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Dr Julia Shaw is an honorary research associate in the University College London (UCL) Division of Psychology and Language Sciences (PALS).
In 2017 Dr Shaw co-founded Spot. Spot helps employees to report workplace harassment and discrimination, and empowers organisations to build a more inclusive and diverse work environment. In her capacity as of Head of Research at Spot, her team studies how to use artificial intelligence to better understand and tackle inappropriate workplace behaviour.
Dr Shaw is also an international bestselling author. In 2018 she published her second bestseller, "Making Evil: The Science Behind Humanity's Dark Side”, following the success of her first book, "The Memory Illusion: Remembering Forgetting and the Science of False Memory", which has appeared in 20 languages since 2016. She has also been a regular contributor to Scientific American.
Dr Shaw is also a regular keynote speaker on the topic of memory hacking, evil, and practical artificial intelligence. Dr Shaw also sometimes consults as an expert on legal cases, particularly cases involving historical allegations.
Her work is often featured on TV, radio, in print, and online.
- Publications (Journal articles)
Shaw, J. (2018). How can researchers tell whether someone has a false memory? Coding strategies in autobiographical false memory research. A reply to Wade, Garry, and Pezdek. Psychological Science.
Chaplin, C. & Shaw, J. (2016). Confidently wrong: Police endorsement of psycho-legal misconceptions. Journal of Police and Criminal Psychology
Shaw, J. & Wafler, M. (2016). Tipping the scales: How defendant body type may result in eyewitness biases. Psychiatry, Psychology and Law, 23(5), 676-683.
Shaw, J. (2015). Research in Brief: Remembering crimes that never happened. The Police Chief, 82, 16–17.
Shaw, J. & Porter, S. (2015). Constructing rich false memories of committing crime. Psychological Science, 26(3), 291-301.
Shaw, J., Crosby, K., & Porter, S. (2014). The impact of a video game on criminal thinking: Implicit and explicit measures. Simulation and Gaming, 45(6), 786-804.
Shaw, J., Öhman, L., & van Koppen, P. (2013). Psychology and law: The past, present, and future of the discipline. Psychology, Crime, and Law, 19, 643-647.
Shaw, J., & Woodworth, M. (2013). Are the misinformed more punitive? Beliefs and misconceptions in forensic psychology. Psychology, Crime, and Law, 19, 687-706.
Shaw, J., Porter, S., & ten Brinke, L. (2013). Catching Liars: Training mental health and legal professionals to detect high-stakes lies. Journal of Forensic Psychiatry and Psychology, 24(2), 145-159.
Korva, N., Porter, S., O’Connor, B., Shaw, J., & ten Brinke, L (2012). Dangerous decisions: Influence of juror and defendant appearance on legal decision-making. Legal and Criminological Psychology, 20, 384-398.
Smeets, T., Giesbrecht, T., Raymaekers, E., Shaw, J., & Merckelbach, H. (2010). Autobiographical integration of trauma memories and repressive coping predict post-traumatic stress symptoms in undergraduate students. Clinical Psychology and Psychotherapy, 17(3), 211-218.
- Publications (books)
Shaw, J. (2019). Making Evil: The Science behind humanity's dark side.
Shaw, J. (2016). The Memory Illusion: Why you may not be who you think you are.
- Publications (book chapters)
Shaw, J.. (2017). Understanding false memories: Dominant scientific theories and explanatory mechanisms. Psychology, Crime, and Law [invited chapter].
Porter, S., & Shaw, J. (2013). Roles and responsibilities of forensic psychologists. In S. Porter & L. Wrightsman (Eds.), Psychology and law (Canadian ed.). West Sussex, UK: John Wiley and Sons.
Shaw, J., & Porter, S. (2013). Psychopathy. In S. Porter & L. Wrightsman (Eds.), Psychology and Law (Canadian ed.). West Sussex, UK: John Wiley and Sons.
Shaw, J., & Porter, S. (2012). Forever a psychopath? Psychopathy and the criminal career trajectory. In H. Häkkänen-Nyholm & J. Nyholm (Eds.), Psychopathy and law. West Sussex, UK: John Wiley and Sons.
- Academic conference presentations
Shaw, J. (2017). When is the issue of false memory raised in historical child sexual abuse allegations? An archival study of British cases. Paper presentation at the annual meeting of the European Association of Psychology and Law, Mechelen, Belgium.
KiwiFoo (2016). Memory Hacking. Memory, identity, and technology. Part of the invite-only 3-day leaders in science and technology event hosted by Google and O'Reilly Media.
Shaw, J. (2015). Generer des souvenirs faux complex de crime commis. Paper presentation at the first Société Française de Psychologie Juridique joint meeting with the European Association of Psychology and Law. Paris, France.
Jones, C. & Shaw, J. (2015). Using EEG to detect Eyewitness Deception. Poster presentation at the first meeting of the Cambridge University deception conference Decepticon, Cambridge, UK.
Shaw, J. (2015). Can technology help us spot a false memory? A linguistic analysis of rich false memories of committing crime. Paper presentation at the annual meeting of the European Association of Psychology and Law, Nuremberg, Germany.
SciFoo (2015). I remember therefor I am? Memory, identity, and technology. Part of the invite-only 3-day leaders in science event hosted by Digital Science, Google, O'Reilly Media, and Nature.
Shaw, J. (2015). True or false memory? Evidence that naïve observers have difficulty identifying false memories of emotional events, especially for audio-only accounts. Paper presentation at the annual meeting of the Society for Applied Research on Memory and Cognition, Victoria, Canada.
Shaw, J. (2015). When the innocent remember committing crime. Invited keynote presentation at the annual meeting of the False Memory Research Group, London, UK
Shaw, J. & Chaplin (2015). Even police officers get it wrong: Police endorsement of, and confidence in, psycho-legal misconceptions. Paper presentation at the annual meeting of the American Psychology-Law Society, San Diego, USA.
Shaw, J. (2014). False memories, real consequences: Can false memories of past criminal behaviour influence future behaviour? Paper presentation at the annual conference of the European Association of Psychology and Law, St. Petersburg, Russia.
Shaw, J. (2014). False memories look real: Generating and evaluating rich false memories of committing crime. Paper presentation at the annual International Conference of Investigative Psychology, London, UK.
Shaw, J., & Rabbit, S., Crosby, K., & Porter, S. (2013). Do false memories look real? Observer accuracy when classifying rich false memories of criminal and emotional events. Paper presentation at the annual meeting of the European Association of Psychology and Law, Coventry, UK.
Shaw, J., & Porter, S. (2013). Constructing rich false memories of committing crime. Paper presentation at the annual meeting of the American Psychology-Law Society, Portland, USA.
Shaw, J., & Wafler, M. (2012). The muscle effect: How body type biases lineup identifications.Paper presentation at the annual conference of the European Association of Psychology and Law, Nicosia, Cyprus.
Shaw, J., Crosby, K., & Porter, S. (2012). The grand theft auto effect: Playing violent video games makes us feel like a criminal. Poster session presented at the annual meeting of the American Psychology-Law Society, San Juan, Puerto Rico.
Shaw, J., Porter, S, & ten Brinke, L. (2011). Deception detection for professionals: Improving mental health professionals' ability to detect high-stakes lies. Paper presentation at the annual congress of the International Academy of Law and Mental Health (IALMH), Berlin, Germany.
Shaw, J., Porter, S, & ten Brinke, L. (2011). Training mental health and legal professionals to detect extremely high-stakes lies. Paper presentation at the International Joint Psychology and Law Conference, Miami, USA.
Shaw, J., & Porter, S. (2010).
Deception detection for professionals. Invited workshop presented at the annual conference of the Australia and New Zealand Association of Psychiatry, Psychology, and Law, Surfer’s Paradise, Australia.
Shaw, J. (2010). Correcting misconceptions in forensic psychology: Proposing the psycho-legal beliefs questionnaire. Paper presentation at the annual conference of the European Association of Psychology and Law, Gothenburg, Sweden.
Shaw, J., & Hart, S. (2009). International rehabilitation programs and recidivism. Paper presentation at the annual conference of the American Psychology-Law Society, San Antonio, USA.
Shaw, J., & Hart, S. (2008). Once a criminal, always a criminal? A statistical comparison of international rehabilitation programs and recidivism. Paper presentation at the annual conference of the European Association of Psychology and Law, Maastricht, Netherlands.
