Faculty
The Chandrika and Ranjan Tandon Professor of Psychology Laurie Santos [website]
Laurie is the director of the Comparative Cognition Laboratory and the Canine Cognition Center at Yale. She received her A.B. in Psychology and Biology from Harvard University in 1997 and her Ph.D. in Psychology from Harvard in 2003.
Lab Manager
Madeline Meade
Madeline graduated from Yale University with a B.S. in Ecology & Evolutionary Biology in the winter of 2022. She discovered her interest in social cognition through her undergraduate research with the lab on non-human primate theory of mind. As a center manager, she is interested in exploring standardized, multispecies cognitive studies and the impact of individual variation on cognitive abilites.
Graduate Students
Zach Silver
Zachary Silver is interested in how nonhuman animals learn from and about human agents. His research explores how dogs and other canid species use observed behavior to socially evaluate humans along serveral dimensions including morality, competence, and social rank. Zachary is also interested in the effects of formal training on sociocognitive development. Prior to beginning his work at Yale, Zachary graduated from Illinois Wesleyan University with a B.A. in Psychology and Music.
Amanda Royka
Amanda studies how humans and non-human primates infer and reason about the goals of other agents. Her work with humans focuses on how we infer communicative goals and create novel communicative signals based on recursive mental state inferences. Amanda also studies what representations underpin action prediction in non-human primates. Amanda graduated from Yale College with a B.S. in Cognitive Science in 2018, and received her Masters in Evolutionary Biology from Queen Mary University of London and her masters in Linguistics from the University of Edinburgh.
Alumni
Emily Richards (YC 2021, Lab Manager: 2021-2023)
Daniel Horschler (Postdoctoral Fellow, 2021-2023)
Alyssa Arre (Lab Manager: 2015-2017, Ph.D. 2017-2021)
Justine Aw (YC 2005)
Melissa Baranay (YC 2011, Lab Manager: 2011-2012)
Jennifer Barnes (YC 2006, Ph.D.: 2007-2012)
Moshe Shay Ben-Haim (Post-Doc, 2018-2019)
Marcela Benitez (YC 2007, Lab Manager: 2007-2008)
Michael Bogese (YC 2014, Lab Manager: 2015-2018)
Louisa Egan Brad (Ph.D.: 2003-2008)
Nick Buttrick (YC 2008, Lab Manager: 2008-2011)
Linda Chang (YC 2012, Lab Manager: 2012-2015)
Erik Cheries (Ph.D.: 2002-2007)
Paul Cohen (YC 2013)
Molly Crossman (Ph.D. 2013-2019)
Lindsey Drayton (Ph.D.: 2011-2017)
Brian Edwards (YC 2008)
Jonathan Flombaum (Ph.D.: 2003-2008)
Ellen Furlong (Post-Doc: 2010-2013)
Courtney Glavis-Bloom (YC 2004)
Liz Gunderson (YC 2005)
Kelly Hughes (Ph.D.: 2007-2012)
Yiyun Huang (Lab Manager: 2018-2020)
Angie Johnston (Ph.D.: 2012-2018; Post-Doc: 2018-2019)
Matthew Jordan (Ph.D.: 2013-2019)
Venkat Lakshminarayanan (YC 2007, Ph.D.: 2007-2012)
Kristi Leimgruber (Ph.D.: 2009-2014)
Derek Lyons (Ph.D.: 2004-2008)
Drew Marticorena (YC 2008)
Alia Martin (Ph.D.: 2009-2014)
Katie McAuliffe (Post-Doc: 2013-2015)
Dakota McCoy (YC 2013)
Koleen McCrink (Ph.D.: 2002-2007)
Cora Mukerji (YC 2011)
George Newman (Ph.D.: 2004-2008)
Webb Phillips (Ph.D.: 2005-2010)
Albert Powers (YC 2004)
Alexandra Rosati (Post-Doc: 2013-2015)
Ben Rottman (Ph.D.: 2006-2011)
April Ruiz (YC 2005, Post-Doc: 2009-2011)
Cecilia Sanchez (YC 2013)
Adena Schachner (YC 2006)
Maya Shankar (YC 2007)
Alex Shaw (Ph.D.: 2008-2013)
Mark Sheskin (Ph.D.: 2007-2013)
Amy Skerry (YC 2010)
Meg Sosnowski (YC 2013)
Ellen Stumph (Lab Manager: 2019-2021)
Mariko (Yamaguchi) Moher (YC 2005)