Recent graduate Taylor Burt receives an academic award from Dr. Jeff Keshen, Vice-President, Grenfell Campus.

Students in Grenfell’s psychology programs continue to raise the bar with respect to our country’s undergraduate research outputs.

For instance, recent B.Sc. graduate Taylor Burt, who hails from Bishop's Falls, credits her volunteer research experiences at Grenfell Campus to her successful acceptance to a prestigious Canadian audiology program. She began a master of clinical science in audiology at the University of Western Ontario in September.

"I received lots of volunteer experience with hearing at Grenfell that was essential to getting accepted," said Ms. Burt, adding she also had the opportunity to do research in the field with an interdisciplinary research project combining sound research and cultural geography.

She conducted the fieldwork under the supervision of Dr. Benjamin Zendel, Faculty of Medicine, Canada Research Chair in Aging and Auditory Neuroscience, and ARC-NL Research Chair. Dr. Zendel runs a state-of-the-art auditory electroencephalography (EEG) laboratory – where Ms. Burt volunteered – called the Cognitive Aging and Auditory Neuroloscience Laboratory. The lab has locations at both St. John’s Campus and Grenfell Campus.

Pictured here from left to right are Grenfell students Cody Chard, Ryan Lee, Savannah Bennett, Bethany Bernier and Emily Alexander, along with supervisor Dr. Daniel Nadolny.

Meanwhile, the honours thesis of graduate Emily Alexander of Kippens, N.L., was about differences in auditory processing (how the brain processes sound) between formally trained and self-taught musicians. You can listen to her talk about her research here. She took part in the Canadian Society for Brain, Behaviour, and Cognitive Science conference in St. John’s in 2018 and also presented her research at the Spring 2018 Science Atlantic Psychology conference that same year.

In fact, the Science Atlantic Psychology conference is a regular part of Grenfell’s honours psychology program. Students are regularly accepted to present their papers and posters and to take part in the annual conference sessions and panels. For instance in 2018, in addition to Emily Alexander, four other senior psychology students attended. The Science Atlantic conference provides undergraduate students from universities throughout Atlantic Canada the opportunity to showcase their own research, learn from psychology presentations in many different areas, and to network with students and researchers across Atlantic Canada.