Dr. Jason Deska

  Curriculum Vitae 

Biography

Dr. Deska is an Associate Professor of Psychology and the director of the Social Perception and Intergroup Relations Lab at Toronto Metropolitan University. He received his PhD in social psychology at Miami University and completed his postdoctoral training at the University of Toronto. He supervises MA and PhD students and teaches courses related to social psychology and social cognition.

The goal of Dr. Deska’s research is to investigate how the impressions people form of others produce and sustain inequality. Specifically, Dr. Deska examines how social categories (e.g., race, socioeconomic status, sex, gender) and individual features (e.g., facial appearance, emotional expression, body shape) lead to discriminatory and dehumanizing outcomes.

Selected Publications:

O’Hagan, M. L., Pejic, S. R., & Deska, J. C. (2025). Black racial phenotypicality: Implications for the #BlackLivesMatter movement. Journal of Experimental Social Psychology, 116, 104696. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.jesp.2024.104696 (external link, opens in new window) 

Paganini, G. A., McConnell, A. A., Deska, J. C., Almaraz, S. A., Hugenberg, K., & Lloyd, E. P. (2024). Waist-to-hip ratio predicts sexual perception and responses to sexual assault disclosures. Personality and Social Psychology Bulletin, 50(6), 857-870. https://doi.org/10.1177/01461672221148008 (external link, opens in new window) 

Kunstman, J. W., Ogungbadero, T., Deska, J. C., Bernstein, M. J., Smith, A. R., & Hugenberg, K. (2023). Race-based biases in psychological distress and treatment judgments. PLOS ONE, 18(10), e0293078. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0293078 (external link, opens in new window) 

Hamovitch, L., Pejic, S. R., Zannella, L., & Deska J. C. (2023). Examining the effect of prison time on landlords’ willingness to rent to exonerees: A test of the stigma-by-association framework. Behavioral Sciences & The Law, 41(2), 78-95. https://doi.org/10.1002/bsl.2608 (external link, opens in new window) 

Alaei, R., Deska J. C., Hugenberg, K., & Rule, N. O. (2022). People attribute humanness to men and women differently based on their facial appearance. Journal of Personality and Social Psychology, 123(2), 400–422. https://doi.org/10.1037/pspi0000364 (external link, opens in new window)