The Memory & Decision Processes (MAD) Lab is housed in the Department of Psychology at Toronto Metropolitan University in downtown Toronto, and is directed by Dr. Julia Spaniol. Research in the MAD Lab uses behavioural and neuroscience techniques to study how motivation and emotion affect cognitive processes in younger and older adults.
Welcome to the Memory and Decision Processes Lab!
About Us
Recent News
September 2026: Lots of MAD lab transitions! Isabella Cullen joins the lab as an MA student in Psychological Science; Rohma Saleem and Wendy Wu start their undergraduate thesis projects; Krischanda Bemister joins the lab as a postdoc (part-time); PhD students Mane Kara-Yakoubian and Shadini Dematagoda start their clinical internships!
July 2026: New MAD Lab study, on predictors of prosociality in older adulthood, provisionally accepted at Psychology and Aging!
June 2026: Mane Kara-Yakoubian and Shadini Dematagoda present MAD lab research at CSBBCS in Toronto!
May 2026: Rohma Saleem starts her NSERC USRA. Congrats Rohma!
May 2026: Aalim Makani presents MAD lab research at the 11th annual meeting of the Toronto Area Memory Group (TAMEG) in Toronto! Megan Vaziri acts as TAMEG conference chair.
April 2026: MAD lab thesis students Janka Meszaros and Emily Tran present their projects at the annual thesis poster day!
March 2026: New MAD Lab study, on age differences in sensitivity to positive and negative feedback, published in The Journals of Gerontology, Series B: Psychological Sciences and Social Sciences. Congrats to first author Lindsay Santacroce!