About Us
The Society for Affective Science is a non-profit organization dedicated to fostering basic and applied research in the variety of fields that study affect broadly defined.
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Membership
Click to find out about the benefits of SAS Membership!
What is Affective Science?
Affective science is the scientific study of emotion and related phenomena (e.g., moods, stress, attitudes, valuation, motivation). Research in affective science focuses on a broad set of topics, including the role of emotions and related phenomena in social perceptions, group processes, interpersonal relationships, communication, personality, memory and learning, decision making, artificial intelligence, pain, and mental and physical health. Affective science also concerns how these phenomena impact and are impacted by lifespan development, culture, and language. Affective science is of critical importance for addressing some of the most pressing issues in human society, including interventions for health and well-being, development of government policy, fostering political tolerance, social justice, educational achievement, developments in computing, and advancements in medical practice and treatment.
Our Vision
A world where humankind acknowledges the origins, functions, and consequences of affect on all aspects of behavior, experience, and physiology.
Our Mission
We advance, innovate, and disseminate affective science, serving as the natural home for scientists in basic and applied areas, who engage in affective science, broadly defined.
How do we do this?
Through a strong governance structure and culture of innovation, we advance and promote the science of our members, train the next generation of scientists, and disseminate our science to the world for the benefit of humankind.
Our Values
With an open, welcome, and collaborative mindset, we value:
- Diversity – members, across many different disciplines, identities, personal backgrounds, career stages, and scientific perspectives, are actively engaged in our mission
- Support – members are provided with opportunities for training, mentorship, and development at all stages of their career
- Innovation –grounded in empirical evidence and the current state of the science, we lead innovation in theories & methods to produce impactful outcomes
- Sharing –our members benefit from access to our collective resources, methodological advances, and community of scholars. We widely share our science as a means of broadening the understanding of how affect influences all that we do as humans.
Executive Leadership
Stephanie Carpenter
Director-at-Large
Luis Flores
Director-at-Large
Awards Committee
Chair: Maital Neta, University of Nebraska-Lincoln
Past Chair: Maya Tamir, The Hebrew University of Jerusalem
Sean Dae Houlihan, MIT, Dartmouth
Casey Brown, Georgetown University
Iris Mauss, University of California, Berkeley
Phoebe Ellsworth, University of Michigan
Brett Ford, University of Toronto
Jonathan Stange, University of Southern California
Anthony Vaccaro, University of Southern California
Fundraising Committee
Co-Chair: Luis Flores, Queen’s University [email]
Co-Chair: Virginia Sturm [email]
Darwin Guevarra, University of California, San Francisco
Monika Lohani, University of Utah
Joseph Mikels, DePaul University
Lorenzo Pasquini, University of California, San Francisco
Ozge Ugurlu, University of California, Berkeley
Past Co-Chair: Nicole Giuliani, University of Oregon
Membership/Outreach Committee
Co-Chair: Stephanie M. Carpenter, Arizona State University (email)
Co-Chair: Nicole A. Roberts, Arizona State University (email)
Newsletter Subcommittee
Lead: Katie Hoemann, KU Leuven
Angelina Sung, Colorado State University
Jennifer Ouyang, University of Southern California
Marissa Ogren, Rutgers University
Listserv Subcommittee
Lead: Jolie Wormwood, University of New Hampshire
Daisuke Ueno, Kyoto Prefectural University of Medicine
Jennifer Ouyang, University of Southern California
Year-Round Events Subcommittee
Lead: Darwin Guevarra, University of California, San Francisco
Anthony Atkinson, Durham University
Jolie Wormwood, University of New Hampshire
Website Review Subcommittee
Lead: Marissa Ogren, Rutgers University
Anthony Atkinson, Durham University
Daisuke Ueno, Kyoto Prefectural University of Medicine
Angelina Sung, Colorado State University
Social Media Subcommittee
Lead: Tabea Springstein, University of California, Riverside
Jennifer MacCormack, University of Virginia
2025 Program Committee
Co-Chair: Jonas Everaert Tillburg, University & KU Leuven [email]
Co-Chair: Yael Millgram, Tel Aviv University [email]
Past Co-Chairs: Erik Nook, Princeton University and Sa-kiera Hudson, Berkeley Haas
Innovation officer: Claudia Haase, Northwestern University
Abstracts Committee
Chair: Katie Hoemann, KU Leuven/University of Kansas
Lior Abramson, Columbia University
Justin Kim, Sungkyunkwan University
Daphne Liu, Universtiy of Denver
Ella Moeck, University of Adelaide
Vera Vine, Queens University
Hongbo Yu, UC Santa Barbara
Methods Co-chair: Yasemin Erbas, Tillburg University
Methods Co-chair: Joao Guassi Morreira, University of Wisconsin -Madison
Salons Co-chair: Maia Pujara, Sarah Lawrence College
Salons Co-chair: Adrienne Wood, University of Virginia
Networking
Shir Atzil Hebrew, University of Jerusalem
Jenna Wells, Cornell University
Preconference
Chair: Casey Brown, Georgetown University
Kuan-Hua Chen, University of Nebraska Medical Center
Student committee
Chair: Eva Lui, Yale University
Membership & Outreach
Stephanie Carpenter, Arizona State University
Nicole Roberts, Arizona State University
Jolie Wormwood, University of New Hampshire
Fundraising
Co-chair: Luis Flores, Queen’s University
Co-chair:Virginia Sturm, UCSF
Co-chair:Monika Lohani, University of Utah
Darwin Guevarra, University of California, San Francisco
Vera Vine, Queen’s University
Ozge Ugurlu, University of California, Berkeley
Social media
Jennifer MacCormack, University of Virginia
Tabea Springstein, University of California, Riverside
Student Committee
Co-Vice Chair: Livia Sacchi University of Lausanne
Co-Vice Chair: Victoria Hart-Derrick Yale University
Past Chair: Kyle Barrentine, University of Virginia
Natali Barragan, Arizona State University
Amy Gregory, McGill University
Pooja Kulkarni, University of Mumbai
Jennifer Ouyang, University of Southern California
Angelina Sung, Colorado State University
Dasha Yermol, The University of Kansas
Ellen Zheng, Arizona State University
Diversity, Equity, and Inclusion Committee
Chair: Hongbo Yu, University of California, Santa Barbara
Past Chair: Michelle “Lani” Shiota, Arizona State University
Derek Isaacowitz, Northeastern University
Joseph Mikels, DePaul University
Yuri Miyamoto, Hitotsubashi University
Jose Soto, Pennsylvania State University
Kyle Barrentine, University of Virginia
Livia Sacchi, University of Lausanne
Leadership Archive
Founders: Lisa Feldman Barrett and James Gross
Past Presidents:
2014: James Gross, Stanford University
2015: Lisa Feldman Barrett, Northeastern University
2016: Wendy Berry Mendes, University of California, San Francisco
2017: Kevin Ochsner, Columbia University
2018: Ann Kring, University of California, Berkeley
2019: Robert Levenson, University of California, Berkeley
2020: Paula Niedenthal, University of Wisconsin-Madison
2021: Barbara Fredrickson, University of North Carolina at Chapel Hill
2022: Elaine Fox, University of Oxford
2023: Maya Tamir, The Hebrew University
2024: Maital Neta, University of Nebraska-Lincoln
Contact Us
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Volunteer
We’re looking for volunteers! Contact us and indicate which area you’d like to help out with.