Our lab studies cognitive control -- how the brain controls its own behavior, depending on the current situation, our goals, and our past experiences. We use a wide variety of techniques, from neural recordings in animals to computational modeling. I am excited to work with students interested in analyzing neural data or computational modeling. Students should have experience in relevant topics. If you are interested in working with us, please reach out to me at [email protected] with your CV, a brief description of your previous work, and a brief description of your interests for the internship.

Our lab studies adversity and close relationships through a sociocultural lens. Current projects in the lab include:

How do the social networks of first-generation, low-income students differ from their peers, and how do changes to their social networks in the first year of college impact health, well-being, and academic adjustment?

How do the experiences and consequences of cross-class interactions differ from those of same-class interactions?

How do working conditions and policies in the workplace impact close relationships?

When does helping fail? How can a person’s attempt to help another through adversity cause incidental invalidation?
 
Students should have experience or interest in close relationships, social networks, social class, first-generation college students, intergroup interactions, health and well-being or helping. If you are interested in working in the lab, please reach out to Danny Hang at [email protected] with your CV and a description of your research interests!

We are investigating people's ability to introspect on the mental processes underlying their choices (see our preprint). We are looking for a graduate student to work on one of several potential projects in this line of research, including:

• characterizing the mechanisms underlying accurate reporting of choice processes; testing people's introspective awareness in other judgment, decision-making, and planning domains;
• exploring the impact of social norms on introspection;
• developing targeted interventions for improving introspection;
• using computational methods (such as deep learning/LLMs) to probe introspection in naturalistic choice scenarios.

Students should be skilled in computational methods and web programming. If you are interested in working on a project in this space, please reach out to me at [email protected] with your CV and a brief description of your research interests.

Our group adopts a usage-based constructionist perspective on language. For this summer position, we are looking for a graduate student in linguistics, CS, or psychology and who is interested in research on autism OR who has computational skills to investigate LLMs. The autism work is testing the idea that autistic individuals are less likely to flexibly generalize meanings (of words and constructions). The LLM project would quantitatively compare human and machine language skills. Please send your CV and a brief letter of interest to my lab manager, [email protected].

The Logic of Emotion Lab uses developmental, translational, and neuroscientific tools to advance our understanding of emotion. In particular, we investigate how language and emotion interact. The lab has several ongoing projects you may be able to help with, several existing datasets you may be able to work with, or you are welcome to pitch an idea for consideration. A new project would need to be feasible in a very short timeline (i.e., ideally a small study that could be conducted online). Please be in touch if you are interested. Interns that provide a strong fit with the lab will bring: Familiarity with the emotion literature, a clear research question, foundational scientific skills (reading, writing, analyzing), and a collaborative approach to science. [email protected]

Our lab studies the dynamics of the mind – both on its own and in interaction with other minds. For example, our studies try to understand: How do spontaneous thoughts flow over time? How do mental states transition from one to the next? How does the sense of self change across transformative experiences? How does the flow of a conversation predict its success? We are looking for a graduate student to help answer these and related questions. The ideal candidate will have expertise in natural language processing and data analysis (e.g., Python, R). If you are interested in working in the lab, please reach out to me at [email protected] with your CV and a brief description of your research interests.

We are hoping to partner with a VIPS participant to study algorithmic and retrieval strategies for sensorimotor adaptation. The project embeds a visuomotor rotation task inside classic tests of working memory to characterize the capacities and constraints of these strategies for improving performance. The overarching goal is to determine if the use of these different strategies results in down-stream consequences on implicit recalibration. Applicants with experience in conducting sensorimotor adaptation experiments, video game programming, statistical analyses, and computational modeling will be given priority. [email protected]

My lab is looking for a VIPS participant to work on one of two projects:

(1) Studying large-scale collaboration within One Hour One Life, a massively multiplayer online game. Recommended skills:

• Numerical data analysis software (Python or R)
• Scientific computing, specifically best practices for working with large datasets and running compute-intensive jobs
• Statistics, specifically best practices in GLMM

(2) Developing online games to study collaboration. Recommended skills:

• Frontend web development (HTML/CSS/Javascript)
• Basic understanding of backend web development (e.g., sending/receiving data from a database)
• Computational modeling

If you are interested in working with me on these projects, please reach out to me at [email protected] with your CV and a brief description of your research interests.