“But how does meat get contents?” My favorite philosophy professor would repeatedly shout at our class. He was echoing the hard problem of consciousness – how can a physical substance such as the brain give rise to the beautifully diverse and colorful phenomenological experiences we enjoy as human beings? This question is part of the insatiable curiosity that led me to doctoral training in Clinical Psychology. To this project, I bring nearly nine years of experience from diverse research involvements gained across laboratories at the University of Minnesota and University of Wisconsin. To inform the contemplative aspects of this project, I have nurtured a yoga practice rooted in mindfulness for 8 years, and am a certified yoga teacher. There is much left to learn about the role of the body in the already complicated puzzle of brain-behavior connections. Somehow, the (as-of-yet) insurmountably complex constellation of neurons, glia, muscles, gut, and other physical matter (i.e., “meat”) inexplicably gives rise to the vast non-physical experiential contents of thoughts, feelings, motives, and sensations we know as human beings. Through a research career, I hope to continue to disentangle relationships between the mind, brain, and body to advance our understanding of emotion and stress. 

My research interests have centered on adapting and assessing mindfulness-based interventions (MBIs) for vulnerable populations, especially individuals with substance use and co-occurring disorders (SU-CoDs), as well as determining the mechanisms of change of such interventions. I received my B.A. in Psychology at Long Beach State University, followed by my M.A. in Counseling Psychology at Humboldt State University. After receiving my graduate degree, I worked full-time at an outpatient chemical dependency clinic, where I facilitated mindfulness-based women’s trauma groups. My interest in mindfulness-based approaches to treating addiction was growing, and I was aware that it was a developing area of research in the field of SU-CoDs. I wanted to contribute to the development of and research in mindfulness-based approaches for acutely vulnerable subpopulations with SU-CoDs, thus, I decided to pursue a Ph.D. in Clinical Psychology. Since entering the PhD program at Pacific University, I have been involved in several research projects with my primary mentor, Dr. Sarah Bowen. In 2018, I was awarded an R36 Dissertation grant from the National Institute on Drug Abuse (1R36DA043554-01) for my dissertation research on implementing a trauma integrated adaptation of Mindfulness-Based Relapse Prevention for women diagnosed with Substance Use Disorder and Posttraumatic Stress Disorder. 

Rémi Thériault obtained his B.A. in Psychology and M.Sc. in Psychiatry both at McGill University, Montréal, Québec. He recently started his Ph.D. at Université du Québec à Montréal (UQAM), under the guidance of Professor Stéphane Dandeneau, working on implicit social cognition. Over the last couple of years, he has been primarily working with Dr. Amir Raz at the McGill Cognitive Neuroscience Laboratory. His undergraduate research has principally focused on exploring the mind-body connection through the placebo effect and the malleability of the sense of embodiment. His master’s research has focused on psychological strategies to increase empathy and reduce intergroup prejudice, such as taking others’ perspective using virtual reality technology. Finally, his current doctoral research focuses on ways to boost altruism and reduce aggression through meditation. He dreams of becoming Professor and director of a “Wisdom, Morality, and Self-Regulation Lab”, focusing on furthering our understanding of sīla (morality) and paññā (wisdom) from a social-cognitive psychological perspective. Overall, Rémi is passionate about putting social-psychological research to use to increase people’s wellbeing and intrinsic motivation to help one another. He hopes to leverage positive psychology to bring true, lasting social change in society by implementing innovative, structural solutions where he lives and beyond. 

Le-Anh Dinh-Williams did her B.Sc. (Honours) in Psychology at McGill University, followed by an M.Sc. in Psychiatry at the University of Montreal. She is currently in her 4th year of study in a MA/PhD Clinical Psychology program at the University of Toronto (at Scarborough) under the mentorship of Dr. Zindel Segal and Dr. Norman Farb. She is interested in examining reward processing in Mood Disorders, including hedonic and eudaimonic forms of reward, and the effects of novel therapeutic interventions in the treatment of these disorders.

Jose Herrero trained in electrophysiology in the UK, under the umbrella of Dr. Alex Thiele, studying the neural and cellular substrates underlying the focus of attention to external objects. Later, he became more interested in the neuronal oscillations underlying attention to inner sensations (e.g., breathing) and meditative processes. Thus, he moved to NYC to work with intracranial human patients at the Department of Neurosurgery at Northwell with a neurosurgeon, Dr. Ashesh Mehta. He is currently studying a new line of mind-body research to explore respiration-coupled oscillations in the cortex and limbic system as they relate to deep, slow breathing and meditation. Jose is also looking into how breathing exercises can change neuronal oscillations and brain connectivity in epilepsy. He also uses electrical neurostimulation techniques to better understand interoceptive attention to breathing. 

Kibby McMahon is currently in her fourth year in the clinical psychology doctoral program at Duke University, supervised by Dr. Zachary Rosenthal. Her primary interests are developing and testing mindfulness based interventions for emotion dysregulation. She is also interested in studying the relationship among mindfulness, emotion dysregulation, and social cognitive processes such as the ability to perceive and understand other people’s emotions (empathy). Prior to graduate school, she was trained as a Vinyasa yoga instructor and has worked in social psychology research at Columbia University and Max Planck Institute of Human Development. 

Tarah Raldiris earned her bachelor’s degree in psychology from the Harriet L. Wilkes Honors College at Florida Atlantic University in 2011. In 2014, she completed her master’s degree in applied psychological research from Penn State-Harrisburg. She entered Virginia Commonwealth University’s social psychology doctoral program in Fall 2015 and defended her PhD in November 2020. Broadly, her research interests are focused on understanding how to promote positive psychological and physical aging processes. She is particularly interested in the effect of mindfulness-based interventions on cognition, health, and well-being in older adults.

Catherine is a Postdoctoral Research Associate in the Institute of Cognitive Science at the University of Colorado. She received her Ph.D. in Experimental Psychology from the University of Texas at Arlington. As a graduate student, Catherine investigated the effects of brief mindfulness training on executive functioning skills among children as well as learning outcomes among university students. Now working in the Emotive Computing Laboratory under the guidance of Dr. Sidney D’Mello, Catherine explores what people think and how they feel when they exert self-regulation. Using mixed methodologies (e.g., physiological modeling, self-report), she works to advance understanding of how mental and emotional states arise and influence outcomes across a range of contexts (e.g., educational game play, reading, interpersonal interactions) from data collected in the lab, online, and in the field. Catherine also investigates interventions for strengthening self-regulation, such as how mind-body practices like deep breathing impact self-regulation and concomitant mental and emotional states.