About

Read the Department Statement in response to the killings of Ahmaud Arbery, Breonna Taylor, and George Floyd, and the pandemic of racism in the United States.

The Department of Psychology at Tufts University conducts cutting-edge research aimed at understanding the causes and consequences of mental processes and behavior. Our work addresses social, cognitive, and neural levels of analysis. We are innovative and interdisciplinary in our approach and emphasize understanding phenomena that have a direct impact on society. Scientists at all levels - faculty, postdoctoral trainees, and graduate and undergraduate students - engage in collaborative scholarship and critical thinking in the classroom and in the laboratory. This synthesis, between research and teaching, positions us to ask and answer fundamental questions while also enriching our students' understanding of psychology.

At Tufts, we are distinctive in having one of the largest majors on campus, while simultaneously maintaining one of the university's highest research profiles. Our focus is strongly experimental, with researchers at the forefront of neuroscience, cognition, social cognition, experimental clinical psychology, cognitive and affective neuroscience, and developmental psychology.

By bridging across these different areas of Psychology, we create a more complete picture of the how and why of behavior, from the microstructure of perception and cognition to the robustness of social behavior. In our undergraduate and graduate programs, we are committed to involving our students in collaborative scholarship at every level, both inside and outside the classroom. Our department prepares undergraduate and graduate students to ask science-based questions about the origins and mechanisms of human and animal behavior using discovery-oriented research and teaching. We are student-centered, striving to combine excellence in teaching, research and advising.

We hope you will join us in exploring the mysteries and mechanisms of behavior.