About
Lucas completed his PhD in social and consumer psychology at the University of Queensland Business School in 2023. His research focuses on the psychology of misleading business and financial opportunities. Specifically, he examines how aspects of online entrepreneurship culture (e.g. influencers, self-development content, business gurus) shape beliefs about business and financial success. He examines how these beliefs sustain participation in digitally promoted entrepreneurial opportunities built around exaggerated earnings claims. This includes multilevel marketing, online business coaching, crypto and trading schemes, and other get-rich-quick or passive income opportunities.
His research spans surveys, experiments, scale development and validation, cognitive interviewing, cross-cultural adaptation, systematic reviews, and mixed methods research. He works extensively with psychometric analysis, complex regression modelling, structural equation modelling, meta-analysis, thematic analysis, content and text analysis. His technical toolkit includes R/RStudio, Python, SPSS, Qualtrics, NVivo, alongside experience in automated web scraping, text analysis, machine-learning-assisted reviews, and AI-assisted research workflows.
Lucas is currently a sessional lecturer in the School of Business and Creative Industries at UniSC, where he teaches research methods and business analytics. He is particularly interested in making research and business analytics accessible to business students. Drawing on his research interests in judgement and decision-making, he aims to inspire students to build hybrid intelligence: the ability to combine human judgement, data and AI to make better decisions in increasingly complex business environments.
Lucas is active in public engagement around success and self-development culture and its relationship to misleading business opportunities. His research has contributed to international television, radio, podcasts, newspaper and magazine coverage, including ABC Australia, BBC, The Times and Freakonomics. He has also contributed to policy and regulatory discussions, including engagement with the US Federal Trade Commission.