Show Listing

Postdoc Description
The position is part of a new interdisciplinary department investigating the foundations of human social behavior, and more specifically the neural, developmental, hormonal mechanism underlying social cognition and emotions such as compassion and empathy. The successful candidate will be involved in the development of tasks that measure socio-emotional competencies, social interactions, as well as emotion regulation in daily life (e.g., by means of experience sampling studies). He/She will also be part of a longitudinal study on the effects of affective and cognitive mental training on neural plasticity, health, subjective well-being, and behavior.

Job description

-Apply structural equation and latent growth modeling of longitudinal day-to-day subjective reports

-Conduct of experience sampling studies and psychological experiments in the domains of subjective emotional experiences, compassion and empathy, emotion regulation, and social interactions

-Implementation of contemporary technology for the assessment of subjective socio-emotional experiences in daily life (e.g., mobile phones), in particular, development of paradigms for the study of empathy and its implications in daily life

-Participation in designing a longitudinal training on emotional plasticity, in particular, elaboration of measures for this training study on compassion and empathy, well-being and social relations

-Interdisciplinary collaboration with experts in social neuroscience, psychobiology (e.g., stress physiology), and social cognition

Job requirements

The successful candidate has finished their PhD and may have held a postdoctoral position, and they show evidence of scholarly promise in the form of publications and other achievements. He/She has experience with motivational and social psychological paradigms and an expertise in structural equation modeling and event-sampling methods. Moreover, experiences with administrative responsibilities on the conduct of psychological studies are required. The successful candidate should also show interest in modern technologies used for psychological assessment in daily life and in ecologically valid environments (e.g., palm pilots, mobile phones, internet studies).

The Max Planck Institute in Leipzig (http://www.cbs.mpg.de) offers an international research environment, with English being the language spoken in the laboratory. It offers an excellent infrastructure (e.g., three human 3T and one 7T MRI, rt-fMRI, EEG, TMS/tDCS, MEG, pharmacology laboratory, behavioral laboratory). The department also has additional laboratory space in Berlin, which is located just an hour by train to the north of Leipzig.

For further details, see http://www.cbs.mpg.de/dept/singer or contact Tania Singer (singer@cbs.mpg.de). Applications (including a CV, list of publications, statement of research interests, and contact information of 3 referees) should be sent as a single PDF file, with your name as the file name, to Tania Singer (singer@cbs.mpg.de) and Sandra Zurborg (zurborg@cbs.mpg.de). Review of applications will continue until the positions are filled. Shortlisted candidates will be invited to the MPI in Leipzig, Germany.

The Max Planck Society is an equal opportunity employer and explicitly encourages women and handicapped individuals to apply.