Profile
Yasemin Acar
My CV
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Education:
I went to high school in Castle Rock, Colorado. After high school ended in 2003, I moved to Boulder, Colorado to attend the University of Colorado. I was there for four years, at first studying biology and then switching to psychology (with a minor in biology). After that I did my Master’s at New York University. I graduated in 2009, but I didn’t get accepted to a PhD program right away. After NYU, I moved to Istanbul to teach English. I lived there for a year, and that helped me decide that I wanted to pursue social psychology. I was accepted to a PhD program at Claremont Graduate University where I worked with Prof Michael Hogg, who studies social identities. But two years into my PhD, I really missed living in Istanbul and I decided to move back and work at a university there, while finishing my PhD remotely. I did that, and then stayed in Istanbul until 2019, when I moved to Dundee.
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Qualifications:
I was in a different country so my qualifications were a bit different, too! I got my high school diploma in 2003, got my BSc in Psychology in 2007, my MA in psychology in 2009, and my PhD in psychology in 2015.
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Current Job:
I’m currently a lecturer at the University of Dundee in Scotland.
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About Me:
My name is Yasemin Acar, I was born in the US and grew up in different parts of the country. My family are originally from Turkey and I moved back to Turkey after my PhD to work at a university in Istanbul before moving to Dundee in 2019. I love reading (and watching!) sci-fi, growing plants in my garden, cooking, and going for hikes and otherwise enjoying living in Scotland.
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My pronouns are:
She/her
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My Work:
I am a social psychologist. My research interests are in social identity and group behavior, and particularly in protest participation.
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Read more
Most of my research focuses on what happens after people participate in some kind of protest. How does it make them feel? Do they decide to protest again? Do they get more involved in politics? The short answer is that it generally makes them feel good to be involved in something bigger than themselves, and that oftentimes they DO want to continue in some way or another.
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My Typical Day:
I wake up, have breakfast and get ready for my day. I usually walk into work. I have lots of meetings for research planning and for teaching. I have lunch, and then usually end up writing up research or continuing to plan new work! But this is an office day. Because a lot of my research is about protests, I do fieldwork as well. This means that I may wake up and hop on a bus to another town where there is a march or a rally, or it could mean that I spend a week in another country, talking to people about their experiences and visiting places that they’ve attended protests in the past (or attending those protests myself).
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What I'd do with the prize money:
One of the things I like to do in my work is to teach other people how to do interviews and ethnographies. For example, at the moment I’m planning some research on climate change activism. As part of that work, I am interested in teaching young activists how they can put on their “research hat” when they are talking to people about their cause. It can be really helpful for them to also reflect on what they do and how they do it. At the end of the day, it may mean they are able to connect with more people about climate change activism. I would use the prize money to go to different cities in Scotland and talk to activists about what I’ve learned in my research and teach them how to use that information, too!
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My Interview
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What did you want to be after you left school?
My first choice was to be a veterinarian, then to work in animal behavior! I only came to social psychology later on, as I thought about my own experiences of being a child of immigrants and what that felt like growing up. How much did this social identity (as Turkish, or as an immigrant) impact me? That really got me on the road to study social psychology.
Were you ever in trouble at school?
Rarely! I was a nerdy kid.
If you weren't doing this job, what would you choose instead?
I'd still love to be doing field research, but with animals! I had hopes to study whale behavior once upon a time. I'd still love to do that!
Who is your favourite singer or band?
So tough! I probably still have a soft spot for the Decemberists.
What's your favourite food?
Turkish food! But I love anything with flavor.
If you had 3 wishes for yourself what would they be? - be honest!
I would love to have a dog to go on hikes and road trips with (but my cat would be mad). I'd love a fancy camera or a go pro to take with me to demos. And if it's a genie giving me wishes I have to wish to free the genie, right??
Tell us a joke.
Why are mountains so funny? Because they're hill areas.
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