Victoria Talwar, McGill University

Research

Deception child witness rapport interviewer support accuracy veracity lie-telling deception, lie-telling, honesty, social development, moral development, cognitive development,child interview methods, moral education, child witness issues

Latest papers

Practice what you preach? Children's evaluations of parents' verbal messages and social modeling of honesty and lie-telling.
Journal of experimental child psychology · 2026 · senior author
The long view: Lie-telling trajectories, ages 6 to 19 years.
Development and psychopathology · 2026 · first author
Does Guilt Help or Hinder Gratitude? Personal Distress, Guilt Proneness, and Gender Differences in Adolescents.
Children (Basel, Switzerland) · 2026 · senior author

All 52 publications

Latest funding

Adolescents' kind mindset: Linking mentalization, self-processes, and prosocial development
SSHRC · 2025 · Co-investigator
$429,892
Portrait longitudinal des différences de genre à l'école primaire et secondaire
SSHRC · 2024 · Co-investigator
$31,283
Morality and Antisocial Lying in Childhood: A Social Domain Approach
SSHRC · 2024 · Co-investigator
$26,589

All 34 grants and awards

52 publications.

01

Practice what you preach? Children's evaluations of parents' verbal messages and social modeling of honesty and lie-telling.

Bélanger E, Crossman AM, Talwar V

Journal of experimental child psychology2026Senior author

DOI: 10.1016/j.jecp.2026.106528 PMID: 41985322

02

The long view: Lie-telling trajectories, ages 6 to 19 years.

Talwar V, Crossman AM, Robinson K, Geoffroy MC, Côté S, Tremblay RE, Vitaro F

Development and psychopathology2026First author

DOI: 10.1017/s0954579426101515 PMID: 42198996

03

Does Guilt Help or Hinder Gratitude? Personal Distress, Guilt Proneness, and Gender Differences in Adolescents.

Yasiniyan S, Bosacki S, Talwar V

Children (Basel, Switzerland)2026Senior author

DOI: 10.3390/children13040539 PMID: 42073116

04

Corrigendum to "Infant-parent attachment and lie-telling in young children: The Generation R Study". [J. Exp. Child Psychol. 247(2024) 106044].

Schröer L, Talwar V, Luijk M, Kok R

Journal of experimental child psychology2026

DOI: 10.1016/j.jecp.2025.106390 PMID: 41076866

05

Mock Juror Perceptions of Eyewitness Reports Given by Children with Intellectual Disabilities.

McDowell K, Wyman J, Talwar V

Journal of autism and developmental disorders2026Senior author

DOI: 10.1007/s10803-024-06561-6 PMID: 39325283

06

Loneliness and self-concept in the relations between Theory of Mind and social anhedonia in adolescents.

Chen S, Bosacki S, Talwar V

Journal of research on adolescence : the official journal of the Society for Research on Adolescence2025Senior author

DOI: 10.1111/jora.70100 PMID: 41251082

07

Bidirectional Associations Between Civic Engagement, Depressive Symptoms, and Suicidality in Youth: A Population-Based Study.

Sciola A, Acland E, Philippe FL, Loose T, Orri M, Vergunst F, Ouellet-Morin I, Castellanos-Ryan N, Girard A, Talwar V, Côté S, Geoffroy MC

Journal of adolescence2025

DOI: 10.1002/jad.70029 PMID: 40818106

08

Online Child Sexual Exploitation and the Role of Computer-Mediated Communication: A Scoping Review.

Shiau AYA, Holden OL, Musacchio S, Talwar V, Wit-Williams S

Journal of child sexual abuse2025

DOI: 10.1080/10538712.2024.2388655 PMID: 39120641

09

Dilemma: Utilizing the activation decision-construction-action theory to understand and predict children's hypothetical decisions to conceal cases of school bullying.

Isik I, Wyman J, Cassidy H, Talwar V

Acta psychologica2025Senior author

DOI: 10.1016/j.actpsy.2025.104744 PMID: 39864290

10

Interrelations Among Adolescents' Family Connections, Solitude Preferences, Theory of Mind and Perceptions of Academic and Work Competence.

Jones M, Bosacki S, Talwar V

The Journal of genetic psychology2025Senior author

DOI: 10.1080/00221325.2024.2386016 PMID: 39126355

Adolescents' kind mindset: Linking mentalization, self-processes, and prosocial development

Co-investigatorSSHRC2025Insight Grants

Principal investigators: Bosacki, Sandra L.

$429,892

Portrait longitudinal des différences de genre à l'école primaire et secondaire

Co-investigatorSSHRC2024Insight Grants

Principal investigators: Plante, Isabelle

Keywords: Différences de genre; réussite scolaire; aspirations scolaires et professionnelles; trajectoires

$31,283

Morality and Antisocial Lying in Childhood: A Social Domain Approach

Co-investigatorSSHRC2024Insight Development Grant

Principal investigators: Jambon, Marc

Keywords: moral development; moral judgments; moral behavior; antisocial lying; verbal deception; early childhood; middle childhood

$26,589

Unpacking the Power of Praise: How does dispositional and process praise influence children's truth-telling

Principal investigatorSSHRC2024Insight Grants

Principal investigators: Talwar, Victoria

Keywords: children's honesty; truth-telling; lie-telling; praise; parental socialization; moral development

$40,032

Engaged youth: advancing knowledge on the contributions of young people in the development of practices, policies and research that affect them

Co-investigatorSSHRC2024Insight Grants

Principal investigators: Carnevale, Franco A.

Keywords: youth;engagement;policy;practice;research

$32,509

Forensic Developmental Psychology

Principal investigatorSSHRC2023Canada Research Chairs

Principal investigators: Talwar, Victoria

$200,000

Social-emotional well-being and sleep quality in preschoolers after a parental relationship dissolution

Co-investigatorSSHRC2022Insight Development Grant

Principal investigators: Pennestri, Marie-Hélène

Keywords: Parental relationship dissolution; Social-emotional well-being; Sleep; Child custody; Preschoolers; Divorce; Life transition; Parental conflict

$35,997

Evaluating knowledge mobilization for stress management in university students: We know it works, so why don't they use it?!

Co-investigatorSSHRC2022Insight Development Grant

Principal investigators: Heath, Nancy

Keywords: Educational psychology; University students; Knowledge mobilization; Mental health; Well-being; Educational technology; Higher education

$43,082

The development of mentalization, identity, and well-being across adolescence

Co-investigatorSSHRC2021Insight Grants

Principal investigators: Bosacki, Sandra L.

Keywords: social cognition; emotion; identity; kindness; compassion; well-being; adolescence; development; education

$105,522

Youth and technologies: Computer-mediated communication, maltreatment, and exploitation of youth

Co-investigatorSSHRC2021Knowledge Synthesis Grants - Emerging Asocial Society

Principal investigators: Williams, Shanna M.

Keywords: youth; child maltreatment; exploitation

$28,821

From CIHR, NSERC and SSHRC funding decisions: CIHR since 2008, NSERC since 1991 and SSHRC since 1998, including their latest published competition results.

Frequent collaborators

Educational Psychology
Psychiatry
Child and Adolescent Psychology
Law
Department of Applied Psychology and Human Development
Family Law
Life Span Development
Other

Co-authors at McGill University, colored by department. Thicker lines mean more shared papers; select anyone to open their profile and their own map.

Sandra Bosacki

Educational Psychology

9 shared papers, latest 2026

Kang Lee

Department of Applied Psychology and Human Development

2 shared papers, latest 2018

Kristy Robinson

Educational Psychology

1 shared papers, latest 2026

Isabelle Ouellet-Morin

Life Span Development

1 shared papers, latest 2025

Natalie Castellanos Ryan

Psycho-éducation

1 shared papers, latest 2025

Massimiliano Orri

Psychiatry

1 shared papers, latest 2025

Write to this professor

A short, specific email works best. This draft uses one of their recent papers; replace the parts in brackets with your own details before sending.

Applying for

Paper to mentionMention their SSHRC grant from 2024

Subject: Prospective PhD student: Deception Dear Professor Talwar, My name is [your name], and I am a [your current degree or role] at [your institution]. I am applying for a PhD position starting in [term and year]. I read your paper "Practice what you preach? Children's evaluations of parents' verbal messages and social modeling of honesty and lie-telling." (2026), and it connects closely to my own work on [your research topic]. [One or two sentences on what you did and what you learned.] I also saw your SSHRC-funded project "Unpacking the Power of Praise: How does dispositional and process praise influence children's truth-telling" (2024), and I would be glad to contribute to work in that direction. Are you accepting new PhD students for [term and year]? I have attached my CV and transcripts, and I would be glad to talk at a time that suits you. Thank you for your time. Kind regards, [your name]

Victoria Talwar

Research

Latest papers

Latest funding

Practice what you preach? Children's evaluations of parents' verbal messages and social modeling of honesty and lie-telling.

The long view: Lie-telling trajectories, ages 6 to 19 years.

Does Guilt Help or Hinder Gratitude? Personal Distress, Guilt Proneness, and Gender Differences in Adolescents.

Corrigendum to "Infant-parent attachment and lie-telling in young children: The Generation R Study". [J. Exp. Child Psychol. 247(2024) 106044].

Mock Juror Perceptions of Eyewitness Reports Given by Children with Intellectual Disabilities.

Loneliness and self-concept in the relations between Theory of Mind and social anhedonia in adolescents.

Bidirectional Associations Between Civic Engagement, Depressive Symptoms, and Suicidality in Youth: A Population-Based Study.

Online Child Sexual Exploitation and the Role of Computer-Mediated Communication: A Scoping Review.

Dilemma: Utilizing the activation decision-construction-action theory to understand and predict children's hypothetical decisions to conceal cases of school bullying.

Interrelations Among Adolescents' Family Connections, Solitude Preferences, Theory of Mind and Perceptions of Academic and Work Competence.

Adolescents' kind mindset: Linking mentalization, self-processes, and prosocial development

Portrait longitudinal des différences de genre à l'école primaire et secondaire

Morality and Antisocial Lying in Childhood: A Social Domain Approach

Unpacking the Power of Praise: How does dispositional and process praise influence children's truth-telling

Engaged youth: advancing knowledge on the contributions of young people in the development of practices, policies and research that affect them

Forensic Developmental Psychology

Social-emotional well-being and sleep quality in preschoolers after a parental relationship dissolution

Evaluating knowledge mobilization for stress management in university students: We know it works, so why don't they use it?!

The development of mentalization, identity, and well-being across adolescence

Youth and technologies: Computer-mediated communication, maltreatment, and exploitation of youth

Frequent collaborators

Sandra Bosacki

Shanna Williams

Nicholas Bala

Kang Lee

Marie-Claude Geoffroy

Kristy Robinson

Isabelle Ouellet-Morin

Natalie Castellanos Ryan

Massimiliano Orri