Scott Barry Kaufman

The Amazing Dr. Scott

By Willow Bradford

Illustration by Audrey Wang

The first time the fantastical was bestowed upon me, I began by imagining the title of my favorite movie, per Kaufman’s instruction. Kaufman then proceeded to ask me a series of questions like “what is the first letter of the title” and “is the title of the movie one word or two words?” From there the weird turned weirder as he shifted from me to my friend. He asked her to take a wallet out of her pocket and open it. Inside the wallet lay a movie ticket for my favorite movie—Spirited Away. Beyond stunned, I needed to unpack his expedition through education and career, and further, the transformation from prospective opera singer to renowned psychology professor/author/mentalist/podcaster, and, of course, wielder of magic.

Every Barnard student is required to take a lab course to graduate; and in this shared academic hurdle, Introduction to Psychology has become one of the most popular options amongst students. But what many might not realize when signing up for the intro lecture is that psychology can be magical. Literally. More than a class about neural networks,operant conditioning, and brain plasticity, Professor Scott Barry Kaufman lectures on how mere mentalist tricks can deceive our minds. Or when Kaufman spoke at a convention in Texas about what it means to be neurodivergent, merging psychology and mentalism to expose that our hidden disabilities can be reinvented as strengths by changing our mindsets.

On July 8, 2026, Kaufman’s Leading for Tomorrow: Unlocking Human Potential in the Era of Continuous Change and Endless Possibility will be released, co-edited by Chris Shipley, the Silicon Guild, and Thinkers50. Many of his publications focus on the psychological dimension of creativity and intelligence, but where does the science end and the fantastical begin?

This interview has been edited and condensed for clarity.

…

The Blue and White: If you want to start off by giving an overview of your journey through psychology and where you went to school—I know you mentioned you went into college as an opera major.

Scott Kaufman: It was a very circuitous route for me, a very untraditional route to get to where I am today. As a kid, I wasn’t expected to graduate high school, I had an auditory learning disability when I was very young that made it difficult to process things. People thought I was really stupid. I fought my way to show my intelligence in some way. I was actually rejected from psychology when I applied to college so I went in through the backdoor, which was opera for me. I sang my heart out and was accepted on a partial scholarship, but once I got into Carnegie Mellon, I switched into psychology. I took a course my sophomore year on cognitive psychology and there was a section on human intelligence. I just fell in love with the mind and understanding what our potential is—what we could be as humans. For me as well, it made me rethink my narrative that I’m stupid. We’re not thinking of intelligence in the right way.

B&W: From [Carnegie Mellon], where you completed your undergraduate degree, where did you go?

SK: So for graduate school I got an embarrassment of riches, as the expression goes, and I got accepted into both Cambridge University in England under a Gates Scholarship and I received a scholarship at Yale for their PhD program. But back up a second, when in sophomore year I fell in love with cognitive psychology, I was reading the textbook and I looked to see who wrote the textbook and I saw it was Robert Sternberg at Yale and I made the decision in that moment—that’s where I want to go to study. I want to do everything I can to make that dream a reality. I did independent readings, I emailed him to ask if I could be his, essentially, water boy—his intern—for a summer. I recommend anyone who wants to get into graduate school to offer free services, because it really does help. So I got accepted to study with Robert Sternberg at Yale for my PhD and ultimately ended up doing both—I studied at Yale for one year and then I went to Cambridge and then I came back.

B&W: How were you introduced to mentalism? I know it’s a bit different than psychology.

SK: In 2009, I was teaching a course in Cognitive Psychology, my first job was a professor at NYU. I was teaching a course on human intelligence and cognitive psychology and I came across a mentalist called Derren Brown from England who had these advertiser executives try to come up with a new creative idea and he guessed exactly what it was and even drew the same thing. Showing even how advertising executives can be under the influence of external things, he then showed on their car ride over there he influenced everything in the background. I thought that was real, I was excited and showed that in my class. But then as the years went on, I went to see other mentalism shows-wait a minute is this B.S?—-and then I saw a show in Vegas called “The Mentalist” with Gerry McCambridge and he called me up and said “is there an S.K in the room?” and he guessed that I was working on a book, 

He said: “what are you afraid of, what’s holding you back?”

“I don’t know, my self-belief?”

“Nothing, Scott Barry Kaufman, nothing.”

B&W: That’s wild.

SK: It freaked me out and so I decided once and for all I would discover the secrets and I was gonna go down the rabbit hole. And down the rabbit hole I went! I joined these Facebook groups, I got mentors, became an apprentice at wizard school, and now I moonlight as a professional mentalist. I want to get a real show, but I do a lot of performing for my students and freak them out.

Did I ever directly guess something from you?

B&W: You did a trick where you guessed the song I was thinking of.

SK: Oh that’s right. I remember now. That definitely freaked you out.

B&W: Yes, but the website—I went there later and it didn’t work again. Maybe you’re the secret.

SK: The conduit.

The website mentioned by B&W was created by Kaufman through Columbia University, it scans brainwaves to predict what individuals are thinking of. 

B&W: So you chose to pursue mentalism because you wanted to figure out its secrets? Did you know you wanted to tie mentalism to psychology or find a way for it to help people?

SK: I did. I had and I still have a vision of mentalism where I leave people feeling inspired, the way “The Mentalist” left me. He actually gave me his magic bracelet and said “whenever you’re feeling any self-doubt, wear this bracelet and remember this conversation.” 

I just did a show over the weekend for 500 people about neurodiversion in Texas, it was for neurodivergent people. I did the show and part of the show is a routine I’ve been wanting to do for a while where I argue that a lot of our disabilities can actually be our strengths. I had someone come up and think of their hidden disability and then I guessed what it was. Sometimes we don’t realize the extent to which our abilities are not as hidden as we think they are—I read her mind and everyone freaked out. It was so fun.

B&W: I noticed you did an interview with Big Think in 2024, how much of a positive psychological impact do you think mentalism can have on people?

SK: It does emotionally affect people. You’re guessing someone’s childhood crush and various things that bring back memories, but I think the vision I have for it is something that is inspiring and leaves people seeing sides of themselves they kept hidden or haven’t accepted. I’m working on a show and I think it works. It worked over the weekend with character strengths.

B&W: How do you think mentalism is different from a motivational speaker?

SK: It’s very different—it’s entertainment first and foremost, you’re having a play with someone and it can get you in a state of wonder and awe. Is this shit really possible? I like showing people impossible things. It gets your brain expanded—show not tell—whereas motivational speakers will tell you how to be. Are you a fan of motivational speaking?

B&W: I haven’t attended many motivational speeches. If you count TedTalks—I’m a fan. On the opposite side, I know you said mentalism can have a positive impact, have you experienced any risks or have you had any negative experiences—I know you tend to do experiments with students—has there been a time when that’s gone awry?

SK: Not that I can think of. Where I have done something wrong or really freaked someone out to an extent to which—I can’t think of a situation, but I performed a magic trick with cards at the show [in Texas]. If it went right, everyone should have ended up with the same card in their pocket at the end, but one girl didn’t. She came up to me at the end and she said “I feel like a loser, what did I do wrong, why did everyone else get that card but I didn’t?” It made me think of how to handle that in the future because that’s never come up before. Lessons learned. I told her “you didn’t do anything wrong.” I don’t want to leave people thinking they failed in any way.

B&W: That’s an interesting thing because I was thinking about the point where mentalism devolves into manipulation, where you’re essentially using magic to influence what people are thinking and feeling about themselves; personally if it was exposed to me and someone told me “I was tricking your brain” I would feel betrayed. I wouldn’t want it to backfire.

SK: But that’s magic. Do you feel that way with all magic tricks?

B&W: I think magic is a different thing because it’s pulling a rabbit out of a hat, it’s not technically focused on your personal well-being in the sense that, perhaps at your conference, it more so was (personal that is). Do you think that there is a line between the two? How far would you go with mentalism?

SK: In what way? I want to make clear it is just entertainment. You have to be in that state of mind.

B&W: Right. 

SK: Derren Brown goes pretty far in his videos, I don’t know if I would do that unless it was in a TV special with written permissions—-he hypnotizes people and has people thinking they’re someone else. It’s fascinating but I don’t do that in everyday life. That’s a good line for me.

B&W: As a closing, what’s your favorite trick to perform?

SK: Well I really like to do the one where I tell people to think of their favorite movie and I guess their favorite movie. They then pull out of their wallet: the movie ticket.