Dr Daniel Pérez-Zapata PhD, MPhil, MSc, BSc

School of Psychology
Early-Career Researcher

Contact details

Telephone: 01214171196
Email: d.perezzapata@bham.ac.uk

View my research portal

Address: School of Psychology
University of Birmingham
Edgbaston
Birmingham
B15 2TT
UK

Dr Daniel Pérez-Zapata is a Huo Family Foundation Early Career Fellow at the University of Birmingham.

Qualifications

PhD University of Birmingham, United Kingdom (2023)
Diploma in Teaching at Higher Education, Universidad of Atacama, Chile (2018)
MPhil University of Queensland, Australia (2016)
MSc Universidad de Tarapacá, Chile (2012)
BSc Universidad de Tarapacá, Chile (2009)

Biography

Dr Daniel Pérez-Zapata is a cognitive developmental psychologist at the University of Birmingham. Originally from Arica, Chile, he holds a BSc (Hons) in Psychology and an MSc in Applied Social Sciences from the Universidad de Tarapacá.

He went on to complete an MPhil in Cognitive Psychology at the University of Queensland, Australia, supervised by Professor Virginia Slaughter and Professor Julie Henry. From 2016 to 2019, he was a Lecturer at the Universidad de Atacama, Chile, teaching undergraduate and postgraduate modules in cognitive and developmental psychology, research methods and data analysis.

Dr Pérez-Zapata then moved to the University of Birmingham, where he completed his PhD in Psychology under the supervision of Professor Ian Apperly. From 2023 to 2025, he was a Research Fellow on a Leverhulme Trust-funded project led by Professor Ian Apperly, Professor Andrea Isoni (University of Warwick) and Professor Tad Zawidzki (George Washington University). He was then a Research Fellow on an MRC-funded project led by Professor Ian Apperly and Professor Rory Devine.

He now leads the Digital Minds in Development project, funded by the Huo Family Foundation.

Research

Dr Pérez-Zapata’s research investigates how people understand other people's minds, and how this ability supports social interaction across development. His recent work also examines how digital environments shape social and cognitive development during adolescence.

Adolescent development in a digital world. He leads Digital Minds in Development (~£350,000), a longitudinal study exploring how young adolescents’ engagement with digital environments relates to their cognitive development and social competence. The project focuses on executive functions, mindreading and social relationships.

Mindreading. He studies how people work out what others think, know and intend. His work has explored how adults understand the minds of people from different cultural backgrounds, and how mindreading relates to executive functions. He also contributed to the development and validation of the Birmingham Advanced Mindreading Stories (BAMS), a new measure of mindreading for late adolescents and adults in the UK.

Coordination without communication. A central strand of his work asks how people manage to coordinate their behaviour when they can't communicate. His doctoral research examined the cognitive foundations of pure coordination games from behavioural economics. His later Leverhulme-funded work investigated the cognitive and social mechanisms that make this kind of coordination possible.

He has also served as a co-investigator on three FONDECYT-funded projects supported by Chile’s National Agency for Research and Development (Agencia Nacional de Investigación y Desarrollo, ANID).

Publications

Highlight publications

Perez-Zapata, D, Isoni, A, Zawidzki, T & Apperly, I 2026, 'Three International Studies on Pure Coordination Games: Adaptable Solutions When Intuitions are Presumed to Vary', Journal of Experimental Psychology: General, vol. 155, no. 3, pp. 760–775. https://doi.org/10.1037/xge0001876

Perez-Zapata, D, McKenzie-Smart, X, Charest, I & Apperly, I 2025, 'Meeting and missing minds: children and adults use alignment of intuitions to solve pure coordination games', Journal of Cognitive Psychology, vol. 37, no. 3, pp. 277-292. https://doi.org/10.1080/20445911.2025.2452232

Wilson, R, Hruby, A, Perez-Zapata, D, van der Kleij, SW & Apperly, IA 2023, 'Is recursive "mindreading" really an exception to limitations on recursive thinking?', Journal of Experimental Psychology: General. https://doi.org/10.1037/xge0001322

Pérez-Zapata, D-I, Cuadra-Martínez, D-J, Valenzuela-Barrios, C & Salgado-García, P 2019, 'Theory of mind and its relationship with behavioural inhibition in Chilean preschools / Teoría de la mente y su relación con inhibición conductual en pre-escolares chilenos', Estudios de Psicologia. https://doi.org/10.1080/02109395.2019.1589084

Perez Zapata, D, Slaughter, V & Henry, J 2016, 'Cultural effects on mindreading', Cognition.

Recent publications

Article

Lee, R, Li, D, Gilligan, R, van der Kleij, SW, Lee, M, Perez Zapata, D, Wang, Y, Devine, RT & Apperly, IA 2026, 'A new measure of social understanding in adolescents and adults reveals individual differences that are trait-like and interpretable', Journal of Experimental Psychology: General.

Puebla, G, Ferrer-Urbina, R, Pérez-Zapata, D, Alarcón-Castillo, K, Sepúlveda-Páez, G & Elgueta, H 2026, 'Cognitive load and individual differences as drivers of health-related misinformation: A signal detection approach', PLOS One, vol. 21, no. 8, e0356642. https://doi.org/10.1371/journal.pone.0356642

Cuadra-Martínez, D, Monárdez-Monárdez, M, Espinosa-Caicedo, J, Pérez-Zapata, D, Sandoval-Díaz, J, Landabur, R, Castro-Carrasco, P & Vera-Calzaretta, A 2026, 'Defending and including students with special educational needs: a qualitative study with Chilean students', Frontiers in Psychology, vol. 17, 1846202. https://doi.org/10.3389/fpsyg.2026.1846202

Martínez, DJC, Castro-Carrasco, PJ, Oyanadel, C, Palta, ING, Sandoval-Díaz, J & Pérez-Zapata, D 2024, 'Identidad profesional, persona formadora de docentes y progresión académica en estudiantes de Pedagogía tradicionales y no tradicionales', Actualidades en Psicologia, vol. 38, no. 137, pp. 118-135. https://doi.org/10.15517/ap.v38i137.54423

Martínez, DJC, Castro-Carrasco, PJ, Palta, ING, Véliz, CO, Zapata, DP, Ilchovska, Z, Díaz, JS & Parada, DHM 2024, 'Identidad profesional y progreso académico en la formación inicial de futuros profesores chilenos: Estudio mixto', Logos: Revista de Lingüística, Filosofía y Literatura, vol. 34, no. 2, pp. 437-463. https://doi.org/10.15443/RL3419

Cuadra-Martínez, D, Castro-Carrasco, P, Oyanadel-Véliz, C, González-Palta, I, Živković, P, Sandoval-Díaz, J & Pérez-Zapata, D 2023, 'Preservice Teacher Professional Identity: Influence of the Teacher Educator and the Teacher Education Model', Education Policy Analysis Archives, vol. 31, 86. https://doi.org/10.14507/epaa.31.7631

Cuadra-Martínez, D, Pérez-Zapata, D, Sandoval-Díaz, J, Castro, PJ, Oyanadel, C, Mora-Dabancens, D, Cuadra-Carrasco, C & González-Palta, I 2023, 'Religión, gratitud y comportamiento prosocial: un modelo predictivo', Revista CES Psicologia, vol. 16, no. 3, pp. 16-29. https://doi.org/10.21615/CESP.6669

Cuadra-Martínez, D, Pérez-Zapata, D, Sandoval-Díaz, J & Rubio-González, J 2022, 'Clima escolar y factores asociados: modelo predictivo de ecuaciones estructurales', Revista de Psicologia (Peru), vol. 40, no. 2, pp. 685-709. https://doi.org/10.18800/psico.202202.002

Sandoval-Díaz, J, Martínez, DC & Pérez-Zapata, D 2022, 'Del Afrontamiento Colectivo al Crecimiento Postraumático Comunitario: Análisis Mediacional del Empoderamiento ante un Desastre Climatológico', Psykhe, vol. 31, no. 2, pp. 1-15. https://doi.org/10.7764/psykhe.2019.22345

Cuadra-Martínez, D, Castro-Carrasco, PJ, Tognetta, LRP, Pérez-Zapata, D, Véliz-Vergara, D & Menares-Ossandón, N 2021, 'Teorías Subjetivas de la Convivencia Escolar: ¿Qué Dicen los Padres?', Psicologia Escolar e Educacional, vol. 25, e221423. https://doi.org/10.1590/2175-35392021221423

Cuadra-Martínez, D, Castro-Carrasco, PJ, Sandoval-Díaz, J, Pérez-Zapata, D & Dabancens, DM 2020, 'COVID-19 and psychological behavior: A systematic review of the psychological effects of 21st century pandemics', Revista Medica de Chile, vol. 148, no. 8, pp. 1139-1154. https://doi.org/10.4067/S0034-98872020000801139

Cuadra-Martínez, D, Sandoval-Díaz, J, Perez-Zapata, D, Castro-Carrasco, P, Véliz-Vergara, D, Guzman-Ávalos, J & Ramos-Thompson, G 2019, 'Helping One’s Neighbor: Teaching and Learning Prosocial Behavior in a Religious Community', Religions, vol. 10, no. 9, 515. https://doi.org/10.3390/rel10090515

Cuadra-Martínez, D, Pérez-Zapata, D, Sandoval-Díaz, J, Valdivia-Díaz, J, Palma-Flores, C & Mora-Dabancens, D 2019, 'Predictores de identidad profesional en estudiantes de psicología: un estudio de análisis de senderos', Actualidades en Psicologia, vol. 33, no. 127, pp. 1-19. https://doi.org/10.15517/ap.v33i127.32860

Chapter

Pérez-Zapata, D & Apperly, I 2025, Mindshaping, coordination, and intuitive alignment. in TW Zawidzki & R Tison (eds), The Routledge Handbook of Mindshaping. 1 edn, Routledge Handbooks in Philosophy, Taylor and Francis Group, pp. 54-65. https://doi.org/10.4324/9781032639239-6

Preprint

Perez-Zapata, DI & Apperly, I 2022 'An International Study of Pure Coordination Games: Adaptable Solutions When Intuitions Are Presumed to Vary' PsyArXiv. https://doi.org/10.31234/osf.io/8fqwn

View all publications in research portal