Moral Decisions & Rational Altruism
- Faculty Sponsor: Falk Lieder
- Department: Psychology
- Contact Name: Zahra Tahmasebi
- E-mail: rationalaltruismlab@gmail.com
- Room Number: 7525 Pritzker Hall
- Phone: (424) 259-5300
- Website: https://ralab.psych.ucla.edu/
Description of Research Project
Note: The early-bird application deadline for Summer and/or Fall 2024 is May 15, 2024. The application remains open until May 30, 2024.
The Rational Altruism Lab is a purpose-driven team with the mission to strengthen the scientific foundations for improving the future of humanity. We conduct fundamental research on crucial questions about morality, altruism, rationality, learning, and decision-making. Our core values include altruism, rationality, scientific rigor, precise theories and models, intellectual humility and open-mindedness, working hard and smart, taking responsibility, open communication, seeking and providing constructive feedback, continuous learning and improvement, publishing our findings, and open science.
The Rational Altruism Lab conducts research in four core areas:
Moral learning and moral decision-making
Identifying the most impactful questions that psychological science can ask by developing a general method for predicting the social impact of scientific research on different topics.
Understanding and promoting effective well-doing
Improving institutional decision-making.
We are looking for research assistants who will contribute to one of the following projects:
Decision-making in social dilemmas. This project investigates how people make decisions in situations where their self-interest is in conflict with the welfare of others. Undergraduate research assistants can contribute to this project in one or more of the following ways: analyzing participants' verbal responses, statistical data analysis in R, setting up Qualtrics surveys, writing descriptions of social dilemmas, and scientific writing.
Promoting altruistic decision-making through systematic reflection. This project investigates whether systematically reflecting on people's decisions can help them learn to become more altruistic and more farsighted. Undergraduate students can contribute to this project by evaluating our systematic reflection intervention in cognitive interviews, creating Qualtrics surveys, writing descriptions of social dilemmas that will be used in the experiment, analyzing written responses, data analysis in R, and scientific writing.
Obstacles to learning how to make better decisions in social dilemmas. This project investigates why people don’t always learn the right lessons from the outcomes of their decisions. In particular, we investigate what can prevent a person who made an overly selfish and/or irrational decision from realizing how bad their decision was for others. Undergraduate students can contribute to this project by analyzing participants’ written responses to questions probing how they evaluate the outcomes of their decisions.
Description of Student Responsibilities
Research Assistants will be routed to one or more of the lab research projects based on their interests and needs of the projects. Primary mentor will depend on the project assignment. Responsibilities (depending on the projects) may include attending project meetings, creating experimental materials, literature research, data collection, study coordination, data analysis, and manuscript preparation. All projects are designed to produce or contribute to scientific articles. All projects will give you the opportunity to earn a co-authorship on one or more publications that your work contributes to.
At least a basic knowledge of psychological research methodology and statistics are necessary for the position. Prior experience working in lab settings is beneficial but not required. The research assistants should be professional and organized, with good communication skills, a desire to learn and dedication to the Rational Altruism Lab core values. A commitment of at least two quarters is expected.
By joining the Rational Altruism Lab, you will benefit from working with a team of skilled and passionate researchers. This will give you the chance to expand your knowledge of psychological research methodologies while providing hands-on experience in various research domains, such as designing and developing research materials, data collection, data analysis, and reporting.
Time Commitment per Week: 12 hours or more
Research Credit Available: Y/N Y
How to Apply: Please complete the Rational Altruism Lab Interest Form: https://forms.gle/td9uvXbykFWaqEkR9
Legal Corpora: A Computational and Cognitive Approach to Copyright and Legal Argumentation
- Faculty Sponsor: Keith Holyoak
- Department: Psychology
- Contact Name: David G. Kamper
- E-mail: davidgkamper@ucla.edu
- Room Number: Pritzker Hall 7570
- Phone: (218) 576-6144
- Website: https://reasoninglab.psych.ucla.edu/
Description of Research Project
How do legal precedents develop? What kind of computational approaches can be taken to better understand how legal concepts develop and are used in courts of law? Our lab examines the impact of analogy, that is the mapping between two concepts, and networks. By leveraging these cognitive and computational tools, we delve into the creativity within intellectual property law. Our research focuses on the genesis and development of intellectual property, including the emergence of new ideas for artistic works and inventions, and more broadly, how human cognition influences legal frameworks.
We are engaged in a variety of research projects. One such set of projects investigates legal corpora, including case law, patent filings, and legal opinions. Utilizing natural language processing and network analysis, particularly through the lens of legal citations, we aim to unravel the development of specific legal concepts and their development. Our work in copyright law leverages large datasets to identify the key terms and concepts that underlie the principle of transformativeness—an essential doctrine within the fair use defense. Additionally, we conduct in-person studies with both laypeople and experts, such as artists, to explore how they perceive art. By employing neuroscientific and computational methods, we compare their responses to existing legal standards. This approach allows us to advance our understanding of aesthetics and creativity and their impact on legal interpretations and outcomes.
Furthermore, our lab investigates the dynamics of persuasion and argumentation within legal contexts, focusing on what narrative structures and concepts are most compelling. This includes examining causal language, counterfactual thinking, and the concept of mens rea (the state of mind) and its influence on legal outcomes and the establishment of precedents.
Description of Student Responsibilities
The research assistant’s duties encompass multiple aspects of current research endeavors, such as participating in lab meetings, conducting literature searches, designing studies and developing stimuli, editing, gathering and programming data, analyzing data, preparing presentation slides, and writing up findings. A significant task will involve constructing legal corpora for further research.
Students are expected to dedicate at least 7 hours weekly to these tasks. Ideal candidates should have experience with R, Python, or MATLAB, and be keen on advancing their research careers in graduate school or law school. Interested individuals should send their resume or CV and an unofficial transcript to David at davidgkamper@ucla.edu.
The Effect of Social Identities on Person Perceptions in the Workpla
- Faculty Sponsor: Margaret Shih
- Department: Psychology & Anderson School of Management
- Contact Name: Margaret Shih
- E-mail: margaret.shih@anderson.ucla.edu
- Website: https://www.psych.ucla.edu/faculty-page/mjshih/
Description of Research Project
How does one's social identity influence their perceptions, behaviors, performance, and well-being in organizations? Our lab examines the impact of social identities-related inequities on people's experiences in organizations.
We have a series of research projects going on in our lab, such as work-related outcomes of Asian employees at the middle of the racial hierarchy, the impact of various diversity ideologies on intergroup relations, backlash against middle performing female employees asking for promotions, and audience perceptions of policy advocacy when the advocator directly benefits from their advocacy.
We use a variety of methods, including online and in-lab surveys and experiments, archival data analyses, natural language processing, data-scraping and more.
Description of Student Responsibilities
The research assistant will be involved in various stages of ongoing research projects, including attending lab meetings, literature reviews, study design and stimuli creation, proofreading surveys, data collection, data coding, data analyses, creating slides for presentations, and drafting results.
Students must be able to commit a minimum of 8 hours a week for a minimum of 2 quarters. Preferred/desired skills: Experience with R, interest in pursuing research in graduate school. If interested, please email Margaret (margaret.shih@anderson.ucla.edu) your resume or CV and unofficial transcript.
Interleaving in Mathematics
- Faculty Sponsor: Steve Bennoun
- Department: Psychology
- Contact Name: Steve Bennoun
- E-mail: bennoun@ucla.edu
Description of Research Project
What is the best way to design homework sets in order to best support student learning? Is it better to practice one topic at a time or to mix different topics? If so, how should the topics be mixed?
In this project we will compare different homework designs and evaluate their impact on student learning in the context of a mathematics course. We will also explore what other factors could explain differences in learning.
Description of Student Responsibilities
Students will participate in a variety of research-related tasks that may include data collection and data cleaning, assisting with statistical data analysis or qualitative data analysis, and literature review. We look for students who are reliable, well organized and comfortable with math and stats. Eagerness to learn is a must. You also need to have taken at least one statistics course. Having taken LS30A is a big plus and knowing R is a plus.
If interested please email your CV, unofficial transcripts and a brief description (just 1 or 2 brief paragraphs, not a letter) of what makes you interested in this project.
Research on Decision Making and Behavioral Science
- Faculty Sponsor: Hal Hershfield
- Department: Psychology & Business (Anderson)
- Contact Name: Megan Weber
- E-mail: mailto:meweber13@gmail.com
Description of Research Project
How does thinking about time and our future selves transform emotions and alter the judgments and decisions we make for ourselves now? How do different communications and interventions change perceptions, intentions, and behaviors such as choosing to invest (or withdraw from the market), getting vaccinated, saving money, planning for retirement, or confronting the aging process? Research methods for investigating these and related questions include online and in-person experiments, neuroimaging, eye tracking, archival and big data analyses, and even virtual reality.
Description of Student Responsibilities
RAs will work on a variety of research-related tasks, including literature reviews, study design, stimuli creation, archival data analysis, and statistical coding. Students should be independent, organized, reliable, and clear communicators. We want RAs who are not only hardworking but also interested in investigating the cognitive processes that are involved in decision making and behavior change.
Analysis of MRI Data using BrainSuite
- Faculty Sponsor: David Shattuck
- Department: Neurology
- Contact Name: Yeun Kim
- E-mail: yeunkim10@engineering.ucla.edu
- Room Number: NRB225
- Website: http://shattuck.bmap.ucla.edu
Description of Research Project
The Shattuck Lab develops computational methods for analyzing magnetic resonance imaging (MRI) data of the human brain and applies these techniques in brain research. One of our software packages, BrainSuite (http://brainsuite.org), provides an open-source collection of tools for the automated and semi-automated processing of human brain MRI data. As part of our ongoing efforts to improve the software, we need to perform manual labeling of imaging data to provide training and evaluation datasets for machine learning algorithms. Additionally, we are applying these software tools to extract and analyze information related to brain structure and function in several research areas.
Description of Student Responsibilities
Students working on this project will use the BrainSuite user interface to visually examine MRI data and delineate neuroanatomical structures and boundaries in the data. They will also perform computational tasks using the BrainSuite software to process and analyze the data. This processing will be performed through both the graphical interface and on the command line using scripting tools. Students will also perform visual inspection of program outputs to ensure that processing has been performed correctly. Students will also perform statistical analysis using R. Experience with bash and Python is preferred.
Learning and Mentorship Study
- Faculty Sponsor: Naomi Eisenberger
- Department: Psychology
- Contact Name: Akila Kadambi
- E-mail: akadambi@ucla.edu
Description of Research Project
The study is conducted remotely and is a collaboration effort across research groups (Eisenberger and Bjork Labs). The project involves pairing together adoptive foster youth (ages 9 -16) and undergraduate students at UCLA as part of a larger mentorship intervention. Each participant pair will meet once a week via zoom to discuss pre-determined learning and humanistic education topics, over a longitudinal period (six weeks per participant pair).
Description of Student Responsibilities
The research assistant will assist on, and potentially lead, aspects of: general study coordination, participant recruitment, and data collection. Prior experience working in lab settings with human subjects and clinical populations is preferred. The research assistant should ideally be able to commit a large portion of time to the project (including weekly meetings), have excellent organizational skills, and provide at least a two quarter commitment. An interest in learning, mentorship, prosociality and/or foster youth is a must.
If interested, please email your CV/resume and a brief statement of interest to Akila Kadambi, akadambi@ucla.edu.
Effect of video games on visual learning
- Faculty Sponsor: Zili Liu
- Department: Psychology
- Contact Name: Maggie Yeh
- E-mail: maggieyeh@g.ucla.edu
- Room Number: 8505 Pritzker
- Phone: 4153738678
Description of Research Project
This research project aims to quantify and evaluate the utility of action video games (first-person shooters) as training for visual skills. Video game players have been generally shown to demonstrate enhanced visual skills, especially relating to attention. However, the question remains: is this benefit due to the video games, or are the players self-selecting by choosing to play games because they are already better at visual skills? This project will compare video games to other methods of visual learning training, and evaluate potential limitations.
Description of Student Responsibilities
Research assistants will assist with data collection. Previous experience with coding in Python, Matlab, or similar is not required, but is appreciated. The specific tasks involved may vary based on individual student interest. Research assistants will be required to attend a weekly RA meeting.
Culture and Contact Lab (CCL) Research Group
- Faculty Sponsor: Brannon, Tiffany
- Department: Psychology
- Contact Name: Tiffany Brannon
- E-mail: tbrannon@psych.ucla.edu
- Room Number: Pritzker 5522
Description of Research Project
The UCLA Culture and Contact Lab studies social inequalities tied to systemic oppression and discrimination including disparities related to academic achievement and well-being. Theories and approaches tied to cultural psychology and intergroup relations are integrated to investigate psychological interventions.
Description of Student Responsibilities
Students in the research group participate in a variety of tasks that are designed to further exposure and experiences with research methods and opportunities for mentorship. In particular, students help with all stages of the research process including providing feedback on study materials, working as an experimenter for studies, assisting with literature reviews and data coding for research reporting and dissemination.
Evaluate Retinal Neural Circuits for Visual Processing
- Faculty Sponsor: Yi-Rong Peng
- Department: Ophthalmology
- Contact Name: Yi-Rong Peng
- E-mail: yirongpeng@mednet.ucla.edu
- Room Number: Jules Stein Building B-200
- Phone: 310-825-7883
- Website: http://www.yirongpeng.com
Description of Research Project
The visual system operates in over 12 orders of magnitude of light intensity and allows for robust discrimination of color, movement, and fine detail. The complex neural processing originates from the circuitry of the retina. In the retina, over 100 types of cells are selectively wired together to form multiple processing circuits, within which achieved parallel processing of visual information. This project is to dissect the functions of individual retinal circuits and understand their roles in processing visual information.
Description of Student Responsibilities
During the quarter, the student will learn about the morphological and functional features of retinal circuits. Under the supervision of the PI, the student will assist in rodent maintenance, eye-tracking experiments, visual behavior assays, data analysis. She/he will also attend relevant seminars and conduct literature search to better understand the process of visual perception and high-acuity vision. In addition, the student will learn and perform basic bioinformatics using R and python, and histological and molecular techniques, and flow-cytometry, in order to participate in the project.