Psychology Colloquium: Dr Natalie Matosin (University of Sydney)
2026-04-24 15:00 - 16:00 (Australia/Sydney)
Dr Natalie Matosin (University of Sydney)

Title: Decoding the impacts of stress on the human brain

Abstract:

Severe psychological stress is a global issue. The accumulation of recent geopolitical, environmental, and health crises has highlighted that stress has broad and substantial ramifications for global mental health. In this presentation, Dr. Natalie Matosin will present cutting-edge research on how stress and trauma affect the cytoarchitecture of the human brain, and how through studying this process, the lab is defining new brain cell types that have not been described before.

Bio:

Dr. Natalie Matosin is a Sydney Horizon and Al & Val Rosenstrauss Senior Research Fellow in the School of Medical Sciences, and Director of the MINDS Lab in the Charles Perkins Centre. With over a decade of international training in neurobiology, Natalie specialises in advanced techniques to explore brain complexities and disorders. Her lab’s pioneering research in spatial and single-cell histology aims to improve diagnostics and develop new treatments for mental health conditions, driving solutions from lab research to clinical applications.

CANCELLED: Psychology Colloquium: Learning, Education, and Assessment Research Network (Psychology) (USYD)
2026-05-01 15:00 - 16:00
UNFORTUNATELY, THE L.E.A.R.N.’S COLLOQUIUM HAS HAD TO BE CANCELLED AND WILL HOPEFULLY BE RESCHEDULED FOR LATER IN THE YEAR.

L.E.A.R.N. (Learning, Education, and Assessment Research Network) (Psychology) (USYD)

Title: The discipline that couldn’t explain itself: Narrative identity and Psychology’s crisis of coherence

Abstract:

Anyone familiar with Psychology’s history will recognise a discipline shaped by fragmentation, competing paradigms, and unresolved questions about Psychology’s identity and purpose. These tensions have become more pronounced in contemporary debates about open science, interdisciplinarity, decolonisation, and Psychology’s standing beyond being ‘just’ a science. In this presentation, we argue that Psychology continues to face an identity problem that is at once theoretical, pedagogical, and professional. We situate the problem historically, tracing enduring tensions between experimental science, applied practice, and humanistic approaches. Drawing on McAdams’ narrative identity framework, we propose that Psychology’s pluralism can be understood not only as intellectual diversity, but also as narrative fragmentation.

We then examine how Psychology’s narrative is encountered by students in undergraduate education. Undergraduate curricula often present Psychology as a collection of disparate topic areas, with limited explicit guidance on how these areas connect to one another or to students’ emerging professional identities. We argue that this lack of a shared disciplinary narrative has important negative consequences for student engagement, sense of belonging, and their understanding of Psychology as a coherent and meaningful field of study.

We then present findings examining first-year students’ perceptions of the implicit and explicit narratives operating within our large introductory Psychology courses. Our findings reveal systematic mismatches between what we teach within the scientist-practitioner model and student narratives potentially shaped by career aspirations and broader societal understandings of Psychology.

We conclude by addressing how narrative coherence can function as a unifying device for Psychology education, linking disciplinary identity, pedagogical practice, and student professional development. More broadly, we suggest that addressing Psychology’s identity challenges begins not only with theoretical integration, but with the stories we tell both ourselves and our students about what Psychology is and can be.

Bio:

L.E.A.R.N (Psychology) is a collective of education‑focused academics within the School of Psychology at the University of Sydney, dedicated to advancing evidence‑based teaching and learning in higher education. The group has enjoyed recent success in securing Scholarship of Teaching and Learning (SoTL) grant funding for innovative projects spanning feedback literacy, clinical supervision, self‑regulated learning, peer‑assisted study, and learning analytics. Funded initiatives include: Facing Feedback: Developing Student–Teacher Feedback Literacy Through Partnership; Advancing Clinical Supervision Pedagogy: Using Developmentally‑Tailored Approaches to Strengthen Engagement, Competency, and Confidence in Early Clinical Placements; Teaching First‑Year Students How to Learn: Co‑Designing Self‑Regulated Learning at Scale; The Value of Peer‑Assisted Study Sessions (PASS) for Mathematics and Statistics Students; and Early Warning: Using AI to Predict and Support At‑Risk Students in Large‑Scale Units.

Psychology Colloquium: Prof Louise Sharpe (University of Sydney)
2026-05-08 15:00 - 16:00
Prof Louise Sharpe (University of Sydney)

Title: Treating anxiety in the context of physical illness: The importance of safety behaviours and fears of disease progression

Abstract:

Cognitive-behavioural treatments (CBT) for anxiety disorders are amongst the most successful applications of CBT, with a vast literature confirming efficacy with large effect sizes. However, when anxiety is treated in the context of a chronic physical illness, meta-analyses confirm that treatments are far less effective, typically with small effect sizes. This keynote will explore two potential mechanisms that are important in working with people with chronic physical illness and comorbid anxiety. First, the presentation of safety behaviours in people with chronic physical health problems will be explored. Clinicians must determine the difference between safety behaviours that exacerbate anxiety and safety precautions which keep patients safe from the impacts of their illness. A decision-making framework will be presented to differentiate safety behaviours and safety precautions. Second, the content of worries differs for people with anxiety in the context of chronic physical conditions. Specifically, an extremely common worry across populations of people with different chronic illnesses is the fear of their disease progressing. Our research shows that fears of progression are common amongst common chronic physical illnesses, including cancer, cardiovascular disease, rheumatological conditions, respiratory conditions and diabetes. This keynote will review evidence of the importance of fears of progression in anxious symptoms, theories of fear of progression and review the relevant treatment outcome literature.

Bio:

TBA

Psychology Colloquium: Scientia Prof Kaarin Anstey (University of NSW)
2026-05-15 15:00 - 16:00
Scientia Prof Kaarin Anstey (University of NSW)

Title: Disaggregating by sex and gender sheds new light on cognitive ageing and dementia risk

Abstract:

There is now a well established body of literature on modifiable and non-modifiable risk factors for Alzheimer’s disease and related dementias (ADRD). However, most findings have been reported in aggregate, without considering whether effects different by sex and or gender. This is a critical problem for the field because of the far higher rates of Alzheimer’s disease in women. In this presentation I will discuss epidemiological research and population modelling on the prevalence and risk factors for ADRD in terms of sex and gender and identify strengths and weakness of this approach. I will then describe the role of research that focusses on the individual including cohort studies and clinical trials, as well as mechanistic research. From this I will describe consistent sex differences in cognitive abilities over the adult life course, as well as sex differences in dementia risk factors, the association of female neuroendocrine factors with cognitive decline and incident dementia, the effects of APOE genotype, as well as sex differences in the accumulation of tau and amyloid pathology. I will also describe recent frameworks for differentiating sex and gender in cognitive ageing research.

Bio:Kaarin Anstey is a Scientia Professor of Psychology at the University of New South Wales, Director of the UNSW Ageing Futures Institute and Senior Principal Research Scientist at Neuroscience Research Australia. She held an ARC Laureate Fellowship 2020-2025 focusing on cognitive resilience in ageing. Anstey conducts research in the fields of dementia epidemiology, risk reduction, and cognitive aging and has developed evidence-based, dementia risk assessment tools that are used in clinical practice and research, including the ANU-ADRI and the CogDrisk. She currently leads two clinical trials focussing on risk reduction in in people with mild cognitive disorders, a program of research on women’s brain health and the app-based Resilient Minds study. Anstey is a member of the World Dementia Council, and a member of the World Health Organisation Guideline Development Group for risk reduction. In 2025 she was awarded the NSW Premier’s Award for Excellence in Biological and Medical Science.

Psychology Colloquium: Dr Poppy Watson (UTS)
2026-05-22 15:00 - 16:00
Dr Poppy Watson (UTS)

Title: When Cues Drive Behaviour: Associative Mechanisms in Humans

Abstract:

Associative learning theories provide parsimonious explanation of how stimuli in the environment can trigger behavioural responses through both instrumental and Pavlovian mechanisms. Although much of this experimental work has been conducted using rodents, many studies have demonstrated similar associative mechanisms that underlie (at least some) human behaviour. I will provide an overview of some of this research and discuss a series of ongoing experiments investigating human S-R habits and Pavlovian-to-instrumental transfer in both healthy and clinical populations. I will highlight some of the conceptual and methodological issues that have arisen along the way and outline some future plans.

Bio:

Dr Poppy Watson is a Senior Lecturer in Psychology at University of Technology Sydney and an ARC Future Fellow. Her research examines how environmental cues influence attention and choice behaviour, with a particular focus on the tension between explicit goals and more reflexive responses shaped by reward learning and habit. Using behavioural experiments, alongside methods such as eye tracking and neuroimaging, she investigates the mechanisms that contribute to unwanted patterns of behaviour in both healthy and clinical populations, as well as how these insights can inform behaviour change interventions.

Originally from New Zealand, Dr. Poppy Watson completed her Master of Research and PhD at the University of Amsterdam. She worked at UNSW Sydney from 2017 to 2023 as a postdoctoral researcher and later an ARC DECRA Fellow. Since 2023, she has been based at University of Technology Sydney, where she has helped develop the undergraduate psychology program alongside her research as an ARC Future Fellow.

Psychology Colloquium: Dr Denise Moerel (Western Sydney University)
2026-05-29 15:00 - 16:00
Dr Denise Moerel (Western Sydney University)

Title: TBA

Abstract:

TBA

Bio:

TBA
