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First-of-its-Kind Trip Brings CUNY SPS Psychology Students to National Conference
In a first-ever initiative made possible by a $70,000 grant from Empire State Development (ESD), the CUNY School of Professional Studies (CUNY SPS) BA in Psychology program brought 32 undergraduate psychology majors to Washington, D.C. this past May for the 2025 Association for Psychological Science (APS) Annual Convention. ... Faculty members Dr. Isabelle Elisha, the associate director for the Psychology program, and Dr. Chelsea Hansen joined Dr. Marquez-Lewis in leading the trip. Looking back afterwards, Dr. Elisha noted the effort required to coordinate such a large group.
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Doing Almost Anything Is Better With Friends, Research Finds
Social interactions are essential for our well-being and happiness, research has shown. And now a large study supports that finding and suggests there are many ways to squeeze in more companionship — and happiness — into our busy lives. ... “What we see is that participants consistently rate every common daily activity as more enjoyable when they’re interacting with somebody else,” said Elizabeth Dunn, a psychology professor at the University of British Columbia and senior author of the study, published in August in Social Psychological and Personality Science. ...
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The Doomed Dream of an AI Matchmaker
... Of course, the dating-app questionnaires of today aren’t the same ones people were completing in 2013. And although major apps already use machine learning to note users’ preferences and to suggest prospects, it’s possible that as AI improves and as dating sites collect more personal information from users, the result could eventually be more fine-tuned matches. But exactly how these algorithms are meant to anticipate human chemistry remains unclear. Unless dating companies have access to some new and groundbreaking information, one big problem remains: Romantic compatibility is largely still a mystery.
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The Rare Disease That Stops People From Feeling Fear
Imagine jumping out of an aeroplane and feeling nothing. No rush of adrenaline, or quickening heartbeat. ... "In that situation, SM and other individuals with amygdala damage will go nose-to-nose with relatively unfamiliar experimenters, which is something that healthy control participants with an intact amygdala would essentially never do," says Alexander Shackman, professor of psychology at the University of Maryland, US. The finding suggests that the amygdala may play a role in organising how we respond to the social world.
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Exposure to Bright Light Can Help Fend Off Winter Blues. The Time to Start Is Now
Our bodies can be quite sensitive to changes in daylight because we rely on it to regulate our circadian rhythms and our sleep-wake patterns. And because our internal body clocks don't keep a perfect 24-hour cycle, the master clock in our brains needs a daily reset. "Light through the eyes" is the cue for the reset, explains Michael Terman, a retired professor of clinical psychology and psychiatry at Columbia University. That's why exposure to morning light is so important. "What we are doing is resetting that drifting circadian clock to synchronize with the outdoor world," Terman explains.
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APS Comments on U.S. Government Shutdown and Science
Read APS President-Elect Pam Davis-Kean’s full statement on the potential government shutdown.
