Dr Kate McCulloch

Kate’s research uses a biological and evolutionary approach to understanding morality and moral emotions. Her research uses self-report, economic games, and pupillometry to investigate disgust and anger in response to immorality. Her most recent work investigates the utility of pupil diameter as a measure of autonomic arousal accompanying physical and moral disgust. This line of research opens new avenues of investigation into moral reactions which are less reliant on self-report measures. 

Publications 

McCulloch, K. & O’Gorman R. (2019) Pathogen Risk. In: Shackelford T., Weekes-Shackelford V. (eds) Encyclopedia of Evolutionary Psychological Science. Springer, Cham 

Presentations 

McCulloch, K. & O’Gorman, R. (2019, May). Disgust, Anger, and Contempt in Response to Harm and Incompetence.  Paper presented at the Annual Conference of the Human Behaviour and Evolution Society, Boston. 

O’Gorman, R., Rieger, G., McCulloch, K., & Whitaker, L. (2019, May). The Westermarck Effect: Measuring Incest Aversion by Pupil Dilation.  Paper presented at the Annual Conference of the Human Behaviour and Evolution Society, Boston. 

McCulloch, K., O’Gorman, R., Knutsen, D., & Rieger, G. (2018, July). Pupil Dilation as a Measure of Disgust. Paper presented at the Annual Conference of the Human Behaviour and Evolution Society, Amsterdam. 

McCulloch, K., O’Gorman, R., Knutsen, D., & Rieger, G. (2018, April). Pupil Dilation as a Measure of Disgust. Poster session presented at the Annual Conference of the European Human Behaviour and Evolution Association, Pécs. 

O’Gorman, R., Rieger, G., McCulloch, K., & Whitaker, L. (2015, September). The Westermarck Effect: Measuring Incest Aversion by Pupil Dilation. Poster session presented at the Annual Conference of the British Association for Cognitive Neuroscience, Colchester. 

Workshops 

Eye Tracking Workshop: Eye Tracking as an Experimental Tool. (2019, June). Workshop run as part of the Essex Cross-Disciplinary Experimental Methods Conference, Colchester. 

Qualifications 

PhD Psychology (University of Essex, 2020) – Thesis: Distinguishing moral disgust and anger using pupillometry and responses to economic behaviours 

MSc Psychology Conversion (University of Essex, 2014) 

BA (Hons) English (University of Leicester, 2013)