Cat Hicks

@grimalkina@mastodon.social

mastodon 4.6.0-nightly.2026-03-19

Psychologist for the humans of tech.
Evidence strategy for technical teams

Co-host at Change, Technically: https://www.changetechnically.fyi/

Author: Psychology of Software Teams (CRC Press, coming 2026)

Seizing the means of scientific production. Quant Psych PhD (but with a love for qual). Chronically underpublished. She/her

Founded: Catharsis Consulting, Developer Success Lab
Neighborhood Cool Aunt of Science

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0 Following

Joined November 10, 2022

Podcast:

https://www.changetechnically.fyi/

Blog:

https://www.drcathicks.com/blog

Developer Science:

https://www.drcathicks.com/projects

Newsletter:

https://fight-for-the-human.ghost.io/

Posts

@grimalkina@mastodon.social

Psychologist for the humans of tech. Evidence strategy for technical teams Co-host at Change, Technically: https://www. changetechnically.fyi/ Author: Psychology of Software Teams (CRC Press, coming 2026) Seizing the means of scientific production. Quant Psych PhD (but with a love for qual). Chronically underpublished. She/her Founded: Catharsis Consulting, Developer Success Lab Neighborhood Cool Aunt of Science

mastodon.social

@grimalkina@mastodon.social

Psychologist for the humans of tech. Evidence strategy for technical teams Co-host at Change, Technically: https://www. changetechnically.fyi/ Author: Psychology of Software Teams (CRC Press, coming 2026) Seizing the means of scientific production. Quant Psych PhD (but with a love for qual). Chronically underpublished. She/her Founded: Catharsis Consulting, Developer Success Lab Neighborhood Cool Aunt of Science

mastodon.social

@grimalkina@mastodon.social · 2d ago

We made a little free library and a neighborhood child submitted it to be a poke stop and now it is one

This whole situation is really escalating

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@grimalkina@mastodon.social

Psychologist for the humans of tech. Evidence strategy for technical teams Co-host at Change, Technically: https://www. changetechnically.fyi/ Author: Psychology of Software Teams (CRC Press, coming 2026) Seizing the means of scientific production. Quant Psych PhD (but with a love for qual). Chronically underpublished. She/her Founded: Catharsis Consulting, Developer Success Lab Neighborhood Cool Aunt of Science

mastodon.social

@grimalkina@mastodon.social

Psychologist for the humans of tech. Evidence strategy for technical teams Co-host at Change, Technically: https://www. changetechnically.fyi/ Author: Psychology of Software Teams (CRC Press, coming 2026) Seizing the means of scientific production. Quant Psych PhD (but with a love for qual). Chronically underpublished. She/her Founded: Catharsis Consulting, Developer Success Lab Neighborhood Cool Aunt of Science

mastodon.social

@grimalkina@mastodon.social · 5d ago

Because mastodon is like a 99% male audience, I will say this: if you have an aging mother you are in relationship with and care about, do NOT make her go through medical stuff alone. I am skilled & mean enough to fight through medical stuff and even so you would not believe how bad it is. Just accept that you cannot imagine.

I talk to a lot of people's aging moms and they are abandoned & alone even in nice families. I don't care how awkward it is, you have to try to ask them about it.

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@grimalkina@mastodon.social

Psychologist for the humans of tech. Evidence strategy for technical teams Co-host at Change, Technically: https://www. changetechnically.fyi/ Author: Psychology of Software Teams (CRC Press, coming 2026) Seizing the means of scientific production. Quant Psych PhD (but with a love for qual). Chronically underpublished. She/her Founded: Catharsis Consulting, Developer Success Lab Neighborhood Cool Aunt of Science

mastodon.social

@grimalkina@mastodon.social

Psychologist for the humans of tech. Evidence strategy for technical teams Co-host at Change, Technically: https://www. changetechnically.fyi/ Author: Psychology of Software Teams (CRC Press, coming 2026) Seizing the means of scientific production. Quant Psych PhD (but with a love for qual). Chronically underpublished. She/her Founded: Catharsis Consulting, Developer Success Lab Neighborhood Cool Aunt of Science

mastodon.social

@grimalkina@mastodon.social · Mar 12, 2026

Neither qual nor quant but a secret third thing (a testable causal model for which we can decide we will accept either or both quant and qual evidence)

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@grimalkina@mastodon.social

Psychologist for the humans of tech. Evidence strategy for technical teams Co-host at Change, Technically: https://www. changetechnically.fyi/ Author: Psychology of Software Teams (CRC Press, coming 2026) Seizing the means of scientific production. Quant Psych PhD (but with a love for qual). Chronically underpublished. She/her Founded: Catharsis Consulting, Developer Success Lab Neighborhood Cool Aunt of Science

mastodon.social

@grimalkina@mastodon.social

Psychologist for the humans of tech. Evidence strategy for technical teams Co-host at Change, Technically: https://www. changetechnically.fyi/ Author: Psychology of Software Teams (CRC Press, coming 2026) Seizing the means of scientific production. Quant Psych PhD (but with a love for qual). Chronically underpublished. She/her Founded: Catharsis Consulting, Developer Success Lab Neighborhood Cool Aunt of Science

mastodon.social

@grimalkina@mastodon.social · Mar 11, 2026

If we're reaching the "statistical models themselves are gibberish and using them is stupid" stage on mastodon I'm going to have to peace out of here for a while again

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@grimalkina@mastodon.social

Psychologist for the humans of tech. Evidence strategy for technical teams Co-host at Change, Technically: https://www. changetechnically.fyi/ Author: Psychology of Software Teams (CRC Press, coming 2026) Seizing the means of scientific production. Quant Psych PhD (but with a love for qual). Chronically underpublished. She/her Founded: Catharsis Consulting, Developer Success Lab Neighborhood Cool Aunt of Science

mastodon.social

@grimalkina@mastodon.social

Psychologist for the humans of tech. Evidence strategy for technical teams Co-host at Change, Technically: https://www. changetechnically.fyi/ Author: Psychology of Software Teams (CRC Press, coming 2026) Seizing the means of scientific production. Quant Psych PhD (but with a love for qual). Chronically underpublished. She/her Founded: Catharsis Consulting, Developer Success Lab Neighborhood Cool Aunt of Science

mastodon.social

@grimalkina@mastodon.social · Mar 11, 2026

In college I discovered I was good at chess, which was a surprise to me. My dad was into chess, and taught classes titled Logic; I was always fascinated by the exercises of those courses, but simultaneously, the men of that church community treated any demonstration of my success as a party trick

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@grimalkina@mastodon.social

Psychologist for the humans of tech. Evidence strategy for technical teams Co-host at Change, Technically: https://www. changetechnically.fyi/ Author: Psychology of Software Teams (CRC Press, coming 2026) Seizing the means of scientific production. Quant Psych PhD (but with a love for qual). Chronically underpublished. She/her Founded: Catharsis Consulting, Developer Success Lab Neighborhood Cool Aunt of Science

mastodon.social

@grimalkina@mastodon.social

Psychologist for the humans of tech. Evidence strategy for technical teams Co-host at Change, Technically: https://www. changetechnically.fyi/ Author: Psychology of Software Teams (CRC Press, coming 2026) Seizing the means of scientific production. Quant Psych PhD (but with a love for qual). Chronically underpublished. She/her Founded: Catharsis Consulting, Developer Success Lab Neighborhood Cool Aunt of Science

mastodon.social

@grimalkina@mastodon.social · Mar 08, 2026

Look, it's a mess out there and you can react to that mess by deciding everyone else is a moron or you could react to it by deciding most people are trying to get by with a different context than yours and start working the problem. Those are your choices pretty much, can't choose "no mess"

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@grimalkina@mastodon.social

Psychologist for the humans of tech. Evidence strategy for technical teams Co-host at Change, Technically: https://www. changetechnically.fyi/ Author: Psychology of Software Teams (CRC Press, coming 2026) Seizing the means of scientific production. Quant Psych PhD (but with a love for qual). Chronically underpublished. She/her Founded: Catharsis Consulting, Developer Success Lab Neighborhood Cool Aunt of Science

mastodon.social

@grimalkina@mastodon.social

Psychologist for the humans of tech. Evidence strategy for technical teams Co-host at Change, Technically: https://www. changetechnically.fyi/ Author: Psychology of Software Teams (CRC Press, coming 2026) Seizing the means of scientific production. Quant Psych PhD (but with a love for qual). Chronically underpublished. She/her Founded: Catharsis Consulting, Developer Success Lab Neighborhood Cool Aunt of Science

mastodon.social

@grimalkina@mastodon.social · Mar 07, 2026

Apparently I need 99 more TikTok followers to be able to post a link lmfao

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@grimalkina@mastodon.social

Psychologist for the humans of tech. Evidence strategy for technical teams Co-host at Change, Technically: https://www. changetechnically.fyi/ Author: Psychology of Software Teams (CRC Press, coming 2026) Seizing the means of scientific production. Quant Psych PhD (but with a love for qual). Chronically underpublished. She/her Founded: Catharsis Consulting, Developer Success Lab Neighborhood Cool Aunt of Science

mastodon.social

@grimalkina@mastodon.social

Psychologist for the humans of tech. Evidence strategy for technical teams Co-host at Change, Technically: https://www. changetechnically.fyi/ Author: Psychology of Software Teams (CRC Press, coming 2026) Seizing the means of scientific production. Quant Psych PhD (but with a love for qual). Chronically underpublished. She/her Founded: Catharsis Consulting, Developer Success Lab Neighborhood Cool Aunt of Science

mastodon.social

@grimalkina@mastodon.social · Mar 07, 2026

Stressed Out Dadpocalypse my beloved genre

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@grimalkina@mastodon.social

Psychologist for the humans of tech. Evidence strategy for technical teams Co-host at Change, Technically: https://www. changetechnically.fyi/ Author: Psychology of Software Teams (CRC Press, coming 2026) Seizing the means of scientific production. Quant Psych PhD (but with a love for qual). Chronically underpublished. She/her Founded: Catharsis Consulting, Developer Success Lab Neighborhood Cool Aunt of Science

mastodon.social

@grimalkina@mastodon.social

Psychologist for the humans of tech. Evidence strategy for technical teams Co-host at Change, Technically: https://www. changetechnically.fyi/ Author: Psychology of Software Teams (CRC Press, coming 2026) Seizing the means of scientific production. Quant Psych PhD (but with a love for qual). Chronically underpublished. She/her Founded: Catharsis Consulting, Developer Success Lab Neighborhood Cool Aunt of Science

mastodon.social

@grimalkina@mastodon.social · Mar 06, 2026

RE: @grimalkina@mastodon.social

Hello. I wrote this after fighting through to another appointment with a new specialist and I got a sudden opening with them and THEY HELPED. A LOT. THEY UNGASLIT the situation and validated a ton of things I'd documented on my own and been bouncing around providers trying to get someone to believe. They did the right test and now we have very significant empirical evidence about something critical.

Do not give up

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@grimalkina@mastodon.social

Psychologist for the humans of tech. Evidence strategy for technical teams Co-host at Change, Technically: https://www. changetechnically.fyi/ Author: Psychology of Software Teams (CRC Press, coming 2026) Seizing the means of scientific production. Quant Psych PhD (but with a love for qual). Chronically underpublished. She/her Founded: Catharsis Consulting, Developer Success Lab Neighborhood Cool Aunt of Science

mastodon.social

@grimalkina@mastodon.social

Psychologist for the humans of tech. Evidence strategy for technical teams Co-host at Change, Technically: https://www. changetechnically.fyi/ Author: Psychology of Software Teams (CRC Press, coming 2026) Seizing the means of scientific production. Quant Psych PhD (but with a love for qual). Chronically underpublished. She/her Founded: Catharsis Consulting, Developer Success Lab Neighborhood Cool Aunt of Science

mastodon.social

@grimalkina@mastodon.social · Mar 01, 2026

You know what's funny to me is that qualitative methods ALSO kill people all the time (bad eyewitness interviews, horrible case reports re: foreign policy, arguably more bad qualitative stuff is being used in damaging ways than stats ever is) but we don't really see those as methods so we don't blame the methods like we do with stats.

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@grimalkina@mastodon.social

Psychologist for the humans of tech. Evidence strategy for technical teams Co-host at Change, Technically: https://www. changetechnically.fyi/ Author: Psychology of Software Teams (CRC Press, coming 2026) Seizing the means of scientific production. Quant Psych PhD (but with a love for qual). Chronically underpublished. She/her Founded: Catharsis Consulting, Developer Success Lab Neighborhood Cool Aunt of Science

mastodon.social

@grimalkina@mastodon.social

Psychologist for the humans of tech. Evidence strategy for technical teams Co-host at Change, Technically: https://www. changetechnically.fyi/ Author: Psychology of Software Teams (CRC Press, coming 2026) Seizing the means of scientific production. Quant Psych PhD (but with a love for qual). Chronically underpublished. She/her Founded: Catharsis Consulting, Developer Success Lab Neighborhood Cool Aunt of Science

mastodon.social

@grimalkina@mastodon.social · Feb 27, 2026

Here is a fun reason psychology is hard:

- making people more aware of stereotypes is usually REQUIRED on the way to intervene on them and reduce them

- but how we make people more aware of stereotypes can actually make them seem more common, and more socially shared, thereby making them stronger

Hardest science.

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@grimalkina@mastodon.social

Psychologist for the humans of tech. Evidence strategy for technical teams Co-host at Change, Technically: https://www. changetechnically.fyi/ Author: Psychology of Software Teams (CRC Press, coming 2026) Seizing the means of scientific production. Quant Psych PhD (but with a love for qual). Chronically underpublished. She/her Founded: Catharsis Consulting, Developer Success Lab Neighborhood Cool Aunt of Science

mastodon.social

@grimalkina@mastodon.social

Psychologist for the humans of tech. Evidence strategy for technical teams Co-host at Change, Technically: https://www. changetechnically.fyi/ Author: Psychology of Software Teams (CRC Press, coming 2026) Seizing the means of scientific production. Quant Psych PhD (but with a love for qual). Chronically underpublished. She/her Founded: Catharsis Consulting, Developer Success Lab Neighborhood Cool Aunt of Science

mastodon.social

@grimalkina@mastodon.social · Feb 27, 2026

I enjoy when using tech tools on my extremely femme-gendered hobby projects makes them feel out-of-genre important

What an interesting way to trigger some stereotype incongruence and realize how much "tech weight" we give things just by all these relatively shallow signifiers

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@grimalkina@mastodon.social

Psychologist for the humans of tech. Evidence strategy for technical teams Co-host at Change, Technically: https://www. changetechnically.fyi/ Author: Psychology of Software Teams (CRC Press, coming 2026) Seizing the means of scientific production. Quant Psych PhD (but with a love for qual). Chronically underpublished. She/her Founded: Catharsis Consulting, Developer Success Lab Neighborhood Cool Aunt of Science

mastodon.social

@grimalkina@mastodon.social

Psychologist for the humans of tech. Evidence strategy for technical teams Co-host at Change, Technically: https://www. changetechnically.fyi/ Author: Psychology of Software Teams (CRC Press, coming 2026) Seizing the means of scientific production. Quant Psych PhD (but with a love for qual). Chronically underpublished. She/her Founded: Catharsis Consulting, Developer Success Lab Neighborhood Cool Aunt of Science

mastodon.social

@grimalkina@mastodon.social · Feb 18, 2026

Kick me in the face if you must for this, I'm at peace with it. I took a risk and started talking on TikTok about harm reduction approaches in helping people who are using AI for their health use it better and with more evidence literacy. And the responses I've gotten from patients is amazing and really moving. You should see the private messages. People need help and I'm going to try to help in my areas of expertise.

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Parent @grimalkina@mastodon.social Open

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crazyeddie @crazyeddie@mastodon.social

@grimalkina@mastodon.social

Psychologist for the humans of tech. Evidence strategy for technical teams Co-host at Change, Technically: https://www. changetechnically.fyi/ Author: Psychology of Software Teams (CRC Press, coming 2026) Seizing the means of scientific production. Quant Psych PhD (but with a love for qual). Chronically underpublished. She/her Founded: Catharsis Consulting, Developer Success Lab Neighborhood Cool Aunt of Science

mastodon.social

@grimalkina@mastodon.social

Psychologist for the humans of tech. Evidence strategy for technical teams Co-host at Change, Technically: https://www. changetechnically.fyi/ Author: Psychology of Software Teams (CRC Press, coming 2026) Seizing the means of scientific production. Quant Psych PhD (but with a love for qual). Chronically underpublished. She/her Founded: Catharsis Consulting, Developer Success Lab Neighborhood Cool Aunt of Science

mastodon.social

@grimalkina@mastodon.social · Feb 16, 2026

I cannot express to you how little I care about how famous someone is, and how easy it is for me to immediately forget about them as soon as I observe how little they see me and mine as human. Be free.

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@grimalkina@mastodon.social

Psychologist for the humans of tech. Evidence strategy for technical teams Co-host at Change, Technically: https://www. changetechnically.fyi/ Author: Psychology of Software Teams (CRC Press, coming 2026) Seizing the means of scientific production. Quant Psych PhD (but with a love for qual). Chronically underpublished. She/her Founded: Catharsis Consulting, Developer Success Lab Neighborhood Cool Aunt of Science

mastodon.social

@grimalkina@mastodon.social

Psychologist for the humans of tech. Evidence strategy for technical teams Co-host at Change, Technically: https://www. changetechnically.fyi/ Author: Psychology of Software Teams (CRC Press, coming 2026) Seizing the means of scientific production. Quant Psych PhD (but with a love for qual). Chronically underpublished. She/her Founded: Catharsis Consulting, Developer Success Lab Neighborhood Cool Aunt of Science

mastodon.social

@grimalkina@mastodon.social · Feb 16, 2026

RE: @grimalkina@mastodon.social

Every time I post even a high level glancing comment like this, some response to it is like "obviously Cat is speaking of XX guy" and it's someone I have never heard of (sue me, I spent my training years in a PhD program doing social science not here) and I go look up the wikipedia entry about whoever and it's worse than I imagined

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Open ancestor post

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Greg Bell @ferrix@mastodon.online

@grimalkina@mastodon.social

Psychologist for the humans of tech. Evidence strategy for technical teams Co-host at Change, Technically: https://www. changetechnically.fyi/ Author: Psychology of Software Teams (CRC Press, coming 2026) Seizing the means of scientific production. Quant Psych PhD (but with a love for qual). Chronically underpublished. She/her Founded: Catharsis Consulting, Developer Success Lab Neighborhood Cool Aunt of Science

mastodon.social

@grimalkina@mastodon.social

Psychologist for the humans of tech. Evidence strategy for technical teams Co-host at Change, Technically: https://www. changetechnically.fyi/ Author: Psychology of Software Teams (CRC Press, coming 2026) Seizing the means of scientific production. Quant Psych PhD (but with a love for qual). Chronically underpublished. She/her Founded: Catharsis Consulting, Developer Success Lab Neighborhood Cool Aunt of Science

mastodon.social

@grimalkina@mastodon.social · Dec 11, 2025

The number one place I think about this type of reasoning being used was when the US was arguing against public education as a concept. Poverty is an exceptionally strong predictor of outcomes; so people said, why should we waste our time and money letting poor children go to school? This might seem absurd to us now but it was a very serious, very influential argument That was immediately disproven by the fact that EDUCATION INTERVENES ON POVERTY

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Greg Bell @ferrix@mastodon.online

@grimalkina@mastodon.social

Psychologist for the humans of tech. Evidence strategy for technical teams Co-host at Change, Technically: https://www. changetechnically.fyi/ Author: Psychology of Software Teams (CRC Press, coming 2026) Seizing the means of scientific production. Quant Psych PhD (but with a love for qual). Chronically underpublished. She/her Founded: Catharsis Consulting, Developer Success Lab Neighborhood Cool Aunt of Science

mastodon.social

@grimalkina@mastodon.social

Psychologist for the humans of tech. Evidence strategy for technical teams Co-host at Change, Technically: https://www. changetechnically.fyi/ Author: Psychology of Software Teams (CRC Press, coming 2026) Seizing the means of scientific production. Quant Psych PhD (but with a love for qual). Chronically underpublished. She/her Founded: Catharsis Consulting, Developer Success Lab Neighborhood Cool Aunt of Science

mastodon.social

@grimalkina@mastodon.social · Nov 29, 2025

Beginning to realize just how much "achievement is not ability" is a well known truism in psychology but perhaps not in tech 😬

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Darby Lines @angry_drunk@union.place

@grimalkina@mastodon.social

Psychologist for the humans of tech. Evidence strategy for technical teams Co-host at Change, Technically: https://www. changetechnically.fyi/ Author: Psychology of Software Teams (CRC Press, coming 2026) Seizing the means of scientific production. Quant Psych PhD (but with a love for qual). Chronically underpublished. She/her Founded: Catharsis Consulting, Developer Success Lab Neighborhood Cool Aunt of Science

mastodon.social

@grimalkina@mastodon.social

Psychologist for the humans of tech. Evidence strategy for technical teams Co-host at Change, Technically: https://www. changetechnically.fyi/ Author: Psychology of Software Teams (CRC Press, coming 2026) Seizing the means of scientific production. Quant Psych PhD (but with a love for qual). Chronically underpublished. She/her Founded: Catharsis Consulting, Developer Success Lab Neighborhood Cool Aunt of Science

mastodon.social

@grimalkina@mastodon.social · Nov 24, 2025

There actually has not been enough reflection in the tech community about DOGE

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