Beyond Academia

Serial Hobbyist

Interested in getting to know who I am outside of work? There's a ton I enjoy doing, some of which has helped in my professional work—and some of which has stayed mostly separate from work. I like to say that I'm a Jack-of-all-Trades, so here are some of those Trades (mostly of the crafting variety):

Textile Arts:
Crochet, Sewing & Machine Embroidery

Crocheting has kept me sane during grad school. I love following patterns, but I've freehanded a few things too! Sewing is something I've inherited from my mom. Since I moved away, I'm mostly altering—or embellishing—but sometimes I'll make a garment from start to finish.

Jewelry-making

My last three years of grad school, a group of friends starting making polymer clay jewelry. It's a great bonding activity—with pretty great results.

Website-design

This isn't a hobby per se, but if I had a dime for every website I've made, I'd have 40 cents. Which isn't a lot, but it's weird it happened so many times. To clarify: I didn't code any of these websites, but I did design them! Here are the links to the four websites I've made:

Version 1 of Development of Social Cognition Lab at UCI: https://www.dosclab.com/

Yale Psychology Graduate Led DEI Committee: https://www.yalepsychdei.com/

Writer Aaraf Afzal's Website: https://aarafafzal.com/

This website!
https://www.sifanasohail.com/

Video-editing

I started out editing videos for fun, but it definitely comes in handy both in study design, and when trying to disseminate our work to the public!

...and more!

There are many hobbies I do every once in a while. Here's a quick overview of some other things I would be happy to do with you (or help you get into): pottery, wax seal stamping, laser etching, CNC-ing, 3-D printing, nail painting,