People

Director:

Jeffrey M. Spielberg – jmsp@udel.edu – CV

Dr. Spielberg is Assistant Professor of Clinical Science in the Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences at the University of Delaware. Dr. Spielberg completed his doctoral work in Clinical Psychology at the University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, followed by a postdoctoral fellowship in the Institute for Personality and Social Research (IPSR) and the Institute for Human Development (IHD) at the University of California, Berkeley. Before coming to UDel, Dr. Spielberg was Associate Director of Neuroimaging Analysis Development in the Neuroimaging Research for Veterans Center at VA Boston.

Co-Investigator:

Naomi Sadeh – nsadeh@udel.edu

Dr. Sadeh is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences at the University of Delaware. Her work tries to understands why people engage in risky, impulsive, and self-destructive behavior, with a special emphasis on elucidating how personality factors and sensitivity/ resiliency to life stress contributes to these harmful behaviors. She studies mental disorders in adulthood that are marked by severe self-regulation deficits (e.g., psychopathy, antisocial personality disorder, post-traumatic stress disorder, substance use disorders) and related public health problems (e.g., suicidal behavior, violence, substance use, criminal behavior). She collaborates with the lab on projects involving self-regulation.

Graduate Students:

Melanie Matyi – mmatyi@udel.edu

Melanie is a sixth year clinical graduate student in the CAD lab who is currently completing her clinical internship at the Baltimore VA. Before coming to UDel, she received her B.S. in Neuroscience at the University of Pittsburgh. Her research focuses on understanding how affective systems interact with other regulatory systems (i.e., emotion X cognition interactions) with the goal of identifying the ways in which these interactions go awry in mental illness.

Jeremy Rudoler – rudoler@udel.edu

Jeremy is a third year clinical graduate student in the CAD lab. Before coming to UD, Jeremy received his B.A. in neuroscience from the University of Pennsylvania, where he worked in the Center for Autism Research. Jeremy also worked as a research assistant for 3 years at the Stanford Cognitive and Systems Neuroscience Lab. His research interests include the neural mechanisms associated with maladaptive emotional symptoms and developing effective treatments for mood disorders.

Leah Church – lchurch@udel.edu

Leah is a second year clinical graduate student in the CAD lab. Before joining the CAD lab as a graduate student, she was our lab manager for two years. She graduated from Temple University, where she received her B.A. in Psychology with a minor in Cognitive Neuroscience. Her main research interests include internalizing disorders in children and adolescents as well as psychopathy and criminal behavior in adult populations.

Julia Merker – jmerker@udel.edu

Julia is a first year clinical graduate student in the CAD lab. Before joining the CAD lab, she worked as a research assistant in the Neurobiology of Fear lab at McLean Hostpital. She graduated from Tufts University, where she received her B.S. in Biopsychology. Her main research interests include  examining the neurobiological and endocrinological mechanisms underlying differences in the onset and maintenance of psychopathology.

Nadia Bounoua – nbounoua@udel.edu

Nadia is a seventh year clinical graduate student currently completing her clinical internship at the Medical University of South Carolina. Her primary advisor is Dr. Naomi Sadeh, and her research seeks to examine the interplay of environmental, neurobiological and affective mechanisms underlying risk-taking behaviors across the lifespan. She was awarded a three-year National Research Service Award, Individual Predoctoral (F31) Fellowship from the National Institute of Mental Health. Nadia is co-advised by Dr. Spielberg and collaborates with the lab’s ongoing research projects.

Lab Managers:

Leah Green – lwgreen@udel.edu

Leah started as one of our lab manager/postbacs in 2022, before which she graduated from William & Mary with a B.S. in Psychological Sciences. She is interested in understanding the development of psychopathology and how we can use this information to improve clinical assessments and prevention/intervention efforts.

Ruby Smith – rmsmith@udel.edu

Ruby began as one of our lab managers/postbacs in 2022, before which she graduated with B.A.’s in both Psychology and Writing, Rhetoric, and Communications from Transylvania University. She is interested in investigating the neural mechanisms that support second-language acquisition in adolescents, as well as investigating the brain networks involved in the development of internalizing disorders in adolescence. 

Undergraduate Students:

Lab Alumni:

Kaleigh Wieand was our lab manager for 2 years, before which she was an undergraduate RA in the lab for 3 years. She graduated from the University of Delaware with a B.S. in Neuroscience and minors in Spanish and Forensic Science. She is currently a Data Manager for PEDSNet at the Children’s Hospital of Pennsylvania.

Emily Heilner was an undergraduate RA in the CAD lab for two years. She graduated from UD with a B.S. in Neuroscience and a B.A. in Psychology. She is currently a postbac at the Laboratory for Healthy Minds at Yale University School of Medicine.

Samantha Rodriguez. Samantha was our lab manager for 1 year. She graduated from UD with a B.S. in Neuroscience and a B.A. in Sociology. She is currently in the Cognition, Brain, and Behavior program at The University of New Mexico studying neural networks related to decision-making, aggression, and callousness in violent offenders.

Frequent Collaborators:

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