Dr Miha Constantinescu
Senior Lecturer
Cognitive and Developmental Psychology
Department of Psychological Sciences , School Of Psychology
Miha is a Senior Lecturer specialising in Cognitive and Developmental Psychology. Before joining UEL in 2018, she earned an MPhil and a PhD in Developmental Psychology from the University of Cambridge. Miha has published research in the following areas: cognitive development and spatial abilities; sex differences in infancy and childhood; hormones and behaviour.
More recently, she has embarked on a research project on bilingualism and foreign accentedness.
Qualifications
- PhD in Psychology, University of Cambridge, 2014
- MPhil in Psychology, University of Cambridge, 2009
- BSc in Psychology, Titu Maiorescu University, Bucharest, 2003
Areas Of Interest
- Cognitive Development
- Bilingualism
- Foreign Accentedness
- Family Structure
- Eating Disorders
- Gender
OVERVIEW
Miha is a senior lecturer specialising in Cognitive and Developmental Psychology. She joined UEL in 2018. Prior to that, she earned an MPhil and a PhD in Developmental Psychology from the University of Cambridge. She then taught and conducted research for several years in Cambridge, where she was an Affiliated Lecturer in the psychology department, as well as Director of Studies and Teaching Fellow at Churchill College.
Miha has previously published peer-reviewed research in the following areas: cognitive development and spatial abilities; sex differences in infancy and childhood; hormones and behaviour.
More recently, Miha has embarked on a research project on bilingualism and foreign accentedness, which seeks to investigate and understand the complex and subtle ways in which existing biases and stereotypes concerning foreignness can impact an individual’s perceived competence and trustworthiness.
CURRENT RESEARCH
Research and impact
Miha’s most recent project on foreign accentedness has important potential implications for a host of socio-cultural issues around stereotyping and discrimination.
More specifically, the project’s objectives are twofold:
- To tackle social stereotypes around non-native accents – by increasing awareness of existing biases, increasing accountability, and committing upfront to selection criteria and various forms of interventions aimed at stereotype-replacement and individuation. The main aim here is to displace stereotypical associations and attenuate the impact of such associations on behaviour.
- To focus on the lived experience of those affected by accent-based bias, understanding what sort of coping strategies are used by individuals to build resilience and maintain self-confidence.
PUBLICATIONS
Peer-reviewed Journal Articles
- Poloka, P. & Constantinescu, M. The impact of speakers’ accentedness and gender on listeners’ perception of speakers’ competence: A quantitative study of communication in the context of official COVID-19 messaging. (under review)
- Richards, G., Browne, W. V., Aydin, E., Constantinescu, M., Nave, G., Kim, M. S., & Watson, S. J. (2020). Digit ratio (2D: 4D) and congenital adrenal hyperplasia (CAH): Systematic literature review and meta-analysis. Hormones and Behaviour, 126.
- Richards, G., Browne, W. V., & Constantinescu, M. (2020). Digit ratio (2D: 4D) and amniotic testosterone and estradiol: An attempted replication of Lutchmaya et al.(2004). Journal of Developmental Origins of Health and Disease.
- Constantinescu, M., Moore, D., Johnson, S, & Hines, M. 2017. Early Contributions to Infants’ Mental Rotation Abilities. Developmental Science, 2017. DOI: 10.1111/desc.12613.
- Kung, K.T.F., Constantinescu, M., Browne, W.V., Noorderhaven, R. & Hines, M. 2016. No relationship between early postnatal testosterone concentrations and autistic traits in 18 to 30-month-old children. Molecular Autism 7(15). DOI: 10.1186/s13229-016- 0078-8.
- Hines, M., Kung, K.T.F., Spencer, D., Browne, W.V., Constantinescu, M. & Noorderhaven, R. 2016. The early postnatal period, mini-puberty, provides a window on the role of testosterone in human neurobehavioural development. Current Opinion in Neurobiology 38: 69-73.
- Kung, K.T.F., Browne, W.V., Constantinescu, M., Noorderhaven, R. & Hines, M. 2016. Early Postnatal Testosterone Predicts Sex-Related Differences in Early Expressive Vocabulary. Psychoneuroendocrinology 68: 111-116.
- Hines, M., Constantinescu, M. & Spencer, D. 2015. Early androgen exposure and human gender development. Biology of Sex Differences 6(3). DOI: 10.1186/s13293-015- 0022-1.
- Constantinescu, M. & Hines, M. 2012. Approaches to studying early hormonal influences on the development of sex-related variability in human behaviour. Child Development Perspectives 6(4): 407-413.
MODULES
Undergraduate:
- PY4003: Introduction to Cognitive and Developmental Psychology
- PY4005: Researching Psychological Worlds
- PY5003: Topics in Developmental and Cognitive Psychology
- PY5010: Developmental Difficulties and Differences
- PY6010: Applied Child Psychology
Postgraduate:
- PY7157: Perspectives in Psychology: Biological, Cognitive and Developmental