Boosting & Cognition in Online Environments

ARC’s work on the mind’s adaptive toolbox is both descriptive and practical, aiming to empower people to make decisions that serve their interests. Researchers design and test competence-building “boosts” that foster the sense of  self-efficacy and the ability to make informed choices and decisions while preserving agency and promoting autonomy, especially in highly engineered and even manipulative commercial choice environments. more

The online world presents challenges including manipulative design, information overload, and widespread misinformation. ARC seeks to develop an evidence-based understanding of how these environments affect human cognition and to create a roadmap to address them. Our work examines public attitudes toward anti-misinformation interventions, explores digital media’s impact on democracy, and investigates the drivers of growing citizen alienation from democratic systems. more