Welcome to the Young Minds Research Lab!

Who are you?

We are a non-profit research group at the University of Manitoba who studies human development. You may have met us in the community or on social media talking about research, healthy human development, and doing fun activities.

What do you do?

Human development is a multidisciplinary research area that spans across several fields, such as linguistics, cognitive psychology, and neuroscience. The goal is to understand how humans grow and change over time. We mainly do experimental research to understand the factors that affect how children think and reason. This means we play games with children or read them stories and then ask them questions after.

What are you studying right now?

We are a multi-disciplinary lab who studies lots of different topics. Right now, we are hoping to learn more about how children think about and learn from technology. We also study related concepts like how children think about privacy in both physical and digital spaces, and how children make decisions. Sometimes we also do projects related to moral development and reasoning. Our goal is to fill critical knowledge gaps in how young children think and reason, so we can (one day) better support child development through appropriate policies and educational campaigns.

How can you help?

We are always looking for families who may want to help with our projects so please consider signing up to hear about our research studies: Sign-Up to Help us do Science or visiting us at the Manitoba Museum at our Living Lab!

Where are the results of your studies?

You can see recent findings in the publications, or by reading our newsletters.

Our Team

Director

Shaylene Nancekivell (she/her)

Dr. Shaylene Nancekivell is an Associate Professor at the University of Manitoba who directs the Young Minds Research Lab. She was previously an Assistant Professor at UNCG. Broadly, she is interested in understanding the nature of conceptual representations, specifically those (potentially) structured as intuitive theories. Right, now her primary interests center around how children and adults reason about digital contexts and possessions. But, as an educator, she has additional interests in people’s beliefs about learning Her work can be found in a wide range of developmental, cognitive science, and educational journals. She is currently funded by NSERC.
Learn more about recent papers here, or by sending her an email at shaylene.nancekivell@umanitoba.ca.

Graduate Students

**Ekam Banipal (she/her)**
Ekam is currently in her first year of the Experimental Psychology Master's program. She is interested in children’s consumption of content provided by algorithms. For her thesis, she is working on investigating algorithmic literacy amongst parents and how this impacts children's interactions with technology. Other than conducting research, Ekam enjoys spending time with her family and friends and reading books.

**Mark Dobrovolskyi (he/him)**
Mark is pursuing a Master’s degree in School Psychology. He aims to increase the inclusivity of children with diverse needs and promote evidence-based practices in education. His Master’s thesis focuses on how learning styles, a common learning myth, may impact how people think of students and the potential consequences of these perceptions. Beyond academia, Mark collects hobbies, like soccer, bowling, baseball, and recently, chess!

Allyson Paton (she/her)

Allyson is in the School Psychology Masters program. She is interested in research that supports wellbeing and development in children. Allyson’s Masters research focuses on promoting wellbeing in digital spaces by learning how children think and feel about technology. Her thesis is supported by the Social Sciences and Humanities Research Council. When not in front of her laptop, you can find Allyson outside gardening or cozying up with her cat and a good book.

**Sarah Petriw (she/her)**
Sarah is our former database coordinator/lab manager. She is in the Clinical Psychology PhD program at the University of Manitoba. She is interested in how young children reason about privacy online (and offline).

Lab Coordinators

**Celeste Vermette (any pronouns) - Lab Manager**
Celeste graduated from the University of Manitoba in June of 2026 with a B.A. Honours in Psychology and minor in Anthropology. Having completed their undergraduate thesis with the MINDLab in the Dept. of Psychology, they are interested in how language affects individual's lived experience and how to support second-language acquisition in young learners

**Taylor French - Social Media Coordinator**
Taylor is a B. A. Honours Psychology student. She joined the lab to gain valuable experience and expand her understanding of the clinical psychology field. Her interests centre around human development and behaviour modification.

Honours Thesis Students

Caleb Payment

Caleb is an undergraduate student in the B.Sc. Honours Psychology program. He is interested in studying the reasons behind human behaviour and decision making. He joined the lab to learn the basis that children use to make decisions.

**Kiana Pagtakhan**
Kiana is a third year undergrad student in the B.A. Honours Psychology program. She joined the lab to get research experience and is happy she gets to do so by studying child development.

This could be you!

We are currently looking for undergraduate research assistants to join our lab.

Apply today!

Lab Alumni

Collaborators

We work with these amazing researchers:

Dr. Drew Weatherhead, Dalhousie University, Cognition and Language Learning Research Group

Dr. Jasmine DeJesus, UNCG, Development Culture Health Lab

Dr. Ori Friedman, University of Waterloo, Child Cognition Lab

Dr. Stephanie Denison, University of Waterloo, Developmental Learning Lab

Dr. Susan Gelman, University of Michigan, Conceptual Development Lab

Dr. Priti Shah, University of Michigan, Basic and Applied Cognition Lab

We also work closely with our Living Lab partner Manitoba Museum to bring research to the community.