Evan Risko, B.A., M.A., Ph.D.
Dr. Evan Risko is currently an associate professor and a Canada Research Chair in Embodied and Embedded Cognition in the Department of Psychology at the University of Waterloo. Since receiving his PhD at the University of Waterloo, he has been pursuing his research interests in issues related to the embodied and embedded nature of cognition and the utilization of cognitive psychology to help improve practices in education and training.
Research interests
Distributed Cognition. Human cognition often involves, as an integral part, the manipulation of the body and/or physical environment. For example, we tilt our head to help us perceive ambiguous images, and we use our smartphones to store and search for information. In all such cases, internal processes are closely coupled to external ones. From this perspective, we are trying to provide a deeper understanding of how we use our body and physical artifacts to help us think and how this coupling ultimately shapes our thinking.
Effort Perception. We are often described as cognitive misers. That is, we tend toward minimizing our cognitive effort. While this idea plays a central role in cognitive science, we know little about how individuals perceive effort and make decisions based on it. As such, we are trying to better understand how individuals understand effort and decide how effortful given lines of action might be.
Education and Training. We are also interested in using research in cognitive psychology to help improve practices in education and training. In particular, we have an active line of research investigating the characteristics of recorded lectures (e.g., like the ones used in online courses) that optimize learning. For example, we are interested in how various features of lectures impact mind wandering, affect, metacognition, and learning.
Recent publications
For an up-to-date list of publications check out Dr. Risko's Google Scholar profile
You can also find copies of more recent papers here
Lastly, for data, code, pre-registrations and materials for recent papers you can check out our OSF page