top of page

MEET OUR TEAM

Thank you for your interest in the Social Identity & Morality Lab!

We have lab meetings every Friday. Please contact us if you are interested in attending lab meetings or presenting your research. If you are interested in joining the lab, please see the Join Us page for more information.

PRINCIPAL INVESTIGATOR 

JAY VAN BAVEL is a Professor of Psychology & Neural Science at New York University, an affiliate at the Stern School of Business in Management and Organizations, and Director of the Social Identity and Morality Lab. To read Jay's official bio in full, go to his NYU home page. Here is his unoffical bio:

After giving up on his dream to become a professional hockey player, Jay became the first person in his family to graduate from college. It took him three years of his undergraduate degree before he realized that research was conducted at universities (despite attending the third-largest research university in Canada). After his first year of graduate school at the University of Toronto, Jay's Ph.D. advisor (Ken Dion) tragically passed away and he was orphaned until a new assistant professor (Wil Cunningham) adopted him. A year later, his new advisor was poached by The Ohio State University and Jay moved to Columbus, Ohio as a visiting scholar. Jay completed most of his Ph.D. requirements (orals, proposal, etc) in various hotel lobbies during the annual SPSP convention since it was the only time and place he could get all his committee members in the same room. In his first year as an assistant professor, Jay had ten papers and three grants rejected and zero publications. His son and daughter were born in his first two years as a faculty member and ensured that he maintained the appearance and intellectual capacity of a zombie until he went up for tenure.

  • Steve Rathje CV Jan 2023
  • Twitter

POSTDOC

lab-steve.png

STEVE RATHJE : NYU Social Psychology Postdoctoral Fellow

Steve Rathje is a postdoctoral researcher with the Social Identity and Morality Lab, funded by grants from the Russel Sage Foundation, the AE foundation, and a Synergy Scholar Grant with the Center for the Science of Moral Understanding. He will be receiving his PhD from the University of Cambridge (Trinity College) as a Gates Cambridge Scholar, and he received his Bachelor of Arts in Psychology from Stanford University. Steve studies polarization and inter-group conflict on social media using field experiments, lab experiments, and computational social science methods.

  • Raunak Pillai CV 08_23
  • Twitter
  • google scholar icon

POSTDOC

_Raunak Pillai headshot.jpg

RAUNAK PILLAI : NYU Social Psychology Postdoctoral Fellow

Raunak Pillai is an incoming postdoctoral researcher. He received his BA in Neuroscience in 2019 from Vanderbilt University and will receive his PhD in Psychological Sciences from Vanderbilt in 2024, working with Dr. Lisa Fazio. His research aims to understand why people believe and share misinformation and identify optimal ways to deliver corrections. In grad school, he focused on the cognitive processes (i.e., memory, decision-making, language processing) involved in these issues. At the Social Identity and Morality Lab, he will continue examining these questions by integrating perspectives from cognitive and social psychology. Outside the lab, he enjoys cooking, tennis, and playing the guitar.

P1140882.jpg
  • Twitter
  • google scholar icon

POSTDOC

LAURA K. GLOBIG : NYU Social Psychology Postdoctoral Fellow

Laura is an incoming postdoctoral researcher with the Social Identity and Morality Lab. She will be receiving her PhD from University College London and was a visiting scholar at Massachusetts Institute of Technology. Her research examines the neural and computational basis of motivated cognition, with the goal of applying the insights obtained from this work to design interventions that reduce biased information-processing and thus aid in reducing the spread of misinformation online. At the Social Identity and Morality Lab, she will continue to adopt a multi-modal approach to help address real world issues, such as the spread of misinformation, polarization, and climate change.

  • thin-081_file_document_cv_curriculum_vit
  • Twitter
  • google scholar icon

PHD STUDENT

Claire_Robertson_2022.JPG

CLAIRE ROBERTSON : NYU Social Psychology Ph.D. Student

Claire received her B.A. in Psychology from Kenyon College in 2017 and then worked for two years as a research specialist in the Princeton University Baby Lab. She began her Ph.D. in Social Psychology at NYU in 2019, and since then has spent her time researching the use of moral and emotional content in news stories and voting behavior. She is also interested in misinformation, political partisanship, and moral decision making. When she’s not in the lab (or, more recently, working in her bed), you can find her wandering through the amazing farmers markets in NYC, writing down recipes for her friends, or reading anything she can get her hands on. 

LAB MANAGER

sarah_photo (1).jpg

Sarah Mughal 

Sarah is a Junior Laboratory Associate in the Social Identity and Morality Lab and the Collective Cognition Lab at NYU. She received her BA and MA in Psychology at NYU, so she often finds herself accidentally walking into Bobst library instead of lab if she hasn’t had her coffee yet. Her research interests include the psychology of social media, discrimination and bias in AI/ML methods, and how psychiatric disorders like ADHD or anxiety affect social interactions and experiences. Outside of lab, Sarah can be found writing in museums, marathoning video games, or meticulously crocheting tiny socks for plushies. 

ACTIVE LAB AFFILIATE

Kareena website photo.jpg

KAREENA DEL ROSARIO: NYU Social Psychology Ph.D. Student

Kareena received her B.A. from San Francisco State University and worked at UCSF as the lab manager for Wendy Berry Mendes prior to beginning her Ph.D. in Social Psychology at NYU. Kareena is broadly interested in studying the effects of emotion and moral judgment on dyadic and group interactions. Her primary advisor is Tessa West and she collaborates with the Social Identity & Morality Lab to explore the physiological underpinnings of moral emotion. In her free time, Kareena enjoys reading magical realism and trying out new restaurants.

linakoppel.jpg

LINA KOPPEL: Postdoctoral Researcher at Linköping University

Lina is a postdoctoral researcher at Linköping University, where she received her PhD in Medical Science in 2020. Her research mainly focuses on the role of affect in everyday decision making, such as how pain and touch influence risk taking, intertemporal choice, and prosocial choice. She is also interested in metascience and, more recently, pro-environmental behavior. Lina is a visiting researcher in the Social Identity and Morality Lab and Collective Cognition Lab at NYU.

  • google scholar icon
  • Twitter

VISITING SCHOLAR

  • thin-081_file_document_cv_curriculum_vit
  • Twitter

ACTIVE LAB AFFILIATE

lab-rachel.jpg

RACHEL LESHIN : NYU Social Psychology Ph.D. Student

Rachel received her BA from Northwestern University in 2015, where she double-majored in psychology and gender studies. Her interests lie at the intersection of social and developmental psychology; her research primarily focuses on children's construction of social categories and the environmental inputs that shape this process. Her primary advisor is Marjorie Rhodes, and she collaborates with the Social Identity & Morality Lab on a line of research examining the influence of parental political ideology on children's conceptions of fairness and morality. 

RESEARCH ASSISTANTS

  • Gabrielle Sylvester

  • Madison Akles

  • Nalinda Wanikpun

LAB ALUMNI

To see a full list of lab alumni and their current positions, see this spreadsheet.

Former Postdoctoral Fellows

Kim Doell, Senior Scientist, University of Vienna

Philip Pärnamets, Senior Research Specialist, Karolinska Institutet

Victoria Spring, Associate Editor, Nature Reviews Psychology

Andrea Pereira, Data and Research Manager, Child Helpline International; Lead Scientist, minds ge
Peter Mende-Siedlecki, Professor, University of Delaware
Shona Tritt, Faculty Lecturer, University of Toronto
Sharareh Noorbaloochi, Vice President, Goldman Sachs
Oriel FeldmanHall, Professor, Brown University
Geraldine Coppin, University of Geneva
Andreas Kappes, Professor, City University of London
Christian Kaul, Chief Operating Officer, Stillfront Group
Tobias Brosch, Professor, University of Geneva

Former Primary Ph.D Students

Ali Javeed, PhD student in the The Politics and Intergroup Relations Lab NYU

Elizabeth Harris, Postdoc, University of Pennsylvania, Annenberg Center for Advanced Study in Communication

Anni Sternisko, United Nations

Diego Reinero, Postdoc, Princeton University

Billy Brady, Professor, Northwestern University, Kellogg School of Management
Jennifer Ray, Learning and Talent Measurement Manager, Takeda Pharmaceutical Center
Julian Wills, Quantitative User Researcher, Google
Leor Hackel, Professor, University of Southern California
Jenny Xiao, Professor, University of Washington-Tacoma

Former Secondary Ph.D Students

Kate Thorson, Professor, Barnard College
Daniel Yudkin, Postdoc, University of Pennsylvania
Rima-Marie Rahal, Researcher, Tilburg University
Ana Gantman, Professor, City University of New York-Brooklyn College
Hannah Nam, Professor, Stony Brook University
Yael Granot, Assistant Professor, Smith College
Lisa Chalik, Professor, Yeshiva University
Amy Krosch, Professor, Cornell University
Kyle Ratner, Professor, University of California-Santa Barbara

Former Affiliates and Visiting Scholars

Chiara Jutzi, TBD

Madalina Vlasceanu, Assistant Professor of Psychology, New York University

Anna Greenburgh, TBD

Jesper Rasmussen, PhD Student, Aarhus University

Clara Pretus, Assistant Professor in Methods in Behavioral Sciences, Autonomous University

Former MA Students

Tatiana Roberts, TBD

Simran Kaur, Survey Research Analyst, Cornell University

Nicole Nowotny, Executive Assistant, Radius Ventures, LLC
Nick Ungson, Visiting Asst. Professor, Albright College
Alea Skwara, PhD Student, University of California-Davis
Yogesh Raut, PhD Student, New Mexico State University
Justin (Duke) Lieberknecht, Associate Vice President of Marketing, American Homes 4 Rent

Former Lab Managers

Yifei Pei, Lab Manager, Yale University

Katie Brown, TBD

Sarah Grevy Gotfredsen, MS Student, Columbia University
Sophie (Wharton) Smith, Insight Analyst, LinkedIn
Jillian Swencionis, PhD, Postdoc, John Jay College of Criminal Justice

Former Honors Thesis Students

Rachel Tang, TBD [lab mentor: Victoria Spring]

Sarah Grevy Gotfredsen, MS Student, Columbia University [lab mentor: Diego Reinero & Philip Pärnamets]

Jena Sohn, TBD [lab mentor: Philip Pärnamets]
Anna Balchunas, Writer/Editor, Development Office, Memorial Sloan Kettering Cancer Center [lab mentor: Diego Reinero]
Stephanie Leung, PsyD Student, Pace University [lab mentor: Billy Brady]
Jonathan Rosenthal, MD Student, NYU School of Medicine [lab mentor: Leor Hackel]
Jayson Dorsett, Research Specialist, University of Pennsylvania [lab mentor: Jennifer Ray]
Bosi Chen, PhD Student, San Diego State University / University of California-San Diego [lab mentor: Leor Hackel]
Jessica Dubin, Chemistry Teacher, Brooklyn Frontiers High School [lab mentor: Daniel Yudkin]
Julia Schaus [lab mentor: Jenny Xiao]
Natasha Thalla, PhD, UX Researcher, Facebook [lab mentor: Daniel Yudkin]
Leslie Berntsen, PhD, Lecturer, University of Southern California [lab mentor: Amy Krosch]
Bram Schumer, JD, Lawyer, Simpson Thacher & Bartlett LLP [lab mentor: Jay Van Bavel]
Ian Kurth, Senior Associate, Alta Capital Group [lab mentor: Jay Van Bavel]

Former RAs

Alejandro Calvo, Honors Student, Lawrence Ian Reed lab, New York University

Anees Goparaju

Armon Dadvand

Christina Capozzoli

Kinda Shammas

Lily Hafez

Shamauri Rivera

Yishu Lu

​​Diána Hughes

Yara Kyrychenko, PhD student, Cambridge

Anastasiia Korolevskaia, Honors Student, Lawrence Ian Reed lab, New York University

Christy Cheng

Cheryl Man, incoming MS Student, Cornell University

Andrew Gruber

Lauren Hyoseo Yoon, Undergraduate, Northwestern University

Cara Reschke, Associate UX Researcher, Match.com

Bayla Zohn

Natasia Pelowski

Maggie Liu

Sahar Hafezi

Brienna Carter, Undergraduate, Yale University
Matt Leipzig, Research Assistant, Stanford University
Prianka Koya, PhD student, UCLA
John Andrew Chwe, PhD Student, NYU
Yi Zhang, PhD Student, University of Southern California
Zoe Kleiman, Neuroendocrine Unit Research Intern, Massachusetts General Hospital
Simone Van Taylor, Research Network Program Associate, Harmony Labs
Jino Kwon, MA Student, New York University
Emily Korf, Research Assistant, CSP
Suraiya Allidina, PhD Student, University of Toronto
Dominic Burkart, Software Engineer/Scientist
Mikaela Kane, MsEd Student, Hunter College
Siri Loken, MD Student, University of California-Irvine School of Medicine
Ashley Castro, PhD Student, DePaul University
Xi Shen, PhD Student, Cornell University
Shreyas Ganesh, Senior Analyst, Hearts & Science
Marc Simon, The Trevor Project
Meslissa Huang
Eugene Jaw, Senior Data Associate, Publicis Sapient
Poorvi Iyer, PhD Student, London School of Economics
Melanie Corwin, Digital Crisis Services Coordinator, The Trevor Project
Ryan Salim, PhD Student, St. John's University
Nick Ichien, Graduate Student, University of California-Los Angeles
Heba Allam

bottom of page