People

Director

Dr. Arielle Baskin-Sommers is a licensed clinical psychologist and Professor at Yale University. She received her Sc.B. from Brown University (2007), a Ph.D. from the University of Wisconsin-Madison (2013), and completed her pre-doctoral internship and fellowship at McLean Hospital/Harvard Medical School. Her work focuses on identifying and specifying the cognitive, emotional, and environmental mechanisms that contribute to disinhibited behavior (e.g., substance use, criminal activity, aggression).  She uses a wide range of techniques and technologies to explore this topic. Overall, her professional career goals are based on a desire to develop both innovative theory and research in service of increasing the efficacy of clinical intervention for disinhibited behaviors. 

Email: arielle.baskin-sommers@yale.edu

Office: 100 College St, #1427

Curriculum Vitae

Post-Docs and Graduate Students

Aleija Rodriguez (pronouns: he / him / his) received his B.A. from the University of Michigan- Ann Arbor in 2021. He worked as a post-baccalaureate research coordinator in Dr. Kent Kiehl’s lab, where he conducted research on the etiologies and consequences of antisocial behavior. In his graduate studies, Aleija is interested in exploring how experiences of stress and executive functioning intersect to yield antisocial behavior, such as aggression. He hopes to use his work to inform interventions for individuals with legal system involvement.

Emailaleija.rodriguez@yale.edu

Curriculum Vitae

Brendan Lam (pronouns: he/him/his) received his B.A. in psychology from Queen’s University. Prior to his graduate studies, he was a post-baccalaureate Research Assistant at Holland Bloorview Kids Rehabilitation Hospital, where he worked with Dr. Shannon Scratch studying acquired brain injury. Brendan is interested in understanding the intersection between socioeconomic experiences and decision-making.  He is interested in integrating multiple levels of analysis (e.g., environmental, cognitive, and neural data) using sophisticated quantitative models.

Emailbrendan.lam@yale.edu

Curriculum Vitae

Dr. Jivesh Ramduny received his BEng from Nanyang Technological University and his PhD in Psychology from Trinity College Dublin. Jiv’s research focuses on improving the robustness and reproducibility of functional connectivity measures derived from fMRI paradigms (e.g., resting-state, movie-watching) in neurodevelopmental and psychiatric conditions. His work employs conventional and advanced functional connectivity techniques to facilitate the detection of brain-behaviour relationships in both community-based samples and large-scale datasets. 

Emailjivesh.ramduny@yale.edu

Curriculum Vitae

Jordyn Ricard (pronouns: she/her/hers) received her B.S. from the School of Education and Social Policy at Northwestern University in 2020. Prior to her graduate studies, she worked as a post-baccalaureate research assistant in Dr. Matthew Nock’s lab where she studied the relationship between early adversity and suicide risk. Jordyn is interested in investigating how community violence exposure shapes mental health outcomes and exploring how structural interventions can mitigate these effects, with the goal of building safer communities, improving well-being, and reducing pathways into the legal system.

Emailjordyn.ricard@yale.edu

Curriculum Vitae

Sonia Ruiz (pronouns: she/her/hers) received her B.S. in Psychology from Yale University in 2019. Prior to her graduate studies, she worked as a post-baccalaureate IRTA in Dr. Daniel Pine’s Section on Development and Affective Neuroscience at the National Institute of Mental Health, where she studied threat learning and avoidance in youth. Sonia is interested in investigating cognitive and affective processes underlying why some individuals have difficulty learning from consequences.

Email: sonia.ruiz@yale.edu

Curriculum Vitae

Dr. Ziwei Zhang received her B.S. in Psychology from East China Normal University and her Ph.D. in Educational Psychology from the University of Minnesota Twin Cities. Her research focuses on developing innovative statistical tools to support applied researchers in achieving their scientific goals in the social and behavioral sciences. She is particularly interested in longitudinal modeling, including intrinsically nonlinear trajectories, longitudinal mixture models and mediation models, with an emphasis on Bayesian approaches. In addition to her methodological work, she is passionate about research aimed at understanding and supporting adolescent mental health.

Email: ziwei.zhang.zz585@yale.edu

Curriculum Vitae

Research Assistants: Post-bac Students and Staff

Aidan Mulvey (ABCD Staff; aidan.mulvey@yale.edu)

Alex Williams (ABCD Staff; alex.williams@yale.edu)

Calvin Dupree (ABCD Staff; calvin.dupree@yale.edu)

Emma Madsen (ABCD Staff; emma.madsen@yale.edu)

Jennifer DiMuzio (ABCD Staff; Jennifer.dimuzio@yale.edu

Nathan Skinner (MoD/ABCD Staff; nathaniel.skinner@yale.edu

Rowan Moore (ABCD Staff; rowan.moore@yale.edu

Research Assistants: Undergraduate Students

Charlotte Fink, Pierson ‘26 (charlotte.fink@yale.edu)

Devin Thomas, Brandford ‘27 (devin.thomas.dst36@yale.edu)

Dom Gearing, Silliman ‘26 (dominic.gearing@yale.edu)

Hunter Robbins, Silliman ‘27 (hunter.robbins@yale.edu)

Katya Pinchuk, Silliman ‘26  (katya.pinchuk@yale.edu)

Lily Goren, Berkeley ‘27 (lily.goren@yale.edu)

Lily Horenkamp, Timothy Dwight ‘26 (lily.horenkamp@yale.edu)

Madelynn Huff, Davenport ‘27 (madelynn.huff@yale.edu)

Matt LasorsaBenjamin Franklin ’26 (matt.lasorsa@yale.edu

Natasha Steinert, Brandford ‘27 (natasha.steinert@yale.edu

Nick Townsend, Davenport ‘26 (nick.townsend@yale.edu)