Date: Monday 16 March 2026

Time: 12pm

Venue: 27 University Square

Description: Intergroup conflicts cause immense harm and undermine the empathy, trust, and social cohesion required for thriving societies. While most research on resolving intergroup conflict focuses on adults, children can play a key role in perpetuating or resolving intergroup conflicts. However, little is known about how children think about and engage in intergroup conflict resolution. In this talk, I will discuss a study examining how children think about resolving multigenerational intergroup conflicts. Findings suggest that fostering children’s development as constructive conflict resolvers represents a critical and often underutilized source of novel interventions for social and political change.

Bio: Jacob Glassman is a fourth-year developmental and social psychology Ph.D. candidate and a National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellow in the Cooperation Lab at Boston College. He graduated summa cum laude from the University of Maryland with degrees in psychology, philosophy, and a minor in statistics. Jacob's research broadly explores how children and adults think about and engage in resolving large-scale intergroup conflicts. Collaborating with researchers across four continents, his current work investigates intergroup conflict resolution strategies, children's developing conceptions of multigenerational intergroup conflict resolution, and how parent sociopolitical attitudes and parenting beliefs shape children’s conflict resolution expectations. Through this work, Jacob aims to identify the processes that foster constructive intergroup relations and to generate knowledge that informs real-world conflict resolution.