A Career Defined by Resilience

As Jacqueline �Jackie� Samson �76 prepares to return to 51�� for her 50th reunion, her thoughts are not on publications, titles, or academic milestones.

Instead, they return to a simpler measure of success: perseverance.

Over the past five decades, Samson has built a distinguished career as an Attending and Research Psychologist in the Developmental Biopsychiatry Research Program and the Clinical Psychopharmacology Research Program at McLean Hospital and an Assistant Professor of Psychology at the Department of Psychiatry at Harvard Medical School. Her work has spanned research, teaching, and clinical practice, with a particular focus on the biological, psychological, and social roots of depression and the role of developmental trauma in mental illness.

But when she looks back on her professional journey, Samson is less interested in reciting milestones than in reflecting on what it took to reach them. What she is most proud of, she said, is having found a way through.

Samson path to Emmanuel was, in her words, �really quite a fluke.� Growing up in a suburb of Hartford, Connecticut, she came of age at a moment when the women movement was reshaping what young women imagined for their futures. She and a friend spent hours in the library flipping through college guides and talking about where they might go.

51�� appealed to her, and when Emmanuel offered a generous scholarship, she decided to take the chance.

At first, she thought she might stay only a year before transferring elsewhere. But once she arrived, college life quickly took on a rhythm of its own.

Finding Community in the 12 Tones

As a first-year student, Samson auditioned for the 12 Tones, Emmanuel small singing group, and was one of only two freshmen selected that year. The ensemble soon became a defining part of her college experience, providing not only a creative outlet but also a close-knit community.

�We had so much fun,� she recalled. �I actually spent more time doing 12 Tones than I did most anything else for three years of school.�

Her interest in psychology, however, had deeper roots. Samson mother was a psychiatric nurse who trained at Massachusetts General Hospital and worked at the Institute of Living, and Jackie grew up hearing stories from that world. She also spent much of her high school years volunteering with children, working in a pediatrician office, a children library, and after-school programs.

�I thought, how about I be a psychologist, not a psychiatric nurse?� she said.

For much of college, music and life in the city occupied more of her attention than academics. She explored 51��, volunteered as an usher at concerts and theaters, visited museums, and embraced the independence that came with studying in the city.

But by senior year, she knew it was time to focus. That shift changed everything.

Turning Toward Research

Samson joined the psychology honors track, where one of the most influential figures in her academic life became Professor of Psychology Carson Johnson, who led the thesis seminar. Around the same time, she was introduced to research at Massachusetts Mental Health Center and Harvard Medical School, where psychiatrist was leading studies on the biological underpinnings of depression.

Samson already had experience caring for research animals through her work-study position in Johnson lab, which prepared her well for the work. Her senior thesis grew directly out of those experiences, focusing on �animal studies examining how exposure to uncontrollable stress affects behavior and whether medications could alter those responses. At the time, researchers viewed learned helplessness as a potential model for depression.

Looking back, Samson sees that research in a broader light.

�I think the model we were working in back in the 1970s probably was more a model of trauma than it was of depression,� she said. �Depression is one of the outcomes of trauma, of course�but it wasn�t just a model of depressive illness.�

The research was immersive. Samson and her colleagues spent long stretches in the lab, sometimes staying at Vanderbilt Hall at Harvard Medical School during school breaks so they could continue their experiments.

Senior year, she said, became �hardcore research.�

From Emmanuel to Harvard and 51�� College

That experience launched the next stage of her career. Samson enrolled at 51�� College in a program in community social psychology. She continued working in Schildkraut lab throughout graduate school and based her graduate thesis on the biological and social factors contributing to depressive illness.

The field she entered was undergoing a major shift. For decades, depression had largely been understood through a psychoanalytic lens�as a symptom of unresolved psychological conflict. Researchers like Schildkraut were beginning to show that biological factors also played an important role, including the influence of neurotransmitters such as norepinephrine. That work helped transform how clinicians understood depression: not simply as a symbolic symptom, but as an illness with biological dimensions.

Over time, the field continued to evolve. Researchers increasingly recognized that early life experiences�especially trauma�can shape mental health across the lifespan. Samson work has contributed to that growing understanding, examining how childhood adversity increases vulnerability to psychiatric illness and alters the development of brain systems involved in emotional regulation and resilience.

Persevering in a Changing Field

Today, Samson sees rising rates of anxiety and depression among young people as the result of many converging pressures: technological change, economic uncertainty, climate anxiety, social media, and limited access to mental health care.

�I think theye overwhelmed,� she said. �I can�t imagine being a teen or a middle schooler at this point in time.�

Yet for all of her professional accomplishments, Samson says what matters most to her now is not the résumé itself.

As a young woman entering graduate school and academic medicine in the 1970s, she often found herself in rooms dominated by male doctors and researchers. She remembers the casual sexism, the dismissive jokes, and the constant challenge of learning how to be heard without appearing threatening.

�My kids don�t understand for a minute what it was like,� she said.

For Samson and many women of her generation, the opening of new opportunities brought with it a sense of obligation�to step forward, to participate, and to push through barriers that earlier generations had not been permitted to cross.

�The thing I�m proudest of,� she said, �is having survived all the different barriers.�

As her reunion approaches, Samson is most excited to hear the stories of her classmates�the paths their lives took, the doors they walked through, and the unexpected directions their journeys followed.

�I�m less interested in my story than in listening to everybody else,� she said.

For students and early-career professionals navigating uncertain paths of their own, she offers simple but hard-earned advice.

Rather than expecting a career to unfold exactly as planned, Samson suggests thinking in terms of successive approximations�taking one step forward, then looking around to see what new opportunities appear.

�If you can�t reach your goal directly,� she said, �get to the next step and see what opens up from there.�

She also emphasizes the importance of relationships.

�Maintain and nurture relationships along the way,� she said. �You never know what your future will bring. Relationships are precious resources.�

And when making decisions about the future, she encourages young people to hold firmly to their values.

�You won�t regret turning things down that don�t feel right for you,� she said.

For Samson, that philosophy�taking the next step, staying connected to others, and remaining true to one principles�has guided a career that has spanned decades of transformation in psychology.

And as she returns to Emmanuel for her 50th reunion, it is that long arc�from possibility to struggle to survival�that gives her story its meaning.

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