The six faculty members who joined the department in the 2025–2026 academic year reflect on their experience and what they've done so far.
Ido Erev
Professor, Cognitive Psychology, Decision Psychology
Since arriving at Ohio State, I've appreciated department's strong commitment to high-quality research and it's collegial atmosphere. Living in Victorian Village, I also enjoy being able to walk to campus each day.
My most recent appointment was in data and decision sciences. Returning to psychology—and especially participating in the department’s seminar series—has inspired my new research, which looks at when and how cognitive models can improve predictions generated by machine learning.
My early results suggest that cognitive models may be effective in predicting the behavior of unfamiliar people in new contexts, as well as the long-run behavior of familiar people. By contrast, they appear less effective in predicting the immediate next choice of a familiar person. Looking ahead, I'm planning to organize an open choice prediction competition to test this pattern.
Kurt Gray
Professor, Weary Family Endowed Chair in Social Psychology
It’s been a fantastic year! I’m so pleased to have joined the department, and my lab is off to a running start. We’ve published work on understanding political divisions and how artificial intelligence can incorporate human values. The Collaborative on the Science of Polarization and Misinformation (C-SPAM) is scaling up, with talk series, research grants and researcher/practitioner partnerships. This summer I’m also hosting a summit on the alignment between AI and human cognition.
Kristen Lindquist
Professor, Robert K. and Dale J. Weary Chair in Social Psychology
Ohio State's Department of Psychology is an exceptional place to do science. The intellectual community here is rigorous and welcoming in equal measure, and I'm looking forward to the work ahead.
I've spent much of this first year building The Affective Science Lab, hiring new staff, and recruiting graduate students. My active projects include a longitudinal neuroimaging study of socio-emotional development and health risk behavior in adolescents (SUPER Brain, NIH-funded); a study examining how aging, interoception, and peripheral physiology contribute to emotional experience across the adult lifespan (NSF-funded); and a neuroimaging study investigating how pleasant and unpleasant social-affective states dynamically reorganize brain networks and shape behaviors such as altruism and social connection.
Megan Renna
Assistant Professor, Clinical Psychology
My first year at Ohio State has been fantastic. I am so impressed by and appreciative of the support of more senior faculty, who have always been willing to meet with me, provide advice and offer help when I need it. The psychology department staff as well as folks at SLDS and the IRB have been instrumental in helping me to learn the ins and outs of such a large department and university.
This year, I’ve been able to begin data collection on several projects, including a pilot project funded through the Department of Psychiatry and Behavioral Health Young Adult Resilience Grants Program. This project uses a single-session emotion regulation training to help reduce immune, physiological and psychological dysregulation in young adults diagnosed with anxiety and depressive disorders. I’ve also been able to begin building relationships at the Institute for Brain, Behavior, and Immunology and The James Cancer Hospital, and I look forward to continuing to build my collaborative relationships across the university and medical center in the upcoming year!
Brynn Sherman
Assistant Professor, Cognitive Neuroscience, Cognitive Psychology
I've really enjoyed my first year here at Ohio State! It's been a warm and welcoming community, and I'm thrilled to be a part of it. Over the past year, our lab has been able to get several behavioral projects off the ground. We've additionally just started running our first fMRI study, and we have an EEG study that we're about to launch, as well. Construction on our lab space also just finished, and it's great to see that the lab members now have a nice and bright space to work in. I'm excited to see what's in store over the coming summer and academic year!
Sami Yousif
Assistant Professor, Cognitive Psychology, Developmental Psychology
I've really enjoyed my time here so far. I remain incredibly grateful to all the folks who helped with the transition to Ohio State.
My lab has been focused on a number of different topic this year. In one line of work, we're interested in understanding the mechanisms behind visual adaptation — the kind of aftereffect that you experience, for example, after staring at a moving stimulus such that you then see motion in the rest of your visual field (even when there is none). In another line of work, we're interested in understanding how adults and children intuitively understand the coarse topological structure of spaces and objects. Our work shows that children naturally understand a sort of 'secret' language for describing spatial structure from an early age — in exactly the same ways that adults do.
Right now the main thing on my mind is the imminent arrival of our second child. I'm looking forward to spending the summer reading and writing with him in my arms.