BBA Lab News

8/14/2024: A new graduate student Isaac Kim has joined the lab. Welcome, Isaac!

Polina presented her work on e-cig cue-reactivity at FENS, 06/28/2024

New Grant!

Incredibly thrilled that the International Center for Responsible Gaming has funded our research on slot machine design features! Read here Mariya’s interview with WVY Today describing this research. This work will be carried out with co-investigators Luke Clark, the director of the Centre for Gambling Research at the University of British Columbia and Katheryn Kestner from the Behavior Analysis area in our department.

New paper!

Cherkasova MV, Clark L, Barton JJS, Stoessl AJ, Winstanley CA. Risk-promoting effects of reward-paired cues in human sign- and goal-trackers. Behavioral Brain Research, 2024, 461: 114865. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.bbr.2024.114865

Neuroscience Capstone poster session, 11/30/2022

Congratulations to Laura and Brianna on their Capstone poster presentations! This was an enormous amount of work done in a short period of time and the first set of EEG data collected in the lab.

Society for Neuroscience, 2022

Congratulations to Polina on presenting her first SfN poster! Well done!

Neuroscience Capstone poster session, 4/29/2022

Congratulations to Alik on acing his Capstone poster presentation!

Alik presenting his work on gambling

Celebratory bowling

WVU Undergraduate Research Symposium, 4/9/2022

Jamie Dotson, Gillian Kaier, and Molly Summers presented their work at the spring Undergraduate Research Symposium. Well done!

Jamie presenting data from Polina’s thesis on sign- and goal-tracking in regular vapers.

Gillian and Molly presenting data on the effects reward-paired cues on reinforcement learning.

… And some post-symposium lab fun throwing axes and knives.

WCBR 2022

Great time presenting the first data from our lab at the Winter Conference on Brain Research (2022)! Almost forgot how fun in-person conferences were. And, of course, can’t complain about the skiing at Snowmass!

Our panel on maladaptive decision making in health and disease. Left to right: Jared Young, Mariya Cherkasova, Jacqueline Ferland, and Cole Vonder Haar. Another speaker in the panel, Donna Calu is, unfortunately, not in the picture. Jackie Ferland was not on the panel, but we are very happy to have her in the picture!

Mariya doing a little skiing

New paper!

Cherkasova MV, Fu J, Tam R, Rauscher A, Kolind S, Sossi V, Traboulsee A, Stoessl AJ. Brain morphology predicts long-term placebo response in multiple sclerosis patients. Scientific Reports, Epub ahead of print.

WVU Undergraduate Research Symposium, 12/4/2021

Congratulations to Alik Assi and Margaret Crow on presenting their poster on The Effects of Reward-Related Sensory Game Features on Simulated Online Gambling at the WVU Undergraduate Research Symposium and winning the poster competition in the Social & Behavioral Sciences category! Well done, Margaret and Alik!

2021 Symposium on Substance Use Research

11/10/2021 - Congratulations to Moyo Jacobs on presenting a poster on her work looking at risky decision making in stimulant use and gambling disorders at the 2021 Symposium on Substance Use Research!