David Rose

I am a Klarman Postdoctoral Fellow at Cornell University, where I work with Shaun Nichols in Philosophy and David Pizarro in Psychology. I earned a PhD in Psychology from Stanford University, where I was advised by Tobias Gerstenberg and Ellen Markman, and a PhD in Philosophy from Rutgers University, where I was advised by Jonathan Schaffer and Stephen Stich.

My research examines how people go beyond visible features and actual outcomes to represent the hidden relations that structure human concepts. I study how purpose helps determine what things are, how people understand outcomes in relation to their causes and to unrealized alternatives, and how causal roles shape judgments of fault, punishment, and obligations to compensate victims. I combine theoretical work with experiments in adults and children, using both verbal and nonverbal measures, and I am extending this work through cross-linguistic and cross-cultural comparisons. My research draws on cognitive and developmental psychology, linguistics, philosophy, and law.