Interested in understanding how young humans think about social relationships? I am reading PhD applications this year! **Please note**, that Harvard now requires the GRE. More information here: www.ashleyjthomas.com/workwithme

A devastating set of decisions on the part of UC leadership to withdraw support from our nationally recognized postdoc program that prioritizes research excellence combined with addressing our university public service mission. www.insidehighered.com/news/faculty...

It’s grad school application season, and I wanted to give some public advice. Caveats: -*-*-*-* 
> These are my opinions, based on my experiences, they are not secret tricks or guarantees 
> They are general guidelines, not meant to cover a host of idiosyncrasies and special cases

Now out in an issue! ~~ www.cell.com/trends/cogni...

Join us for two fun days of moral psychology and philosophy! #MPRG2025

I am accepting graduate students for the UCI Cognitive Sciences PhD program for Fall 2026. Check out my lab website - www.relcoglab.org for our recent themes. Our funded work focuses on combinatorial reasoning, moral decision-making, and conceptual cognition in humans and large language models.

Come join the Moral Minds Lab as a grad student at MSU! Brand-new lab equipped for child & adult testing, with motivated undergrads in a happy department. 🤩 Learn more: www.moralmindslab.com/join-our-tea... (P.S. @tedmond.bsky.social is also taking a student!) @msupsychology.bsky.social

YES! "to explain all human cognition, we inherently must include development". Beyond the Adult Mind: A Developmental Framework for Predictive Processing in Infancy - Ward - Topics in Cognitive Science - Wiley Online Library onlinelibrary.wiley.com/doi/full/10....

I am recruiting a postdoc at UC Santa Barbara for an NIH-funded project on the organization of lateral PFC function--across emotion and cognition--using representational fMRI & TMS. I’d love to find someone w/ a background in cognitive control & computational modeling to complement our team! 🏝️ 🧠 🧲

I’m recruiting #PhD students to join my Lab for Infant Learning and Cognition (LILAC) at @ucsantabarbara.bsky.social! We study how infants learn about the natural world from others 🌱 If you’re interested in #devpsych, #EvPsych, and #infantstudies, please reach out and apply! More info below (1/2)

We're excited to announce that Cognitive Science at Dartmouth is recruiting PhD students to work collaboratively with me, Steven Frankland, and Fred Callaway. Come study the principles and mechanisms that enable us to understand, plan, and act in the world! Info: sites.dartmouth.edu/cogscigrad/

Help! Do you know some great resources for teaching (grad or UG thesis) students how to manage their projects?

1/ Alright, this one’s been sitting in my drawer for a year now, after @mcxfrank.bsky.social and I got turned down for a public commentary. But before I forget about it completely, here’s the preprint: Can we harvest insights for rice theory from two state farms in China? osf.io/preprints/ps...

Fewer grad students means less science, but many STEM PhD programs in the US are cutting back on admissions this year due to federal funding uncertainties. Words by me for @nature.com: www.nature.com/articles/d41... @emsque.bsky.social @ucsdcooperlab.bsky.social @julieposselt.bsky.social 🧪

Wow. Harvard nuking its PhD programs - Science PhD admissions reduced by more than 75% - Arts & Humanities reduced by about 60% - Social Sciences by 50–70% - History by 60% - Biology by 75% - The German department will lose all PhD seats - Sociology from six PhD students to zero

Fully-funded 4-year #PhD in Cultural Evolution! Join my @erc.europa.eu project exploring how compression & compositionality drive cultural innovation: hmc-lab.com/ERCPhDCultur... Apply by Nov 12! Maybe of interest to folks from #COSMOS2025 or @eslr.bsky.social? Please feel free to share! 🙏

there's a lot of interest in making AI more "human like" -- but what about the flip side? when real humans seem like robots/puppets/NPCs? nnnnnewwww pre-print: "The Development Of Sensitivity To Automatic Behavior" (by Bass, Bonawitz, & me) doi.org/10.31234/osf...

Some personal news: I adopted a cat! This is Bruno, and he enjoys sleeping on my desk as I’m writing

Implicit bias education has gotten a bad rap recently (and for some very good reasons), but in this paper (newly out in PIBSS) I argue that it could have value if done differently: doi.org/10.1177/2372... (Still also available as a preprint: osf.io/preprints/ps...)

Exciting news: My lab has published our first paper! Here, we review the literature on early social evaluation, and we make recommendations about how to best study social evaluation in infants and toddlers. direct.mit.edu/opmi/article...

Parents of 0- to 12-year-olds, come do science with us! We run short, game-like studies with kids. We offer in-person and online options, flexible scheduling (weekdays & weekends), and sessions that are fun for children and easy for caregivers.

Calling all ICIS members! Make a difference this summer by becoming a mentor for the Founding Generation Summer Fellowship. Share your expertise, inspire budding researchers, and help shape the future of #InfantResearch. Sign up here: docs.google.com/forms/d/e/1F...

TEN DAYS left to submit your work to the Origins of the Social Mind Preconference at #SPSP2026! 👶🐒🌍 This year, our morning timeslot is compatible with a variety of fantastic afternoon preconferences (e.g., Social Cognition, Gender, Economic Inequality). See you there! spsp.org/events/annua...

just finished steve levinson's new book! it's a beautifully articulated argument for social interaction as the evolutionary niche which made language possible, rather than the other way around. progress in linguistics depends on a stronger science of interaction. www.cambridge.org/core/books/i...

now says "No upcoming due dates Program 23-500 is currently waiting for a new publication"; in prior yrs, would've been due 11/5. Can't ask NSF POs right now... if any1 got info on this before the shutdown happy to hear it! @jaeyoungson.bsky.social i saw you had a similar q, tagging you in too. #NSF

Please also feel free to register for our virtual open house if you are looking for a #phd in #devpsych #devscience #PsychSciSky I'll be there for the faculty meet and greet part

Our paper in annual review of dev psych is out! It's a big-picture look at the development of social cognition from a computational perspective: compdevlab.yale.edu/docs/2025/an...

This is a big one! A 4-year writing project over many timezones, arguing for a reimagining of the influential "core knowledge" thesis. Led by @daweibai.bsky.social, we argue that much of our innate knowledge of the world is not "conceptual" in nature, but rather wired into perceptual processing. 👇

New paper in Open Mind, with @emmayu23.bsky.social, Megan Richardson, and @ashleyjthomas.bsky.social! We find that by 6 years of age, children think that close friends know the content of each other’s minds. direct.mit.edu/opmi/article... @openmindjournal.bsky.social

Good lab news: Welcome to Emma Yu (@emmayu23.bsky.social), our team's first graduate student! So excited to be doing science together and growing the team. Here's a picture of some of the members of our team on a visit to the Santa Barbara Botanic Garden.

I'm recruiting grad students!! 🎓 The CoDec Lab @ NYU (codec-lab.github.io) is looking for PhD students (Fall 2026) interested in computational approaches to social cognition & problem solving 🧠 Applications through Psych (tinyurl.com/nyucp) are due Dec 1. Reach out with Qs & please repost! 🙏

Spread the word: I'm looking to recruit a PhD student for Fall 2026 to @ucsb.bsky.social! Reach out if you are applying this cycle and hoping to study infant and child social cognition, specifically expectations about friendship and/or groups. Bonus: live in paradise! And.. 1/3

Very cool new RL-based approach to modeling the emergence of social norms www.researchgate.net/publication/...

Ever wonder how habituation works? Here's our attempt to understand: A stimulus-computable rational model of visual habituation in infants and adults doi.org/10.7554/eLif... This is the thesis of two wonderful students: @anjiecao.bsky.social @galraz.bsky.social, w/ @rebeccasaxe.bsky.social

Seems like a particularly cruel change to make without warning given the stress that reviewers often put on applicants' publication record. Presumably many strong students waited based on this apparent criterion, not because they didn't already have great ideas to propose.

I’m starting a suicide prevention research lab at UMass Amherst! I’ll be reviewing applications for our clinical psychology PhD program. Come to our virtual open house to learn more about the program and speak with faculty accepting students. www.umass.edu/psychologica...

Hi #canadian researchers - please sign this petition to help ensure funding isn’t cut to tri council agencies (NSERC, SSHRC, and CIHR). We’re looking at potential 15% cuts to ALL federal spending including grants win.newmode.net/canadianasso...

Come work with us! UC Irvine Cognitive Sciences is looking for a new Assistant Professor to join our team: recruit.ap.uci.edu/JPF09896 I'm not on the committee, but happy to talk if you're interested.

For potential grad students: if you're interested in this kind of work on assessing and improving close relationships measures, our group just got a grant to do five more years of it. Join our team!

If you’re applying to grad school this cycle, consider signing up for the MIT BCS application assistance program!

My lab is hiring a lab manager! Application deadline = 11/1, start date sometime between June & September 2026 (to be arranged with finalist). Please spread the word & apply here: opportunities.columbia.edu/jobs/a3f80f7.... #AcademicSky #PhdSky #PsychSciSky #SocialPsyc #DevPsyc #psychjobs

A nice post in praise of the @socphilpsych.bsky.social and the virtue of interdisplinary-mindedness.

I had an illuminating interaction with a colleague who said that they try to find time to do a few paper reviews per year. It made me realize that different researchers have widely varying expectations about reviewing, probably because there are no public norms.

Interested in applying to graduate programs or research positions in psychology? Want more information and feedback on your submission materials? Then Harvard’s Prospective Ph.D. & RA Event in Psychology (PPREP) Is for you!! psychology.fas.harvard.edu/pprep More info in the link!! Please retweet!

As a Fellow in CIFAR's Future Flourishing Program, I've seen the real impact of the Global Scholar program for ECRs. New call for GS in: Child & Brain Development Multiscale Human Future Flourishing Humanity’s Urban Future Learning in Machines & Brains Quantum Materials cifar.ca/global-scholars

📢 Come join us on Sunday, November 9th for the Rutgers Symposium of Learning with an amazing list of speakers and great company! More details: sites.rutgers.edu/symposium-le...

I know there's a lot happening today, but this is sneaking in under the radar. This proposed new rule would absolutely crush foreign PhD students, potentially making it impossible for them to enroll with any certainty of their ability to finish www.politico.com/news/2025/08...

Come be my colleague! The Department of Psychology at Princeton and @princetonneuro.bsky.social‬ are jointly searching for an Assistant Prof in Cog Neuro. puwebp.princeton.edu/AcadHire/app...

The Social, Behavioral and Economic Sciences (SBE) Postdoctoral Research Fellowships at NSF are no more? But hopefully I misunderstand? www.nsf.gov/funding/oppo...