May 2026
The Morality Lab gathered to celebrate our amazing graduating research assistants: Katerina von Helms, Mengyao Zhao, Andrea Budiu, and Michaela Henderson! We have been very grateful for the opportunity to work with them, and wish them the best of luck on their next adventures!
Undergraduate RA Katerina von Helms won the inaugural Donnah Canavan thesis award, which honors “exceptional senior thesis work that promotes societal well‑being, advances equity, and deepens understanding of the structures that shape opportunity and harm.” Congratulations Kat!
Several of our lab members presented their work at the end-of-year Undergraduate and Graduate Research Conferences! Undergraduate RAs Katerina von Helms and Mengyao Zhao presenting their undergraduate thesis work, and graduate students Seoyeon Bae and Helen Zheng presented their ongoing research projects. Congratulations to all!
April 2026
Out of over 300 nominees, Ph.D. student Marcus Trenfield was selected for the 2026 Ann Forest Morgan, Ed.D. Graduate Student Award! This award honors a graduate student who exemplifies commitment to the graduate student community and student experience through leadership, innovation, and service. Congratulations Marcus!
Ph.D. student Marcus Trenfield presented work on sustainability and climate activism to the greater Boston community through a workshop at the Riverwalk Church!
The Morality Lab had an unforgettable time exploring the Harvard Museum of Natural History with visiting scholar Zoé Szczepaniak!
March 2026
Ph.D. student Seoyeon Bae had her first first-author lab paper accepted for publication! “Altruistic, more than reputational concerns, drive legacy motives, values, and aspirations across the world” will be published in the journal, Personality and Individual Differences. Check out our Publications page to read the full text!
February 2026
The Morality lab ventured to Chicago for SPSP 2026! Lab members presented posters, data blitzes, and professional development workshops to social psychologists from around the world. We were grateful to reunite with former lab members, present on our latest findings and methodological inventions, and meet both new collaborators and old friends!
October 2025
We were so excited to participate in the second annual Marginalia conference hosted at Boston College. Ph.D. students Marcus Trenfield and Trystan Loustau were on the conference organizing committee, Ph.D. student Helen Zheng and lab manager Sara Haman volunteered with conference preparation, and Ph.D. student Seoyeon Bae and undergraduate RA Katerina von Helms presented posters on their research! A huge congratulations to everyone!
September 2025
The Morality lab had a wonderful time tabling at the the 2025 Cambridge Science Carnival. We had the chance to talk to people – both from the local Boston community and beyond – about the lab’s on-going research on contrarianism!
July 2025
We had a blast playing board games, eating popsicles, and celebrating our wonderful RAs! We are so lucky to have you all in the lab!
The lab went bowling to send off our incredible post-baccs Jodie and Thomas. We will miss you both, and wish you the best in your next adventures!
June 2025
The lab went to the Boston Common for a picnic, games, and a swan boat ride to say goodbye to Project Coordinator Adaeze Chukwudebe and Ph.D. Student Isaac Handley-Miner. Next year, Isaac will remain in the lab as a postdoc, and Adaeze will be starting at Burrell College of Osteopathic Medicine! Congratulations to you both!
May 2025
Boston College held a conference about custom AI tools, featuring presentations from graduate students Seoyeon Bae and Helen Zheng! Seoyeon demonstrated ongoing work of hers on creating an AI chatbot to help with bystander intervention training, and Helen presented her latest work on the relationship between survey participants’ religiosity and their tendency to seek moral advice from AI chatbots.
We were so glad to celebrate the successful dissertation defense of our very own Dr. Isaac Handley-Miner! Fortunately for us, Isaac will continue to work in the lab as a postdoc next year. Congratulations again Isaac!
Several of our lab members presented their work at the end-of-year Undergraduate and Graduate Research Conferences! Undergraduate RA Kae’la Powell-Cobbs presented her senior thesis work, and graduate students Trys Loustau, Yiyuan Zhang, Seoyeon Bae, and Helen Zheng presented their ongoing research projects. Congratulations to all!
April 2025
The lab took a trip to the Museum of Fine Arts in Boston and then went to dinner to send off our amazing postdoc Jordan Wylie! Jordan will be starting at Cornell University in the fall, where she will be an Assistant Professor of Psychology and the PI of the WyLab. We will miss you Jordan, and best of luck in your new role!
February 2025
Our lab had an unforgettable time at the 2025 Society of Personality and Social Psychology (SPSP) conference in Denver! We presented our latest research, exchanged ideas with psychologists from around the world, and caught up with lab alumni. Special shoutouts to RA Harold for attending and presenting his work in-person, and to Dr. Jordan Wylie for organizing the Moral Psychology preconference!
December 2024
The lab went to the North End to send off our amazing postdocs Stelios and Kyle, who are starting new positions at Arizona State University! Stelios will be an Assistant Professor in the School of Sustainability, and Kyle will be a postdoc in Stelios’s lab, the Intergenerational Decisions and Effective Action Lab—best of luck to both of you in your new roles!
September 2024
The lab went to downtown Boston for a duck tour and dinner to say a bittersweet goodbye to our beloved postdoc Gordon! Thank you Gordon for being such an amazing presence in our lab over the past five years—we will miss you so much!
The Morality Lab had so much fun tabling at this year’s Cambridge Science Festival! We had the opportunity to talk to so many folks about our lab’s current work in social identity complexity—thanks to everyone who stopped by!
The postbaccs had a lovely time tabling at the Student Involvement Fair! A big thank you to everyone who stopped by, and we’re excited to have new faces in the lab soon!
May 2024
We had so much fun welcoming our incoming graduate students Seoyeon and Helen with a workshop and lab dinner—we are thrilled that they will be joining us soon!
We had a blast enjoying Tuesday’s weather with a pizza picnic and celebrating our wonderful graduating RAs! Here’s to their bright futures and all of the amazing adventures ahead!
Lab director Liane Young was recently the guest on the Templeton Ideas Podcast! She discussed factors that influence moral judgement and how morality can be a moving target for researchers. You can find her episode on both Spotify and Apple Podcasts!
Congratulations to our brilliant undergraduate RAs Patrick, Maggie, Katie, Heleni, and Harold for their wonderful presentations at the Undergraduate Research Conference—we are so proud!
April 2024
The lab would like to congratulate several current members and alumni on recent accomplishments!
Fourth-year Ph.D. candidate Isaac Handley-Miner received two grants, one from the Alfred P. Sloan Foundation to study comparatively how humans and large language models assess the validity of claims, and another from the Berkeley Initiative for Transparency in the Social Sciences (BITSS) to understand researcher practices and attitudes towards reporting pilot studies in psychology.
Post-bacc Research Associate Lizy Szanton committed to the Counseling Psychology Ph.D. program at the University of Minnesota, where she will be advised by Melissa Ertl.
Second-year Ph.D. Student Marcus Trenfield was awarded a Graduate Research Fellowship by the National Science Foundation, and Lizy Szanton received an honorable mention for the fellowship as well.
Finally, former graduate student Dr. Jordan Theriault will be joining Northeastern as an Assistant Professor in the Psychology Department (with a cross appointment in Biology).
Congratulations to all for their amazing accomplishments!