Stanford Psychology Podcast
The student-led Stanford Psychology Podcast invites leading psychologists to talk about what’s on their mind lately. Join Eric Neumann, Anjie Cao, Kate Petrova, Bella Fascendini, Joseph Outa and Julia Rathmann-Bloch as they chat with their guests about their latest exciting work. Every week, an episode will bring you new findings from psychological science and how they can be applied to everyday life. The opinions and views expressed in this podcast represent those of the speaker and not necessarily Stanford's. Subscribe at stanfordpsypod.substack.com. Let us hear your thoughts at stanfordpsychpodcast@gmail.com. Follow us on Twitter @StanfordPsyPod. Visit our website https://stanfordpsychologypodcast.com. Soundtrack: Corey Zhou (UCSD). Logo: Sarah Wu (Stanford)
Stanford Psychology Podcast
166 - Steve Rathje: The Psychology of Virality
Su chats with Dr. Steve Rathje. Dr. Rathje is an incoming Assistant Professor of Human-Computer Interaction in the School of Computer Science at Carnegie Mellon University. He is an NSF and AXA postdoctoral fellow at New York University. Steve’s work centers on the psychology of technology. He studies how core psychological phenomena like polarization, intergroup conflict, the spread of information, and mental health interact with emerging technologies such as artificial intelligence and social media. Through a combination of behavioral science, computational methods, and large-scale data, his research sheds light on how our minds and our societies are being shaped in the digital age. In today's episode, we discuss his research background together with his recent review paper “The psychology of virality," in which they explore why certain content spreads rapidly online and offline, often involving a mix of emotional, social, and structural factors..
Steve’s paper: https://doi.org/10.1016/j.tics.2025.06.014
Steve’s personal website: https://stevenrathje.com/
Su’s Twitter @sudkrc & Bluesky @sudkrc.bsky.social
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