Prof. Dr. Hans-Peter Erb

Research Interests

Throughout my life as a scientist I have been interested in how humans form judgments and attitudes. I have conducted research on the topic of persuasion, integrating motivational, affective, and cognitive processes in attitude formation and change. In particular, I have been fascinated by the integrative power and parsimony of a Unimodel approach to persuasion phenomena. In the realm of social influence I have proposed a very general model – the mere consensus approach – to explain the social impact of minorities and majorities that may help explain compliance and deviation on a most basic level. More recently, I have developed interest in the personal need for uniqueness. I have conducted research on how this basic motivational need can be assessed and how it forms individual reactions in social contexts.

Major Publications

• Erb, H.-P., Kruglanski, A. W., Chun, W. Y., Pierro, A., Mannetti, L., & Spiegel, S. (2003). Searching for commonalities in human judgment: The parametric unimodel and its dual mode alternatives. European Review of Social Psychology, 14, 1-47.
• Erb, H.-P., Bohner, G., Rank, S., & Einwiller, S. (2002). Processing minority and majority communications: The role of conflict with prior attitudes. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 28, 1172-1182.
• Erb, H.-P., Bioy, A., & Hilton, D. J. (2002). Choice preferences without inferences: Subconscious priming of risk attitudes. Journal of Behavioral Decision Making, 15, 251-262.
• Erb, H.-P., Bohner, G., Schmälzle, K., & Rank, S. (1998). Beyond conflict and discrepancy: Cognitive bias in minority and majority influence. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 24, 620-633.
• Erb, H.-P., & Bohner, G. (2007). Social influence and persuasion: Recent theroretical developments and integrative attempts. In: K. Fiedler (Ed.), Frontiers of Social Psychology: Social Communication (pp.191-221). New York: Psychology Press.
• Erb, H.-P., Hilton, D. J., Bohner, G., & Roffey, L. (2015). The minority decision - A risky choice. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 57, 43-50. Online-Zugriff