Meet Our Team!

JULIA LEONARD

Principal Investigator

Dr. Leonard is an Assistant Professor in the Department of Psychology at Yale. She received her B.A. in Neuroscience and Behavior from Wesleyan University, her Ph.D. in Cognitive Science from MIT, and completed a MindCore funded postdoctoral fellowship at the University of Pennsylvania. Dr. Leonard wants to understand the factors that support both children’s approach to learning and their capacity to learn. She addresses these questions with the tools of cognitive science, developmental psychology, and neuroscience, with a focus on early childhood and educational implications.

Email: julia.leonard@yale.edu, Website, Twitter, CV

BRANDON CARRILLO  

PhD Student

Brandon is a fourth-year graduate student in the Leonard Learning Lab at Yale. He received his B.A. in Psychology and in Studio Art from Carleton College. Prior to graduate school, he worked in the nonprofit world at the University of Nebraska at Omaha and as a research coordinator at Stanford University. Brandon is wildly fascinated about how kids think about and regard their own cognitive capacities, specifically how and why they learn. He hopes his research will follow a trail of metacognitive questions that, in the end, will help develop our theories of young children’s motivation to see and understand themselves better as fulfilled learners.

Email: brandon.carrillo@yale.edu, Twitter

REUT SHACHNAI 

PhD Student

Reut is a fourth-year Ph.D. student in the lab. Before joining Yale, she completed an M.A. in developmental psychology at Cornell University. Reut wants to understand what factors prevent children from reaching their full potential. In particular, she is fascinated by the ways in which well-intentioned social input (e.g., helping, feedback, role models) can inadvertently suppress young children's motivation and learning. Importantly, her work interweaves basic science with translational research, with the ultimate goal of helping children – especially those from marginalized groups – become the best version of themselves.

Email: reut.shachnai@yale.edu, Twitter

AARTHI POPAT

PhD Student

Aarthi is a second-year Ph.D. student in the Leonard Learning Lab and the Social Cognitive Development Lab. Before coming to Yale, she received her B.A. in Psychology from Stanford University and worked as a lab manager at UCSD. Aarthi's research in the Leonard Learning Lab focuses on the cognitive mechanisms that underlie children's imposter syndrome and identity-based self-doubt. She ultimately hopes to identify and intervene on backfiring efforts to increase the representation of women and minorities in STEM.

ELAINE WANG

PhD Student

Elaine is a second-year Ph.D. student at the Leonard Learning Lab. She recently graduated from the University of Toronto with a BSc in psychology and neuroscience. Elaine's research focuses on exploring both internal (e.g., cognitive mechanisms) and external factors (e.g., caregiver praise) that influence children's persistence behaviors and she hopes to further understand how the reward incentives present in informal and pedagogical environments alter children's intrinsic motivation. Ultimately, Elaine is passionate about studying how we can build contexts that promote the value of effort and boost optimism towards lifelong learning.

Email: elaineyilin.wang@yale.edu, Twitter

ARIELLE BELLUCK

PhD Student

Arielle is a first-year Ph.D. student in the lab. She received her B.A. in Psychology from Wellesley College, and before starting graduate school she worked as a preschool teacher and as a lab manager at Princeton University. Arielle is interested in the cognitive processes and social factors that shape children's motivation and curiosity. Ultimately she hopes to promote and preserve children's excitement for learning, to help raise a generation of enthusiastic and exploratory learners.

Email: arielle.belluck@yale.edu

SURYA MARIMUTHU

Lab Manager

Bio incoming!

Email:

Research Assistants

Lab Alumni

Mika Asaba, Postdoctoral Fellow 2021-2025; now fellow at Teaching Lab Studio

Natalie Masetti, Lab Manager 2023-2025; Master’s student at Columbia University

Flora Zhang, Graduate Student 2021-2025; Postdoctoral Fellow at Brown University

Melissa Santos, Lab Manager 2021-2023; now Project Manager at the College Board, previously at Zearn

Thesis Students

Lizbeth Lozano (MY ‘25), Statistics & Data Science Senior Thesis Student Fall 2025

Lauren Okine (DC ‘25), Psychology Senior Thesis Student Fall 2025

Carigan McGuinn (TD ‘25), Psychology Senior Thesis Student Fall 2025

Bethel Asomaning (BK ‘25), Cognitive Science Senior Thesis Student Fall 2025

Paloma Casanova (BF ‘25), Cognitive Science Senior Thesis Student Fall 2025

Zahra Yarali (SM ‘24), Psychology Senior Thesis Student AY 2023-2024

AC Christakis (‘23), Psychology Senior Thesis Student Fall 2023

Noah Norman (SY ‘23), Cognitive Science Thesis Student AY 2022-2023; now at Altana AI

Marissa Healy (‘23), Cognitive Science Thesis Student AY 2022-2023

Emily Li (TD ‘22), Cognitive Science Senior Thesis Student Fall 2021

Research Assistants

Jam Stebbins, Research Assistant (Winter 2023-Spring 2024)

Stella Choi, Undergraduate Research Assistant (Fall 2022-Spring 2023)

Justice Brown, Undergraduate Research Assistant (AY 2022-2023)

Ally Eisenberg, Research Assistant (Spring 2023-Summer 2023)

Yagmur Ozturkoglu (‘25), Undergraduate Research Assistant (AY 2022-2023)

Montserrat Rodriguez (DC ‘25), Undergraduate Research Assistant (Spring 2022-Fall 2022)

Matthew Elmore Merritt (TD ‘24), Undergraduate Research Assistant (AY 2021-2022)

Suzanna Yang (TD ‘24), Undergraduate Research Assistant (AY 2021-2022)

Rebecca Roberts, Research Assistant (Fall 2023)

Adriana Abad Castro, Undergraduate Research Assistant (Summer 2023)

Ayannah Obas, Research Assistant (Summer 2023)

Jessie Cheung (DC ‘24), Undergraduate Research Assistant (Summer 2022)

Elaine Cheng (GH ‘25), Undergraduate Research Assistant (Spring 2022)