Carolyn Jones, 2006

Postdoctoral Research Fellow, Oregon Health & Science University

Professional Background

After graduating from Duke with a double major in Biomedical Engineering and Psychology I worked for three years in the healthcare sector of a financial services firm before deciding to go back into research. I then attended graduate school at The University of Texas at Austin where I received my PhD in Behavioral Neuroscience studying the neural mechanisms of socially transmitted fear in rats.  I currently work a post-doctoral fellow at OHSU in Portland, OR researching the neurobiological function of sleep in the development of social cognition in the prairie vole.

How has being a P&N graduate helped shape your professional success?

 I was lucky to work as an undergraduate research assistant in a couple of Psychology & Neuroscience department research labs despite the fact that Psychology was a second major that I didn’t pursue until my junior year of college. I took Dr. Beth Marsh's Introduction to Human Memory course which dramatically shifted my academic interests towards the research topics I pursue today. Once I expressed an interest in psychological research, Dr. Marsh hired me as an undergraduate assistant where I began to learn the ins and outs of human research on neurocognition. I found the research faculty at Duke to be very open to providing hands on experience to undergraduate students in a way that develops practical research skills. That experience helped me secure two summer internships at the NIH during my undergraduate studies and, later, my admission to graduate school.

Carolyn Jones, 2006