Dan Finkel
I am interested in the evolution and neural bases of social
cognition and music, particularly how they relate to cooperation, morality,
and religion. Email: daniel.finkel@uconn.edu
Current Graduate Students
Jordan Kiper
On the whole, my interests in anthropology centralize around the interdisciplinary endeavor to bridge the cognitive and behavioral studies of religion, morality, and cooperation. As such, my particular interests include: cognitive evolution, phenomenology, moral behavior, collective action problems, religious signaling, and agency detection. Email: jordan.kiper@uconn.edu
Erika Phillips
My interests lie in the evolution of religion. I am especially focused on
how religion pertains to cooperation and othering, and how these behaviors
may potentially be maladaptive. Email: erika.phillips@uconn.edu
Former Graduate Students
Candace Alcorta, Ph.D., UConn 2006; Research Scientist.
Research Interests: Behavioral Ecology; Evolution of Human Ritual and Religion; Neurophysiology of Ritual and Religion; Human Development; Adolescent Stress and Resilience; Interrelationship between sociocultural and neurophysiological mechanisms and their integration and expression in individual behavior.
Ben Purzycki, Ph.D., UConn 2012; post-doctoral research fellow at the University of British Columbia's Centre for Human Evolution, Cognition, and Culture working with the Cultural Evolution of Religion Research Consortium (CERC).
Dr. Purzycki works on the evolution of religious systems and religious cognition, particularly how people make sense of their gods’ minds. He has conducted fieldwork in the Tyva Republic (Tuva) and has published works in a variety of journals including Cognitive Science, Religion, Brain and Behavior, Journal of Cognition and Culture, and Skeptic Magazine. His professional website and publications can be accessed here.
John Shaver, Ph.D., UConn 2012
Research Interests: Human Behavioral Ecology; Cognitive Anthropology; Ritual and Religion; Religious Change; Evolution of Inequality; the South Pacific.
Paul Swartwout, M.A.
My research examines the role of risk in human decision-making.
I am particularly interested in how environmental/physical variables, like foraging, and social variables, like religion, influence risk preferences, and how this translates into behavior.
My other interests include religious signaling, the psychology of religious beliefs, and the interaction between human biology and economics.
