2024 Sandra G. Wiener Student Investigator Award, Anna Vannucci

Anna Vannucci is a doctoral candidate in Psychology at Columbia University, where she works in the Developmental Affective Neuroscience Lab (DANLab) under the mentorship of Dr. Nim Tottenham. Before pursuing her doctoral studies, Anna received a B.A. in Psychology from the College of the Holy Cross and an M.S. in Clinical Psychology from the Uniformed Services University. She spent a decade conducting research in clinical child psychology. This work inspired her to pursue a career in developmental neuroscience to understand how early environments shape the neurobiology of human emotional development. Anna is currently a D-SPAN Scholar and was previously a Fulbright Scholar. Her work has been supported by the American Psychological Foundation, International Society for Traumatic Stress Studies, and National Institutes of Health. Anna’s research broadly asks: how is brain development influenced by early interpersonal (i.e., caregiving) adversity, and what affective knowledge is represented within these altered circuits? To address these questions, she leverages experimental, neuroimaging, machine learning, and experience sampling methods. Anna’s dissertation aims to determine how adaptations in midline cortico-subcortical circuitry following early adversity represent the interpersonal-affective “attachment” schemas learned during early caregiving experiences. Anna’s long-term goal is to lead an interdisciplinary research team that investigates the developmental neurocomputational mechanisms that link early-life adversity to affective behaviors.