Newly appointed: Professor Dr. Sonja Geiger
Psychology and marketing in the sustainable agriculture and food industry
Since 1 March 2025, Prof. Dr. Sonja Geiger has joined the team at Eberswalde University for Sustainable Development (HNEE) as Professor of psychology and marketing in the Sustainable agriculture and Food Sector. With her interdisciplinary approach, she brings psychological and social science perspectives to teaching and research. Even before her appointment, she supported HNEE as a deputy professor in the field of sustainable food systems.
Her focus is on teaching the young degree program "Designing Sustainable Food and Agricultural Culture" (ErNA). She will also teach on the Organic Agriculture and Food Systems (OLE) and Organic Farming and Marketing (ÖLV) degree courses and will develop a cross-course teaching activity on the role of psychology in sustainability transformations.
The new ErNA degree course integrates psychological and social science perspectives alongside agricultural and nutritional science. It looks at the entire value chain and its transformation towards greater sustainability - an innovative approach that complements traditional degree courses. Sonja Geiger will teach psychological and ethical influences on sustainable nutritional behavior as well as interventions for nutritional education. She will also lead a transdisciplinary project on vision development for sustainable food systems.
Prof. Dr. Sonja Geiger is inspired by nature: "Meaningful experiences with or in nature can promote a connection to nature and have a lasting influence on and change our thoughts and actions. This is one of many ways in which psychology can be used to shape a more sustainable society and make a decisive contribution to sustainability transformation."
In her previous research, she has investigated profound strategies that focus on moral values and emotional connection with nature. While these take more time than more superficial measures such as nudging, which in turn effectively reduce behavioral costs, they only change behavior in the short term. She will continue to research how psychological influencing factors - such as values and ideas of justice - can be specifically integrated into communication strategies for sustainable challenges. She is also investigating the effects of ongoing climate change on people's psychological well-being.
Sonja Geiger studied at the Humboldt University of Berlin, obtained her doctorate at the University of Potsdam and habilitated at the Technical University of Berlin with a focus on sustainable consumer behavior. Most recently, she worked as an environmental psychologist at Murdoch University in Perth, School of Psychology.
At HNEE, she will set new priorities, particularly on international contexts of dietary patterns, such as the effects on South America, and on issues of global food justice.
With her work, Sonja Geiger wants to make her contribution to what is probably the shortest definition of sustainability: "Enough for all forever."
Note: This article has been translated using a computer system without human intervention. LUMITOS offers these automatic translations to present a wider range of current news. Since this article has been translated with automatic translation, it is possible that it contains errors in vocabulary, syntax or grammar. The original article in German can be found here.
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