Here at the MEAN Lab we are interested in a seemingly simple but pressing question: what makes people get into interpersonal conflicts and, in some cases, harm others?  

Research in the MEAN Lab approaches this question through the lens of personality science. We investigate how consistent patterns in how people think, feel, and act can shed light on harmful interpersonal behavior. Our work is grounded in empirically based models of personality and psychopathology, most notably the Five-Factor Model and the Hierarchical Taxonomy of Psychopathology (HiTOP). Our research frequently involves repeatedly sampling the experiences of individuals as they go about their daily life to better understand interpersonal conflict where it naturally occurs and is most consequential. 

Our lab often draws on more advanced analytic methods to answer the questions we care about. We also work to make our research trustworthy and useful to others: trustworthy by letting our methods be checked openly, through tools like preregistration and registered reports, and useful by sharing our data, code, and other resources so others can scrutinize our work and, hopefully, build on it.