E248: Steve Most: Flow state, mentor, scholar, curiosity, and gorillas
From PsychSessions: Conversations about Teaching N' Stuff by Garth Neufeld, Eric Landrum
April 7, 2026 · 1h 15m · Season 10 · Episode 248
About this episode
Garth interviews Steve Most about his academic journey, research interests, and the impact of mentorship and cognitive psychology.
In this episode Garth interviews Steve Most from the University of New South Wales in Sydney, Australia. Steve shares his approach to navigating the two-body academic problem with his wife, which has led to dual jobs in Sydney and continued adjunct affiliation with the University of Delaware. He describes early uncertainty about research, influential mentors, and how Dan Simons' visual cognition work and the "gorilla" selective attention task reshaped his interests, highlighting inattentional blindness and the role of attention in shaping conscious experience. He outlines his research on emotion-induced blindness and a newer program on effort aversion, including links to students' Psych 1 grades and planned applications to critical thinking and entrepreneurship. They discuss AI as cognitive offloading versus "desirable difficulties," his TEDx card-change demonstration, and his co-authored Oxford cognition textbook, emphasizing story-driven, real-world examples and interdisciplinary connections. [Note. Portions of the show notes were generated by Descript AI.]
People in this episode
Guest: Steve Most
Topics covered
- flow state
- mentorship
- visual cognition
- inattentional blindness
- emotion-induced blindness
- effort aversion
- critical thinking
- entrepreneurship
- AI
- cognitive offloading
Keywords
- gorilla task
- TEDx
- Oxford cognition textbook
- story-driven examples
- interdisciplinary connections
Mentioned in this episode
Products: Descript AI, Oxford cognition textbook
Places: Sydney, Australia
More episodes of PsychSessions: Conversations about Teaching N' Stuff
- E249: Danae Hudson (Part 3): Navigating change, adapting, the future of learning, and post-pandemic thoughts · April 21, 2026 · 55 min
- E010: RE-RELEASE: Charles Brewer · April 14, 2026 · 1h 11m
- E009: RE-RELEASE: Wayne Weiten · March 31, 2026 · 1h 31m
- E247: Clara Cheng: Academic pathways, empowerment, bridging cultures and disciplines · March 24, 2026 · 55 min
- SB31: Melissa Maffeo: New book--The Science of the Supernatural · March 20, 2026 · 21 min
- E008: RE-RELEASE: Elizabeth Loftus · March 17, 2026 · 51 min
Explore listener stats, chart rankings, contacts and more on the PsychSessions: Conversations about Teaching N' Stuff podcast page.