Welcome to the Cognition and Natural Behaviour Laboratory! We are housed in the Department of Psychology at the University of Waterloo in Canada. Our research focuses on three broad areas (1) trying to better understand how we use our body and the social and material environment (e.g., technology) to help us think, and how this coupling ultimately shapes our thinking (2) trying to better understand how we think about our thinking (metacognition) and (3) using research in cognitive science to try to improve educational and training practices. This involves research that spans a number of traditional domains including attention, memory, cognitive control, perception, and language.
For more information, please feel free to browse our website or contact us directly at canb.laboratory@uwaterloo.ca.
Evan F. Risko, PhD
Lab Director
Testimonials from our lab members.
The CaNB lab provided me with my first opportunities for hands on learning and participation in research. I appreciate the lab's open and welcoming atmosphere. Professor Risko and the grad students are approachable, interested, and wonderful to work with.
I could never have predicted the amount of learning opportunities I would gain from joining the Cognitive and Natural Behaviour lab. I had just recently graduated from another institution and was in search of some further research experience before deciding whether to pursue graduate school. After being warmly accepted into this lab as a senior research assistant (RA; which led to a paid RA position), it was not long before I found myself invited onto multiple projects, one of which even led to a publication. Moreover, the graduate students and other RAs were all extremely knowledgeable and generous and I found myself looking up to and learning from them very early. I knew quickly after that, not only did I want to go to graduate school, but that I wanted to do it in this very lab. The rest is (a delightful) history.