Chelsea Helion
Chelsea Helion is an Assistant Professor of Psychology at Temple University, in both the Social and Cognition & Neuroscience subareas. Prior to joining the Temple faculty, she completed her postdoctoral training in Social and Affective Neuroscience at Columbia University. She holds a BA in Psychology from Temple University, and a PhD in Social Psychology from Cornell University. Outside of the lab she can usually be found hanging out with her three sons (two of which are canine), trail running, or biking around the city.
William Mitchell
Billy is a sixth-year PhD student in the SANLab who uses naturalistic and feature-rich study designs, like video fMRI, to study neural and behavioral representations of emotions, how we regulate those emotions, and the resolution of uncertainty from social sources over time. He’s a proud union organizer and co-director of Temple’s Coding Outreach Group (COG), a programming resource for the broader community. When he’s not working, Billy is playing basketball, making music, or playing tabletop RPGs.
Ginny Ulichney
Ginny is a fifth-year Ph.D. student in the Social Psychology program. Broadly, she is interested in how people best support one another to reach personal and societal goals, with a focus on emotions and self-regulation during interpersonal communication. She graduated with a B.S. in Psychology and additional majors in International Relations and Spanish from Tufts University in 2020. Outside of the lab, she plays beach volleyball, makes vegan food, and goes on hikes with her dogs Bodhi and Nono.
Helen Schmidt
Helen is a fourth-year Ph.D. student in the Social Psychology program. She is broadly interested in social and affective cognition, employing neuroimaging and natural language processing techniques to explore the relationship between emotions, social interactions, and language. Helen graduated with a B.S. in Biology from Tufts University in 2017 and with an M.Sc. in Clinical Neuroscience from University College London in 2018. In her free time, Helen can always be found with a cup of coffee in hand as she reads a good book, travels to new places, takes photos, and enjoys time outside.
Isabel Leiva
Isabel is a first-year graduate student in the Social Psychology track, co-mentored by Drs. Chelsea Helion and Jason Chein. Her research interests lie in the interactions between social decision making, emotion regulation, and memory. When she isn’t in lab, she is either exploring the PA wilderness, reading, or drinking copious amounts of tea.
Emma Moughan
Emma is a first-year PhD student in the Social Psychology program. Broadly, she is interested in the how and why we socially connect, with a focus on emotion regulation strategy use and the influence of social media. She graduated with a B.A. in Psychology from Miami University (the Ohio one) in 2022 and completed a Lab Manager position at Worcester Polytechnic Institute (PI: Richard Lopez). Outside of the lab, Emma enjoys reading, binge-watching TV shows, karaoke nights, and filling her camera roll with pictures of her half-gremlin cat Nova.
Katie Dow
Katie is the lab manager for the SANLab. She is a recent graduate of Temple University, with a B.A. in Psychology and a minor in English. She is generally interested in all things Social Psychology and Neuroscience and is working towards one day pursuing a Ph.D. in Psychology or Neuroscience. Outside of the SANLab, Katie is also the lab coordinator for Temple’s Social Developmental Neuroscience Lab! When she’s not working, Katie can be found enjoying live music, playing with her cat, Moose, and spending time with her friends and family.
Lab Alumni
Graduate Students
Joy Ham - Joy was a PhD student (co-mentored with Deepu Murty) in the lab from from 2020 - 2024. They are broadly interested in how curiosity functions in social contexts, impacts identity development, and influences well-being.
Lab Managers/Research Coordinators
Joanne Stasiak - Joanne was the SANLab’s first lab manager, from 2019 - 2021. She is currently pursuing her PhD in Cognitive Neuroscience at UC-Santa Barbara in the LEAP lab (PI: Regina Lapate).
Ian O’Shea - Ian was the lab manager from 2022-2023, he concurrently served as a research coordinator for Temple’s Adaptive Memory Lab (PI: Murty). He is currently pursuing an M.D. at Penn State University.
Tiara Bounyarith - Tiara served as an undergraduate Neuroscience Research coordinator for the SANLab. She is currently a research coordinator in the Kucyi Lab at Drexel University.
Lauren Iglio - Lauren served as the undergraduate Behavioral Research coordinator for the SANLab from 2022 - 2023.
Research Assistants
Modupe Osuntokun, Kal Brown, Ange Vittone, Alina Spas, Sevila Temirova, Rachel Kelly, Micah Jordan, Bijal Patel, Sophia Tran, Esha Kadakia, Aaliyah Johnson, Shay Richardson, Lauren Ewell
Collaborators
Vishnu “Deepu” Murty — The University of Oregon
Johanna Jarcho — Temple University
David Smith — Temple University
Jason Chein — Temple University
Ingrid Olson — Temple University
Kevin Ochsner — Columbia University
BJ Casey — Barnard College
Emily Falk — University of Pennsylvania
Dani Cosme — University of Pennsylvania
John Medaglia — Drexel University
Jamie Reilly— Temple University
Leor Hackel — University of Southern California