Josh Wenger successfully defended his master's thesis on AI and empathy choice at the end of May. Congratulations, Josh!
Lab News
Kudos to EMP Lab Undergraduates!
Congratulations to several of our EMP Lab undergraduates, graduating and otherwise -- well deserved and excellent work! Skylar Cui, who graduated this spring, will be taking a new position as a full-time research assistant at the Cognition, Affect,...
Rachel Buterbaugh Named Psychology Student Marshal
One of our graduating seniors, lead research assistant Rachel Buterbaugh, has been named the Psychology Department student marshal for this weekend's commencement ceremony. Congratulations, Rachel!
Expanding Empathy Series Returns for 2025
For the 7th year, Dr. Cameron is bringing back the Expanding Empathy Speaker Series through the Rock Ethics Institute, and now the Consortium on Moral Decision-Making. For more about the series and how to register for the free Zoom webinars in May,...
Political Morality Conference at Penn State
We held a conference here at Penn State, through the Consortium on Moral Decision-Making, about political divisions and morality. We brought together scholars from psychology, political science, philosophy, sociology, communications, and media...
Welcome to Jolie Kretzschmar!
The EMP Lab welcomes Jolie Kretzschmar, who will be joining the lab in fall 2025 as a new graduate student. Congrats, Jolie!
Melody Munitz Revisits Penn State
Earlier this semester in April, EMP Lab Honors alum Melody Munitz revisited us at Penn State while starring as Wednesday Addams in the off-Broadway production of the Addams Family. Melody did an interdisciplinary Honors thesis with us on empathy...
Faruk Yalcin Publishes Science e-Letter on Outrage
Faruk Yalcin, second-year graduate student in the EMP Lab, has published an e-letter in Science in response to McLoughlin et al.'s paper on moral outrage and social media. In the article, he discusses motivational approaches to outrage and how to...
Rachel Buterbaugh to Attend Grad School at UT Austin
Rachel Buterbaugh, senior lead RA in the EMP Lab, has accepted an offer to join the UT Austin Social Psychology program, where she will go to work as a graduate student with Bertram Gawronski. Congratulations, Rachel!
Joshua Wenger Presents at Society for Affective Science
Joshua Wenger gave his first external conference talk on AI empathy choice paradox at the Society for Affective Science in Portland, Oregon! He was part of a larger session on AI empathy that was led by Dr. Cameron as discussant, and included some...
Rachel Buterbaugh Receives Mona Shibley Bird Award
Rachel Buterbaugh, our senior lead RA for the EMP Lab, has received the Mona Shibley Bird Memorial Scholarship for undergraduate excellence and future career potential in Psychology. Congratulations, Rachel!
EMP Lab at SPSP 2025
EMP Lab graduate student Joshua Wenger will be presenting two posters on our work on empathic AI. Come say hi to Josh, and nice work in repping the EMP Lab at SPSP this year!
Josh Wenger Accepted into EASP Summer School
Josh Wenger, 2nd-year student in the EMP Lab, has been accepted in to the European Association for Social Psychology's summer school for this year (https://blogs.kent.ac.uk/easp2025/). He'll be taking part in the work-stream on the moral psychology...
Recap of Moral Psychology Research Group 2024
Here's a press release from November 2024's Moral Psychology Research Group conference that Dr. Cameron hosted through the Consortium on Moral Decision-Making. All of the talk recordings are available on the Consortium on Moral Decision-Making's...
Dr. Cameron Writes About Empathy and Democracy in Scientific American
Dr. Cameron was invited to write a piece about empathy choice and supporting democracy for Scientific American. To read more, check out the article here.