Journal Article2023
The minds of machines: Children’s beliefs about the experiences, thoughts, and morals of familiar interactive technologies
Flanagan, T., Wong, G., & Kushnir, T.
Developmental Psychology
Research
What we think of machines and how we engage with them
We are surrounded by interactive technologies that look, move, and act like agents. My work looks at how we think of and engage with these technologies as agents.
01
Theories of machines
What kind of thing do we take a robot to be?
I study the beliefs children and adults hold about what machines can feel, know, choose, and deserve. Those ideas are more structured than a simple verdict about whether a robot is alive, and they change with age, experience, and the kind of machine someone encounters.
Selected papers
Journal Article2021
Constrained choice: Children’s and adults’ attribution of choice to a humanoid robot
Flanagan, T., Rottman, J., & Howard, L.
Cognitive Science, 45(10), e13043
Conference Paper2025
Perceived morality of robot and human transgressors varies by perceived ability to feel
Georgiou, N., Flanagan, T., Scassellati, B., & Kushnir, T.
Proceedings of the 2025 ACM/IEEE International Conference on Human-Robot Interaction (HRI ’25)
Journal Article2022
Children’s developing beliefs about agency and free will in an increasingly technological world
Flanagan, T., & Kushnir, T.
HUMANA.MENTE Journal of Philosophical Studies, 15(42), 179–204
Conference Paper2019
Do children ascribe the ability to choose to humanoid robots?
Flanagan, T., Rottman, J., & Howard, L.
Proceedings of the 41st Annual Conference of the Cognitive Science Society
02
Engagement with machines
How do we come to trust and connect with robots?
I also study what happens once an interaction is underway: whether people trust a robot, feel connected to it, or want to keep engaging. Children do not simply scale down the adult response; their trust and connection follow a developmental path of their own.
Selected papers
Journal Article2024
School-age children are more skeptical of inaccurate robots than adults
Flanagan, T., Georgiou, N., Scassellati, B., & Kushnir, T.
Cognition
Conference Paper2026
Can you help me? The influence of robot requests for help on child–robot connection
Flanagan, T., Zhang, J., Bian, L., & Sebo, S.
Proceedings of the 2026 ACM/IEEE International Conference on Human-Robot Interaction (HRI ’26)
Book ChapterIn press
Children’s judgments and interactions with empathetic AI
Flanagan, T., & Kushnir, T.
In D. Cameron & A. Perry (Eds.), AI Empathy
03
Social cognitive development
How do we come to understand other minds at all?
Not all of this work is about technology. I also study how children reason about explanation, evidence, and other minds, which is the foundation for the questions I ask about machines.
Selected papers
But why?: Children’s belief in the necessity of explanations
Flanagan, T., Vesga, A., Kushnir, T., & Nichols, S.
Journal of Experimental Child Psychology
Is it personal or is it social? The interaction of knowledge domain and statistical evidence in U.S. and Chinese preschoolers’ social generalizations
Flanagan, T., Zhao, X., Xu, F., & Kushnir, T.
Journal of Experimental Psychology: General
Individual differences in counterfactual fluency predict judgments of free will
Flanagan, T., & Kushnir, T.
Proceedings of the 41st Annual Conference of the Cognitive Science Society