Dr Anthony Lee

Lecturer in Psychology

Psychology Stirling

Dr Anthony Lee

Contact details

About me

I completed my PhD at The University of Queensland and was a Marie Curie Fellow at The University of Glasgow. I joined The University of Stirling in 2019 as a Lecturer.

My research covers a wide range of topics on human behaviour and cognition, including human mate preference, face and person perception, and methods and measurement in psychological science. I focus on investigating issues using methods from many difference disciplines, including social psychology, evolutionary biology, and computer sciences.

If you are interested in a PhD, below are potential project ideas I would be interested in working on. I am also happy to chat with students about project ideas, so if you are interested in any of the below projects, or wish to propose a project related to my research, feel free to send me an email and we can organise a meeting.

A Multivariate Investigation of Human Mate Preference

Much research has investigated factors that influence human mate preference; however, most of this research has only investigated one or two factors at a time. Given the massive multivariate nature of human mate choice (and social judgements in general), it is unclear how we attend to and integrate all the relevant information when assessing a potential mate. This project will seek to develop a model of how humans make mate choice judgements.

Sexual Selection and Musical/Artistic Ability

Musical/artistic ability has long been theorised to be important for sexual selection. Indeed, in a data-driven analysis of descriptions in dating profiles, we found that music/artistic ability was associated with desirability for both men and women. Prominent theories have suggested that musical/artistic ability is associated with ‘good-genes’, though it’s equally as likely that this ability is preferred for more direct benefits, for example, traits associated with resource acquisition such as determination. These possibilities are yet to be disentangled. This project would seek to investigate the underlying mechanism that leads musical/artistic ability to be desirable in a partner.

Self-perceptions and Wellbeing

How people perceive oneself is important to many aspects in life; however, people are not accurate with their self-representations; for example, in recent study, we have found that Asian Americans are more likely to perceive themselves as having stereotypical East Asian features, and idealise phenotypically “Whiter” faces. Negative self-perceptions potentially lead to many problems, such as depression, anxiety, and low self-esteem. This project, using techniques such as reverse correlation to assess internal representations of self, will seek to investigate how variation in internal representations of oneself influences individual differences in wellbeing.

Outputs (78)

Commentary

For the good of evolutionary psychology, let's reunite proximate and ultimate explanations

Zietsch BP, Sidari MJ, Murphy SC, Sherlock JM & Lee AJ (2021) For the good of evolutionary psychology, let's reunite proximate and ultimate explanations. Commentary on: A.J. Lee, M.J. Sidari, S.C. Murphy, J.M. Sherlock, B.P. Zietsch Sex differences in misperceptions of sexual interest can be explained by sociosexual orientation and men projecting their own interest onto women Psychological Science, 31 (2020), pp. 184-192. Evolution and Human Behavior, 42 (1), pp. 76-78. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.evolhumbehav.2020.06.009

Article

Mating strategies and the masculinity paradox: How relationship context, relationship status, and sociosexuality shape women's preferences for facial masculinity and beardedness

Stower RE, Lee AJ, McIntosh TL, Sidari MJ, Sherlock JM & Dixson BJW (2020) Mating strategies and the masculinity paradox: How relationship context, relationship status, and sociosexuality shape women's preferences for facial masculinity and beardedness. Archives of Sexual Behavior, 49, p. 809–820. https://doi.org/10.1007/s10508-019-1437-2

Article

Evidence Head Tilt Has Dissociable Effects on Dominance and Trustworthiness Judgments, But Does Not Have Category-Contingent Effects on Hypothetical Leadership Judgments

Torrance JS, Holzleitner IJ, Lee AJ, DeBruine LM & Jones BC (2020) Evidence Head Tilt Has Dissociable Effects on Dominance and Trustworthiness Judgments, But Does Not Have Category-Contingent Effects on Hypothetical Leadership Judgments. Perception, 49 (2), pp. 199-209. https://doi.org/10.1177/0301006619898589

Article

Women's preferences for men's facial masculinity are strongest under favorable ecological conditions

Marcinkowska UM, Rantala MJ, Lee AJ, Kozlov MV, Aavik T, Cai H, Contreras-Garduño J, David OA, Kaminski G, Li NP, Onyishi IE, Prasai K, Pazhoohi F, Prokop P & Rosales Cardozo SL (2019) Women's preferences for men's facial masculinity are strongest under favorable ecological conditions. Scientific Reports, 9, Art. No.: 3387. https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-019-39350-8

Article

No evidence that facial attractiveness, femininity, averageness, or coloration are cues to susceptibility to infectious illnesses in a university sample of young adult women

Cai Z, Hahn A, Zhang W, Holzleitner IJ, Lee AJ, DeBruine LM & Jones BC (2019) No evidence that facial attractiveness, femininity, averageness, or coloration are cues to susceptibility to infectious illnesses in a university sample of young adult women. Evolution and Human Behavior, 40 (2), pp. 156-159. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.evolhumbehav.2018.10.002

Commentary

Reply to Fleischman and Fessler's (2018) comment on "Hormonal correlates of pathogen disgust: Testing the Compensatory Prophylaxis Hypothesis"

Jones BC, Hahn AC, Fisher CI, Wang H, Kandrik M, Lee AJ, Tybur JM & DeBruine LM (2018) Reply to Fleischman and Fessler's (2018) comment on "Hormonal correlates of pathogen disgust: Testing the Compensatory Prophylaxis Hypothesis". Commentary on: Fleischman DS, Fessler DMT (2018) Response to "Hormonal Correlates of Pathogen Disgust: Testing the Compensatory Prophylaxis Hypothesis", Evolution and Human Behavior, 39 (4), pp. 468-469. Evolution and Human Behavior, 39 (4), pp. 470-471. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.evolhumbehav.2018.03.010

Article

Pathogen disgust sensitivity and resource scarcity are associated with mate preference for different waist-to-hip ratios, shoulder-to-hip ratios, and body mass index

Lee AJ, Brooks RC, Potter KJ & Zietsch BP (2015) Pathogen disgust sensitivity and resource scarcity are associated with mate preference for different waist-to-hip ratios, shoulder-to-hip ratios, and body mass index. Evolution and Human Behavior, 36 (6), pp. 480-488. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.evolhumbehav.2015.07.002

Teaching

I teach the Quantitative Methods module on the psychology MSc programmes. I teach using the statistics program R. The module website can be found here: https://antlee53.github.io/stirpsychstats/

For students who are considering me as a dissertation supervisor, you can find more information on the types of projects I supervise and my supervision style here: https://antlee53.github.io/supervision.html

Research centres/groups