Developmental Science explores changes in language, cognition, social/emotional functioning, neuropsychology, behavioural development, and health from the prenatal period to adolescence. Our affiliated faculty also examine developmental trajectories and outcomes across the broader lifespan (e.g., later adulthood). Key developmental phenomena are viewed at multiple levels, ranging from sub-systems of genetics, neurobiology, physiology, and hormones, to families, schools, communities, and cultures.
Core Faculty Members
Johnson, Elizabeth
infant perception and cognition; language acquisition; speech perception; developmental psycholinguistics; early word recognition and comprehension.
Ganapathy-Coleman, Hemalatha
cultural differences in parenting values and beliefs; educational ethnotheory; socialization into religion and culture; qualitative and ethnographic methods.
Kamenetsky, Stuart
social development; exceptionality in human learning, disability and giftedness; cross-cultural psychology.
Malti, Tina
social-emotional development, child and adolescent mental health, intervention research, developmental and clinical child psychology.
Ronfard, Samuel
developmental psychology; cognitive development; conceptual development; social learning; culture and cognition.
Spiedel, Ruth
development of emotion regulation and empathy; emotion socialization in parent-child interactions; community research; evidence-based intervention strategies.
Vanden Bosch der Nederlanden, Christina
auditory developmental neuroscience; music; language; EEG; auditory scene analysis; attention; human development.
VanderLaan, Doug
gender and sexual orientation diversity; child and adolescent mental health; alloparenting; family and peer relationships; developmental psychology; cross-cultural psychology; evolutionary psychology; clinical psychology; neuroimaging.
Affiliated Faculty Members
Andersen, Judith
biopsychosocial health psychology; severe stress, mental and physical health; trauma, psychophysiology, LGBT health, posttraumatic stress disorder and chronic illness.
Chambers, Craig
cognitive science; psycholinguistics across the lifespan; spoken language comprehension.
Holmes, Melissa
behavioural neuroscience; neuroendocrinology; neuroplasticity; social behaviour; social status.
Monks, Ashley
sex differences, sexual development, hormones, testosterone, neuroanatomy, sexual behaviour, neuromuscular systems, Kennedy Disease/SBMA.