Daniel Västfjäll, Ph.D.
Daniel Västfjäll is a senior research scientist at Decision Research and Professor of Cognitive Psychology at Linköping University in Sweden. His research focuses on the role of affect, especially mood, in judgment and decision-making, perception and psychophysics. A common theme for his research is how affective feelings serve as information for various judgments including judgments about consumer products, health, the self, and auditory characteristics of objects.
Linköping University profile
Recent Publications
Västfjäll, D., Slovic, P., Mayorga, M., Peters, E. (). Compassion fade: Affect and charity are greatest for a single child in Need. PLoS ONE, 9(6), e
Slovic, P., & Västfjäll, D. (). The more who die, the less we care: Psychic numbing and genocide. In A. J. Oliver (Ed.), Behavioral public policy (pp. 94–). UK: Cambridge University Press.
Dickert, S., Västfjäll, D., Kleber, J., & Slovic, P. (). Valuations of human lives: Normative expectations and psychological mechanisms of (ir)rationality. Synthese, , 95– doi: /s
Daniel Västfjäll, Ph.D.
By understanding how decisions are shaped, we can create changes that make a real difference, e.g. for the climate and in healthcare. This is what a prominent, interdisciplinary research group at LiU is aiming for.
Daniel Västfjäll is a professor of cognitive psychology, the study of how we receive and respond to information. Gustav Tinghög is a professor of economics. Together with some twenty colleagues, they make up the JEDI lab (Judgement, Emotion, Decision and Intuition). They are pioneering in how they combine different scientific methods.
“Human behaviour is very complex. It can’t be understood by one method or approach,” says Daniel.
His research is about how emotions arise and affect us in everyday life and what makes us want to help others. Gustav Tinghög studies economic decision-making and focuses on priorities in the healthcare sector. It is important that those who make the decisions there receive the right support, to ensure that help to patients is as fair and effective as possible.
“Having to make a lot of difficult decisions is mentally exhausting and then there is a risk that you resort to simplifications. For example, we have seen that patients who me
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Daniel Västfjäll
Professor of cognitive psychology
Wallenberg Scholar
Institution:
Linköping University
Research field:
Psychological drivers of behavioural change
What can make us more thoughtful?
How can you increase the willingness to help others in need or get people to change their behaviour to save the environment? These are some of the questions that Daniel Västfjäll wants to answer as a Wallenberg Scholar.
“I hope my research can help people make more effective everyday choices that are positive for their own and others’ well-being and that have a positive effect on the environment,” says Daniel Västfjäll.
The world is facing a number of major crises in the form of climate change and wars with great suffering as a result. To make a better world, we need to change the way we behave.
However, experience shows that it is difficult to get people to change their habits completely. By understanding the psychology behind our decisions, Daniel wants instead to find measures to influence the behaviours we already have, to achieve a better result both for the environment and for our fellow human beings.
“Many people are already doing a lot fo
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