Our Team

Principal Investigator

Signy Sheldon.jpg

Dr. Signy Sheldon

associate professor

Department of Psychology, McGill University

Canada Research Chair in Cognitive Neuroscience of Memory

2014 Post-doctoral Research Fellow, Rotman Research Institute, Baycrest Centre for Geriatric Care, Toronto, ON, Canada
2011 Post-doctoral Research Fellow, Division of Neurosurgery, St. Michael’s Hospital, Toronto, ON, Canada
2011 Ph.D., Psychology, University of Toronto, Toronto, ON, Canada
2006 M.A., University of Toronto, Toronto, ON, Canada

Graduate Students

SYDNEY LAMBERT
PhD Student in Experimental Psychology
sydney.lambert[at]mail.mcgill.ca
My research interest focuses on the interaction between emotion and memory, particularly how affective states influence encoding, consolidation, and retrieval. I’m also interested in the role of neuromodulatory systems in memory enhancement and impairment, as well as how memory representations evolve over time through experience-driven schema updating.

LOUISE VAN DIJCK
MA Student in Experimental Psychology
louise.vandijck[at]mail.mcgill.ca
Hi! My name is Louise, and I am a visiting graduate student from Belgium. During my time in the lab, I will be working on a project examining how information provided about upcoming events shapes the encoding of event details and influences later recall. More broadly, I am interested in aging and memory, as well as memory disorders such as Alzheimer’s disease.

CHRISTIANE MARIE CANILLO
MA Student in Experimental Psychology
cm.canillo[at]mail.mcgill.ca
I am interested in two lines of work: (1) the impact of encoding goals on the details we remember, building on prior work conducted in the lab on goal reinstatement effects between memory at encoding and retrieval, and (2) how culture influences what we remember and the way this impacts how we communicate what and why we remember.

TYLER CALL
tyler.call[at]mail.mcgill.ca
Tyler Call is a research assistant in the Sheldon Memory Lab. He is analyzing post-encoding fMRI data from the Grammy project, investigating the relationship between post-encoding functional connectivity and subsequent recall performance. His research is primarily concerned with how certain experiences (e.g., bilingualism and musicianship) might modify brain structure and function in ways that provide resilience against age-related and pathological cognitive decline. He recently received a Master’s in Cognitive Science from Carleton University. Outside of the lab, he loves to make music, play baseball, boulder, run, and spend time with his partner and their 3 dogs.

MIKAILA TOMBE
MA Student in Experimental Psychology
mikaila.tombe[at]mail.mcgill.ca
I am interested in the intersection between music and event memories, as well as autobiographical memory. Under the co-supervision of Dr. Caroline Palmer my current research program focuses on how tempo evoked arousal impacts event memories in time and space.

SUSANNE SEVCIK
MA Student in Music Technology
susanne.sevcik[at]mail.mcgill.ca
My research looks at musical metaphors, or the way we describe sound through timbre semantics and how that may impact our memory for timbre. Specifically, I'm interested in how these descriptions may influence our short-term and working memory for music, as well as autobiographical memories evoked by music. My research is supervised by Stephen McAdams and I am grateful for the opportunity to collaborate with my friends in the memory lab and gain wonderful insights into memory research!

undergraduate students

ANNA BOGDAN
Hi! My name is Anna, and I am in my fourth year of my undergraduate degree majoring in psychology with a minor in interdisciplinary life sciences. This year, I will be continuing my NSERC project from over the summer with Mikaila on a study investigating the effects of music as an emotionally salient cue on the enhancement of memory, and the interpretation of visual art.

DENITSA TOSKOVA
Hi! My name’s Denitsa and I’m a U3 Psychology major with a double minor in behavioural science and sociology. I am currently a volunteer at the lab and am working with Sara on a study looking at memory recall flexibility and aging.

KIARA BRETON
Hi! My name is Kiara and I'm a U2 psychology major student with a double minor in behavioral science and communications. I am joining the lab as a research volunteer, and I'm currently working with Sara with her research on social anxiety.

SOFIA BALLARANO
Hi! My name is Sofia Ballarano, and I am a U3 undergraduate student in Honours Psychology with a minor in Anthropology. I will be continuing my Honours thesis research with support from an NSERC Undergraduate Student Research Award (USRA), exploring how music-evoked arousal influences temporal memory.

MAYA SCHMIDT
Hi! My name is Maya, and I am a U2 psychology major with a double minor in behavioural science and anthropology. This semester I will continue at the lab as a volunteer helping Christiane Marie with her project on encoding goals.

TARA VAN HEUSEN
Hey! My name is Tara Van Heusen, and I am entering my third year of my undergraduate studies with a degree in Psychology and a minor in Interdisciplinary Life Sciences. I am super excited to be working with Sydney's PUP and CRISP project and investigating how the different ways of remembering memories can evoke similar patterns in the brain!

LAUREN NORDSTROM
Hi! My name is Lauren Nordstrom, and I am a U3 psychology major with a double minor in behavioural sciences and sociology. This semester, I will be working on a project looking at the effects of titles and title congruency for artwork on memory and art appreciation.

SHAWN CHINIAH
Hello, my name is Shawn, I'm a U3 psychology major with a double minor in behavioral sciences and education. This year I will be staying with the lab as part as a research course. I am currently working with Christiane Marie on her Encoding Goals study.

EMILIE LEPINASSE
Hi! I’m a U3 Honours psychology student with a minor in philosophy. This year, I’m excited to be working with Christiane Marie on my honours thesis, which investigates cultural differences in autobiographical memory and the role of social goals during retrieval. More broadly, I’m also interested in the intersections of memory, identity, and clinical disorders.

SARA TOCA
Hi! My name is Sara, and I am a research assistant in the Sheldon Memory Lab. This year, I’m excited to be working on a project investigating schema updating through autobiographical memory rescripting.

ANAÏS CAUCHI
Hi! My name is Anaïs Cauchi and I’m an upcoming U2 Psychology major with a double minor in Philosophy and Behavioural Neuroscience! I’ll be helping Sara with data scoring in the lab’s FLAGE project examining changes in memory storage and retrieval through age.

ALICIA ZIBREIRA
Hi! My name is Alicia and I’m a U3 Psychology major with a double minor in Behavioural Science and Sociology. I am thrilled to be doing my independent research project this summer with the guidance of Louise. We are looking at how different implicit encoding strategies and pre-event misinformation can affect later recall of event details.

OUR MASCOT: THE COG DOG

Click here to contact us if you are interested in being part of our team

COLLABORATORS

At McGill

Jennifer Bartz
Veronique Bohbot
Caroline Palmer
Lesley Fellows
Ross Otto
Mathieu Roy
Madeleine Sharp
Nathan Spreng
Natasha Rajah

At Other Universities

Brian Levine (UofT)
Morris Moscovitch (UofT)
Mary Pat McAndrews (UofT)
Nicole Anderson (UofT)
Carrie Esopenko (Rutgers)
Daniela Palombo (UBC)
Jens Pruessner (Konstanz)
Shayna Rosenbaum (York University)
Stefan Kohler (Western)
Louis Renoult (East Anglia)

alumni

Graduate Students

Jamie Snytte
Azara Lalla
Charles Ferris
Can Fenerci
Lauri Gurguryan
Rebecca Scheurich
Sarah Peters
Marianne Lévesque (collaborator)
Cherie Strikwerda-Brown (collaborator)
Jonas Nitschke (collaborator)
Greta Melega (collaborator)
Olivia Zaborowska (collaborator)
Dorothee Shoemaker

Undergraduate Students

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