Altruistic Minds Lab

Rana is a postdoctoral researcher at the University of Edinburgh. She holds a PhD in Psychology from the University of York. Her overarching research interests focus on the capacity limits of our information processing resources. Within the Altruistic Minds Lab she explores the factors that shape our moral concern, including how age and cognition influence moral circle expansion. 

Rana also explores anthropogenic and existential risks. She looks at the cognitive factors that constrain decision-making and expose humanity to extinction risks. Her work measures the prevalence of omnicidal tendencies and how people rationalise extinguishing life on earth.

Ali is a PhD student at the University of Edinburgh and a researcher at Sentience Institute. His research looks at how people think morally about nonhuman animals and artificial intelligences. He previously completed master's degrees in Cognitive Science and Economics and worked as a researcher in the nonprofit and private sectors 

Miranda is studying for her PhD in Psychology at the University of Edinburgh. Her work seeks to disentangle the influence of individualist, neoliberal ideology from moral circle and altruism research and, subsequently, to better understand collective moral regard and behaviour. She is also interested in moral regard towards villains and outcasts 

Jack is a PhD student at the University of Edinburgh. His interests primarily lie in moral judgement and moral reasoning, with particular interest in the way we make moral judgements about individuals who use or misuse AI and artificial entities 

Taranah is a PhD student at the University of Edinburgh supervised by Dr Sarah Stanton and Dr Matti Wilks. She is interested in relationships and well-being. Her research focuses on the role of meditation interventions in promoting secure attachment 

Julie is an ESRC-funded PhD student at the University of Edinburgh supervised by Dr Adam Moore and Dr Matti Wilks. She is broadly interested in using computational modelling to understand morality and how we value others with factors from large social systems in addition to individual-level cognitive factors. She has previously worked on interventions to deter human dairy consumption and modelling political polarisation as a function of uncertain moral signalling. She also keeps a curated selection of adorable and silly bunny pictures to brighten anyone’s day.

Elise is an affiliate of the lab.  She works as a social researcher with Bryant Research, aiming to improve farmed animal advocacy strategies and promote alternative proteins via a social psychologically informed approach. She is keenly interested in speciesism, meat eating behaviour, and how we attribute moral worth to others. Elise earned an MSc in Psychological Research from the University of Edinburgh. 

Anita is an affiliate of the lab. She completed her MSc in Social Cognition at LSE where she researched what is unique about members of the existential risk community. She is currently a Research Assistant at the Fairness Foundation, and Visitor at the University of York where she is continuing her research into the existential risk studies community with Professor Jenkins and Dr Wilks. She is interested in understanding the motivations of unusual altruists; the effects of socioeconomic inequality on moral cognition, and beliefs about death and existential risk.