Payton A. Small

Payton A. Small is an Assistant Professor of Psychological Science at Vassar College, a position held since 2022. Small received a B.A. in Psychology from the University of California Santa Cruz in 2014 and a Ph.D. in Psychological and Brain Sciences from the University of California Santa Barbara in 2022, and worked as a Behavior Interventionist at Holdsambeck and Associates between undergraduate and doctoral study. Small's research examines race and racism in the United States, including racial colorblindness in institutional contexts such as college admissions, the fluidity of racial identity, discrimination and its effects on outcomes such as sleep, and the relationship between authoritarianism, critical history, and democracy.