Psych Mic

Garth Neufeld, LMFT, teaches an array of psychology courses at Cascadia College where he has been a professor since 2016. Garth is the founder of Teaching Introductory Psychology Northwest and the co-founder of the PsychSessions: Conversations About Teaching N’ Stuff podcast. Garth is the Director of Regional Conference Programming for the Society for the Teaching of Psychology and the co-chair of APA’s Introductory Psychology Initiative. He has served the national teaching of psychology community through the AP psychology exam reading, APA’s Summit on the National Assessment of Psychology, and APA’s Summit on High School Psychology Education. In 2018 Garth was awarded a presidential citation from the American Psychological Association (APA) as a Citizen Psychologist for his co-founding and ongoing participation as president of Shared Space For All, a non-profit organization that educates and mentors at-risk Thai children toward the prevention of prostitution. Garth is also the recipient of the 2019 STP Wayne Weiten Teaching Excellence Award.

In this episode, we talk about Garth's own lack of direction after his BA in psychology from Saskatchewan University in Canada, why he got a Master's in Marriage & Family Therapy but chose to become a professor instead, his experience as a professor at a community college, finding friends and mentors who have an "inner gold," advice for psych students to harness their skills and knowledge, how to get your feet wet in teaching, advice for preventing burnout among teachers, and so much more!

Listen to Garth's PsychSession's podcast!
Check out Garth's nonprofit, Shared Space For All!

To submit questions for future speakers, follow @psych_mic on Instagram and visit psychmic.com to sign up for the newsletter, where I will be sending out job opportunities and tips for job searching related to the fields of our weekly speakers!

Music by: Adam Fine 

Ashley Darcy-Mahoney, PhD, NNP, FAAN, a neonatal nurse practitioner and researcher, has worked throughout her career to advance nursing research, education and practice, with a focus on neonatology, infant health and developmental pediatrics. Her research has led to the creation of programs that improve health and developmental outcomes for at-risk and preterm infants.  

As an associate professor of nursing and the director of infant research at George Washington University’s Autism and Neurodevelopmental Disorders Institute, Dr. Darcy-Mahoney advances the body of research in infant health and developmental outcomes in high-risk infants with a focus on understanding the early brain and development trajectories in this population. In addition to her work with the institute, she conducts interdisciplinary research through “Talk With Me Baby” a multi-agency initiative using the nursing workforce to educate parents in the importance of talking and engaging with their babies in early infancy. 

Dr. Darcy-Mahoney is a Robert Wood Johnson (RWJ) Nurse Faculty Scholar and with her most recent grant from the RWJ Foundation, she is pursuing outcomes research in preterm infants by comparing developmental trajectories of children raised in a bilingual environment against those raised in a monolingual environment. She was named among the Top 25 Pediatric Nursing Professors by nursepractitionerschools.com and has earned numerous awards.

In this episode, we cover:

• Ashley's beginnings in nursing and in pre-med
• Why she ultimately chose nursing with neonates as a specialty
• What can you do as a nurse? Where do nurses work?
• How can I figure out if nursing is the right path for me?
• If it is the right path for me, how do I begin if I didn't study nursing in college?
• The economic and career benefits of a Master's (NNP) and PhD in Nursing - we talk salaries (here is the data Ashley talked about during the episode:  https://www.aanp.org/news-feed/2017-national-nurse-practitioner-sample-survey-results)
• Cross disciplinary work as a nurse
• Med school vs. nursing
• The association between preterm birth and cognitive/health risks
• Programs that have been developed to improve infant outcomes
• How a psych lens helps when working with families
• The most rewarding and most difficult parts of her job
• Self-care as a clinician

... and some more.   

To submit questions for future speakers, follow @psych_mic on Instagram and visit psychmic.com to sign up for the newsletter, where I will be sending out job opportunities and tips for job searching related to the fields of our weekly speakers!

Music by: Adam Fine 

Stacie M. Spencer, PhD, is a Professor of Psychology and the Director of the BS in Health Psychology program at MCPHS University (formerly the Massachusetts College of Pharmacy and Health Sciences; Boston, MA). She received her BA from Allegheny College and her MA and PhD from Northeastern University in Experimental Social and Personality Psychology. She later did her Post-Doc at the University of Miami in Behavioral Medicine. A recipient of the MCPHS Trustees’ Award for Teaching Excellence, Dr. Spencer has developed a comprehensive series of career exploration and professional development seminars and conducts research on team-based learning and interprofessional education. You can contact her at [email protected].

In this episode, we talk about:

• Stacie's difficulties in undergrad
• The quality that served Stacie no matter where she went
• What is behavioral medicine?
• How are social and personality psychologies related to health?
• Stacie's research on defensive pessimism and strategic optimism and on coping 
• Why her gravestone will say: "Yes, you can get a job with a bachelor's in psychology"
• Why she became a college professor
• What can you do with a bachelor's in psychology?
• Job searching and graduate school application advice

To submit questions for future speakers, follow @psych_mic on Instagram and visit psychmic.com to sign up for the newsletter, where I will be sending out job opportunities and tips for job searching related to the fields of our weekly speakers!

Music by: Adam Fine 

Daniel Lerner, MAPP, is an expert in positive and performance psychologies. His key theme is that developing a healthy psychological state has a profound impact on the pursuit of excellence—a message that he brings to students, established and high-potential performing artists and athletes, and executives at Fortune 500 companies and startups worldwide. Dan is a faculty member at NYU, is on the teaching staff in the Master of Applied Positive Psychology program at the University of Pennsylvania, and guest lectures regularly at universities across the country. He co-teaches “The Science of Happiness,” currently the largest and most popular non-required offering at New York University, in great part due to the positive changes that students report throughout the semester. Following a decade at International Creative Management (where he specialized in the representation and development of young performers) and at 21C Media Group (where he was a co-founder and the director of artist development), Lerner studied closely with renowned sports psychologist Dr. Nathaniel Zinsser—a Director of The Center for Enhanced Performance at the United States Military Academy at West Point—focusing on coaching and performance enhancement techniques employed by professional and Olympic athletes. He holds a Masters in Applied Positive Psychology from the University of Pennsylvania, and his book U Thrive: How to Succeed in College (and Life), was released in Spring 2017 by Little, Brown, and Company. 

In this episode from one of Psych Mic's live events, we cover how Dan's beginnings in music budded into a passion for helping others achieve their potential, how his mentors shaped him and how to find great mentors, the infinite ways to apply positive psychology, how he landed a faculty position without a PhD, his struggle with perfectionism, achieving wellbeing, and so much more. 

To submit questions for future speakers, visit @psych_mic on Instagram and  visit psychmic.com to sign up for the newsletter, where I will be sending out job opportunities and tips for job searching related to the fields of our weekly speakers.  

Music by: Adam Fine 

Chris Branson, Ph.D is a licensed psychologist and nationally-recognized expert in trauma-informed practice for the juvenile justice system. Since 2012, he has provided consultation on trauma-informed practice to state and county juvenile justice systems in nine states. Dr. Branson has personally trained over 1,000 professionals in probation, detention/corrections, court, and diversion program settings. He also consults for several national organizations, including the US Department of Justice.  

Dr. Branson has 14 years of juvenile justice experience as a therapist, researcher, and consultant. He began his career at St. Luke’s-Roosevelt Hospital in Harlem, where he provided mental health evaluations and evidence-based treatment to youth and families involved with the juvenile justice system. Alarmed by the high rates of trauma reported by his clients, Dr. Branson shifted his focus to increasing access to effective treatment for youth with traumatic stress. He served as Co-Principal Investigator for a 4-year federally-funded project to implement trauma-informed care in the NYC Department of Probation, Rikers Island, two diversion programs, and a drug treatment court. 

In 2014, he joined the faculty of the New York University School of Medicine, where he led the first-ever NIMH-funded study of trauma-informed care in the juvenile justice system. He served as Co-Investigator on a subsequent SAMHSA-funded project to spread trauma-informed care through all of NYC's juvenile detention facilities.  

In 2019, Dr. Branson left academia and launched C. Branson Consulting in order to focus on working directly with county and state juvenile justice agencies on implementing trauma-informed practices. His other areas of expertise include work-related traumatic stress in juvenile justice professionals, implementation science, program evaluation, and adolescent substance abuse.   

In this episode, we cover why he decided to work with adolescents, why he talks about psychological concepts without using "damn jargon," why he aims to learn as much as he teaches, and so much more. Throughout, he gives "advice they don't tell you" about grad school, mastering public speaking, and finding mentors.   

To submit questions for future speakers, visit @psych_mic on Instagram and  visit psychmic.com to sign up for the newsletter, where I will be sending out job opportunities and tips for job searching related to the fields of our weekly speakers.  

Music by: Adam Fine 

Eleonora Bartoli, Ph.D is a therapist who provides counseling and consulting services with expertise in trauma, resilience, and multicultural/social justice issues. Eleonora grew up in Italy and later received her bachelor's in psychology and philosophy at Brandeis University, and her Ph.D in Psychology: Human Development and Mental Health Research at the University of Chicago. On her website, she writes "I began my undergraduate career equally passionate in philosophy and psychology; what ultimately steered me towards clinical training was my passion for action and change, and not simply understanding. This deep desire to make a difference in others’ lives led directly to my commitment to social justice work, as it became clear that too often mental health concerns are triggered by social inequalities and injustice." Read more on her website here. 

In this episode, we cover Eleonora's love for teaching, research, and clinical work, her "aha" moments along the way, why a Ph.D was the right degree for her, how she works towards anti-racism as a white clinician, practical tips for choosing graduate school, and much more.

If you still have questions, I invite you to submit them at psychmic.com and follow @psych_mic on Instagram to stay updated and get career tips!

Music by: Adam Fine

Shabnam Javdani, Ph.D is a clinical and community psychologist who examines and intervenes in the health and mental health disparities created by persistent inequality. Javdani completed her doctoral work at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign in 2012, and completed an APA-approved clinical internship in the Institute for Juvenile Research at the University of Illinois at Chicago prior to coming to NYU.  

The overarching goal of her scholarship is to understand and reduce the development of inequality-related mental health and legal problems and study community and institutional responses to these complex challenges. Javdani's research hopes to advance our understanding of people in context, and to identify meaningful individual- and ecological-level solutions.  

To read more about Dr. Javdani's research team (RISE - Researching Inequity and Society Ecologically), visit https://wp.nyu.edu/rise/about-rise/ 

If you are interested in her publications, visit https://steinhardt.nyu.edu/people/shabnam-javdani 

In this episode, we cover her job right out of undergrad, the reasons she pursued a Ph.D in clinical and community psych (and compare this degree to social work), how she builds partnerships with community members, why she built her advocacy program, ROSES, how she approaches  systems-change in the face of immense pushback, and much more. Shabnam also provides practical advice during the live audience Q&A, such as how to cultivate a dream-based over a fear-based mindset post-college. 

If you still have questions,  follow @psych_mic on Instagram, where I'm always collecting questions for speakers, or visit psychmic.com!   

Music by: Adam Fine 

Ruvanee Pietersz Vilhauer has worked as a science writer for NASA, a biology researcher and a therapist in various settings, including a jail. For many years, her day job has been as an academic psychologist. She has a Ph.D. in psychology from the University of Chicago and teaches at New York University. She grew up in Sri Lanka and lived in India, Thailand, Canada and Australia before settling in the United States. Her short fiction has been broadcast on BBC Radio 4, and her essays and short stories have appeared in The Kenyon Review, The Massachusetts Review, Notre Dame Review, The Summerset Review, Quiddity, Michigan Quarterly Review, Stand, The American Literary Review, The Examined Life, and many other venues. She won the Commonwealth Short Story Competition in 2004 and the Iowa Short Fiction Award in 2018. She lives in New Jersey with her family.    

Her novels are: The Mask Collectors and The Water Diviner and Other Stories.   
Learn more at her website: ruvaneevilhauer.com.   

In this episode, we cover Ruvanee's unending curiosity, achieving balance, being multi-passionate, tips for choosing graduate schools, how to develop your writing skills, the role of psychology in creative writing (and the role of creativity in psychology), and much more. This episode includes audience Q&A!!!  

If you still have questions,  follow @psych_mic on Instagram, where I'm always collecting questions for speakers, or visit psychmic.com!  

Music by: Adam Fine

Hillary Lin, MD is a physician and founder of Curio, a creative and social mental health startup. Hillary was trained at Stanford (BS, MD, GSB Cert, and Residency), where she also developed her passion for healthcare innovation. She also practices internal medicine via  telemedicine.

Curio is an end-to-end emotional intelligence diagnostics and training platform working on areas such as emotional resilience, leadership, team bonding, and workplace performance. They offer live workshops as well as self-paced adaptive exercises which are customized for the user and organization.

Hillary has a minor obsession with escape rooms (she’s done 125+ in the last 5 years). She hosts Parlor Nights in her tiny Manhattan apartment where friends and friends of friends come together to discuss deep topics from a salad bowl.

In this episode from one of Psych Mic's LIVE EVENTS, we learn how and why Hillary made the leap of faith from practicing medicine full-time to founding her startup. Along the way she offers practical advice about medical school, self-development, and innovation.

If you still have questions, submit them at psychmic.com or keep up using the Instagram, @psych_mic!

Music by: Adam Fine

Curio's socials:
https://www.linkedin.com/company/joincurio

https://twitter.com/joincurio

https://medium.com/joincurio

https://www.instagram.com/joincurio/

Pascal Wallisch, Ph.D is one of the most adored professors of psychology and data science at NYU. In this episode, we how he moved from "obsessively playing video games, to obsessively taking classes, to obsessively doing research, to obsessively teaching." Along the way, we talk about:

• his German upbringing, 
• why passion matters, 
• why people who start grad school in their 30s tend to do better, 
• why he thinks about teaching like metalworking, 
• whether psych is a science, 
• fusing data science with psychology, 
• why you have to be comfortable with uncertainty to be a researcher, 
• learning to code, 
• marketing your background in psychology, 
• ... and more 

 
If you still have questions, I invite you to SUBMIT THEM at psychmic.com. Make sure to follow @psych_mic on instagram to stay updated and get career tips!

Music by: Adam Fine