Dr. Iniobong Essien

Dr. Iniobong Essien studied psychology at the University of Hamburg, where he earned his doctorate in social psychology in 2020 with his dissertation “Group Evaluations among Members of Stigmatized Groups” (summa cum laude). Since 2021, the diversity and intergroup researcher works at Leuphana’s Chair of Social and Organisational Psychology of Social Work. His research and teaching focus on stereotypes, prejudice and discrimination in the context of racism. Research stays have taken him to the University of California, Riverside (2023/24) and the University of Groningen (2016/17), among others. Since 2025, he is the co-director of the project ‘Constructive Diversity Talk for Prospective Teachers’ (KoDiTa), and from 2021 to 2023 he led a research project funded by the German Research Foundation (DFG) on context-based discrimination in education. Previously, he worked at the FernUniversität in Hagen. His publications shed light on socially relevant topics related to diversity, including the stigmatizing perception of immigrant neighborhoods, stereotypical and threat-related tendencies of police officers in Germany, and regional differences in prejudice and their connection to local discriminatory behaviour.