Our Team

Vishakha recently completed a B.Sc. Specialized Honours Psychology program at York University. She focuses on working with children and adolescents, particularly from vulnerable backgrounds, including racialized minorities, impoverished families, foster homes, and orphanages. Vishakha is currently the ETI lab manager and aims to pursue further education in clinical psychology, with a research interest in exploring developmental outcomes in this population and the impact of diverse parenting styles.

Apart from her academic pursuits, she enjoys reading, walking, and volunteering as a crisis responder at the Redwood Shelter for Women.

Michelle recently graduated from York University with a Specialized Honours degree in Psychology. Her Honours Thesis examined the potential for untrained observers’ ratings of client resistance during short therapy video clips to predict therapy outcome expectations. Michelle is keen to continue refining her research skills while exploring her interests in trauma, coping, emotion regulation, suicide, and the use of nonverbal and paralinguistic behaviour to understand the theory of mind. Her clinical work includes supporting individuals in crisis at the Kids Help Phone Crisis Text Line and Distress Centers of Greater Toronto. Michelle’s career goal is to work as a registered Clinical Psychologist to provide psychotherapy and conduct clinical research to inform interventions to improve mental health outcomes.

Angela is a research associate with the Emotion Transformation Institute. She was previously a manager for ETI and oversaw the recruitment and training of research assistants, general institute workflow, and research. She joined the MA program in Clinical Psychology at Lakehead University in 2023. She completed her B.Sc. (Honours) in Psychology: Brain & Cognition and a Minor in Neuroscience at the University of Guelph in 2020. Her research interests broadly incorporate emotional coping, childhood adversity, family resiliency, and enhancing access to mental healthcare and support. Her MA thesis will analyze the impact of an e-mental health resilience-building tool, the Joypop app, on youth seeking mental health services in Thunder Bay. Angela also worked as a direct support professional for five years for individuals with intellectual and developmental disabilities. In her spare time, she enjoys cooking new recipes, reading, and rock climbing.

George graduated from York University with a specialized B.A., Honours in Psychology in 2019. He has had extensive research involvement in various settings, working alongside researchers like Drs. Christian Bell and Robert T. Muller at York University. Apart from his more recent addition to our team, George’s latest work has focused on emotional and interpersonal dialects in high-arousal personality and trauma disorders, through Dr. Skye Fitzpatrick’s guidance. He is particularly interested in the comorbidity between Borderline Personality Disorder and Posttraumatic Stress Disorder, as they pertain to attachment and intimate social ties. Namely, he wishes to focus his future studies on the effects that perceived feelings of social and intimate safety/ danger have on the arousal of preconceived attachment modalities and their effects on current and future social representations, as well as levels of emotional reactivity vs. integration. His career goal is to work as a registered psychologist in community health settings while conducting research and teaching as well.

Jessica completed her Honours Bachelor of Applied Science in Psychology, Diploma in General Arts and Science, and Certificate in Organizational Behaviour at the University of Guelph-Humber in 2021. Her current research interests include developmental experiences, addiction, criminal justice, trauma, and psychopathology. As an aspiring clinic owner as well as a clinical and forensic psychologist, her next plan is to pursue a Master’s in Clinical Psychology. Her responsibilities as an institute manager consisted of recruiting and training research assistants, updating and implementing lab procedures, as well as overseeing the institute’s workflow. In her free time, she enjoys travelling, exercising, and spending time with her family, friends, and dog.

Before starting her degree at York, Elizabeth completed her Bachelor's of Global Business and Digital Arts at the University of Waterloo in 2019 and worked as a video specialist. She spends her free time volunteering for Kids Help Phone and walking her dog. (She doesn't have a dog. She added that to sound personable).

Imayan is a former lab manager for the ETI and is currently a research associate working on EFT-Y research. He completed his Honours BSc. in Psychology in 2021. Over the years, Imayan has procured extensive research experience, specifically in clinical psychology and psychiatry research. Currently, he is working on various clinical research projects focusing on youth experiencing suicidality, neuroimaging, BPD, self-compassion, and more in hospital settings. Imayan’s future goals are to research and practice with high-risk mental health populations through clinical psychology graduate studies. His research interests include emotional regulation, self-compassion, mindfulness, self-harm, and suicidality.