflicts. British Journal of Social Psychology, 59(4), 791-818. doi.org/10.1111/bjso.12356 
• Oeberst, A. (2019). Der Rückschaufehler im juristischen Kontext: Relevante psychologische Forschung, begründete Spekulationen und Schlussfolgerungen für die Praxis [The hindsight bias in the legal context: Relevant psychological research, reasoned speculation and conclusions for practice]. Rechtswissenschaft, 10, 180-203. doi.org/10.5771/1868-8098-2019-2-180
• von der Beck, I., Cress, U., & Oeberst, A. (2019). Is there hindsight bias without real hindsight? Conjectures are sufficient to elicit hindsight bias. Journal of Experimental Psychology: Applied, 25, 88-99. dx.doi.org/10.1037/xap0000185 
• Oeberst, A., von der Beck, I., Cress, U., Back, M. D., & Nestler, S. (2018). Biases in the production and reception of collective knowledge: The case of hindsight bias in Wikipedia. Psychological Research, 82, 1010-1026. doi.org/10.1007/s00426-017-0865-7
• Oeberst, A. & Matschke, C. (2017). Word order and world order. Titles of intergroup conflicts may increase ethnocentrism by mentioning the in-group first. Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, 146, 672-690. doi.org/10.1037/xge0000300
• Jirschitzka, J., Oeberst, A.*, Göllner, R., & Cress, U. (2017). Inter-rater agreement and construct validity of reviews in an interdisciplinary field. Scientometrics, 113, 1059-1092. doi.org/10.1007/s11192-017-2516-6  *shared first authorship 
• Oeberst, A. & Goeckenjan, I. (2016). When being wise after the event results in injustice: Evidence for hindsight bias in judges’ negligence assessments. Psychology, Public Policy, and Law, 22, 271-279. psycnet.apa.org/doi/10.1037/law0000091 
• Oeberst, A. & Lindner, I. (2015). Unannounced memory tests are not necessarily unexpected by participants. Test expectation and its consequences in the repeated test paradigm. Cognitive Processing, 16, 269-278. doi.org/10.1007/s10339-015-0663-3 
• Oeberst, A., & Wu, S. (2015). Interrogative compliance and self-construal: Intra- and cross-cultural evidence. Personality and Individual Differences, 85, 50-55. doi.org/10.1016/j.paid.2015.04.038 
• Oeberst, A. (2015). How good are future lawyers in judging the accuracy of reminiscent details? The estimation-observation gap in eyewitness accounts. European Journal of Psychology Applied to Legal Context, 7, 73-79. doi.org/10.1016/j.ejpal.2015.03.002 
• Oeberst, A., Gnambs, T., & Haberstroh, S. (2015). Not really the same: Computerized and real lotteries in decision making research. Computers in Human Behavior, 44, 250-257. doi.org/10.1016/j.chb.2014.10.060 
• Oeberst, A., & Seidemann, J. (2014). Will your words become mine? Underlying processes and co-witness intimacy in the memory conformity paradigm. Canadian Journal of Experimental Psychology, 68, 84-96. dx.doi.org/10.1037/cep0000014 
• Oeberst, A. (2012). If anything else comes to mind… better keep it to yourself? Delayed recall is discrediting – unjustifiably. Law and Human Behavior, 36, 366-374. doi.org/10.1007/s10979-011-9282-4 
• Oeberst, A. & Blank, H. (2012). Undoing suggestive influence: The reversibility of the misinformation effect. Cognition, 125, 141-159. doi.org/10.1016/j.cognition.2012.07.009 
• Oeberst, A. (2011). Ich sehe was, was du nicht siehst (und was vielleicht nicht existiert) – scheinbare Ursachen und reale Konsequenzen [I see something that you don't see (and that perhaps doesn't exist) - apparent causes and real consequences]. InMind, 3. de.in-mind.org/article/ich-sehe-was-was-du-nicht-siehst-und-was-vielleicht-nicht-existiert-scheinbare-ursachen-und