Leon Kroczek

Leon Kroczek

PhD

Regensburg University

Biography

I’m a researcher at the Institute of Experimental Psychology at Regensburg University. I got my PhD at the Max Planck Institute for Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences (Department of Neuropsychology, Leipzig) where I investigated ‘the impact of speaker information on language processing’.

My current research focuses on behavioral and neural mechanisms of social interaction and communication in- and outside of Virtual Reality. I’m also interested in the effects of social context on emotional learning and communication.

I’m using a wide range of experimental and neuroscientific methods (Virtual Reality, EEG, fMRI and other psychophysiological measures) and I’m very interested in combining methodical approaches, e.g. combining Virtual Reality paradigms with psychophysiological measures. My goal is to develop interactive ‘closed loop’ paradigms that allow for highly immersive social interactions in VR in order to (1) study behavioral and neural responses in these contexts and (2) apply them in clinical settings.

Recently, I started to engage with Open Science and Computational Reproducibilty and I’m happy to implement these approaches in my research.

Download my CV .

Interests
  • Verbal and nonverbal communication
  • Social interaction
  • Emotional Learning
  • Virtual Reality
  • Interplay of Brain and Behavior
  • Open Science & Computational Reproducibility
Education
  • PhD in Cognitive Neuroscience, 2019

    Max Planck Institute of Human Cognitive and Brain Sciences, Leipzig

  • Diploma in Psychology, 2013

    Regensburg University

Recent Publications

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(2026). Hey AI: Can You Trigger Me? A Comparison of Text-to-Speech Synthesis and Human Speech in a Virtual Social Stress Paradigm. Computers in Human Behavior: Artificial Humans.

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(2026). Interactive Communication -- Cross-Disciplinary Perspectives from Psychology, Acoustics, and Technology. arXiv.

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(2026). Preliminary Evaluation of the German SPIN and Mini-SPIN for Screening Social Anxiety Disorder in University Students. BMC Psychology.

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(2026). Aurally Impressed, yet Not More Stressed: On the Relationship between Audiovisual Realism, Social Anxiety, and Presence in a Virtual Social Stress Scenario. PLOS One.

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(2026). Use of Audio-Visual Interactive Virtual Environments to Avoid the Room Divergence Effect in Office-like Environments. Acta Acustica.

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Contact

  • Universitätsstrasse 31, Regensburg, 93053
  • DM Me