The Intersection of Psychology and Computers The connection between psychology and computers is a critical juncture for innovation and user-centered design in technology. It’s also where many unintentional injuries to people occur. That’s why we need psychologists to play a bigger role in tech development–particularly given that many technology www.rebootdata.net/generated-post companies change human behavior at scale and profit from behavioral changes, and generally embrace scientific innovation. In the past the collection of data in psychological research was based on two primary methods: lab studies and surveys [1]. The first study a specific aspect in a controlled, small setting; while the latter measure more general behavior with self-report questionnaires or (potentially structured) interviews. Both have inherent weaknesses. Computers, however, can record and analyze vast quantities of information at high speed in ways that conventional methods are unable to. This creates powerful new tools for psychologists, 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 of experts: psychologists with domain knowledge and computer scientists with the skills to build large-scale tracking systems and to manage and model the data that results from it. But until recently, there was not much collaboration between these fields. Google directors, for instance are more likely to have completed studies in computational and computer science (29%) than psychology (less than 2%). This is likely to have led to psychologists being under-represented as leaders at tech companies. This has meant that technology products tend not to take psychological considerations into consideration.
