The intersection of psychology and computers is a critical juncture for innovative design and user-centered technology. It’s also a place where unintentional harms to people occur. That’s why we need psychologists to play a bigger role in tech development–particularly given that many technology 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 main methods: laboratory research and surveys. The former focus on a particular aspect in a controlled, small setting; while the latter measure more general behavior with self-report questionnaires or (potentially structured) interviews. Both suffer from inherent limitations.

Computers can record and analyze vast quantities of information at high speed. They can also do this in ways traditional methods cannot. This makes them powerful new tools for psychological researchers, opening up a whole new field of study. 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 expertise, and computer scientists with the skills to build large-scale tracking systems, and to manage and model the resulting data.

However, until recently, there was little collaboration between these fields. For instance, Google directors have been more inclined to study computer and computational science (29 percent studied it) and psychology (less than 2percent). This has likely resulted in psychologists being under-represented in leadership at tech companies. The result is that technology products fail to take psychological considerations into consideration.

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