Current Members
Cleotilde (Coty) Gonzalez, Ph.D.
Research Professor and Founding Director of the DDMLab
Coty is a Research Professor in the department of Social and Decision Sciences at CMU. She earned a Ph.D. in Management Information Systems from Texas Tech University in 1996.
Coty's research lies at the intersection of Human Behavioral Decision Making and Technology. Her research program is motivated by real-world decision making and by the challenges involved in studying dynamic decision making in the laboratory. Her research is embedded within a theoretical framework that emphasizes the role and development of decisions from experience, the similarity of contexts, and the cognitive abilities of decision makers.
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Tyler Malloy, Ph.D.
Post-Doctoral Fellow
Tyler Malloy is a post-doctoral researcher with the DDM lab. He received his PhD in Cognitive Science in 2022 at Rensselaer Polytechnic Institute in Troy, New York. His research interests include cognitive modeling of human perception, learning, and decision making. During his time at RPI, Tyler was a part of the IBM Artificial Intelligence Research Collaboration where he worked alongside IBM researchers on human-inspired reinforcement learning. As a member of the Dynamic Decision Making Lab, Tyler will explore how humans quickly learn new tasks in contexts like cybersecurity that require decision making under risk and uncertainty.
ContactE-mail: tylermal@andrew.cmu.edu
Maria Ferreira, Ph.D.
Post-Doctoral Fellow
Maria José Rodrigues Ferreira earned her Ph.D in Computer Science and Engineering in 2023 from Instituto Superior Técnico, University of Lisbon (Portugal). Her research focuses on enhancing Social Agents' capabilities to assist people in a more personalized and engaging manner by exploring the intersection of Human-Agent Interaction and technology. Specifically, her work involved user-adapted environments, decision making, and the manipulation of personality traits and biodiversity knowledge.
ContactE-mail: mariajor@andrew.cmu.edu
Erin Bugbee
Ph.D. Student
Erin is a doctoral student in Behavioral Decision Research through the Department of Social and Decision Sciences at Carnegie Mellon University. She received her Bachelor of Science in Statistics and Bachelor of Arts in Behavioral Decision Sciences from Brown University in 2020. Her previous research spans the explore-exploit dilemma, trust in humans versus machines, computational neuroscience, and music information retrieval. She is interested in how we can create computational cognitive models of human learning and decision making, and how knowledge gained from these models can be used to improve both human decisions and artificial intelligence.
ContactE-mail: ebugbee@andrew.cmu.edu
Chase McDonald
Ph.D. Student
Chase is a doctoral student in the Social and Decision Sciences department. His research interests include both empirical and simulated multi-agent systems and their connections to social decision-making, cognition, and intelligence. He received his Bachelor’s degree in Computational Social Science from the University of California, Los Angeles, and wrote his undergraduate thesis on the emergence of inter- and intra-group norms under discrimination in multi-agent reinforcement learning systems.
ContactE-mail: chasemcd@andrew.cmu.edu
Yinuo Du
Ph.D. Student
Yinuo Du is a Ph.D. Student student in Societal Computing. She's interested in the area of Behavioral Cybersecurity. Her work in DDMLab will involve Instance-based modeling and cyber simulation platforms like CyberVAN and CybOrg. She'll also be exploring methods to help promote cooperation among defenders.
ContactE-mail: yinuod@andrew.cmu.edu
Jeffrey Flagg, M.S.
Lab Manager - Research Associate II
Jeffrey obtained his Bachelor’s and Master’s Degree in Psychology at the University of Pittsburgh. His research interests include information sharing, online privacy concerns, newcomers to groups, and social exclusion. He has previously managed the Privacy Economics Experiments (PEEX) Lab based at the Heinz College, and is now supporting the management of the DDMLab in its daily operation and development.
ContactE-mail: jflagg@andrew.cmu.edu
Anu Aggarwal, M.S.
Research Associate & Programmer
Anu is a Research Associate at the Social and Decision Sciences Department. She has 6 years of industrial experience in software development. She is a Master degree holder in Cyber Law & Information Security from the Indian Institute of Information & Technology Allahabad. She has completed her Bachelor's in Computer Science from University Institute of Engineering & Technology (UIET), Panjab University, Chandigarh. She is interested in exploring cognitive biases and their applications in the field of cyber security.
ContactE-mail: anua@andrew.cmu.edu
Don Morrison
Senior Research Programmer
Don received his S.B. in Physics from M.I.T., and M.S. in Computer Science from the University of Utah. He works on software supporting researchers in the DDMLab and the Psychology Department's FMS Group. He previously worked in the HCII, and before that a variety of software companies. Outside of work, Don is obsessed with change ringing, an obscure art form that arose in Renaissance England and combines music, sport, and group theory.
ContactE-mail: dfm2@cmu.edu
Saketh Mudundi
Research Assistant
Saketh is a Master's student pursuing a degree in Information Technology with a focus on Information Security at Carnegie Mellon University. Saketh is interested in exploring the intersection of human decision-making processes and their implications in the realm of cybersecurity. His research focuses on understanding how cognitive biases and behavioral patterns influence both attackers and defenders in the digital landscape.
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Sophie Ding
Undergraduate Research Assistant
Sophie is an undergrad student studying Electrical and Computer Engineering, as well as Human-Computer-Interaction, at CMU. She is curious about decision science in gameplay, and she is researching Instance-based-learning between humans and AI-models through simple games such as "Rock Paper Scissors."
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Pranav Kumar
Student Research Programmer
Pranav is a Master’s student in Information Networking at Carnegie Mellon University, focusing on computer systems and networks. He has experience in both full-stack development and low-level systems programming, and is interested in building practical, reliable software. He approaches development with attention to detail and enjoys working across different layers of the stack.
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Selena Zheng
Student Visitor
Selena Zheng is an undergraduate student at New York University studying Psychology and Data Science. She is interested in understanding the cognitive mechanisms of human decision-making through computational modeling, and in applying these insights to develop technologies that enhance everyday life.
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Jinfeng Lou, Ph.D.
Associated Researcher
Jinfeng Lou is a Carnegie Bosch Postdoctoral Fellow. He earned his Ph.D. from The University of Hong Kong, where his research centered on advancing resilience and sustainability within the building and civil infrastructure sector by developing various AI and secured information systems. Within the Dynamic Decision Making Lab, he will explore human-AI collaboration in improving the response and recovery process of urban subway flooding.
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