The intersection of psychology and computers is crucial to innovation and design of technology that is user-centric. But it’s also where many accidental harms to people happen. That’s why we need psychologists to play a bigger role in tech development–particularly given that many technology companies change human behavior at scale and profit from behavioral changes, and generally embrace scientific innovation.
Traditionally, psychological research rely on two main methods of data collection that are lab experiments and surveys, or interviews [1]. The first focuses on a particular aspect in a small controlled setting, whereas the latter evaluates general behaviour using self-reporting questions or (potentially) structured interviews. Both suffer from inherent limitations.
Computers, however, are able to process and analyze large amounts of data click this link here now at a high speed. They can also do this in ways traditional methods are unable to. This makes them powerful new tools for psychological researchers, opening up a whole new area of research. For example, a new field called Psycho(neuro)informatics is emerging that merges psychology and computer science to develop models of human brains and intelligence. This requires a team consisting of psychologists with domain expertise and computer scientists with the skills required to construct large-scale systems, manage and analyze data.
There was little collaboration in the past. Google directors, for instance are more likely have studied computer and computational sciences (29%) than psychology (less that 2percent). This has led to a lack of psychological understanding in the management of tech companies, and has had the result that many tech products fail to consider psychological aspects.