Pinar Aldan earned her B.A. and M.A. in Psychology from Boğaziçi University in Turkey and her Ph.D. in Developmental Psychology from Yale University. She joined the CADLab in the summer of 2025. Her research looks at how people understand social and economic inequalities, and what shapes their willingness to rethink long-held beliefs. Right now, she’s studying: (1) how people of different ages pay attention to and learn from examples that either support or challenge stereotypes, (2) how parents talk to their kids about everyday inequality, and (3) how people make sense of unequal pay in the workplace.

Outside the lab, Pinar loves to travel, knit, cook, and watch indie horror movies.

If you would like to learn more about Pinar, visit her website here.

Jordan Legaspi, M.S., is a 6th year PhD Student in the Cognition Across Development Lab, based at UMass Amherst. He is interested in the global development of cognitive heuristics and social bias, with special consideration to how essentialism and stereotyping affect intra- and inter- personal relations.

Yuchen Tian (she/her/hers), M.A. is a 5th-year PhD student in the CAD lab, based at Boston University. She studies how adults and children think about leadership, social status, and socioeconomic inequalities. In asking these questions, Yuchen pays particular attention to how culture (e.g., macro-level: U.S. vs. China; micro-level: contact to certain social groups) shapes differences in people’s social thinking. In her dissertation, Yuchen is investigating the development of 4- to 12-year-old children’s beliefs about social mobility across different social groups and in a cross-cultural context.

Before joining the CAD lab, Yuchen received her Master's degree in Developmental Psychology from Cornell University. You can learn more about Yuchen by clicking here.

Nicole is a third-year PhD student working in the CAD lab and the BASE lab at Boston University. Prior to attending BU, she received her BS in Psychology at UW-Madison and worked as a lab manager for the combined research projects of the Prejudice and Intergroup Relations Lab (PI: Dr. Devine) and the Social Kids Lab (PI: Dr. Shutts).

As a doctoral student, Nicole seeks to answer the following questions: (1) Why do children help, hurt, and empathize with others? (2) How can parents reduce children’s intergroup biases and promote their prosocial behaviors?

Sophia is a graduate PhD student in the CAD Lab, based at Boston University. Before joining the lab she received her BA in Psychology from NYU and worked as a lab manager. She’s interested in children’s awareness of disparities and how they reason about observed differences. She hopes her work will develop strategies to better support children with marginalized identities and help them navigate the inequities they face.

Ashleigh is a sophomore at Boston University, majoring in psychology and minoring in deaf studies. Her time as a mentor and ABA behavioral therapist fostered her love for working with children and plans to pursue a graduate degree in developmental neuropsychology. She hopes to become a neuropsychologist and conduct research on ASD, specifically in children. She is so excited to be working with the CAD Lab and learning more about children’s perspectives of our world!

Sam is a junior at Boston University, where he blends his love for language, literature, and science by majoring in Japanese Language & Literature and minoring in Chemistry. On a pre-medical track, he’s driven by a passion for research and knowledge, with plans to go to medical school. Sam is especially fascinated by how children from diverse backgrounds perceive and navigate the world, and he's eager to explore these insights further in the CAD
Lab.