Greene Lab

Department of Psychology, Harvard University

For many years our lab has studied moral judgment and decision making. More recently, we’ve focused on behavioral research aimed at social impact. This work has led to the creation of two public-facing projects. The first is Giving Multiplier, a charity platform that addresses the “heart vs head” dilemma in charitable giving and supports some of the world’s most impactful charities. The second is Tango, a two-player cooperative quiz game that reduces animosity and increases openness and respect across lines of division.

Our lab also does basic research on the brain’s infrastructure for complex thought. This work focuses on “compositionally”, the brain’s uniquely generative capacity to build complex thoughts out of conceptual parts. This work uses both functional neuroimaging and computational modeling.

Our longstanding research program on moral cognition has focused on the respective contributions of intuitive emotional processes and more reasoned and reflective processes. We have applied this dual-process framework to classic hypothetical dilemmas (“trolley problems”), temptations toward dishonesty, beliefs about free will and punishment, belief in God, wishful thinking, cooperation, healthcare decisions, and the governance of AI.