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 Philip Abrami Photo by Christian Fleury |
Philip Abrami Philip C. Abrami is a professor in the Department of Education and Director of Concordia University’s Centre for the Study of Learning and Performance (CSLP). Through his work at the Centre, he is actively involved in researching the ways in which people acquire, retain and use knowledge and complex skills. Dr. Abrami is interested not only in understanding skill acquisition, but also in developing effective pedagogical tools for instructors and learning strategies for students, based on his research findings. Dr. Abrami came to Concordia as an assistant professor in 1980 after acquiring his PhD in Social/Instructional Psychology from the University of Manitoba, where he was awarded the Vineburg Research Prize. He previously received a BA degree in Social Psychology from Bard College in Annandale, N.Y. and an MA in Social Psychology from Manitoba. One longstanding area of interest for Dr. Abrami is faculty development and instructional effectiveness. His research in this area has led to two awards—the American Educational Research Association’s McKeachie Award and the Canadian Society for Studies in Higher Education Research Award. A second area of interest is the social psychology of education. His research in this area led to the publication of a text on small group instruction available in both English and French. A third area of interest is research methodology. Dr. Abrami has published several important articles on quantitative synthesis or meta-analysis. He recently published a textbook on applied statistics, which include an interactive multimedia CD-ROM. A final area of interest is technology integration for learning. Dr. Abrami and his colleagues work closely with instructors from primary through to postsecondary levels. He helped bring to Concordia both the McConnell Family Foundation award to and a large U.S. tri-council grant whose aim is to design technological enhancements to basic literacy programs. |
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 Shimon Amir File Photo |
Shimon Amir Shimon Amir is a professor in the Department of Psychology and a member of Concordia University’s Center for Studies in Behavioural Neurobiology. The aim of Dr. Amir’s work is to understand the neural and cellular basis of circadian rhythmicity and how it is regulated by environmental and state variables. He is particularly interested in the idea that the mechanisms involved in the generation and regulation of circadian rhythmicity are plastic and can thus be influenced through conditioning and stress. A native of Rehovot, Israel, Dr. Amir first came to Concordia in 1977 as a post-doctoral fellow. He returned permanently in 1987 as an associate professor. He received his BA and MA degrees in Psychology from Tel Aviv University in Israel and completed his PhD in Psychobiology at McGill University. He has also worked as a senior scientist and neurobiology professor at the Weizmann Institute of Science. Dr. Amir’s research findings have been widely published and he has won many awards from organizations such as the National Research Council of Canada and the Medical Research Council of Canada. He teaches courses and graduate seminars in topics such as Biological Rhythms, Neuroplasticity and the Neurobiology of Cicardian Clocks. Because of the crossover of his research, he was appointed as an adjunct professor in the Department of Biology in 1998. |
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 William Bukowski File Photo |
William Bukowski William Bukowski, a professor in the Department of Psychology and a member of Concordia’s Centre for Research in Human Development, has developed a well-known research program focused on the features and effects of childhood and adolescent friendships and peer relations especially as they are associated with psycho-social maladjustment and health. Together with several collaborators, particularly Lorrie Sippola, he has published papers in prestigious journals and books on the impact of peer relations on development especially in regard to the emergence of gender differences in well-being during early adolescence. As much of his research is dependent on the use of longitudinal studies, Dr. Bukowski has developed a secondary interest in the methodological and statistical challenges of longitudinal research designs. His research program has been funded continuously since 1984 by grants from US and Canadian federal agencies and by private foundations including the Foundation for Child Development and the W.T. Grant Foundation. In addition to his research work, Dr. Bukowski has taught undergraduate and graduate courses in developmental psychology and the graduate course in multivariate statistics. Dr. Bukowski received his BA in 1976 from Canisius College in Buffalo, N.Y. Before entering graduate school, he was a mathematics teacher at the St. Labre School on the Northern Cheyenne Indian Reservation in southeast Montana as a member of the Jesuit Volunteer Corps. After receiving his MA and PhD degrees in Developmental Psychology from Michigan State University, Dr. Bukowski joined the department of psychology at the University of Maine in 1983. He came to Concordia as an associate professor in 1989. He was promoted to the rank of professor in 1999. From 1996 to 1999 he was the chair of his department and he is the founding principal of Loyola International College, the newest of the Faculty of Arts and Science’s six interdisciplinary colleges. |
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 Lisa Serbin Photo by Andrew Dobrowolskyj |
Lisa Serbin Lisa Serbin is a professor in the Department of Psychology and is director of Concordia University’s Centre for Research in Human Development. She has an impressive research profile, particularly in the field of social stereotyping and gender-related patterns of behaviour in adults. She has published many articles and book chapters over the years, including a monograph titled “The Development of Sex-Typing in Middle Childhood.” Dr. Serbin came to Concordia University as an associate professor in 1978 from the State University of New York–Binghamton, where she had been an assistant professor of Psychology. She received a BA in Psychology from Reed College in Portland, Ore. and a PhD in Clinical Psychology from the State University of New York in Stony Brook. Since joining Concordia, Dr. Serbin has been associated with a landmark longitudinal study that has tracked the health and development of poor children in a Montreal neighbourhood into adulthood. The study, celebrating its 25th anniversary, is now tracking the lives of the next generation of children born to the original subjects in an attempt to understand how certain behavioural patterns are transmitted from one generation to the next. In addition to yielding important findings for the psychology community, the study has also proved to be an excellent research training ground for many Concordia graduate students. In addition to her work at Concordia, Dr. Serbin has served as a consultant and advisory board member to several community associations, including the Island School Council of Montreal and a recently convened group that is looking into health and welfare disparities on the Island of Montreal, for the Montreal Department of Public Health. |
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 Peter Shizgal Photo by Christian Fleury |
Peter Shizgal Peter Shizgal is a professor in the Department of Psychology and director of Concordia University’s Centre for Studies in Behavioural Neurobiology. His primary area of research centers on the brain and an understanding of how animals and humans evaluate competing goals and select alternatives to address their biological needs. Dr. Shizgal came to Concordia as an assistant professor in 1976, a year after graduating from the University of Pennsylvania with MA and PhD degrees in Physiological Psychology. He received his BA in Psychology from McGill University. Dr. Shizgal is renowned for his work in behavioural neurobiology; using a combination of psychophysical, electrophysiological, neuroanatomical and molecular methods, he and his research colleagues are gaining an understanding into the function of neurons and the surrounding circuitry in the brain, particularly in terms of decisions related to motivation and reward. More recently, Dr. Shizgal has begun using functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to assess neural activation in humans during the anticipation and experience of rewards. In an article published recently in the journal Neuron, Dr. Shizgal and colleagues in Massachusetts and New Jersey used fMRI to measure neural responses to expected monetary gains and losses (see article on cover page). In addition to his research work, Dr. Shizgal has taught undergraduate and graduate courses in the Fundamentals of Behavioural Neurobiology Judgment and Decision and other related subjects. Outside of the classroom, he has sat on numerous university administrative bodies, including the Committee on Performance Evaluation, the Senate Research, the Committee on Research Centers and the Advisory Council for the Centre for Teaching and Learning Services. He has also been active in grant evaluation and science policy discussions, and has chaired the Psychology Grant Selection Committee of NSERC. |