People

“Within the Psychology world, I’m much more focused on fundamental, experimental questions, whereas at HBS, I deal more with large data sets and real-world applications.”

While pursuing a triple degree from the University of Oklahoma in Economics, Psychology, and Political Science, Evan DeFilippis (he/him) served as a research assistant for a development economist and a psychologist, hoping to better understand the psychological underpinnings of poverty. While he enjoyed engaging with economic theory and concepts from social psychology, he longed to see the practical application—and positive outcomes—of his work. This goal led him to pursue a career in international development after graduation, managing large-scale poverty reduction programs for Innovations for Poverty Action in Nairobi, Kenya. Convinced that public policy was the clear path toward making real, impactful change, he returned to the United States and completed a Master in Public Affairs at Princeton’s Woodrow Wilson School with a specialization in International Development and Economics.

But research kept calling to Evan. While he considered Psychology PhD programs, he became particularly interested in the PhD in Organizational Behavior at HBS because of its interdisciplinary approach and emphasis on real-world applications. “The more I learned about Organizational Behavior as a field, the more I realized that it combined all of my interests,” Evan says. “Organizational Behavior really emphasizes the value of applied research and interventions which target complex, real-world problems—which is exactly what I wanted to do. When I look back, I wonder why I ever thought I would want to do anything else.”

Evan says he feels equally at home both at HBS and in the Psychology department within the Faculty of Arts and Sciences. “I get all the benefits of a traditional psychology lab model, but I have a great deal of freedom to explore different lines of research and modes of thinking,” he says. “Within the Psychology world, I’m much more focused on more fundamental questions about human behavior, examined through the lens of experiments, whereas at HBS, I deal more with large data sets with the goal of informing practice.”

Research

At Harvard, Evan’s research focuses on the psychology of persuasion and political de-polarization. He and his colleagues designed a quiz-based activity to investigate whether cooperative participation in an activity would increase trust between individuals with political disagreements and thereby lead to an increase in the likelihood of compromise. He is also interested in the factors that influence the quality of teams, such as communication strategies, diversity of thinking styles, and individual characteristics.