Agency research group

Combining philosophy and psychology, the agency research group’s focus is in the study of agency, metacognition, and agential capacities such as self-control, and decision-making, from a socially embedded perspective. Our approaches synthesize social and political approaches with biologically informed cognitive science. We are interested in human diversity and interpersonal differences in agency and the agential capacities, and our research is motivated by a desire to understand the social causes of these differences, as well as how policy should respond to them.

Research interests in the group span:

• Self-control and cognitive control
• ADHD and neurodiversity
• Metacognition
• Mental health
• Decision-making and option generation
• Human-computer interaction and AI
• Philosophy of psychology and neuroscience
• Social disadvantage
• Political agency and political participation
• Agency in behavioral public policy
• Moral responsibility
• Feminist theory and disability studies

Funded by

Kone Foundation ¹ (403,300€)
Academy of Finland Strategic Research Council ² (318,000€)

People

Research group leader

Polaris Koi, Assistant Professor of Philosophy ¹²

Research fellows

Jussi Jylkkä, Senior Researcher, Docent ²
Dr. Jussi Jylkkä holds PhDs in both philosophy and psychology. His research interests span metacognition, cognitive control, consciousness, meditation and psychedelic experience.

Joonas Martikainen, Postdoctoral Researcher ¹
Dr. Joonas Martikainen‘s research combines study of political agency and democracy with critical phenomenology and social theory. His book, Political Poverty: Losing Faith in Democracy (2025), explores disenfranchisement and citizenship.

Anssi Bwalya, Postdoctoral Researcher ¹
Dr. Anssi Bwalya recently got his PhD in psychology from the University of Edinburgh. His research interests include metacognition, ADHD, and executive function. He is also an accomplished science journalist.

Doctoral Researchers

Tuomas Tiainen, Doctoral researcher
Tuomas Tiainen’s doctoral research concerns agency, empathy, and virtual reality.

Master’s Students

Elina Lindström
Elina Lindström’s master’s thesis, in philosophy of psychology, critically examines theories of basic emotions. 

Research assistant

Emmi Vahtera ¹
Emmi Vahtera is the team’s research assistant, assisting the team in communications, research management, and associated tasks.

External Members

Sanna Lehtinen (Aalto), Senior University Lecturer, Docent ²
Dr. Sanna Lehtinen’s research focuses on applied aesthetics, human-environment relations, human-technology relations, and value-based choice.

Onerva Kiianlinna (Aalto), Postdoctoral Researcher ²
Dr. Onerva Kiianlinna works on the intersections of philosophical and empirical aesthetics. She is interested in aesthetic cognition, meta-aesthetics, and questions of cross-disciplinarity at large.

Research projects

Agency as experience and capacity: social mechanisms, political implications

This four-year research project (2025–2028), backed by generous funding from the Kone foundation, examines the relationship between subjective sense of agency and the basic agentive capacities from the perspectives of analytic philosophy, critical phenomenology, and cognitive psychology. We explore how social mechanisms and political systems shape the experience of agency and its core capacities: decision-making, volition, and self-control. While previous empirical research has primarily focused on the neuropsychological aspects of these capacities at the individual level, social conditions and structural injustices, such as poverty, also have a significant impact.

For more information, see the project’s website at https://sites.utu.fi/agencyproject/