This week we have a very special episode of the podcast. We had the grand pleasure of welcoming Professor Viren Swami onto the podcast. He is a professor of Social Psychology at Anglia Ruskin University in the UK and Perdana University in Malaysia, with his current area of focus being on body image and how we can promote healthy body image across the population.
Although his parents wanted him to study medicine, Viren states that he followed his curiosity about the ‘outside view of ourselves (aka how the way others view us affects our lives) and ended up getting his Ph.D. in Psychology from UCL (University College London) in ‘05.
Viren Swami is one of, if not the leading researcher within the field of body image, beauty ideals, and attractiveness. Viren has in the past focused on looking at cross-cultural differences and explored if and why attractiveness may differ between different cultures.
However, spanning beyond his field, Professor Viren Swami is one of the top researchers in the world full stop - he is within the top 2% of most scientists globally.