How experience shapes decisions
Yael Niv studies learning and decision-making at Princeton. Her questions concern everyday choices: how experience changes what people expect and what they do next. She uses computational approaches to investigate these processes and, more recently, how differences in learning might inform research on mental health and psychotherapy.
A research lab, not a clinic
Niv clarifies that her lab recruits participants for research studies rather than treating patients. She also resists choosing one learning method that works best for everyone. Understanding individual differences is part of the research question; it is not a promise that the team already has a personalised treatment for each person.
Discovering an interest she could not yet name
Niv initially thought she would study physics, partly because her father was a physicist. His question about whether she actually liked it prompted reconsideration. A book connecting minds, mathematics and computation opened another possibility, and she sought an interdisciplinary route into it. Her advice is to take present interests seriously without treating every choice as a lifelong commitment. She also acknowledges that changing jobs or finding success is not guaranteed.