Lab Director
Rob Chavez, Ph.D.
Associate Professor of Psychology
email | CV | personal website | Google Scholar | GitHub | OSF | Substack
Ph.D. Cognitive Neuroscience, 2015 – Dartmouth College
B.S. Psychology, 2008 – University of New Mexico
Dr. Rob Chavez joined the faculty at the University of Oregon in 2017. He is interested in how our brains build representations of our sense of self and the social environment and how we use these representations to guide our behavior in the real world. He is also interested in predictive modeling, computational methods in digital social science, and non-technical writing for broader audiences.
Graduate Students
Moriah Stendel
Ph.D. Candidate on clinical internship at Harvard Medical School–McLean Hospital
email | Google Scholar | GitHub | OSF
Moriah Stendel has an interdisciplinary academic background, having received a Bachelor of Arts in Psychology & Art History and a Master of Science in Psychiatry. Accordingly, her past research experience is varied, spanning mechanisms of consciousness, culture, absorption, and selfhood. Her doctoral research focuses on the entwined relationship between self, brain, and psychopathology. Specifically, she is interested in how concurrent disruptions in self-referential processing, social cognition, and reward functioning – and their shared neural substrates – contribute to the origin and maintenance of internalizing symptomatology.
Rachel Jacobson
3nd Year Ph.D. Student in Social-Personality Psychology
email | GitHub | OSF
Rachel Jacobson is interested in how individuals’ social identities influence their identity development, social perceptions and interactions with others. In particular, her work focuses on populations with multiple identities (e.g., biracials and biculturals), in both how they are perceived and the impressions they form of others.
Prospective Graduate Students
We are almost always taking graduate student applications for students with a good fit with our interests. If you are interested in applying to our lab for graduate studies, I would encourage you to read our Guide for Prospective Graduate Students to give yourself a sense of what we are typically looking for in competitive applicants.
To apply, see the Department of Psychology admissions page for this and other important information about materials and deadlines.
Undergraduate Research Assistants
Debbie Okeke
Debbie is a second-year undergraduate student at the University of Oregon. She is pursuing a B.S. in Neuroscience. This is her second year at the lab and she is excited to learn more about how different brain functions are involved with perceptions of ourselves and others. She is especially interested in learning how diverse life experiences shape the way our brains perceive events. In her free time, she enjoys reading, baking, watching movies, and spending time with friends and family.
Lab Alumni
Dr. Taylor Guthrie
Former Ph.D. student, graduated in 2024.
email | Google Scholar | OSF | YouTube
Sonny Mattek — former postdoc
Jack Kapustka — former lab manager
Dale Tovar — former lab manager
Angela O’Neil — former RA and honors student, psychology
Youri Benadjaoud — former RA and honors student, human physiology
Maddie Schall — former RA and honors student, psychology
Maddie Alms — former RA, psychology
Sara Carasso — former RA, psychology
Faith Collins — former RA, psychology
Ryan Conaghan — former RA, psychology
Austin (Aussie) Frost— former RA, data science
Hannah Grant — former RA, psychology
Nate Holley — former RA, data science
Conor Hollowell — former RA, psychology
Louis Kerner— former RA, premed postbacc
Clara Morrison — former RA, physics
Michael Saccio — former RA, data science
Madison Young — former RA, psychology