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Research Areas

Moral Development

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A number of studies in the MACLab are focused on the development of moral cognition, across the lifespan and across cultures.

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Associated Projects:

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The Essential Moral Self — An investigation into the role morality plays in shaping identity and concepts of the 'self'.

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Bridging the Moral Gap — An investigation into asymmetries in the understanding of moral concepts between children and adults, and interventions aimed at closing the gap.

Select Publications: â€‹â€‹

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Jordan, Amir, & Bloom (2016) Are empathy and concern psychologically distinct? Emotion.

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Amir et al. (2021) Children are more forgiving of accidental harms across development. Journal of Experimental Child Psychology.

The Development of Heuristics

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One research avenue at the MACLab concerns how heuristics emerge & change across the lifespan, like those related to risk, uncertainty, and exploration.

Associated Projects:

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CREATE — A series of studies focused on the heuristics that underlie children's creative exploration in the analog & digital worlds

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Tissue Box Task  — An investigation into how children and adults trade off reward and information value in their costly exploration

The Emergence of Cooperation

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How do we learn to cooperate? These studies focus on examining early roots of cooperative behavior and its manifestations across cultures through experimental research games with children all around the globe.​​

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Associated Projects:

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Building Virtue — A multi-year, multi-country investigation into the development of cooperative preferences and norms across development

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Strategic Randomness — A series of studies focused on how children and adults utilize randomness in strategic interactions around coordination and anti-coordination

Select Publications:

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Amir et al. (2018) Trustworthiness is distinct from generosity in children. Dev Psych.

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Amir et al. (2023) Computational signatures of inequity aversion in children across seven societies. JEP:Gen.

Cognitive Regularities Across Cultures

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Which cognitive processes are or are not influenced by culture? An important avenue of research concerns the degree to which culture penetrates cognition and the ways in which it can do so.​​

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Associated Projects

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Culture+Cognition Pathways — In this project, we are developing a framework to think concretely about the ways in which culture can shape cognitive processes.

Select Publications:

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Amir et al. (in prep) Inattentional blindness as a cognitive regularity: Evidence from twelve populations on six continents.

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Amir & Firestone. (2025). Is Visual Perception WEIRD? The Müller-Lyer Illusion and the Cultural Byproduct HypothesisPsychological Review.

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