Emilio Valadez

I am a clinical scientist trained in developmental cognitive neuroscience. My lab focuses on understanding how early risk factors, such as temperament and early adversity, confer risk for future emotional problems among children and adolescents. More specifically, we are interested in how executive functions (assessed with a combination of behavioral, EEG, and MRI measures) moderate the psychiatric impact of early-life risk factors. To address this overarching goal, three interrelated questions spanning basic and translational work guide our research: 1) How are executive functions supported by the brain? 2) How do early risk factors alter the development of executive functions? 3) How do executive functions interact with early risk to modulate psychiatric outcomes? Ultimately, our work aims to provide unique insights into basic cognitive and developmental processes to better inform evidence-based assessment of at-risk individuals and to identify novel target mechanisms for intervention.