While they have a relatively small following on campus, make no mistake: Tufts Mood Psychology is changing the media scene. This completely student-run organization focuses on making documentaries (in both English and Chinese) that connect the real lives of students to important psychological concepts. Episodes from their latest series, “Flash in My Life,” are screened in Barnum Hall regularly.
Maggie Zhang, club president and fourth-year combined degree student, explained the history of Mood Psychology and its reach to other colleges such as University of California, Berkeley, University of California, Los Angeles, Boston University, Boston College and Brandeis University.
“Mood Psychology is a huge [organization],” Zhang said. “It’s around the U.S., and it is organized and regulated by Chinese international students.”
According to junior Suci Li, the chair of Mood Psychology’s media department, their club is open to anyone “interested in [both] films and psychology and how they are integrated in our daily lives.”
As part of the club’s media department, Li oversees around 10 members who script, film and edit each episode. Each video goes through two main editing stages: a rough cut, where hours of footage are narrowed down to about 20 minutes, and a final cut, where special effects and music are added to polish up each episode.
While the club predominately consists of Chinese international students, they have recently begun to make content in English to appeal to a broader demographic of Tufts students.
“Our club mainly started with making Chinese content, but right now, in order to be attached to more of our Tufts community, we’re switching to English programs,” Li said.
Despite being a relatively small club on campus, Mood Psychology has garnered some publicity internationally through its Chinese episodes.
“We’ve published around nine episodes right now, and we’ve reached about … 100,000 views on Chinese social media,” Zhang said.
To publish their content in the past, Mood Psychology has solely used Bilibili, a popular streaming platform in China; however, they are currently trying to expand onto YouTube as well.
“[Bilbili is] pretty accessible, but I’m aware that most non-Chinese speakers don’t use that platform,” Li said. “So, right now we are transferring our content [and] videos onto YouTube and other English-user platforms.”
Despite its success, Mood Psychology remains unrecognized by the Tufts Community Union Senate as a JumboLife student organization and therefore receives no funding from TCU. All expenses, from camera equipment to presenting the episodes at their screenings in Barnum, come from its members’ wallets.
“It would be really great if we [had] some [funding],” Li said. “[Zhang] spends hundreds of bucks on each video, just publishing them and then advertising them, and then buying snacks for our members and our screening events.”
Junior Virginia Jiang, who double-majors in psychology and film and media studies and serves as Mood Psychology’s vice president, seconded this sentiment.
“We only have one camera, [Zhang’s] camera. It would be good to have more professional equipment so we can have different projects going on at the same time,” she said.
So, how would funding from TCU benefit a club like Tufts Mood Psychology?
“First, we will definitely invest in our filming, because we’re inviting guests, so we do need to provide some sets, props or even snacks,” Li said.
Furthermore, as the club puts out more episodes, Zhang feels that funding would make the club “confident to invite more professional people” including “professors from different areas” instead of just friends and peers.
“If we have funding, we’ll have more opportunities and more possibilities to make a more professional team,” Jiang said.
Yet, this lack of funding doesn’t slow the club down when it comes to their content.
“For our members, … their motivation is to produce better content,” Jiang said.
In this past year, the club has grown in size — what started off as a few handfuls of people has now grown into 30 active members taking part in the filmmaking process.
“Most of our club members are really active,” Li said. “We spend a lot of time just putting our effort into making work that we find to be meaningful, and I believe most of our club members really enjoy the process.”
Zhang said that hearing members say that Mood Psychology “feels like a home” reminds her that the club is doing something meaningful, which is truly rewarding.
When asked the same question — her favorite moment in the club — Jiang’s answer was equally heartwarming.
“[My favorite moment was] the first time I shot the episode that I directed myself. … I could see the audience really enjoyed this episode,” Jiang said.
Mood Psychology is not just another club at Tufts, it’s a reminder that psychology is everywhere, in the stories we tell and the people we meet. For those interested in the intersection of media and psychology, this club is an excellent creative outlet.
