Dr Sharon Leal
Biography
Dr. Sharon Leal obtained a first-class honours degree in Psychology at the
ºÚÁÏÕýÄÜÁ¿ in 2000 and received The John Dennis Award for best overall student and The Wiley Publishers Award for best overall dissertation. The following year she completed a Postgraduate Diploma in research methods before embarking upon PhD research. Her doctoral research was funded by the E.S.R.C and focused on the Central and Peripheral Physiology of Attention and Cognitive Demand, where multiple physiological responses were examined within the context of varying cognitive demand. Since completing her PhD, she has worked on grants from the E.S.R.C. and UK / US governments.
Her research has involved working with different agencies concerned with high stake deception, including UK, US and Singapore governments. Additionally, she provides consultation and training to the intelligence community as well as expert testimony for courts. Since entering this arena in 2005 she has published numerous articles on this topic and has recently been ranked, as the 5th most prolific author in peer-reviewed journal articles in the field of deception and deception detection, worldwide.
Research interests
Sharon is member of the International Centre for Research in Forensic Psychology (ICRFP) in the School of Psychology, Sport and Health Sciences. Her current research involves interviewing to assess credibility whereby the focus is to elicit information and maximise differences between lie tellers’ and truth tellers’ accounts. This research is relevant for discerning how people engaged in ‘high stake’ deception respond verbally and non-verbally in a variety of scenarios.
Research outputs
2025
Deeb, H., Vrij, A., Severino, M., Leal, S.
1 Sep 2025, In: Behavioral Sciences. 15, 9, 20p., 1163
Research output: Article
Giorgianni, D., Vrij, A., Leal, S., Deeb, H.
1 Jul 2025, In: The European Journal of Psychology Applied to Legal Context. 17, 2, p. 101-110
Research output: Article
Burkhardt, J., Vrij, A., Leal, S., Deeb, H., Vernham, Z.
1 Jan 2025, In: Journal of Applied Research in Memory and Cognition. 14, 1, p. 74–84
Research output: Article
Vrij, A., Leal, S., Deeb, H., Fisher, R. P.
1 Jan 2025, In: The European Journal of Psychology Applied to Legal Context. 17, 1, p. 25-37
Research output: Article
2024
Leal, S., Vrij, A., Deeb, H., Fisher, R. P.
2 Dec 2024, In: Journal of Applied Research in Memory and Cognition
Research output: Article
Deeb, H., Vrij, A., Palena, N., Hypšová, P., Dib, G., Leal, S., Mann, S.
21 Oct 2024, In: Applied Psycholinguistics. 45, 5, p. 934-962, 29p.
Research output: Article
Deeb, H., Vrij, A., Burkhardt, J., Leal, S., Mann, S.
19 Sep 2024, In: Behavioral Sciences. 14, 9, 15p., 839
Research output: Article
Leal, S., Vrij, A., Ashkenazi, T., Vernham, Z., Fisher, R., Palena, N.
1 Sep 2024, In: Acta Psychologica. 249, 20p., 104440
Research output: Article
Mann, S., Vrij, A., Deeb, H., Leal, S.
1 Sep 2024, In: Psychiatry, Psychology and Law. 31, 5, p. 909-931
Research output: Article
Leal, S., Vrij, A., Deeb, H., Fisher, R. P.
1 Aug 2024, In: Applied Cognitive Psychology. 38, 4, 12p., e4232
Research output: Article