25.06.2025
Nicole Klein successfully defended her PhD

Nicole Klein successfully defended her PhD thesis entitled “Stronger together: The interplay between episodic and semantic memory in constructing past events and the influence of stress”. The committee consisting of Helen Blank, Patrizia Thoma, Christian Merz and Oliver Wolf were really impressed by her work and the discussion. They were convinced that she fully deserves to be awarded a PhD.
Congratulations, Nicole, Dr. Klein, we are all very proud of you! All the best for your future steps!

Christian Merz re-elected as Committee Member of the Board and Treasurer in the Section Biological Psychology and Neuropsychology of the German Psychological Society

After four years, Christian was successfully re-elected to further serve as Committee Member of the Board and Treasurer in the Section Biological Psychology and Neuropsychology of the German Psychological Society. Further Committee Members are Tina Lonsdorf (Bielefeld), Monika Schönauer (Freiburg), Alina Koppold (Bielefeld) and Sarah Danböck (Mannheim). Congratulations!

Osman Akan successfully defended his PhD on 11th December 2024

Osman Akan successfully defended his PhD thesis entitled "Shedding Light on an Uncharted Path: Stress Hormone Effects on Human Spatial Navigation". He started with a nice example of a friend who could not make it to the defense in time, since he got lost in a desert trying to find the correct way out. The committee, consisting of Nikolai Axmacher, Christian Merz, Sabine Seehagen and Oliver Wolf, was deeply impressed by his engaging talk and the fruitful discussion. They were convinced that he fully deserves to be awarded a PhD.

Congratulations, Dr. Akan! We are all absolutely proud of you!

DFG Grant approval

We are delighted to announce that the proposal of Katja Langer for funding through the German Research Foundation (DFG) has been successfully approved! In this project, supported under the "Sachbeihilfe" program, Katja Langer will investigate acute stress effects on emotion regulation flexibility and the moderating role of working memory capacity. We are looking forward to new, inspiring insights in this research area of our department. Stay tuned for updates as the project progresses!

Best Poster Award!

Lena Pfeifer has won the best poster award at the 9th North Sea Laterality Conference on Brain Asymmetry which was held at the University of St Andrews, Scotland

With her poster presenting findings on stress-induced effects on functional hemispheric asymmetries in an online context, Lena Pfeifer succeeded to convince the poster jury at the 9th North Sea Laterality Conference on Brain Asymmetry. The prize was awarded at the social dinner at the venerable University of St Andrews which also covered a Ceilidh - a traditional Scottish dance.

Congratulations, Lena - well done!

Lena Pfeifer successfully defended her PhD on 19th July 2024

Lena Pfeifer successfully defended her PhD thesis entitled “Stress research beyond the laboratory: Recent advances in stress induction and effects on functional laterality”. The committee consisted of Sebastian Ocklenburg, Carolin Hahnel, Dirk Scheele and Christian Merz. All of them were overwhelmed by Lena’s presentation and the discussion about her various findings. They concluded that she fully deserves to be awarded a PhD.

Congratulations, Lena! We are all very proud of you!

Jaël Caviola has won a Poster Award at the Psychology and Brain conference in Hamburg

Out of almost 400 posters presented at the conference “Psychology and Brain in Hamburg, Jaël Caviola was able to convince the joint Poster Committee of the Section “Biopsychology and Neuropsychology of the German Psychological Society (DGPs) and the German Association für Psychophysiology and its Application (DGPA) with her poster titled: “Non-genomic and genomic cortisol effects on the return of fear after contextual extinction generalization”.

Congratulations, Jaël! We are all so proud of you!

Lisa Pötzl successfully defended her PhD on 17th July 2024

Lisa Pötzl successfully defended her PhD thesis entitled “Cortisol and episodic memory retrieval: investigating the relationship between circadian rhythm, stress and sex hormones”. Patrizia Thoma, Adriane Icenhour, Dirk Scheele and Christian Merz were in the committee and really impressed by her work and the discussion. They were convinced that she fully deserves to be awarded a PhD.

Congratulations, Lisa, from now on: Dr. Pötzl! We are all very proud of you!

Tobias Rüttgens successfully defended his PhD on 15th May 2024

Tobias Rüttgens successfully defended his PhD thesis entitled “Effects of acute stress on selective attention, working memory, and long-term memory formation”. The committee, consisting of Christian Merz, Patrizia Thoma, Sabine Seehagen and Boris Suchan, was highly impressed by his achievements and were convinced that he fully deserves to be awarded a PhD.

Congratulations, Tobias! We are all very proud of you!

New paper out on the stability and durability of salivary alpha-amylase across different storage conditions

The collection of salivary alpha-amylase in remote and field settings should be carefully considered. Check out our paper for details on what to take into account when collecting salivary alpha-amylase outside the laboratory.

New paper on the timing-dependent impact of cortisol on the neural correlates of emotion regulation.

New paper on Stress Research

Important Stress Questionnaire now available in German

For further information see RUB homepage / news.

© RUB, Marquard

New paper on rapid stress effects on emotion regulation performances

Click here to learn more about the publication by Katja Langer, Valerie Jentsch and Oliver Wolf