Deirdre Stockdill is a rising Senior at Skidmore College were she is majoring Neuroscience and Chemistry. For the past three years, she has been conducting research on the effects of 3,4-methylenedioxymethamphetamine (MDMA), a known empathogen, on helping behavior in rats in the Lopéz lab. As an Amgen Scholar, she has begun working in the Izquierdo lab exploring the effects of previous methamphetamine exposure on reversal learning in rats. Chronic psychostimulant misuse has been known to heighten feelings of paranoia and cause people to overestimate how volatile the world around them is. However, the causal link between psychostimulant misuse and its influence on how the user perceives an environment’s volatility has yet to be shown in preclinical models. To understand the neural mechanisms underlying this phenomenon and explore potential  reversals of it, behavioral models must first be established. Rats exposed to methamphetamine will undergo a behavioral task that tests their ability to integrate new information from changing environments into their decision making to optimize reward acquisition. Deirdre would like to thank Dr. Izquierdo for the opportunity to explore this project in her laboratory, as well as PhD candidate Miriam Ortega for her mentorship in the lab throughout the Amgen program. Deirdre would also like to thank Dr. Hassan Lopéz at Skidmore College for his mentorship and guidance throughout the past three years.