Dorsa Amir, Ph.D. UC Berkeley

Topic: Culture and the developing mind

Humans are an unusually successful species, numbering in the billions and inhabiting every habitat on the planet. An important determinant of this success is our adaptability, supported by a culturally-informed and extended period of developmental plasticity. My research examines this uniquely human process, exploring the myriad ways in which the early sociocultural environment shapes our cognition. In this talk, I will present an integrated framework for conducting cross-cultural, psychological research, and share my work on the ways in which culture helps shape both core cognitive processes such as attention and risk tolerance, in addition to more complex social phenomena like cooperation. Taken together, these studies help elucidate the developmental origins of behavioral diversity across diverse contexts, and underscore the utility of interdisciplinary research for explaining human behavior.

Dr. Dorsa Amir is a postdoctoral researcher at the UC Berkeley Department of Psychology. She received her PhD from Yale University in 2018. Her research program integrates tools from psychology, anthropology, and behavioral economics to explore how differing sociocultural environments shape the developing mind. Her primary fieldwork is conducted in collaboration with the Shuar of eastern Ecuador, with complementary fieldwork through research collaborations across five continents.