2026 Conference

NEW DIRECTIONS IN RESEARCH ON THE PSYCHOLOGY OF TECHNOLOGY 2026 CONFERENCE

Our tenth annual “New Directions in Research on the Psychology of Technology” conference will be held at the UC Berkeley Haas School of Business on November 6-7, 2026. The theme will be “The Future of Meaning”, focusing on how emerging technologies are reshaping what people find meaningful—and how tech can strengthen purpose, belonging, and agency. We are grateful to our partners and co-sponsors for this conference: UC Berkeley Haas School of Business, the Center for Human-Compatible AI, the UC Berkeley Information School, the UC Berkeley Institute for Personality and Social Psychology Research, the Berkeley Culture Center, and the Kavli Center for Ethics, Science, and the Public and our advisors affiliated with these partners: Jenny Chatman, Sarah Otis, J.P. Gonzales, Diag Davenport, Iris Mauss, Sameer Srivastava, Martha Gerhan, and Jodi Halpern.

CONFERENCE ORGANIZERS

Schedule

Please note that all the times indicated in the schedule are provided in Pacific Time.

FRIDAY, NOVEMBER 6, 2026

08:30am - 08:45am | Dean's Welcome

  • Dean Jenny Chatman, UC Berkeley Haas School of Business

08:45am - 09:00am | Conference Overview & Organizers’ Welcome

  • Don Moore and Juliana Schroeder (UC Berkeley Haas School of Business)

09:00am - 10:45am | Opening Speaker Session: Technology and the Transformation of Meaning

  • 09:00am - 09:30am | Jeff Hancock (Harry & Norman Chandler Professor of Communication, Stanford University; Founding Director, Stanford Social Media)

  • 09:30am - 10:00am | Barry Schwartz (Emeritus Professor of Psychology, Swarthmore College)

  • 10:00am - 10:30am | Beth Goldberg (Head of Research & Development, Jigsaw / Google)

  • 10:30am - 10:45am | Discussion

    • Moderator: Juliana Schroeder  (Harold Furst Chair in Management Philosophy and Values, Berkeley Haas; Co-Director, Psychology of Technology Institute)

10:45am - 10:50am | Featured Research Project: Open Benchmarking AI Models for Human Impact ("ImpactBench")

  • Shared by: Constanze Albrecht (PhD student, MIT MediaLab)

10:50am - 11:00am | Break

11:00am - 11:45am | Panel: Regulating for Meaning

  • David Evan Harris (Chancellor’s Public Scholar, UC Berkeley)

  • Camille Carlton (Policy Director, Center for Humane Technology)

11:45am - 12:00pm | Keynote: Holding Technology Companies Accountable for Their Impact on Society

  • Josh Lowenthal (California Member of the Assembly)

12:00pm - 12:30pm | Q&A with Assembly Member Josh Lowenthal

12:30pm - 01:30pm | Lunch

01:30pm - 02:10pm | Conversation: Embodied AI—When Intelligence Meets the Physical World

  • Ken Goldberg (William S. Floyd Jr. Distinguished Chair in Engineering, UC Berkeley; Professor of IEOR, EECS, School of Information, and Art Practice)

  • In conversation with: Malte Jung (Information Scientist, Cornell University)

02:10pm - 02:15pm | Featured Research Project: The AI Indices (Youth and Adult)

  • Shared by: Marco Angrisani (Senior Economist, USC Center for Economic and Social Research)

02:15pm - 02:30pm | Break

02:30pm - 04:15pm | Speaker Session: AI and Society—Risks, Benefits, Responsibility

  • 02:30pm - 03:00pm | Sendhil Mullainathan (Professor of Economics and Peter de Florez Professor of EECS, MIT)

  • 03:00pm - 03:30pm | Jenny Radesky (David G. Dickinson Collegiate Professor of Pediatrics, University of Michigan; Co-Medical Director, AAP Center of Excellence on Social Media and Youth Mental Health)

  • 03:30pm - 04:00pm | Stuart Russell (Smith-Zadeh Chair in Engineering & Professor of EECS, UC Berkeley; Director, Center for Human-Compatible AI)

  • 04:00pm - 04:15pm | Discussion

    • Moderator: Nate Fast (Professor of Management and Organization, USC Marshall; Co-Director Psychology of Technology Institute; Director, USC Neely Center)

04:15pm - 05:15pm | Discussion Potluck: Bring Your Own Topics to Discuss!

05:15pm - 05:30pm | Day 1 Wrap-up

05:30pm - 06:30pm | Poster Session & Happy Hour

06:30pm - 08:30pm | Dinner

08:30pm - midnight | Post-Dinner Socializing

SATURDAY, NOVEMBER 7, 2026

08:30am - 09:00am | Opening Keynote: Design for a Better World

  • Don Norman (Founder, Don Norman Design Award, Humanity-Centered Design)

09:00am - 09:55am | Panel: Designing AI for Human Values

  • Jodi Halpern (Professor of Bioethics, UC Berkeley; Co-Director, Berkeley’s Kavli Center for Ethics, Science, and the Public)

  • Ryn Linthicum (Head of User Well-Being Policy, Anthropic)

  • Amanda McCroskery (Applied AI Ethics & Governance Researcher, Google DeepMind)

    • Moderator: TBA

09:55am - 10:00am | Featured Research Project: Survey Data Quality in the AI Age

  • Shared by: TBA

10:00am - 10:10am | Break

10:10am - 11:55am | Speaker Session: Connection, Conflict, and Communication in the AI Age

  • 10:10am - 10:40am | Pattie Maes (Germeshausen Professor of Media Arts and Sciences, MIT Media Lab)

  • 10:40am - 11:10am | Lena Slachmuijlder (Executive Director of Digital Peacebuilding, Search for Common Ground; Co-Chair, Council on Tech and Social Cohesion)

  • 11:10am - 11:40am | Xuan Zhao (CEO & Co-Founder, Flourish Science; Research Scientist, Stanford University)

  • 11:40am - 11:55am | Discussion

    • Moderator: Ravi Iyer (Managing Director, Neely Center; Managing Director, Psychology of Technology Institute)

11:55am - 12:00pm | Featured Research Project: The Social Spectrum

Shared by: Micaela Rodriguez (Assistant Professor of Social Psychology, Yale University)

12:00pm - 01:00pm | Lunch

01:00pm - 02:00pm | Datablitz & Discussion

  • Dunigan Falk, University of British Columbia

  • Ertuğrul Uysal, ETH Zurich

  • Grace Elizabeth Falgoust, Georgetown University

  • Kibum Moon, Georgetown University

  • Rafael Batista, Johns Hopkins Carey Business School

  • Yuning Liu, Harvard Business School

02:00pm - 02:15pm | Break

02:15pm - 04:00pm | Concluding Speaker Session: The Social Mind in the Digital World

  • 02:15pm - 02:45pm | Nicholas Epley (John Templeton Keller Distinguished Service Professor of Behavioral Science, Chicago Booth School of Business)

  • 02:45pm - 03:15pm | Amit Goldenberg (Assistant Professor, Harvard Business School)

  • 03:15pm - 03:45pm | Michael Inzlicht (Professor of Psychology, University of Toronto)

  • 03:45pm - 04:00pm | Discussion

    • Moderator: Juliana Schroeder  (Harold Furst Chair in Management Philosophy and Values, Berkeley Haas; Co-Director, Psychology of Technology Institute)

04:00pm - 04:30pm | Conference Wrap-Up

04:30pm - 05:30pm | Concluding Happy Hour

Note: Details regarding an optional Saturday evening social event will be announced soon.