🚨 All staff for NSF’s Division of Equity for Excellence in STEM (EES) have just been fired.
In email to grantees: “the entire Division of Equity for Excellence in STEM has just been dissolved and the entire staff fired.”
High time for scientists, public, Congress, YOU to take action to #SaveNSF
What makes people feel entitled to rewards—the effort they put into their work or the outcomes they achieve?
Out now in PNAS; with Jin Kim and Jared Wong:
Achievement.
Effort seems to matter very little (if at all).
www.pnas.org/doi/10.1073/...
NEW: At least two institutions have been directed to comply with Trump’s anti-trans executive order as a condition of getting NIH grants, according to letters I've seen. The policy marks a new front in the administration's efforts to reshape the science ecosystem.
www.chronicle.com/article/the-...
We are happy to see folks in Congress stepping up, but we need more than sternly worded letters. We need action. The US scientific enterprise is at stake #resist
Psych Stats Instructors: please consider participating in a 15-min anonymous survey about best practice and teaching methods. Closes May 31st. For details see: ryersonpsych.co1.qualtrics.com/jfe/form/SV_...
Sharing appreciated!
🧵New paper out in Cognition
Why do people moralize harmless carnal sins (e.g. gluttony, masturbation)?
@danielnettle.bsky.social & I find that these behaviors activate reciprocity-based moral judgment—no need for a distinct "purity" module.
50 days free link: authors.elsevier.com/a/1l18D2Hx2-...
🧪💪I know folks are struggling to appeal #NSF grant terminations
I created a generic GD version of our team's response plan, including a draft appeal*, based on compiled guidance.
*Not a lawyer, best guess! Also, DMs open for ?/feedback. @davidimiller.bsky.social
docs.google.com/document/d/1...
Cross-cultural researchers: still worried about the reference group effect? It’s often cited as a major threat to cross-cultural comparisons using Likert scales. Our new article critiques its logic and shows why it may not be the threat you think it is.
doi.org/10.1177/1069...
Forero sat on the outskirts filming as police dragged protesters from the flagpole. "And before I knew it, I was completely knocked over," Forero said. "I was just sitting there filming, I'm knocked over, and then an officer steps on the barricade trying to keep me pinned under it. And people immediately rush in (to help), like I said, community has always saved me." That day, photos and videos of her trapped under the barricade began circulating around social media. It would later become one of the many images that would make Forero a target. Unlike other students who can use masks to shield their identities, Forero's wheelchair makes her easily recognizable. And she was already a well-known voice on campus for her past activism for disability rights.
"I knew I was being watched, both from the university (and) from Morehead-Cain. There was nowhere where I was 'safe,' because there was nowhere where I could hide my identity," Forero said. "Constantly being surveilled — that is very much a significant form of oppression. And I wasn't going to let my visibility prohibit me from standing for the things that I believe in. And by doing so, I had to pay some extra costs or at least consider them." In the next year, those costs of being an activist would expand to include Forero being doxxed, criminally charged, and losing her scholarship.
A wheelchair-using UNC student who was physically assaulted by police when they broke up the school’s anti-genocide encampment has since had a prestigious scholarship rescinded, been criminally charged, doxxed and constantly surveilled because of her Palestine activism.
www.wunc.org/education/20...
They’re also teaching the COVID lab leak hypothesis as though it’s verified fact, and not just one possible disputed theory about the origins of COVID.
Like many others, Angela, Kelci, and I were disappointed to learn that the NSF grant supporting Flourish was terminated last week. Flourish remains committed, now more than ever, to our mission of uplifting pre-tenure faculty of color in psychology. Learn more & spread the word about our community.
ATTENTION: NSF GRANT RECIPIENTS
We received a heads up from a trusted source that you should proactively download/print/screen shot any documentation on research.gov pertaining to your NSF awards, both those that are current and any that have closed in the last 5-6 years.
1/n
Due to maintenance, Research.gov (including access to NSF-PAR, GRFP, PES, and ETAP) will be unavailable from Fri., 4/25 at 10:00 PM ET to Sat., 4/26 at 1:00 PM ET. NSF apologizes for any inconvenience.
🚨 Practical URGENT tip for NSF grantees:
Out of an abundance of caution, I would right now go into Research.gov and…
1. Download your NSF award letters.
2. Print PDF your annual reports.
3. Screenshot the status table for annual reports.
NSF is planning maintenance tomorrow to Research.gov
New paper is interesting
But result is not gleaned from online abstract
Turns out, Republicans (vs. Democrats) use science less in policy making.
www.science.org/doi/10.1126/...
But you'd not know that from title or Abstract
Sometimes I worry we're afraid to say political findings out loud
As predicted, we are now seeing the US science brain drain. We will be losing incredible talent, scientific discovery, patents, novel therapeutics, and health & disease treatment and prevention. This pool of experts will take their research and trainees, current and future talent, with them 👇👇👇👇
This isn't about scientists alone. NIH generates jobs and economic investment in communities across the country. This is an attack on your community, your state, your livelihood, your health, your survival. H/T @joeallenjoe.bsky.social.
I am teaching my phd writing workshop course this quarter, question: are there any words/phrases said to you by an advisor/mentor that stuck with you, were memorable, or particularly helpful? If so please reply below!
these people hate DEI because they would be unemployable in any system where they couldn’t rely on favoritism and nepotism
Check out @megan-elaine-burns.bsky.social's new work on worker/org (mis)alignment and union attitudes ✊🏻
Two important points here:
*The cancellation of awards at odds with the administration's priorities appears to violate a court order
*Many of the awards cancelled were on Ted Cruz's list of "questionable projects". We are replacing scientific peer review with disingenuous hacks.
A colleague at Stanford’s business school used The Stanford Daily to argue—poorly—against DEI. The piece was riddled with historical errors and left one searching for fact, so I broke my public writing hiatus to respond.
I hope you’ll read and share the piece.
stanforddaily.com/2025/04/22/w...
FOR IMMEDIATE RELEASE NYU Faculty Take Classes Off Campus to Protest Lack of Protections for International Students NEW YORK, April 17, 2025 - More than fifty NYU faculty members have taken their classes off campus starting today, and continuing for the next week, to protest the University's lack of commitment to protect international students in the face of the Trump administration's attacks. Some faculty have moved their classes to in-person locations that have been declared sanctuary spaces, where international students are assured that building administrators will do everything in their power to refuse to cooperate with ICE agents. Other faculty have moved their classes online so that students can attend from a safe location of their choosing.
This is how you do it.
The conservative movement has turned against reality on every scientific issue of our time, from gun violence to climate change to epidemiology.
If campuses are ideologically homogenous, it's not because academia has ostracized conservatives. It's because conservatives have ostracized academia.
The SPARK Society supports scholars of color in the cognitive sciences.
Learn about the SPARK Society and get involved if you can! www.sparksociety.org
You can also help the SPARK Society achieve their mission by donating at buy.stripe.com/3cs03h1be38D...
I'm disappointed to share that my NSF career grant on anti-Asian dehumanization was terminated. This affects ongoing project activities, which have shown great progress so far, and support for my research team and more.
I'm sad to share that the hiring of the postdoc role is currently on pause.
🧪 Our Terminated NSF Grant Tracker is live 🧪
🔴 114 NSF grants listed so far
🔴 Cancelled grants focused on
→ Training scientists
→ Misinformation
→ AI
→ Climate change
Credit to @noamross.net for all the work to build this & to all PIs who submitted their info.
Link: airtable.com/appGKlSVeXni...
Psych friends: If you wanted to identify a group of people to survey before and after they move from one geographic location to another, how would you go about it? We could spend a small fortune trying to prescreen in Prolific or MTurk, but maybe there's a better way? WWYD?