https://www.umass.edu/psychological-brain-sciences/

Psychological and Brain Sciences - UMASS Amherst, 135 Hicks Way-Tobin Hall, Amherst, MA (2026)

05/01/2026

A big thank you to everyone who gave to our department during UMassGives! Donations will aid student research and scholarship! Your support means a great deal to our students!

04/30/2026

Another Power Hour is coming up! Support the Next Chapter of Neuroendocrine Research at UMass! Power Hour today April 30 from 1:00 – 2:00 PM for the Center for Neuroendocrine Studies at UMass Amherst.

The organization with the most individual donations during this hour will receive a bonus prize of $2,000. Second place will get $1,000 and third through fifth place will receive $500 in bonus money!

Every single gift counts. Giving during this hour amplifies the impact of your support and helps fuel the Center’s growth.

Give Today: https://umass.scalefunder.com/gday/giving-day/111216/department/111487

For nearly three decades (27 years), the Center for Neuroendocrine Studies at UMass Amherst has supported excellence in neuroendocrine research in the Pioneer Valley, exploring how hormones, the brain, and behavior interact in health and disease. Today, the Center is entering an exciting new chapter of growth and renewal under new leadership.

By investing in the Center, you are helping expand educational and outreach efforts that inspire students, broaden participation, and strengthen pathways into STEM fields. Your generosity helps build a healthier, more informed society.

Thank you for your generosity and commitment!

04/30/2026

TODAY! HELP US WIN our POWER HOUR from 11 a.m.– 12 p.m.! The organization with the most individual donations during this hour will receive a bonus prize of $2,000. Second place will get $1,000 and third through fifth place will receive $500 in bonus money! Plus, this year the Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences will match the total donations made during our Power Hour up to $2,000!

Learn More and Give Today:
https://umass.scalefunder.com/gday/giving-day/111216/department/111223

Your contributions will aid PBS students in the following ways:

• Improve undergraduate research experiences, with funds for research materials and conference presentations, including programs in our new Neuroscience major!

• Enhance graduate student scholarship, including dissemination of research and travel support for conferences.

• Organize community-building workshops and events in the department to enhance student success.

Invest in the next generation of outstanding psychological and brain scientists by giving today! Thank you!

College of Natural Sciences at UMass Amherst

04/29/2026

Announcing an exciting Giving Challenge for , April 29 and 30! Through the generosity of an anonymous donor, if the Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences reaches 50 unique donations during UMassGives, we will unlock a $5000 contribution! We got this!

Your donations will aid PBS research and scholarship in the following ways:
• Improve undergraduate research experiences, with funds for research materials and conference presentations, including programs in our new Neuroscience major!
• Enhance graduate student scholarship, including dissemination of research and travel support for conferences.
• Organize community-building workshops and events in the department to enhance student success.

Learn more and give here:
https://umass.scalefunder.com/gday/giving-day/111216/department/111223

Also, consider a gift during our Power Hour, Thursday, April 30 from 11 am – 12 pm! The organization with the most individual donations during this hour will receive a bonus prize of $2,000. Second place will get $1,000 and third through fifth place will receive $500 in bonus money! Plus, this year our department will match the total donations made during our Power Hour up to $2,000! Just a $5 gift during our Power Hour will help us win!

Thank you for your support!

04/29/2026

Your gifts during TODAY April 29 or TOMORROW April 30 to the Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences will support graduate student research and scholarship! Check out these photos from national and international conferences attended by our grad students, made possible by funding from our department. Opportunities like these enhance the dissemination of our student's research and allows them to make connections in the psychological science community.

Your donations will advance our graduate students on their journey to becoming meaningful professionals in their field.

Learn more about our fund and give today:
https://umass.scalefunder.com/gday/giving-day/111216/department/111223

Also, HELP US WIN our Thursday, April 30 POWER HOUR from 11 a.m.– 12 p.m.! The organization with the most individual donations during this hour will receive a bonus prize of $2,000. Second place will get $1,000 and third through fifth place will receive $500 in bonus funds! Plus, this year our department will match the total donations made during our Power Hour up to $2,000!

04/27/2026

Your gifts during on April 29 and 30 to the Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences will support our student organizations like the UMass Neuroscience Club! Here is an account of their latest trip to the NEURON Conference at Quinnipiac University:

"Our favorite club event is when we attend the NEURON Conference every spring. The conference has been a great way for our club members to connect with each other and learn about a lot of amazing neuroscience-related research that undergraduate students are doing across the northeast, including here at UMass Amherst. The conference also provides allows our club members to network with other students, researchers, companies, medical schools, graduate schools, etc. Overall, it is always a great experience for us to be able to attend the NEURON Conference every year."

Your contributions will support student research and community-building! Learn more on our webpage:
https://umass.scalefunder.com/gday/giving-day/111216/department/111223

Also, HELP US WIN our Thursday, April 30 POWER HOUR from 11 a.m.– 12 p.m.! The organization with the most individual donations during this hour will receive a bonus prize of $2,000 while 2nd and 3rd place winners will receive $500. Plus, this year our department will match the total donations made during our Power Hour up to $2,000!

04/24/2026

We give our students the knowledge and experience they need to succeed! Your contributions to the Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences (PBS) during UMassGives April 29 and 30 will support student research and scholarship. Invest in the next generation of outstanding psychological and brain scientists!

HELP US WIN our Thursday, April 30 POWER HOUR from 11 a.m.– 12 p.m.! The organization with the most individual donations during this hour will receive a bonus prize of $2,000 while 2nd and 3rd place winners will receive $500. Plus, this year our department will match the total donations made during our Power Hour up to $2,000!

Your gifts will aid PBS in the following ways:

• Improve undergraduate research experiences, with funds for research materials and conference presentations, including programs in our new Neuroscience major!

• Enhance graduate student scholarship, including dissemination of research and travel support for conferences.

• Organize community-building workshops and events in the department to enhance student success.

Each gift is an expression of support to our department and our exceptionally talented students.

More info on our official webpage: https://umass.scalefunder.com/gday/giving-day/111216/department/111223

04/17/2026

Nilanjana Dasgupta, provost professor of psychological and brain sciences and founding director of the Institute of Diversity Sciences, was recently recognized by the Axiom Business Book Awards with one of four Outstanding Books of the Year honors for her recent publication, “Change the Wallpaper: Transforming Cultural Patterns to Build More Just Communities.”

Using a science-driven approach to social change, “Change the Wallpaper” argues that small changes to the local cultures around us are far more effective in producing structural change than symbolic acts, bias awareness training or relying solely on good intentions.

“Wallpaper” is Dasgupta’s metaphor for the elements of culture that are hidden in plain sight in neighborhoods, workplaces, and educational settings, shaping our perspective of the world. They include the design of our physical environment; popular stories that explain social reality, provide morals and takeaways and guide our behavior; people we see in valued and respected roles who we may or may not relate to; and the tacit knowledge that some of us have the privilege to get ahead in life with little friction. These four types of situational nudges interact to compound advantages for some and disadvantages for others.

“For culture change to happen, we first must notice the elements of culture—the metaphorical wallpaper—that create inequality in small cumulative ways before we can learn how to avoid the negative elements and harness the positive ones in coordination with other people to move toward social justice,” says Dasgupta.

More information about Dasgupta’s book can be found at https://changethewallpaper.com/

04/13/2026

During this year's you can help aid Psychological and Brain Sciences research! 🔬🧐
UMassGives is a campus-wide fundraiser where you can choose to support your favorite department or organization on April 29 and 30. Our department is raising funds to support student research and scholarship!

Your gifts will:

• Improve undergraduate research experiences, with funds for research materials and conference presentations, including programs in our new Neuroscience major!

• Enhance graduate student scholarship, including dissemination of research and travel support for conferences.

• Organize community-building workshops and events in the department to enhance student success.

Also, help us win our Thursday, April 30 POWER HOUR from 11 am – 12 pm!
The organization with the most individual donations during this hour will receive a bonus prize of $2,000 while 2nd and 3rd place winners will receive $500.

Thank you and give us a share!

04/08/2026

during , Wednesday, April 29 and Thursday, April 30! Your contributions to the Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences during UMassGives will support student research!

Your gifts will aid PBS in the following ways:
• Improve undergraduate research experiences, with funds for research materials and conference presentations, including programs in our new Neuroscience major!
• Enhance graduate student scholarship, including dissemination of research and travel support for conferences.
• Organize community-building workshops and events in the department to enhance student success.

HELP US WIN our Thursday, April 30 POWER HOUR from 11 am – 12 pm! The UMass fund with the most individual donations during this hour will receive $2,000 while 2nd and 3rd place winners will receive *$500.

Plus, this year our department will match the total donations made during our Power Hour up to $2,000!

Spread the word! Ask your contacts to support Psychological and Brain Sciences during ! Give us a share, thank you!

* Donations must be unique: only one gift per donor allowed. $5 minimum donation.

04/02/2026

Ella Ford '26, a psychology major and student in the Developmental Disabilities and Human Services Program at UMass Amherst, has received a $3,500 "Advancing Community, Democracy, and Dialogue Grant" from the Chancellor’s Community, Democracy, and Dialogue initiative to support the third annual Neurodiversity and Disability Studies Summit.

The summit will be hosted on Saturday, April 12th from 11:00 to 2:30 in Herter Hall (and on Zoom). The summit partners with the Boltwood Project to bring the Five College community an interactive poster session, keynote presentation and Q&A, as well as breakout discussions.

Keynote address:
‘At the end of the world, let there be you’: Crip-of-Color Writing in the Apocalyptic Now

In this lecture, Jina Kim (Smith College) will discuss her new book, Care at the End of the World: Dreaming of Infrastructure in Crip-of-Color Writing (Duke UP 2025), as well as debut some new work on the politics and poetics of crip-of-color friendship. Care at the End of the World demonstrates why we need radical disability politics and aesthetics for navigating contemporary crises of care. It brings a disability lens to bear on feminist, q***r, and crip-of-color writing following major US welfare reform, which passed in 1996. Looking to authors such as Octavia Butler, Jesmyn Ward, Leah Lakshmi Piepzna-Samarasinha, and Aurora Levins Morales, Kim examines how this body of literature grapples with the disabling effects of state austerity measures and interrupts dominant narratives about who deserves care. She calls forward the critiques and possibilities in their literary representations of infrastructure, honoring the imaginative work that these writers do to envision alternative infrastructural arrangements in a world that refuses to support them.

Attend the third annual Neurodiversity and Disability Studies Summit! Register online for in-person or Zoom attendance: https://websites.umass.edu/ddhs/neurodiversity-and-disability-studies-summit-2026/

Sponsors:
The Boltwood Project
The Developmental Disabilities and Human Services Program
The Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences
Advancing Community, Democracy, and Dialogue Grant

03/30/2026

Aliah Zewail, a graduate student at Psychological and Brain Sciences - UMASS Amherst (PBS), has co-authored a new paper on moral stereotyping in the “Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences.” The paper examines the confluence of artificial intelligence (AI), large language models (LLMs), morality, and cultural diversity.

Zewail and her co-authors argue that generative pre-trained transformers (GPTs)—such as ChatGPT—play a role in the misrepresentation of the moral values of non-Western individuals. “We showcase that social scientists should not replace human participants with LLMs, as these AI systems fail to capture human diversity around the globe,” Zewail asserts.

This paper was written in partnership with: Alexandra Figueroa, a postdoctoral scholar at the University of California, Berkeley, Haas School of Business; Jesse Graham, the George S. Eccles Chair of Business Ethics and Professor of Management at the University of Utah; and Mohammad Atari, an assistant professor at PBS.

Learn more about this research: https://bit.ly/4rud28z

Psychological and Brain Sciences - UMASS Amherst

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