LaB Director
Our
Team
Todd Cunningham
Todd is a faculty member in the Applied Psychology and Human Development department of the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education at the University of Toronto. He completed his Postdoctoral Fellowship at the Hospital for Sick Children after earning a Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology from the University of Toronto. His area of expertise is adaptive educational technology, specifically the circumvention of students’ academic weaknesses to help them better attain and retain knowledge.
Our
Team
LaB Director
Todd Cunningham PhD C.Psych
Todd is a faculty member in the Applied Psychology and Human Development department of the Ontario Institute for Studies in Education at the University of Toronto. He completed his Postdoctoral Fellowship at the Hospital for Sick Children after earning a Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology from the University of Toronto. His area of expertise is adaptive educational technology, specifically the circumvention of students’ academic weaknesses to help them better attain and retain knowledge.
LaB Director
Graduate Students
Bronwyn Lamond MA OCT
Current Program
PhD 3rd Year
School and Clinical Child Psychology
Previous Education
MA in School and Clinical Child Psychology from OISE
MA in Child Study and Education from OISE
BSc. in Honours Specialization Psychology from Western University
Research Interests
Bronwyn's research focuses on student and teacher perceptions of assistive technology. She is particularly interested in the barriers to assistive technology integration into classrooms.
Contact her at bronwyn.lamond@mail.utoronto.ca
Harrison McNaughtan MA
Current Program
PhD 2nd Year
School and Clinical Child Psychology
Previous Education
MA in School and Clinical Child Psychology from OISE
MA in Developmental Psychology and Education from OISE
BScH in Psychology from Queen's University
Research Interests
Harrison's research in the past has focused on adolescents and emerging adults with Autism and how they understand romance and signal consent. Moving forward, Harrison's research will focus on validating the Hypothesis-Driven Integrated Psychological Assessment method for psychological assessments in the context of education.
Contact him at h.mcnaughtan@mail.utoronto.ca
Francis Wall MA
Current Program
PhD 2nd Year
School and Clinical Child Psychology
Previous Education
MA in School and Clinical Child Psychology from OISE
BScH in Psychology from University of Toronto Scarborough
Research Interests
Francis is currently exploring how learning to use assistive technology can influence the mental exertion, or cognitive load students experience in school. To better understand how assistive technology can reduce student cognitive load, he is also studying new ways to measure cognitive load using only the camera from a personal mobile device.
Contact him at francis.wall@mail.utoronto.ca
Emily Staffiere MA
Current Program
PhD 1st Year
School and Clinical Child Psychology
Previous Education
BScH in Psychology from Wilfrid Laurier University
Research Interests
Emily’s research examines the effectiveness of typing interventions on quality of written expression for students with learning disabilities in the area of writing. She is interested in developing an appropriate typing measure that will be used in the evaluation of various keyboarding programs that aim to teach typing skills to students.
Contact her at emily.staffiere@mail.utoronto.ca
Andrea Zians MA
Current Program
PhD 3rd Year
Developmental Psychology and Education
Previous Education
MA in Psychology from OISE
BA in Psychology from Yeshiva University
Research Interests
Andrea's research focuses on how accommodations and assistive technology support students with disabilities in the post-secondary setting. She am interested in understanding the variables that lead to successful engagement with the supports and services provided by post-secondary institutions.
Contact her at andrea.zians@mail.utoronto.ca
Damian Page BA
Current Program
MA 2nd Year
School and Clinical Child Psychology
Previous Education
BA Honours in Psychology from the University of Victoria
Research Interests
Damian's research focuses on exploring factors that affect the early identification of emerging mental health disorders in children. Specifically, he is interested in the role educators play in identifying problem behaviours indicative of inchoate psychopathologies.
Contact him at damian.page@mail.utoronto.ca
Lisa Phyllis MA
Current Program
PhD 5th Year
Developmental Psychology and Education
Previous Education
MA in Child Studies from Ryerson University
Research Interests
Lisa's research is focused on improving educational equality for children labelled with special education needs.
Contact her at lisa.phyllis@mail.utoronto.ca
Kunio Hessel MSC
Current Program
MA 1st Year
School and Clinical Child Psychology
Previous Education
MSc in Psychology from The University of Western Ontario
BCogSci(H) in Cognitive Science from Carleton University
Research Interests
Kunio's previous research has focused on moral and cognitive development, as well as bullying. He is currently developing a project to investigate the school engagement of refugee youth in Canada, and hopes to work with teachers, students, and parents to promote education and school engagement in refugee populations.
Contact him at kunio.hessel@mail.utoronto.ca
Shona Mistry MEd
Current Program
MA 1st Year
Developmental Psychology and Education Psychology
Previous Education
MEd in Developmental Psychology and Education from OISE
BA in Psychology from McGill University
Research Interests
Shona's research focus is on the interactions between learning disabilities, addiction, and mental health. Her current research investigates the role of family factors (e.g., parenting style, family functioning, and parent engagement) on substance use treatment between youth with and without learning disabilities.
Contact her at shona.mistry@mail.utoronto.ca
Research
Placement
Students
These students have joined our lab for one school year as part of an undergraduate Research Opportunity Program or OISE's MEd Research Practicum Course.
Research
Volunteers
These lab members volunteer their time to support a variety of on-going research studies happening in our lab.