DR. MARTIN STEPPAN · FREELANCE CONSULTING
People Insights for organisations seeking evidence-based decisions about their people.
I combine psychological research with statistical analysis and AI — from defining the right question to insights you can put to work.
Discuss your projectMy services support companies, insurers and other organisations with analyses of employees, health and organisational relationships.
DATA. PATTERNS. PEOPLE.
HOW I CAN HELP
Understand what retains employees and which working conditions support their health.
Research background: my contribution to the Absenteeism Report 2013.
Understand what matters to employees and which changes would help.
Methodological background for assessing measurement quality and validity: our psychometric evaluation of meinBeruf.ch.
Assessing personality in everyday life: our FFM-PSI study (2025) on developing and validating an instrument for repeated measurement of personality states.
Explore potential and career fit using psychologically grounded methods.
Research background: our study in Intelligence on test fairness and the importance of language-free assessments.
Apply AI where it helps us understand people and organisations, with transparent findings and expert interpretation.
An example from our research: AI-based emotion recognition in psychotherapy — University of Basel article.
I support you from selecting a suitable use case through to evaluation. We combine AI with statistical methods and human judgement, clarifying which data may be used, how findings can be checked and where their interpretation has limits.
SOCIAL NETWORK ANALYSIS · GEPHI
How are people, teams and organisations connected? I analyse social networks with Gephi, exploring collaboration, information flows, group structures and the people who connect them.
From planning a network survey and preparing relational data to metrics, visualisation and presentation of findings. Methodological background: my further training in Social and Economic Networks: Models and Analysis at Stanford University.
BIOLOGICALLY INSPIRED AI · ANT COLONY OPTIMIZATION
We also use AI and optimisation methods inspired by biological principles. In Ant Colony Optimization virtual ants explore possible solutions. Successful selections receive more pheromone; this trail influences subsequent search steps and fades over time.
In psychometrics, this approach can identify suitable items for a shorter questionnaire. Our LoPF-Q study (2022) uses this approach to select items based on model fit, reliability and clinical validity.
In our personality states study (Gander, Traut, Uhlich, Horstmann, Steppan, Ziegler & Grob, 2025) Ant Colony Optimization also contributed to developing the Five-Factor Model Personality States Inventory. The instrument assesses momentary personality states through repeated measurements. Psychology Today covers the study.
AI & INTERACTION ANALYSIS
An annotated interview with Robert Downey Jr. illustrates how AI can analyse facial expressions and the temporal dynamics of a conflictual interaction.
Our study on AI-based emotion recognition · Multimodal process analysis
Demonstration: automated classifications do not establish the emotions, intentions or personality of the people shown.
DASHBOARDS & REPORTING
Two dashboard concepts for Power BI and Tableau, presented as interactive web demos with synthetic data.
RESEARCH FOUNDATION
TALENT MANAGEMENT & CAREER FIT · 2026
How well does AI-based career matching perform? An evaluation with 914 users provides initial evidence on measurement quality, construct validity and technical gender fairness of meinBeruf.ch.
Long-term outcomes such as job satisfaction or career success have not yet been assessed.
Steppan, M., Jogho, G., Ruchti, I., & Hell, B. (2026). Psychometric evaluation of the AI-based career matching platform meinBeruf.ch: Evidence for reliability, construct validity, and gender fairness. Psychological Test Adaptation and Development, 7, 289–295.
Read the meinBeruf.ch studyDesigned study cover for the journal publication.
TURNOVER & WORKPLACE HEALTH · 2013
Condemned to succeed — an addicted working society?
The 2013 Absenteeism Report explores addiction, its relevance to the workplace and health-promoting workforce policies.
With a contribution by Martin Steppan, Tim Pfeiffer-Gerschel and Jutta Künzel.
Edited by B. Badura, A. Ducki, H. Schröder, J. Klose and M. Meyer. Springer, 2013.
COGNITIVE ABILITIES & TEST FAIRNESS · 2024
Our study in Intelligence examines whether the IDS-2 measures comparably in children and adolescents with and without a migrant background. It shows that linguistically demanding subtests may disadvantage participants with a migrant background.
The findings highlight the importance of language-free, culturally fair methods for assessing cognitive abilities — a key consideration in developing and selecting assessments.
The study concerns children and adolescents. It supports the need for language-free tests; it did not validate a new language-free assessment.
Gantscheva, L., Steppan, M., & Grob, A. (2024). Investigating measurement invariance of the IDS-2 intelligence scales between migrant and non-migrant groups. Intelligence, 107, 101873.
Read the Intelligence studyDesigned study cover for the journal publication.
AI & EMOTION RECOGNITION · 2024
Our study in Psychopathology examines AI-based facial expression analysis in psychotherapy research. Automated emotion classifications were compared with human ratings in 389 sessions involving 23 patients.
The work shows how video data can support research on emotional expression and highlights the importance of carefully evaluating AI methods.
A feasibility study in a clinical context. The findings do not validate emotion recognition for employment decisions.
Steppan, M., Zimmermann, R., Fürer, L., et al. (2024). Machine Learning Facial Emotion Classifiers in Psychotherapy Research: A Proof-of-Concept Study. Psychopathology, 57(3), 159–168.
Read the Psychopathology studyRead the University of Basel article
Designed study cover for the journal publication.
RESEARCH IN THE MEDIA
Documentaries and media coverage of our research on artificial intelligence and psychology.
A documentary featuring our research on AI-based emotion recognition.
Watch the documentary →Science coverage of our Basel study and facial expression analysis.
Read the article →Coverage of the study, its findings and the role of human relationships.
Read the article →CONTACT
Tell me briefly about your question. Together we can discuss how I can support you as a freelance consultant.
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Write a project enquiryREFERENCES
EMCDDA
University Medical Center Hamburg-Eppendorf
Springer
meinBeruf.ch
Tyrol Economic Chamber
HBSC study
Steppan, M., Jogho, G., Ruchti, I., & Hell, B. (2026). Psychometric evaluation of the AI-based career matching platform meinBeruf.ch: Evidence for reliability, construct validity, and gender fairness. Psychological Test Adaptation and Development, 7, 289–295. Read the study (DOI) · Full text in the FHNW repository
Badura, B., Ducki, A., Schröder, H., Klose, J., & Meyer, M. (Eds.). (2013). Absenteeism Report 2013: Condemned to succeed — an addicted working society? Springer. With a contribution by Martin Steppan, Tim Pfeiffer-Gerschel and Jutta Künzel. View the book at Springer
Gantscheva, L., Steppan, M., & Grob, A. (2024). Investigating measurement invariance of the IDS-2 intelligence scales between migrant and non-migrant groups. Intelligence, 107, 101873. Read the study (DOI) · Full text in the University of Basel repository
