What is PsyberSpace®
Hello!
I’m your host, Leslie Poston
Every week I’ll be there for you, hosting PsyberSpace on your favorite podcast player, helping you wrap your head around what’s happening in our world with solid research.
Why me? I’m a PhD candidate in the Applied Psychology program at Fielding Graduate University, host of this podcast, and a research assistant in the Society, Technology, and Subjectivity Lab(STS-Lab). My own research examines how social media platforms, digital spaces, and AI systems shape identity, emotion, resistance, and everyday sense-making, with a particular focus on TikTok, Discord, reddit, and other social and dark social communities as digital “third places.” Drawing on qualitative, quantitative, and critical approaches, I study how people adapt their language, lives, and self-presentation in response to algorithmic systems, and how these dynamics intersect with power, neurodivergence, and social justice in mediated environments.
Science is magic that works.
Kurt Vonnegut
01
The Research
In addition to drawing on my own knowledge from my studies, PsyberSpace® runs on actual research, not opinion dressed up as expertise. Each week I draw on new studies and current thinking, with access to the complete research libraries of two universities alongside publicly available sources like Google Scholar, preprints, and Open Science publications. When I can’t find a study through the usual channels, I go straight to the authors. Researchers genuinely love that, and it means you get the real thing rather than a secondhand summary. No fabricated citations, no made-up experts. If I cite it, it exists and I can show you where to find it.
02
The Education
I hold a BA in Organizational Psychology from UMass Amherst, an MA in Media Psychology and an MA in Applied Psychology with a concentration in technology and media, both from Fielding Graduate University, where I’m currently a PhD candidate in the Applied Psychology program. I also have a certificate in the Psychology of Popularity from UNC. Additionally, I’m a research assistant in the Society, Technology, and Subjectivity Lab. My own research looks at how social media platforms, digital spaces, and AI systems shape identity, emotion, resistance, and everyday sense-making (which is, not coincidentally, exactly what this podcast covers). Prior to my research career I was a Chief Marketing Officer in the B2B SaaS AI space with two successful exits, so I’ve spent time on both sides of the systems we talk about here.
03
What is the PsyberSpace® Podcast
I started this podcast because I wanted to make everything that is happening less confusing, and help people find and understand real research that could help them in their day to day lives. The show covers digital psychology, societal entropy, and everyday cognitive traps: the systems shaping how we think, how power concentrates and what that does to people, and the patterns that trip us up in modern life. No sponsors, no advertisers, just research and honest analysis.