Director and Principal Investigator

James MacKillop, Ph.D.


Dr. MacKillop completed a BA in psychology and philosophy at the State University of New York (SUNY) at Binghamton. After a brief hiatus, he returned to SUNY-Binghamton and completed MA and PhD degrees in clinical psychology, completing the predoctoral clinical internship at the Brown University Clinical Psychology Consortium. He then stayed at Brown to complete a postdoctoral research fellowship at the Center for Alcohol and Addiction Studies and was a member of the core faculty of the Center from 2006-2008. Most recently, he joined UGA’s Department of Psychology, where he directs the Experimental and Clinical Psychopharmacology Laboratory. Dr. MacKillop conducts research using behavioral economics and other learning-based approaches to improve the understanding and treatment of addictive behavior. He is a member of the clinical area of the Psychology Department and is currently accepting new PhD students; interested individuals should contact him at jmackill@uga.edu.

Curriculum Vitae (PDF)

Lauren Pryor, M.S.; Project Coordinator


Lauren Pryor completed a BS in psychology at Furman University in Greenville, SC. She is currently a 3rd year student in the Clinical Psychology program at UGA and recently completed her MS thesis examining the reliability and validity of a brief, clinician-rated measure of the Five-Factor-Model of personality. Her research primarily involves investigating relations between personality (i.e., general and pathological personality models) and externalizing behavior, including substance use, aggression, and pathological gambling. She also studies personality disorders and psychopathy.

Curriculum Vitae (PDF)

Michael Amlung, M.S.; Project Coordinator

Email: mamlung@uga.edu
Website: http://mamlung.myweb.uga.edu/

Michael completed his BS in Cognitive Science and Neuroscience from Indiana University and earned his MS in psychology from UGA in 2009. He is a 3rd year Ph.D. student in the cognitive-experimental program. His primary interests intersect cognitive and clinical neuroscience. His current work uses a multimodal approach combining neuroimaging and behavioral techniques to explore alcoholism and drug addiction. He is especially interested in using behavioral economics paradigms to explore factors that predispose individuals to the development of substance abuse, especially in undergraduate samples. Michael serves as project coordinator on two projects in the lab: one investigating the effects of alcohol cue exposure on behavioral economic measures of craving for alcohol and the other study is using fMRI to investigate the neural substrates of alcohol craving, delay discounting, and cue reactivity. His graduate training is generously supported, in part, by a fellowship from the Franklin Foundation Neuroimaging Training Program.

Curriculum Vitae (PDF)

John Acker, B.A.; Graduate Student

Email: ajohn10@uga.edu

John received his BA in psychology from Binghamton University in Binghamton, NY in 2008. I am a first-year graduate student in the clinical psychology program at UGA. Currently in the ECPL, I contribute to a grant investigating craving for cigarettes via behavioral economics. Generally speaking, my research interests involve the clinical applications of experimental psychopathology paradigms (the addiction Stroop, Flanker Task, Change Blindness, Go/No-go task),in substance abuse/dependent populations. I am also interested in the multidimensional constructs of impulsivity and demand in such populations.

Curriculum Vitae (PDF)

Cara Murphy, B.S. ; Graduate Student

Email: murphyc@uga.edu

Cara Murphy completed a BS in psychology and Spanish at Union College in Schenectady, New York. While at Union College, she researched the possible neuropsychological effects of alcohol use in college students with special attention on the impact of binge drinking and the possible moderating effects of personality, specifically, self-monitoring. Following her commencement, she conducted research at Harvard Medical School looking at schizophrenia and schizotypal personality disorder with a particular emphasis on predictors of progression using neuropsychological, electrophysiological, and magnetic resonance imaging studies. Cara now joins the Experimental and Clinical Psychopharmacology Laboratory as a first-year doctoral student in clinical psychology. Her research interests lie primarily in the study of voluntary behaviors associated with addiction, particularly, choice and motivation to use alcohol and substances when compared with the opportunity costs.

Courtney Brown, B.A. Graduate Research Assistant Courtney joined the lab as a graduate research assistant in fall 2009. She earned a B.A. in Psychology from Tufts University and is currently a graduate student in the Clinical Psychology Program at UGA. Her research interests include studying language processes using neuroimaging methodology. She is interested in components of verbal memory, and verbal memory detriments in individuals with schizophrenia.		Monika Stojek, B.S. Graduate Research Assistant Monika joined the lab as a graduate research assistant in fall 2009. She earned a B.S. in Psychology from Kennesaw State University and is currently a graduate student in the Clinical Psychology Program at UGA. Her research interests lie primarily in the area of eating disorders. She is interested in comorbidity of bulimia nervosa with other forms of psychopathology, including personality disorders, anxiety disorders, and substance use disorders as well as binge drinking among young women.
Chris Bower Senior Research Assistant Chris is a senior psychology major at UGA who began working in the ECP lab in May of 2009. My interests include behavioral neuroscience, genetics involved with addiction, psychopharmacology, and behavioral economics and . After graduation in May of 2010, I hope to attend graduate school where I will pursue a Ph.D.		Anna Harrell. Senior Research Assistant Anna earned a B.A in Psychology from UGA in 2009. Her interests include the role of genetics in alcoholism, substance abuse, schizophrenia, and other behavior disorders. Other interests include factors that may influence addictive behavior, co-occurring disorders, and behavioral neuroscience.
Kristi Jackson Senior Research Assistant Kristi graduated from UGA in 2009 with a psychology major/women's studies minor and has been working in the ECP lab since August 2008. She hopes to attend graduate school and attain a Ph.D in clinical psychology. Her two focal interests are substance abuse and the therapy of interpersonal relationships.		Whitney Adams Research Assistant
Thomas Crow Research Assistant		Nathan Monnett Research Assistant
Spencer Speagle Research Assistant Spencer is a third year undergraduate psychology major at UGA and began working in the lab in Fall 2009. His interests include Cognitive Behavioral Psychology and Neuroscience with specific interests in psychological disorders, substance abuse and human sexuality. After graduating in May 2010, he hopes to attend graduate school and pursue a PhD. in clinical psychology.		Catherine Spann Research Assistant