Dr. Jean Decety is a Professor at the University of Chicago and the College, with a primary appointment in the Department of Psychology and a secondary appointment in the Department of Psychiatry.
Jean Decety is the Editor of Social Neuroscience. He also serves on the editorial board of The Scientific World Journal and of Neuropsychologia, and is a member of the faculty advisory committee of the France Chicago Center. As of March 2007, he is the co-director of the Brain Research Imaging Center at the University of Chicago Medical Center.

For more information:
Personal Page | Articles | Book Chapters | Conferences | Teaching
e-mail: decety@uchicago.edu
Phone: (773) 834-3711

Post-doc fellows

Dr. Yuko Akitsuki was awarded an M.D. (Psychiatry) from Tohoku University (Japan) in 1995 and a Ph.D. in 2005. Having a background as a clinical psychiatrist, she is interested in functional imaging studies on social cognitive deficits of patients with mental disorders. Yuko conducts research on the neural and cognitive mechanisms that underpin intersubjectivity in healthy individuals (adults and children) as well as people with psychiatric disorders.
For more information on Yuko, please click here.
e-mail: akitsuki@uchicago.edu
Phone: (773) 702-4661

Dr. Claus Lamm received his Ph.D. (Psychology) from the University of Vienna (Austria) in 2001. His current research in the SCN Lab centers around the question how empathy can be promoted and modulated. To this end, Claus uses a multi-level approach, combining behavioral and psychophysiological measurements with functional neuroimaging techniques.
For more information on Claus, please click here.
e-mail: clamm@uchicago.edu
Phone: (773) 702-4661

Dr. Makiko Yamada studied psychology at McGill University in Canada. Then in 2006 she was awarded a Ph.D. (Neuropsychology) from Kyoto University in Japan. Dr. Yamada has been investigating, for several years, deficits in emotion processing and social cognition in patients with neurological and psychiatric disorders. Makiko conducts research on how empathic neural responses are modulated by contextual factors in healthy individuals as well as in psychiatric patients using fMRI and ERPs.
For more information on Makiko, please click here.
e-mail: myamada@uchicago.edu
Phone: (773) 702-4661

Eric Porges received his B.A. in Cognitive Neuroscience from Hampshire College (Amherst, MA). Eric researched Traumatic Brain Injury at the University of Illinois at Chicago in the Center for Cognitive Medicine.
In the SCN Lab Eric is involved in the design of the studies, the collection and analysis of fMRI, DTI, EMG & autonomic measures. He will start graduate school (Integrative Neuroscience) in the coming Fall.
For more information on Eric, please click here.
e-mail: eporges@uchicago.edu
Phone: (773) 702-4661

Inbal Bartal earned an M.A. in biopsychology from Tel-Aviv University, where she was a student in the interdisciplinary program for outstanding students. She was also a research assistant in the laboratory of Cognitive Neuroscience of High Level Vision led by Dr. Galit Yovel. Inbal is preparing her Ph.D. at the University of Chicago (Integrative Neuroscience), and investigates the nature of self consciousness. Her interests also include the role of imagery and dreams, agency, identity and memory as well as perception of others in creating a sense of self.
e-mail: inbalb@uchicago.edu
Phone: (773) 702-4661

Stephanie Echols is first-year doctoral student in Social Psychology at the University of Chicago. Previously, she earned a M.A. from the University of Chicago and a B.Sc. in Psychology at Mount Allison University, Canada. In addition, Stephanie spent time working at the University of British Columbia Pain Research Lab, led by Dr. Kenneth Craig. Stephanie's Master's thesis, supervised by Dr. Jean Decety, investigated empathy for pain and health stigma. Current directions in research involve exploring the relationship between empathy, stigma, and racial bias.
e-mail: sechols@uchicago.edu
Phone: (773) 702-4661

Kimberly McCue received a B.S. in Psychology and Biology from Northwestern University, Chicago.  She is currently working on a M.A. in the MAPSS program at the University of Chicago.  Kim worked as a research assistant at Northwestern University’s Feinberg School of Medicine for Dr. Mary McDermott researching the impact of peripheral vascular disease progression on quality of life as a result of increased functional impairment.  In addition, she also spent a summer as a clinical intern at Children’s Memorial Hospital of Chicago, working with children and adolescents who have social, emotional and behavioral issues.
email: kmccue@uchicago.edu
Phone: (773) 702-4661

Kalina Michalska is a Ph.D. student in Developmental Psychology at the University of Chicago. She earned a B.A. in Psychology from Boston University. Prior to joining the doctoral program, she did research with Dr. Larry Gray in the Department of Developmental and Behavioral Pediatrics at the University of Chicago Children’s Hospital investigating the biological markers for early regulatory processes in infancy. Kalina is involved in functional MRI studies of empathy with children and adolescents with conduct disorder.
email: kalina@uchicago.edu
Phone: (773) 702-4661

Laurie Skelly hails from Edwardsville, IL and received her bachelors
degree in Neuroscience from Trinity College in Hartford, Connecticut.
Her undergraduate thesis was an fMRI project which investigated the
role of the amygdala in salience processing. After graduation she
worked as a research assistant at the Olin Neuropsychiatry Research
Center, in Hartford, acquiring and analyzing MRI data. She is
now a first-year doctoral student in the Integrative Neuroscience
program, where she applies quantitative measures (including
fMRI and DTI) to the study of abnormal social cognition.
email: lskelly@uchicago.edu
Phone: (773) 702-4661

Undergraduate students

Jacob Cogan is a third-year student at the University of Chicago.
email: jccogan@uchicago.edu

Alicia Graf is a first-year student at the University of Chicago.
email: agraf@uchicago.edu

Whitney Hansen is a first-year student at the University of Chicago.
email: whitneyh@uchicago.edu

Jessica Hempel is a second-year student at the University of Chicago.
email: jleigh09@uchicago.edu

Jack Reeves is a second-year student at the University of Chicago.
email: jreeves@uchicago.edu

They will join the Lab soon

Dr. Maiko Fujimori from the National Cancer Center Hospital, Kashiwa, Chiba, Japan.

Dr. Alexander Otti from Munich University Medical School, Munich, Germany.

Our collaborators

SCNL alumni