Lab Members

Briony Swire-Thompson is the Director of the Psychology of Misinformation Lab. Her research examines what drives belief in inaccurate information, why people share misinformation online, and how corrections can be designed to maximize impact. Prior to joining the Network Science Institute, she was a doctoral student at the University of Western Australia’s Cognitive Science Laboratories and a Fulbright scholar at Massachusetts Institute of Technology. She is currently funded by a Pathway to Independence Award from the National Institutes of Health to study cancer misinformation.

Lucy (she/her) is a Postdoctoral Research Fellow in the Psychology of Misinformation Lab under the supervision of Dr. Briony Swire-Thompson. Her research primarily focuses on the role social factors play in people’s vulnerability to misinformation and the effectiveness of misinformation interventions. She is particularly interested in how the characteristics of online social networking sites may influence belief, belief updating, and correction effectiveness.

Mitch is currently working with Briony Swire-Thompson as a PhD student in the Psychology of Misinformation Lab. Prior to Northeastern, he graduated from Penn State with a B.A. in Psychology in May 2021. His current research interests include misinformation and belief updating, cognitive biases, and evolutionary mismatch hypotheses.

Jane Acierno is a PhD candidate in the Psychology of Misinformation Lab under the supervision of Dr. Briony Swire-Thompson. Her research focuses on how we evaluate the veracity of information, how we update our beliefs, and the role that morality plays in these processes. Jane aims to apply her research to develop interventions combatting belief in misinformation.

Mel is a PhD student working with Dr. Brooke Welles and Dr. Briony Swire-Thompson. They are broadly interested in social media, data science, public health, science communication, and design. They have a Bachelor's degree in math and computer science and a minor in art history from Indiana University. At Netsci they are studying how online aesthetic movements can be appropriated, specifically the Cottagecore to Tradwife Pipeline on Tumblr." and my bio on the Comm lab to "I am a Network Science PhD student at Northeastern University. My research focuses on the aesthetics of online communication, and I'm broadly interested in social media, data science, public health, science communication, and design. Currently I work with the Communication Media and Marginalization (COMM) Lab and the Psychology of Misinformation (PoM) lab, and I am advised by Dr. Brooke Foucault Welles and Dr. Briony Swire-Thompson.

Emma is currently working with Dr. Briony Swire-Thompson as a research assistant in the Psychology of Misinformation Lab. Prior to starting at Northeastern, Emma graduated from the University of California, San Diego with a B.S. in Psychology. Her current research interests include misinformation and corrections, cognitive biases, and moral and rational judgments.