Research
Research Interests
My philosophical research is at the intersection of Philosophy of Psychiatry, Neuroscience, Law, and Clinical Ethics. I am concerned about the far reaching effects of neuroscience and psychiatry, particularly in cases where this data may be misapplied (especially in the court of law. )
Projects
Less Than Whole: Implications of Reduced Agency
The aim of this paper is to demonstrate the dual-use dilemma of characterizing individuals with mental illness as less than full agents, and therefore, less responsible (legally and morally). While there may be instances where we do want to hold these individuals as less responsible, these accounts do not take into consideration that there are detrimental pragmatic consequences for these indivdiuals as they move through the penal system.
I have presented versions of this paper at:
The Annual Meeting of the Association for the Advancement of Philosophy and Psychiatry (AAPP) (2022)
The Values in Science, Medicine, and Technology Conference as part of a panel entitled "Beyond the Ivory Tower: Practical Consequences of Philosophical Debates about Psychiatry" (2022)
The Annual Meeting of the Southern Society for Philospophy and Psychiatry (2022)
The Tanner Graduate Works in Progress Series at the University of Utah (2021)
The Intermountain Philosophy Conference (2020)
I was selected to be 1 of 12 Summer 2022 Research Interns at the Baylor Center for Medical Ethics and Health Policy out of around 600 applicants. I spent my internship working on the BRAINShare Project, which is a branch under the larger NIH Brain Initiative, focusing on innovation in neuroscience research. The BRAINShare Project is focused on data sharing in the neurosciences by engaging stakeholders to identify challenges and concerns related to sharing brain data. The aim is to generate strategies to improve data sharing and inform policy decisions surrounding the use of neuroscience data.
My involvement entailed assisting with generating challenge statements for further interviews, analyzing past data collected through interviews, and literature search focusing on a way to coalesce concerns that key stakeholders and researchers have when it comes to data sharing.
I am also currently working on a draft with my mentors on my research aimed at clinicians and researchers working with brain data.
Moral Psychology/X-Phi
In collaboration with moral psychologist Dr. Jesse Graham, I am currently working on collecting data for a moral psychology/x-phi project titled "Folk Intutions Regarding Psychiatric Diagnosis, Responsibility and Punishment."
Publications
Santana, C., Smith, A.C., Petrozzo, K., & Halm, D. (forthcoming). “The irrationality of Stand Your Ground: game theory on self-defense.” Moral Philosophy and Politics.
Petrozzo, K. 2017. "Free Will and Responsibility in the Neuroscientific Age." compos mentis: Undergraduate Journal of Cognition and Neuroethics 5 (2): 83–100.