Raihan Alam

Raihan Alam is a psychologist who studies the causes and consequences of moral disagreement and their implications for criminal justice, extremism, and political polarization. Drawing on methods and theories from psychology, sociology, and political science, he investigates how moral psychology shapes our relationships to punishment and democratic institutions. In recent work, he has found that morally motivated actors are less sensitive to punishment, that incentivized punishment undermines cooperation, and that people are more inclined to rebuild relationships with morally motivated offenders.

Alam is a National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellow and is pursuing a specialization in Anthropogeny through the Center for Academic Research and Training in Anthropogeny. He received his B.A. in Psychology and Political Science, with a minor in Philosophy, from Lehigh University. His research has been published in top interdisciplinary and social psychology journals, including Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences and Social Psychological and Personality Science.