YongQi completed a Bsc in Psychology at the University of Groningen and a research masters in Psychology at the University of Amsterdam. YongQi is interested in emotion communication in the cross-cultural and developmental context. 

In her PhD research (funded by a NWO research talent grant), YongQi investigates the "in-group advantage" effect in non-verbal emotion communication across cultures.  Specifically, she studies how people from differnt cultures express and percieve emotions differently, and why people are better at recognizing emotional facial expressions displayed by someone with the same culture compared to those from other cultures. YongQi examines how culture influences emotion communication using a range of research methods including eye-tracking and longitudinal designs, and works  with diverse samples including immigrants/expats and culturally-mixed individuals.