At RAP Lab, understanding how humans relate to humanlike technologies requires more than a single discipline. Our team brings together technologists, psychologists, engineers, neuroscientists, sociologists, and ethicists to examine anthropomorphism and human-robot interaction from every angle.
Why it matters
No single field can capture the full picture of how people perceive, trust, or misjudge artificial agents. A psychologist’s read on attachment differs from an engineer’s read on system design, and an ethicist’s concerns differ still. A sociologist might notice how a robot’s presence shifts group dynamics in a workplace, while a neuroscientist can trace how the brain responds to humanlike cues at a level no interview could surface. By working across these boundaries, we surface insights that a siloed lab would miss, and we catch blind spots that any single discipline, working alone, tends to develop over time.
How we collaborate
Projects at RAP Lab are built around mixed teams from the outset, not assembled after a study is already designed. Researchers pair technical development with behavioral analysis from the earliest planning stages, and ethical review runs alongside every study, not as a final checkbox. Engineers building a robot’s behavior consult directly with psychologists on how that behavior will be perceived, and ethicists weigh in before data collection begins, not after. This structure ensures our findings are technically sound, psychologically grounded, and socially responsible, and it means problems get caught at the design stage rather than discovered in the results.
Training the next generation
Because our teams are interdisciplinary by design, graduate students and early-career researchers at RAP Lab gain exposure to methods and frameworks well outside their home discipline. A student trained primarily in engineering leaves with a working knowledge of psychological measurement, and a student trained in social science gains fluency in how robotic systems are actually built. This cross-training is deliberate: the researchers best equipped to study human-robot interaction going forward will be the ones comfortable moving between these worlds.
A growing network
Our interdisciplinary approach extends beyond the lab itself. We collaborate with partner labs, industry teams, and visiting scholars from adjacent fields, ensuring that our internal expertise stays connected to the broader research community and that new perspectives keep entering the work.