Profile
Mariana is a Research Associate at the Environmental Change Institute. Mariana has a background in environmental psychology and behavioural science. Her research involves the study of psychological factors, perceptions and different contexts that determine sustainable behaviour change. Mariana is the Principal Investigator (PI) of the EDRC Flexible Fund project “Understanding willingness to accept energy-sufficiency behaviours”. She is also contributing to the new Oxford University Centre for Research on Climate Leadership, funded by the Askehave Climate Foundation.
Research
Mariana was part of the iDODDLE project funded by European Research Council from 2021 to 2025. Her contribution included designing of surveys to test the determinants of digitalised daily life, as well as research into the use of Agentic AI for low-carbon behaviours.
Mariana’s research interests include understanding public perceptions of energy transition and climate change and their relation to digital services, as well as what are the barriers that may reduce engagement with low-carbon technologies. Her research is interdisciplinary and problem orientated. She is interested in the use of big data and machine learning tools for evaluating perceptions of sustainable behaviour change.
Other research interests include the assessment of collective actions for climate change mitigation and pro-environmental behaviours, perceptions of barriers and co-benefits of climate actions, and implementation of self-regulatory strategies to promote behavioural change.
Publications
- Gaytan Camarillo, M., Ferguson, E., Ljevar, V. and Spence, A. (2021). Big changes start with small talk: Twitter and climate change in times of coronavirus pandemic. Frontiers in Psychology, 12: 2308. doi: 10.3389/fpsyg.2021.661395