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News (Summer 2016):

  • Andrea Lafnitzegger will be leaving our lab in preparation for medical school. Andrew Rakhshani will be joining the ESP team as the new Project Coordinator. Congratulations to both Andrea and Andrew!

  • Allison E. Gaffey successfully defended her dissertation on May 27, 2015. Congratulations to Allison!

  • Allison E. Gaffey is spending her 2015-2016 clinical psychology internship in the Behavioral Medicine Track at Brown University's Warren Alpert Medical School. Her internship research mentor is Laura Stroud, Ph.D.

  • Allison E. Gaffey and Michelle M. Wirth had a poster accepted to the 45th annual International Society for Psychneuroendocrinology (ISPNE) conference. The ISPNE poster is entitled: Oxytocin increases cortisol in men exposed to acute social-evaluative stress.

  • Brandy S. Martinez and Michelle M. Wirth had a poster accepted to the 45th annual International Society for Psychneuroendocrinology (ISPNE) conference. The ISPNE poster is entitled: Age, cognition, and hydrocortisone: exogenous cortisol administration in a community sample reveals no age-related effects on the Operation-Span and Trail-making tasks.

News (Spring 2015):

  • Allison Gaffey won the Young Investigator Travel Award from the International Society for Psychoneuroendocrinology (ISPNE). This highly competitive award provided $500 for travel to the ISPNE meeting in Montréal, Canada, August 2014.

  • Welcome back for spring semester to our returning Research Assistants!!

News (Fall 2014):

  • New publication in press at Stress: Gaffey, A. E., Wirth, M. M., Hoks, R. M., Jahn, A. L., Abercrombie, H. C. Circulating cortisol levels after exogenous cortisol administration are higher in women using hormonal contraceptives: Data from two preliminary studies.

  • In August, Ph.D. student Allison Gaffey and Project Coordinator Brandy Martinez presented a poster at the annual International Society for Psychoneuroendocrinology (ISPNE) conference.

  • Allison Gaffey won the Young Investigator Travel Award from ISPNE. This highly competitive award provided $500 for travel to the ISPNE meeting in Montréal, Canada, August 2014

  • Allison Gaffey and co-authors Thomas Lienhoop and Brandy Martinez presented a poster at the 2014 American Psychological Association (APA) conference titled: When stress matters: Acute stress selectively improves men's working memory performance.This poster received an award in the APA Behavioral Neuroscience division!

  • We are currently recruiting new graduate students to the lab for Fall 2015, via either the Clinical or Cognition, Brain and Behavior programs. If you are interested, please contact Dr. Wirth in advance of submitting your application. Include your CV, including descriptions of prior research experience, theses, and/or independent projects, and publications or conference presentations.

  • Welcome to new Research Assistants: Amy Ahn, Ann Bode, Kenneth Colon, Megan Covington, Maggie Li, Sierra Muir, and Natalie Pottschmidt!

News (Spring 2014):

  • New publication in press at Stress: Gaffey, A. E., Wirth, M. M., Hoks, R. M., Jahn, A. L., Abercrombie, H. C. Circulating cortisol levels after exogenous cortisol administration are higher in women using hormonal contraceptives: Data from two preliminary studies.

  • Michelle Wirth and Liz Page-Gould organized the third annual Social Neuroendocrinology preconference at the meeting of the Society for Personality and Social Psychology (SPSP), in Austin, TX, February 2014.

  • At the Social Neuroendocrinology Data Blitz, Ph.D. student Allison Gaffey presented the lab’s findings on oxytocin’s effects on corrugator muscle reactivity.

  • Michelle Wirth was awarded a Large Social Sciences Research Grant from Notre Dame’s Institute for Scholarship in the Liberal Arts (ISLA).

  • This semester, Tom Lienhoop is finishing up his exciting senior thesis project entitled “TSST Panel Composition: Effects of Gender and Attractiveness on Physiological Responses to Social-Evaluative Stress in Gay Men

News (January 2014):

  • The ESP lab is looking for new Research Assistants for Summer & Fall 2014, as many of our current Research Assistants will be graduating. If interested, please send your resume and transcript (Unofficial is OK) to Professor Wirth or to Brandy Martinez during the spring semester.

  • In August, Ph.D. student Allison Gaffey presented posters, “Circulating cortisol levels after exogenous cortisol depend on individuals' sex and hormonal birth control use” and "Sex differences in oxytocin’s influence on working memory and steroid hormones in humans" at the Annual Conference of the International Society for Psychoneuroendocrinology in Leiden, The Netherlands. Presentation of the second poster, co-authored with Brandy Martinez, was awarded the ISPNE 2013 Poster Award!

  • Welcome to new research assistants Madison Ratycz and Jung Hyun Choe, and welcom back to Sarah Owensand Erica Mitchell who were studying abroad last semester!

News (October 2013):

  • Professor Wirth is recruiting new Ph.D. students to join the ESP lab in Fall of 2014. If your research interests are a good fit for our lab, please contact Professor Wirth by email in advance of submitting your application. Your C.V., a description of your main research interests, and a writing sample will be helpful.

  • The ESP lab is looking for new Research Assistants for Fall 2014, as many of our current Research Assistants will be graduating. If interested, please send your resume and transcript (Unofficial is OK) to Professor Wirth or to Brandy Martinez during the spring semester.

  • In August, Ph.D. student Allison Gaffey presented posters, "Circulating cortisol levels after exogenous cortisol depend on individuals' sex and hormonal birth control use" and "Sex differences in oxytocin's influence on working memory and steroid hormones in humans" at the Annual Conference of the International Society for Psychoneuroendocrinology in Leiden, The Netherlands. Presentation of the second poster, co-authored with Brandy Martinez, was awarded the ISPNE 2013 Poster Award!

  • Welcome to new research assistants Molly Partusch (ND '14) and Liz Palmer! Liz is a recent graduate of St. Mary's College, whose Senior Thesis was entitled, "Effects of Red Bull Energy Drinks on Catecholamine Levels in Urine Samples of College Females (2012-2013)."

News (April 2013)

  • Congratulations to Erica Mitchell and Catie Buckley, who were awarded UROP (Undergraduate Research Opportunities) summer grants! Erica’s project is titled “Effects of Aging and Cortisol on Working Memory” and Catie’s is titled “Oxytocin and the Suppression of Hunger”.

  • Congrats also go to Christina Buchanan for completing her Glynn Honors Thesis, “The Effects of Oxytocin on Sympathetic Nervous System Responses to Emotional Pictures”, and to Kelly Miller for completing her Psychology Senior Thesis, “The Effect of a Night’s Sleep on Social Closeness and Altruistic Feelings”.

  • In April, Ph.D. student Allison Gaffey presented her poster, “Intranasal oxytocin effects on men’s autonomic nervous system and emotional reactivity” at the annual Wisconsin Emotion Symposium in Madison, WI.

  • Welcome to new research assistant Tom Lienhoop, who joins the lab as a Glynn Honors Fellow this summer.

  • The lab has many graduating seniors this year, all moving on to great things! Watch this space for updates...

  • Lab alumni news: Kelsey Christoffel (’12) was hired by Dr. Suma Jacob, pediatric psychiatrist, to work as a research assistant helping with clinical trials for oxytocin treatment of autism. Way to put skills and knowledge gained in the lab to work!

News (Winter/Spring 2013):

  • Welcome to the new members of our lab team! Project Coordinator Brandy Martinez (B.A., Florida International U.), and new undergraduate research assistants Erica Mitchell and Catherine (Catie) Buckley joined the lab January 2013.
  • In January, Ph.D. student Allison Gaffey gave a “data blitz” presentation in the Social Neuroendocrinology preconference for the annual meeting of the Society for Personality and Social Psychology, held in New Orleans, LA. Allison presented preliminary findings from our study of how oxytocin impacts heart rate and respiratory sinus arrhythmia. Michelle Wirth also presented a talk entitled “Not just social: Evidence for broader effects of oxytocin on human cognition”.

  • September 2012, Allison Gaffey also presented a talk on our collaborative work with co-authors Amy Nuttall, Stephen Mattingly, Jessica Payne, Kristin Valentino and Michelle Wirth, entitled “Child abuse moderates cortisol’s relationship to memory” at the annual ISPNE meeting in New York, NY.

  • Congrats also go to Allison Gaffey for successfully defending her Master’s Thesis!

  • This year, Christina Buchanan and Kelly Miller are working on Senior Thesis projects. Christina’s thesis, through the Glynn Family Honors Program, addresses how oxytocin impacts physiological responses to emotional pictures. Kelly’s thesis, “The Effect of a Night’s Sleep on Social Closeness and Altruistic Feelings”, explores a possible mechanism behind a prior finding from our lab regarding a delay in the development of a new close bond.

News (Spring/Summer 2012)

  • Lab members presented posters at MPA, APS, MWCSC and SBN this spring and summer. Please see Recent Conference Presentations under the Publications tab for more.

  • Ph.D. student Allison Gaffey was awarded a National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellowship. Congratulations Allison!

  • Undergraduate research assistants Christina Buchanan and Ryan Tixier were awarded UROP summer funds from the Glynn Family Honors Program (Christina) and the University of Notre Dame / Institute for Scholarship in Letters and Arts (Ryan). Ryan and Christina will complete projects this summer investigating effects of oxytocin on physiology and cognition in men. For more on Notre Dame's UROP program, see here.

  • Research assistant Chiamaka Esomonu was awarded a Frazier Thompson scholarship. Chiamaka was also accepted to the Indiana Clinical and Translational Science Institute for Summer 2012. As part of this Summer Institute, she will conduct research with a faculty mentor at IUPUI (Indiana University – Purdue University Indianapolis).

  • Congrats to research assistant Kelsey Christoffel for successfully completing her Senior Honors Thesis, "Oxytocin and Testosterone in Female Social Cognition". Kelsey graduated Spring 2012. Next Fall, she will begin medical school at the University of Minnesota.