Susan E. Beers

I grew up in Seattle, Washington, and as an undergraduate studied at Pitzer College in Claremont California (then a women’s college) before graduating with a B.S. in Psychology from the University of Washington. Unlike most people, I’ve known since high school that I wanted to be a psychologist. At first I thought I wanted to be a therapist, but after doing an internship with autistic children, and writing a literature review on the social construction of mental illness, I decided that I would prefer being a researcher and teacher, so I applied for graduate study in Personality. I went to graduate school at the University of Connecticut, and had my first faculty position at Vassar College. I have been teaching at Sweet Briar since 1983.

At Sweet Briar I teach Personality, Social Psychology and Cognition, as well as the Introductory, Seminar, Research in Psychology and Senior Seminar courses all Psychology faculty teach. I particularly enjoy working with students who take an active responsibility for their own learning, and who enjoy thinking about psychological theories and research.

My own research interests include topics in social and personality psychology, psychology applied to higher education, philosophical psychology, and consciousness. I also have an interest in American Sign Language and Deaf culture, and sometimes teach beginning-level courses on this subject.

Although I am on the Sweet Briar campus a lot, my home, where I live with my husband, Frank Hanlon, and my three cats, is in Charlottesville.

Brian Cusato

 Professor Cusato is the newest member of Sweet Briar’s Psychology department. He earned his B.A. from Muhlenberg College, his M. A from Bucknell University, and his Ph. D. in Behavioral Neuroscience from the University of Texas at Austin. 

Dr. Cusato’s research concerns the behavioral mechanisms of learning, primarily in animals. He is most interested in the role of learning in seemingly instinctive responses, adaptive specializations in learning, and the integration of biological, psychological, and evolutionary approaches to the study of behavior. Most of Professor Cusato’s experiments investigate how learning occurs in the sexual behavior system, and how animals learn about the species typical cues they experience during naturally occurring social interactions. This is a novel approach to the study of learning – sufficiently general to apply across species, and sufficiently specific to make contact with the evolution and genetic makeup of particular species and individuals. The work is revealing sex differences in learned behavior, and the importance of learning in ecologically relevant social situations. 

Dr. Cusato has been the recipient of a fellowship in Neurobiology and Behavior from the National Institute of Mental Health, and the Rosemary Harmon Memorial Fellowship from the University of Texas at Austin. He has received first place honors in research competitions sponsored by the Southwestern Psychological Association and the Southwestern Comparative Psychological Association, and publishes regularly in such journals as Animal Learning and Behavior, Learning and Motivation, Behavioral and Brain Sciences, and the Journal of Comparative Psychology. His research collaborations with students have resulted in numerous national and regional conference presentations. Professor Cusato teaches Introductory Psychology, as well as courses in Statistics, Experimental Methodology, Learning, and Evolutionary Psychology.

Tim Loboschefski

I grew up in northwestern Ohio and did my graduate work at the University of Toledo specializing in Developmental Psychology. I actually started off my undergraduate education as a business major spending a few years in the Accounting/Business Management programs before I realized that I just was not enjoying myself very much (so for those of you who have made one or more of these life-altering decisions...I can empathize). After switching to Psychology I fell into conducting research (mostly developmental but some cognitive work as well) and found my way into graduate school, graduating in 1996.

During graduate school I also taught at a number of colleges and universities in the area when I realized that I really enjoyed the direction my choices had taken me. I had not expected to like either research or teaching before I actually began doing it, and was glad to find a place which provided the opportunity to do both. Here at Sweet Briar I teach the Developmental Psychology classes as well as the Statistics and Experimental Psychology classes.

My research at SBC involves ADHD and possible biological markers for the disorder.   With colleagues in the Mathematical Sciences at SBC and the Behavioral Medicine at UVA Medical Hospital, we have undertaken a number of externally granted projects focusing on EEG indicators of ADHD in children and adults.  Our work has been highlighted in numerous local and regional papers and will be the subject of a CNN report airing sometime in April or May of 2000.

I live on Sweet Briar campus in have trouble with just 1 member of the animal kingdom, a dog named Blue.

Roberta Sadler

I grew up in Virginia Beach and attended Mary Washington College which was at that time a woman’s college. I chose psychology as my undergraduate major because I found it so interesting. After a year of graduate work in New York City taking classes at both the (then) Heights’ campus and at Washington Square, I completed my MA and Ph.D. at the University of North Carolina at Greensboro. I have always been drawn to the application of basic psychological principles, pursuing formal studies of behavior therapy and psychophysiology.

My first professional position was in the field of rehabilitation where I worked with spinal cord and brain injury programs that sought both to bring new research findings into clinical practice and to influence directions of research based on clinical needs.

I came to Sweet Briar College in 1981. I enjoy the liberal arts tradition and small classes. I live in rural Buckingham County on forty acres. My home was originally an eighteenth century tavern. A few sheep, horses, dogs and cats help to populate the place.