I’m Arvin and I’m happy you cared enough to click and learn more about me!
Academic Background
I did my Specialized Honours BSc in Psychology at York University, completing my undergraduate thesis under the supervision of Dr. Jennifer Steele at the Interpersonal Perception and Social Cognition Lab. During my time at York, I also had the pleasure of volunteering as a research assistant in Dr. Joni Sasaki’s Culture and Religion Lab.
In the fall of 2015, I joined the Social and Political Psychology Lab at Ryerson University. Under the supervision of Dr. Becky Choma, I completed my SSHRC-funded Master’s degree, focused on identifying the role of sociopolitical ideology and threat as predictors of support for and engagement in cyber-aggressions towards women (Jagayat & Choma, under review). Currently, my SSHRC-funded PhD dissertation is evaluating whether impression management processes can be leveraged to reduce the sharing of misinformation on social media. In the process of doing this, my colleagues (Dr. Becky Choma and Carson Pun) and I are developing a new way to experimentally test design changes to and collect detailed behavioural data on social media in ecologically-valid contexts. Check out the Mock Social Media Website page on this website to learn more.
While at Ryerson, I’ve also had the privilege of working with an interdisciplinary team of researchers at the Social Media Lab, namely on updating PoliDashboard for covering social media activity during the 2019 Canadian Federal Election.
Visit the Research Interests page to learn more about what I am interested in studying and my ongoing lines of research.
Personal Interests
Outside of my academic research, I have a passion for all things creative. This is mostly with respect to the visual arts: I’ve been sketching automotive, product, and graphic designs since before I knew these were professions unto themselves. While I most consistently sketch, I often find myself getting fascinated with a new medium or style of creative expression and diving deep into it. This has ranged from dabbling in trying my hand at hip-hop production in FL Studio (went very poorly FYI), to bulding custom Gunpla, to worldbuilding my own science fiction.
I am endlessly fascinated with the creative process, and it’s not uncommon to find me smiling endlessly while flipping through Logo Modernism, listening intently to the annual Hollywood Reporter Roundtables, or passing time putting together palettes in Coolors. If you know of anything that changed your perspective on the creative process, please make sure you reach out and let me know!
Contact
Find me elsewhere
Google Scholar ― Social and Political Psychology Lab Website ― ORCiD ― Open Science Framework ― Github ― ResearchGate