Rate My Professor Francesca Filbey

Francesca Filbey is the Bert Moore Chair in BrainHealth and Professor in the Department of Psychology at The University of Texas at Dallas, where she also serves as Senior Associate Provost since 2024 and previously as Associate Provost from 2018 to 2024. She earned a PhD in Experimental Neuropsychology from the Institute of Psychiatry, King’s College London in 2002, an MS in Applied Cognition and Neuroscience from the University of Texas at Dallas in 1997, a BA in Psychology from the University of Texas at Arlington in 1995, and completed a postdoctoral fellowship in neuroimaging at the National Institute of Mental Health in 2005. Her professional appointments include Area Head of Cognition and Neuroscience in the School of Behavioral and Brain Sciences from 2017 to 2018, Associate Professor from 2013 to 2018, and Assistant Professor from 2010 to 2013 at UT Dallas; Assistant Professor of Translational Neuroscience at The Mind Research Network from 2007 to 2010; Research Assistant Professor at the University of New Mexico and University of Colorado Boulder; and earlier research assistant positions at the Institute of Psychiatry and Dallas Veterans Affairs Medical Center.

Dr. Filbey's research interests center on the cognitive neuroscience of addiction, utilizing multimodal neuroimaging techniques, genetics, and computational modeling to characterize reward system dysfunction in substance use disorders such as cannabis and alcohol dependence, as well as in obesity. She directs the Neuroimaging of Reward Dynamics Lab at the Center for BrainHealth. Key publications include "Long-term effects of marijuana use on the brain" (Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 2014), "Marijuana craving in the brain" (Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 2009), "A baseline for the multivariate comparison of resting-state networks" (Frontiers in Systems Neuroscience, 2011), "Interactions between cannabis use and chronic pain on sleep architecture" (Neurotherapeutics, 2025), and "The Intersectionality of Cannabis Use and Depression Symptoms on Functional Brain Topology in Adults" (Drug and Alcohol Dependence, 2026). Major awards and honors encompass Elected Fellow of the American College of Neuropsychopharmacology (2024), multiple Recognition of Outstanding Achievements in Research (ROAR) awards from UT Dallas Office of Research and Innovation (2022-2025), Bert Moore Endowed Chair in BrainHealth (2015), Elected Board of Directors Member of the College on Problems of Drug Dependence (2021), and various NIDA travel and training awards. Her scholarship, cited over 8,700 times per Google Scholar, advances understanding of neurobiological mechanisms for prevention and intervention in addictive disorders.