Aaron Peikert

Fellow, IMPRS COMP2PSYCH Berlin
Max Planck Institute for Human Development, Center for Lifespan Psychology

Aaron Peikert earned his Bachelor's and Master's degrees in Psychology at Humboldt University in Berlin (HU). One of the first things he learned in Introduction to Research Methods was that about half of what he would be taught during his studies was wrong: Since then, he has been trying to figure out which half that is. In this quest, he initially focused on statistical methods and psychometrics as a student assistant at HU's Department of Diagnostics. He broadened his view and focused on Open Science practices in general when he joined the "Formal Methods Group in Lifespan Psychology" at the Max Plank Institute for Human Development (MPIB) as a student assistant, where he now continues his quest as a PhD student. At MPIB, his research focuses on computational reproducibility and philosophy of open science. To achieve computational reproducibility (getting the same results from the same data), he integrated best practices from software engineering and research. His goal is to convince researchers that software engineering tools are necessary for data analytic research, and to increase the usability of these tools. Along the way, he is actively developing the software StructuralEquationModels.jl and exploring the utility of regularized structural equation models for theory development and random effects approaches for machine learning algorithms.

Email: peikert@mpib-berlin.mpg.de
MPIB webpage