Principal investigator

Randy Jamieson is a cognitive scientist who uses experimental and computational methods to investigate how people and other animals learn, remember, think, and know. He is particularly interested in the problems of implicit learning, associative learning, memory, knowledge representation, and translating discoveries in those domains to the design of cognitive technologies. He is Editor-in-Chief of the Canadian Journal of Experimental Psychology, a member of the Discovery Grants Evaluation Group at the Natural Science and Engineering Research Council of Canada, and CSBBCS Representative on the Canadian Psychological Association's Board of Directors. He has previously served as President of the Canadian Society for Brain, Behaviour, and Cognitive Science, President of the Society for Computers in Psychology, Chair of the Brain and Cognitive Science Section of the Canadian Psychological Association, Associate Editor for the Canadian Journal of Experimental Psychology, and both Acting Head and Acting Associate Head (Graduate) in the Department of Psychology.

Current lab members

Matt Cook is a PhD student interested in natural language processing and cognitive computing. His Honours work focused on a computational analysis of Type 1 and Type 2 error rates associated with statistical procedures and assumption violations. His Masters work focused on natural language processing and diagnosis of depression. His PhD work applies large-scale semantic modelling to big data problems in both clinical and social psychology. He has won a number of awards for his research including the John Castellan Student Paper Award from the Society for Computers in Psychology, the Peter Graf Award from the Brain and Cognitive Section of the Canadian Psychological Association, the Kenneth Dion Award from the Social and Personality Section of the Canadian Psychological Association, and a Canadian Psychological Association Certificate of Excellence for his Masters thesis. His work has been funded by NSERC along the way.
Brad Smith is a PhD student who completed his undergraduate work in Dr. John Vokey's Micro-Cognition Laboratory at the University of Lethbridge. His Honours work focused on the perception of differences from a statistical point of view. His Masters work focused on developing an instance-based account of associative learning. His PhD work is focused on understanding the mechanisms and structures that give rise to behaviours associated with the study of mental organization in learning and memory. His work has been funded by NSERC along the way.
Jackie Spear is a Masters student interested in recognition memory, mental representation, and distinctiveness. Her Honours work focused on the production effect in recognition memory.  Her Masters work is focused on developing a rigorous mathematical theory of distinctiveness and recognition memory. She worked for a time as a research assistant in Dr. Murray Singer's Psycholinguistics Laboratory.
  •  Singer, M., Solar, K. G., & Spear, J. (2017). Validating presupposed versus focused text information. Memory & Cognition, 45, 456-479.
  • Curtis, E. T., Chubala, C. M., Spear, J., Jamieson, R. K., Hockley, W. E., & Crump, M. J. C. (2016). False recognition of instruction-set lures. Memory, 24, 32-43.
  • Singer, M., Solar, K. G., & Spear, J. (2015). Validating given versus new discourse information. Canadian Journal of Experimental Psychology, 69, 350.
  • Singer, M., & Spear, J. (2015). Phantom recollection of bridging and elaborative inferences. Discourse Processes, 52, 356-375.
  • ​Jamieson, R. K., & Spear, J. (2014). The offline production effect. Canadian Journal of Experimental Psychology, 68, 20-28. 
Stefaniia Martsynkevych is an Honours student interested in the relationship between mental health and cognitive function.
Katie Davies is an Honours student interested in UXP and human computer interaction

Lab alumni

Essence Perera was an undergraduate student who helped to collect experimental data on contingency learning.

Matt Slusky was an undergraduate student who helped to collect experimental data on a number of projects.
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Anna Polyvyanna was an undergraduate student who helped to collect experimental data related to recognition memory.
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Michelle Crease-Lark was a visiting PhD student from University of British Columbia who worked on problems related to prospective memory. She completed her PhD in 2019 and is now teaching psychology courses at the University of Winnipeg.

Lisa Tarnowski completed her Honours on semantic modelling and language classification related to depression and anxiety.

​Chelsea Matsumoto completed her Honours on embodiment, robotics, and cognition.

​Evan Curtis completed his Honours in 2010 on audition and artificial grammar learning and his PhD in 2017 on selective memory impairment in amnesia. He won the W. N. Ten Have Award for his Honours Thesis and a CPA Award of Excellence for this PhD Thesis. He is now an Assistant Professor at Booth University College.

Chrissy Chubala completed her PhD in 2017 on group function learning.  She went on as a postdoctoral researcher at the Memorial University of Newfoundland and is now a Defense Scientist in Maritime Decision Support.

Robert Collins was a visiting PhD student from McMaster University who worked on problems related to learning and recognition memory. He finished his PhD in 2018 and is now a Defense Scientist at Defense Research and Development Canada.

Mikayla Preete completed her honours thesis in 2017 on developing a model for visual semantics. She went on to complete a postgraduate degree computer science at the University of British Columbia and is now a Interaction Designer/Developer for Farm Credit Canada.

Mitch Cunningham is a philosophy student who won an Undergraduate Student Research Award to work on knowledge representation in humans and machines

Adam Hawkeye completed his Honours thesis in 2015 on modality effects in artificial grammar learning.  He is now pursuing a graduate career in accounting.

Rory Waisman completed his honours thesis in 2017 that compared the quality of data collected using on-line versus in-lab procedures. He is now in the business program at the University of Alberta

Brian Hauri completed an Undergraduate Student Research Award award in 2009, his honours thesis in 2010 on unconscious decision making, and his MA in 2013 on symmetry and pattern processing

​Andrew Gabel completed his honours thesis in 2015 on the list-length effect in recognition memory. 

Alexa Yakubovich completed an Undergraduate Student Research Award and her honours thesis in 2013, both on the illusion of truth. Her thesis won the Ten Have Award for Best Thesis in Psychology. She is now a Rhodes Scholar pursuing a PhD at the University of Oxford

Thomas Toles completed an Undergraduate Student Research Award and his honours thesis in 2013, both on the illusion of truth. His thesis won a CPA Certificate of Excellence. He won a Rhodes Scholarship and is now participating in theatre.

Nigel Daly completed his honours thesis in 2012 on decision making in relation to climate change

Chris Cadonic completed his honours thesis in 2012 on implicit learning. He went on to pursue a graduate degree in Biological Engineering and is now a Machine Learner for BOLDCommerce.com 

Scott Bridgeman completed his honours thesis in 2010 on serial recall

Julianna Hurley completed her honours thesis in 2010 on decision making and gambling. She went on to pursue a career in social work

Uliana Nevzorova completed an Undergraduate Student Research Award and her honours thesis in 2010, both on artificial grammar learning. Her thesis won a CPA Award of Excellence. She is now a practicing clinical psychologist

Courtney O'Brien completed her honours thesis in 2009 on the relationship between classification and recognition. She is now a Youth Care Worker at Knowles Centre. 

Signy Holmes completed her honours thesis in 2009 on implicit learning and amnesia. Her thesis won a CPA Award of Excellence and the Ten Have Award for Best Thesis in Psychology. Signy went on to pursue a degree in medicine and is now a neuroradiologist

Anthony Pranata completed his honours thesis in 2008 on the relationship between classification and recognition. His thesis won a CPA Award of Excellence. He is now practicing law in Calgary

Our collaborators

Scott Allen (University of Lethbridge)
Harinder Aujla (University of Winnipeg)
Glen Bodner (Flinders University)
Chrissy Chubala (Defence Research and Development Canada · Maritime Decision Support)
Robert Collins (Defence Research and Development Canada · Toronto)
Matt Crump (Brooklyn College)
​Evan Curtis (Booth University College)
Peter Graf (University of British Columbia)
Sam Hannah (Capilano University)
Bill Hockley (Wilfrid Laurier University)
Brendan Johns (McGill University)
Mike Jones (Indiana University)
Bruce Milliken (McMaster University)
​Penny Pexman (University of Calgary)
Rachel Searston (University of Adelaide)
Jason Tangen (University of Queensland)
Debra Titone (McGill University)
John Vokey (University of Lethbridge)