Assistant Professor
Psychology, Hunter College
Neuropsychological Predictors of Child Emotion Regulation
In her neurophysiology lab, Professor Dennis studies brain activity in children through her one-year, $158,000 NIH grant, Neuropsychological Predictors of Child Emotion Regulation. Using electroencephalography (EEG) she endeavors to understand why some children are capable of controlling their emotions while some are not.
Children ages 5 and 6 years are recruited to participate in the project. They first complete a set of emotional tasks before a computer while wearing an EEG cap containing 64 electrodes to measure the brain’s response to each task. Children are then placed in emotional situations and their responses observed. Professor Dennis was trained as a clinical psychologist and worked with children who showed signs of emotional problems. “If we can identify the brain markers that detect good emotion regulation, we can learn a great deal about how children regulate emotions and by catching emotional problems in early childhood we can prevent the suffering of millions of adults.”