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Brendan Cullen
I am a NSF Graduate Research Fellow in the Department of Psychology at the University of Oregon and a Data Science Educator at RStudio, PBC. My research takes a translational (neuro)science approach toward predictive modeling of health behaviors. I teach R and R Markdown to empower others to conduct rigorous and reproducible data science.
Education
20192017
MS, Psychology
University of Oregon Eugene, OR- Thesis: Comparing cognitive and affective predictors of craving
- My graduate research took a translational (neuro)science approach toward predictive modeling of self-regulation processes and health-risking behaviors.
- As part of my graduate training, I completed a 5-course Data Science Specialization in Educational Leadership taught entirely in R, focused on reproducible analysis, data visualization, functional programming, and machine learning within a tidyverse framework.
20152011
BA, Neuroscience
Middlebury College Middlebury, VT- Thesis: Neurophysiological correlates of self-referential activity in meditators and non-meditators
Certification
2020
RStudio Certified Instructor
RStudio, PBC- I am an RStudio Certified Instructor in the tidyverse (see certificate).
Honors & Awards
20232018
NSF Graduate Research Fellowship [more info]
National Science Foundation2020
Gregores Research Award [more info]
Department of Psychology, University of Oregon2020
Graduate Education Committee Research Award
Department of Psychology, University of Oregon2020
General University Scholarship [more info]
University of Oregon2020
Pilot & Training Core Travel Award [more info]
Center on Parenting and Opioids, University of Oregon2020
Graduate School “Special Opps” Travel & Research Award [more info]
University of Oregon2019
Graduate Education Committee Travel Award
Department of Psychology, University of Oregon2017
Graduate School Recruitment Award [more info]
University of Oregon2017
Mind and Life Summer Research Institute Fellow [more info]
Mind and Life Institute2016
International Symposium for Contemplative Studies Scholarship [more info]
Mind and Life Institute2015
BA in Neuroscience with Highest Honors, Summa Cum Laude
Middlebury College2015
Elected to Phi Beta Kappa [more info]
Middlebury College20152011
Dean’s Honor List (8 semesters)
Middlebury College2015
Rosalin Lieberman-Reiss Memorial Award
Department of Psychology, Middlebury College2015
Mind and Life Summer Research Institute Fellow [more info]
Mind and Life Institute2014
International Symposium for Contemplative Studies Scholarship [more info]
Mind and Life Institute2014
Academic Conference Travel Fund Award
Middlebury College2014
Senior Research Project Supplement
Middlebury College2014
Bicentennial Fund for Research Partnerships in the Sciences Fellowship
Middlebury College2013
Fred M. Roddy Research Fellowship in Biomedical Science
Middlebury CollegeProfessional Research Experience
20212018
National Science Foundation Graduate Research Fellow
Social and Affective Neuroscience Lab University of Oregon- Co-designed interventions for large-scale study comparing behavioral response and cognitive reappraisal interventions for devaluing unhealthy food.
- Created and maintained automated workflow for daily backup of fMRI data via a high performance computing cluster.
20172015
Research Assistant
Clinical and Affective Neuroscience Lab Brown University- Led independent research projects exploring outcomes of a randomized controlled trial of Mindfulness-Based Cognitive Therapy for depression.
- Led a project investigating the effects of meditation training on EEG and behavioral measures of self-referential processing
20172015
Research Assistant
Embodied Neuroscience Lab Brown University- Collected EEG data for pilot RCT testing a neuromuscular-immune model of chronic fatigue in female cancer survivors
- Designed custom software in MATLAB to implement novel EEG/EMG paradigm for measuring neural correlates of tactile acuity and precision grip strength
2016
Recruitment Specialist
Women’s Medicine Collaborative,Miriam Hospital Providence, RI
- Developed strategies to recruit specialized patient populations for randomized controlled trials, including female cancer survivors and patients with asthma
20152014
Research Assistant
Social Psychology of Meditation Lab Middlebury College- Led a study on relationship between mindfulness, hormones, empathy, and prosocial behavior
- Recruited and interviewed participants, administered surveys and cognitive tests, and analyzed salivary cortisol and testosterone assays
20142013
Research Assistant
Behavioral Neuroendocrinology Lab Middlebury College- Collected animal behavior data on the dose-dependent effects of testosterone replacement on spatial memory
- Performed behavioral testing, prepared brain samples, collected microscopy data and assisted with manuscript preparation
Teaching Experience
I believe that learning open-source data science tools can empower us to be better scientists and critical thinkers. I have served as a teaching assistant and lab instructor for both undergraduate and graduate-level statistics courses.
20212020
Data Science Educator
RStudio, PBC Remote- Developed interactive educational materials related to using R for data science.
2020
Lab Instructor
PSY 302: Statistical Methods in Psychology University of Oregon- Taught online lab sections for introductory undergraduate statistics course (~200 students total) using the open-source statistical software jamovi. (Spring 2020)
2020
Lab Instructor
PSY 612: Data Analysis II University of Oregon- Designed and taught lab sections on Correlations, Univariate Regression and the General Linear Model, Regression with Categorical Predictors, Interactions, and Factorial ANOVA. (Winter 2020)
2019
Lab Instructor
PSY 611: Data Analysis I University of Oregon- Designed and taught lab sections on R Basics and Descriptive Statistics, Matrix Algebra, Data Transformation with dplyr, Pre-registration, and Paired samples t-tests. (Fall 2019)
2015
Teaching Assistant
PSYC 301: Physiological Psychology Middlebury College- Assisted with lab and discussion sections, held exam review sessions, prepared experimental equipment, and conducted animal testing for student projects
Workshops Taught
2020
R Markdown: Lesser-known tips and tricks
Portland R User Group Remote- A collection of “lesser known” tips and tricks in R Markdown, prepared for the Portland R User Group “aggregate” meetup.
2020
Using R more “wisely”: Column-wise & row-wise operations with dplyr
R Ladies Algiers Remote- Workshop for R-Ladies Algiers on column-wise and row-wise operations with dplyr for more efficient data wrangling and summarizing.
2020
UO Psych R Bootcamp
Department of Psychology University of Oregon- 3-day introductory bootcamp covering basics of R, R Markdown and transforming and visualizing data with the tidyverse. ~45 attendees including current and incoming grad students, undergrads, research staff and tenure-track faculty.
2020
Introduction to Git and Github
Psychology First Year Research Seminar University of Oregon- Introductory workshop for ~20 first-year psychology PhD and Master’s students on basics of using Git and Github for version control
2019
Intermediate Git and Github
UO Data Science Club University of Oregon- Intermediate Git/Github workshop for University of Oregon’s Data Science Club, including discussion of merge conflicts, branching, pull requests, and best practices for collaborative Github projects
Peer-reviewed Publications
My peer-reviewed scientific publications are varied in topic, ranging from the neuroendocrinology of spatial memory to decomposing neurocognitive mechanisms of mindfulness practices. In general, I am interested in studying how the plasticity of the brain can be leveraged to better understand and guide adpative changes in behavior to support human health and wellness.
2021
The contributions of focused attention and open monitoring in Mindfulness-Based Cognitive Therapy: a 3-armed randomized dismantling trial
PloS One, 16(1), e0244838.- Cullen, B., Eichel, K., Lindahl, J., Rahrig, H., Kini, N., Flahive, J. & Britton, W.B.
2018
Dismantling Mindfulness-Based Cognitive Therapy: Creation and validation of 8-week Focused Attention and Open Monitoring interventions within a 3-armed randomized controlled trial
Behaviour and Research Therapy, 101, 92-107.- Britton, W.B., Davis, J., Loucks, E.B., Peterson, B., Cullen, B., Reuter, L., Rando, A., Rahrig, H., Lipsky, J. & Lindahl, J. (2018).
2018
Comparing embodiment experiences in expert meditators and non-meditators
Consciousness and Cognition, 65, 325-333.- Xu, A., Cullen, B., Penner, C., Zimmerman, C., Kerr, C.E., & Schmalzl, L. (2018)
2018
Dose-dependent effects of testosterone on spatial memory in adult male rats
Psychoneuroendocrinology, 89, 120-130.- Wagner, B., Braddick, V. Batson, C., Cullen, B., Miller, E. & Spritzer, M. (2018).
Pre-prints & Works in Progress
2020
Neural correlates of emotion reactivity and emotion regulation in women with borderline personality disorder: A replication of the literature with novel extensions
In prep- Lewis, J., Cullen, B., Giuliani, N., & Zalewski, M.
2019
Comparing cognitive and affective predictors of craving
Pre-print- Cullen, B., DeStasio, K., Cosme, D., & Berkman, E.T.
Selected Poster Presentations
2019
Cognitive versus affective predictors of craving
Society for Personality and Social Psychology Portland, OR- Cullen, B., DeStasio, K., Cosme, D., & Berkman, E.T. (2019)
2019
Personalized stop-signal training to improve inhibitory control among adults who experienced early adversity
Society for Personality and Social Psychology Portland, OR- DeStasio, K., Cullen, B., Shaffer, K., & Berkman, E.T. (2019)
2017
Teacher effects in a school-based mindfulness intervention
Mind and Life Summer Research Institute Garrison, NY- Cullen, B., Canby, N., & Britton, W. B.
2017
Sustained Attention in Focused Attention versus Open Monitoring Meditation: Behavioral and Neurophysiological Changes
29th Association for PsychologicalScience Annual Convention Boston, MA
- Eichel, K., Essien, G., Cullen, B., Rogers, A. & Britton, W.B.
2017
Dose-dependent effects of testosterone on spatial memory in young and adult male rats
International Meeting for Steroids and theNervous System Turin, Italy
- Spritzer, M.D., Batson, C.G., Braddick, V.C., Chyr, C.U., Cullen, B., Goins, E.C., Jaeger, E.C.B., Miller, L.E., Super, C., & Wagner, B.A.
2016
An open-source system for EEG neurofeedback and transcranial current stimulation control: Applications for meditation research
International Symposium for Contemplative Studies,Society for Neuroscience Annual Meeting San Diego, CA
- Cullen, B., Santoyo, J., Black, C., McFarlane-Blake, C. & Kerr, C.
2016
A Neurofeedback Informed Meditation Technique (NIMT) for modulating posterior cingulate cortex activity: Proof-of concept for a novel mental-training paradigm with clinical applications
International Symposium for Contemplative Studies,Society for Neuroscience Annual Meeting San Diego, CA
- Santoyo, J., Cullen, B., & Kerr, C.
2015
Neurophysiological correlates of self-referential activity in meditators and non-meditators
Mind and Life Summer Research Institute Garrison, NY- Cullen, B., Bruns, M., Paritsky, A., McGuirk, E., Ogle, T., Kimble, M., & Cronise, K.
2015
Neurophysiological correlates of self-referential activity in meditators and non-meditators
Advances in Meditation Research New York, NY- Cullen, B., Bruns, M., Paritsky, A., McGuirk, E., Ogle, T., Kimble, M., & Cronise, K.
2014
Effects of testosterone dose on spatial memory in adult male rats
Society for Neuroscience Annual Meeting Washington, D.C.- Cullen, B., Spritzer, M., Batson, C., Spillane, S., & Wagner, B.
Talks
2020
Predicting diabetes status from personality using machine learning
useR! 2020 (canceled due to COVID-19) St. Louis, MO- Cullen, B., Weston, S., & Condon, D.
2017
Dismantling effects of focused attention and open monitoring techniques in Mindfulness-Based Cognitive Therapy for affective disturbances
Annual Meeting and Expo of the AmericanPublic Health Association Atlanta, GA
- Chang, B., Cullen, B., Kini, N., Rahrig, H., & Britton, W.
2016
Movement, embodiment and interoception in the context of contemplative practices (Panel)
International Symposium for Contemplative Studies San Diego, CA- Schmalzl, L., Powers, C., Yetz, N., Groessl, EJ., Saron, C., Kerr, C., Zimmerman, C., Cullen, B., Clark, D., Mostofsky, SH., Feinstein, J., Khalsa, S., Simmons, K., & Paulus, M.
2016
Effects of focused attention and open monitoring meditation on sustained attention
International Symposium for Contemplative Studies San Diego, CA- Eichel, K., Cullen, B., & Britton, W.
Additional Training
2020
RStudio Instructor Training
RStudio, PBC Remote- Two-day intensive training on applying modern evidence-based teaching practices to teach data science using R and RStudio’s products.
2020
Introduction to Machine Learning with the Tidyverse
rstudio::conf(2020) San Francisco, CA- Two-day workshop on machine learning with the tidymodels meta-package. Topics covered included prediction, classification, sampling & resampling, ensembling, workflows, recipes, cross-validation and model tuning.
Service & Leadership
2020
Co-organizer
Cascadia R Conf 2020 Eugene, OR- Updated website, designed new hex sticker, secured additional sponsors
2018
Co-organizer
Eugene Brainhack Eugene, OR- Co-organized a two-day Brainhack event hosted at the University of Oregon for collaborative software development projects related to computational neuroscience and psychology
2018
Science communication ambassador
The People’s Science Eugene, OR- Trained to be a coach to assist people with communicating their scientific work to the general public
2018
Lab Tour Guide
Intel Science Fair Eugene, OR- Gave a presentation for middle- and high-school students as part of a science outreach event during the regional Intel Science Fair in Eugene
- Gave students a tour of the Social and Affective Neuroscience Lab and hosted a Q&A session about scientific careers
2016
Co-organizer
Mindfulness, Healing and Empathy in Healthcare Speaker Series,Warren Alpert Medical School at Brown University Providence, RI
- Coordinated with guest speakers for a 6-part lecture series for Brown University medical students and community members
- Created a website to advertise the public talks and to provide community members with information about mindfulness resources