About Me and My Research

I am a doctoral student at Case Western Reserve University in the Departments of Psychological Sciences and Philosophy.   I am housed within the Developmental, Cognitive and Affective Sciences (DCAS) program within Psychological Sciences.  I graduated from CWRU (2014) summa cum laude with dual degrees in Philosophy and Cognitive Science.  I was the recipient of prizes for "outstanding academic achievement" in both departments.  I have received considerable training in research at the intersection of philosophy, psychology and neuroscience, primarily under the mentorship of Tony Jack.   I use neuroscience (fMRI) and experimental psychology to investigate the neural and psychological relationship between various sorts of analytical-critical-empirical reasoning and various sorts of empathic-experiential-regulatory processing.  The fundamental tension between these two different modes of understanding the world and our experience in it - analytical-critical-empirical reasoning and empathic-experiential-regulatory processing - is known as the opposing domains hypothesis.  

I have been helping develop this theory under the mentorship of Tony Jack.  Together, we have applied this stream of research towards perennial philosophical problems that capture a fundamental tension between seemingly incompatible and deeply meaningful beliefs, including belief in free will versus determinism; belief in dualism (e.g., we have souls/minds) and monism (e.g., we are nothing but physical 'stuff'); and belief in spiritualistic versus naturalistic worldviews.  We have contributed, both experimentally and theoretically, to our understanding of moral cognition, with a special focus on empathic concern, dehumanization and rehumanization.  This theory has also been applied to theories of leadership and un/ethical behavior in the context of organizations.  We are currently applying this theory to our understanding of how the brain processes different sorts of health information, and which sorts of health information - and their underlying neural signatures - relate to meaningful and sustainable behavior change.  

More recently, I have been using this theoretical framework to better understand the relationships between i) prosocial and antisocial cognition/behaviors; ii) emotional regulation and emotional suppression; iii) spiritual and naturalistic worldviews and; iv) their roles in (in)effective behavioral change.  I am particularly interested in the relationship between these phenomena among individuals living with substance use disorder and in recovery.  This work is under the additional mentorship of Dr. Heath Demaree and Dr. Sarah Hope Lincoln.