I. (Islam) Borinca, PhD

Societal Transitions and Behavior Change
As part of the Dutch national sector plan (2020–2025), this interdisciplinary project addresses how societal systems and human behavior must change together to tackle major challenges such as climate change, public health, and sustainability. The focus is on understanding behavioral processes at multiple levels — individual, group, organizational, and systemic — and developing interventions that can support long-term, large-scale transitions in society. My role focuses on identifying and defining criteria for just social transitions, particularly through the lens of social and behavioral sciences. This work bridges theory and application, contributing to the broader goals of behavioral change and public trust in institutions.

For more: https://stab.opens.science/persons/core-person--islam--borinca.html

Intergroup Dynamics and Reconciliation in Post-Conflict Contexts
This project explores how individuals and groups respond to reconciliation efforts after intergroup violence. It focuses on the psychological impact of intergroup apologies, meta-perceptions, (de)humanization, and inclusion/exclusion in shared identities.

Read more:

• Borinca, I., & Spears, R. (in press). When everything is at stake: Understanding support for radical collective actions and collective victimhood through anger in a post-conflict setting. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology.

• Borinca, I., Guerra, R., & Uka, F. (2025). “Ins and outs”: Ethnic identity, the need to belong, and responses to inclusion and exclusion in inclusive common ingroups. Group Processes & Intergroup Relations, 28(2), 324–354. https://doi.org/10.1177/13684302231223984

• Borinca, I., Koc, Y., & Mustafa, S. (2024). Fostering social cohesion in post‐conflict societies: The power of normative apologies in reducing competitive victimhood and enhancing reconciliation and intergroup negotiation. European Journal of Social Psychology. https://doi.org/10.1002/ejsp.3001

• Borinca, I., Van Assche, J., & Koc, Y. (2024). How meta-humanization leads to conciliatory attitudes but not intergroup negotiation. Current Research in Ecological and Social Psychology, 5, 100198. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.cresp.2024.100198

• Borinca, I., Sainz, M., & Gkinopoulos, T. (2024). Social norms and peace. Peace and Conflict: Journal of Peace Psychology, 30(3), 277–283. https://doi.org/10.1037/pac0000761

Reimagining Masculinities (Current project)
This project investigates how progressive forms of masculinity are understood, measured, and received across cultural contexts. It combines qualitative and quantitative methods to explore women's perspectives, cross-cultural measurement, societal reactions, and individual experiences of internalising progressive masculinities. (PhD-Student: Ayca Aksu)

Read more:

• Aksu, A., Koc, Y., Borinca, I., & Otten, S. (2024). Beyond traditional masculinities: Women’s perceptions of new masculinities. Psychology of Men & Masculinities. https://doi.org/10.1037/men0000502

Adversity and Resilience in Organizations (Incoming project, starting September 2025)
This project explores how individuals and teams respond to workplace adversity. Adopting an episodic approach, it views resilience as a dynamic, context-dependent process shaped by social interactions, support, and collective efficacy. It combines longitudinal, diary, experimental, and behavioral methods to better understand the mechanisms of recovery in organizational settings. (Incoming PhD-Student)

Children’s Religious Understanding and Outgroup Prosocial Behaviour (Completed project, 2020–2024)
This PhD project examined how children’s religious beliefs relate to their prosocial behaviours toward outgroups. The research combined developmental and social psychological approaches to explore the links between prayer, moral reasoning, and intergroup behaviour. (PhD-Student: Isabelle Zammit; co-supervised during my time at University College Dublin)

Read more:

• Zammit, I., Hennessy, E., Borinca, I., & Taylor, L. K. (2024). From prayer to practice: Children's religious understanding and outgroup prosocial behaviours. Journal of Community & Applied Social Psychology. https://doi.org/10.1002/casp.70023