Dr. Tara Mcauley

Biography

Tara McAuley is an Associate Professor in the Department of Psychology at the University of Waterloo. She holds a Bachelor's degree from the University of Toronto and a PhD from Washington University. Her research focuses on child and adolescent neuropsychology, specifically examining the development of executive control. Her work investigates how interrelated skills contribute to goal-oriented behavior and aims to cultivate research programs that promote these skill sets. Key areas of interest include modeling executive control development during critical transitional periods in early childhood, adolescence, and young adulthood, as well as identifying various factors that influence this development, such as neurobiological risks and psychosocial adversities. McAuley's research also explores the relationship between executive control domains and outcomes like academic achievement and peer relationships, along with developing interventions to strengthen executive skills. She employs converging behavioral and neuroimaging methods to address questions in both typical and atypical developmental contexts.

Research Interests