About us

Willem Frankenhuis

is an Associate Professor of Psychology at Utrecht University and a Senior Researcher at the MPI-CSL. He studies how cognition and behaviour develop in harsh and unpredictable conditions. His empirical work focuses on ‘hidden talents’, abilities that are enhanced by adversity, and ‘reasonable responses’, behaviour that can be understood as a response to the costs and benefits faced by people living in poverty. His theoretical work uses mathematical modeling to explore the evolution and development of plasticity, the ability to adjust development to different environmental conditions. For all of his publications, see his personal website.

Stefan Vermeent

is a PhD candidate at Utrecht University with a background in cognitive psychology and psychometric testing. His research focuses on cognitive adaptations to harsh and unpredictable environments. Specifically, he is interested in the types of processing and attentional styles that people develop in response to adversity and how these affect cognitive performance.

Nicole Walasek

is a postdoctoral researcher at Utrecht University interested in the evolution and development of sensitive periods – time periods during which experiences have a particularly large impact on development. She uses mathematical models to explore how different environmental conditions, such as environmental change, shape patterns of sensitive periods across development. She is also interested in developing a statistical framework for studying environmental stability and change in empirical data.

Ethan Young

is a postdoctoral researcher at Utrecht University, broadly interested in how early life experiences and environments shape cognition, behavior, physiology, and health. More specifically, he studies how adverse environments shape mental abilities that are useful under stressful conditions. He also looks at how stress across the lifespan impacts stress physiology and biological health outcomes.

Esther Weijman

is a research assistant at Utrecht University and a behavioral scientist at a secondary school for special education. She has a background in developmental psycho(patho)logy and is mostly interested in the possible positive traits and abilities of (young) people generally seen as ‘at risk’ due to their (early) social environment and/or behavioral problems.

Kat Adams Shannon

is a postdoctoral researcher at Stanford University. She studies how experience shapes young children’s attention, self-regulation, and learning strategies, particularly in the context of adaptation to social and environmental risk. A key aim of her research is to create and collaborate on innovative uses of technology and statistical methods to support education and developmental science.

Susan Brener

is a PhD student in the Developmental Psychology program at the University of Utah. She is interested in using evolutionary theory to better understand how early exposure to stress affects individuals both biologically and behaviorally, with a particular emphasis on how these outcomes may represent adaptive responses to one's environment.

Jesse Fenneman

is a PhD student at Radboud University. He studies how the environment influences impulsivity – specifically, whether impulsive behaviours result in (long-term) benefits or costs in harsh or unpredictable environments. To answer this question, he uses formal modelling to understand how environmental dimensions shape (long-term) outcomes of information impulsivity (“acting before thinking”) and temporal impulsivity (“having things now rather than later”).

Katarina Miletic

is a research intern at the University of Bologna with a background in developmental and educational psychology and hopes to start her PhD studies next year. She is interested in the impact of harsh and unpredictable environments on cognitive and behavioural plasticity.

Foto Katherina — Katarina Miletic as a child and now

Benoît de Courson

is a PhD student in the MPI-CSL in Freiburg im Breisgau. He uses formal models and agent based simulations to study the link between deprivation, inequalities and violent behaviour. In addition, he is interested in digital humanities and in particular in its application in French contemporary history.

Meriah DeJoseph

is a PhD student at the University of Minnesota's Institute of Child Development. She studies how the type and timing of child poverty influence adaptive self-regulation and learning development across levels of behavior, physiology, and the brain. A long-term goal of this work is to inform applied policy efforts that enhance and sustain youth's capacity to thrive in the face of economic inequality.