Directory

Sandra Wiebe, PhD

Professor, Faculty of Arts - Psychology Dept

Pronouns: she/her

Curriculum Vitæ
Contact Overview Publications

Contact

Professor, Faculty of Arts - Psychology Dept
Email
sandra.wiebe@ualberta.ca
Address
P-243 Bio Science - Psychology Wing
11355 - Saskatchewan Drive
Edmonton AB
T6G 2E9
Availability
On Sabbatical July 1, 2025 - June 30, 2026

Overview

Area of Study / Keywords

Child Development Cognitive Neuroscience Executive Function

About

I joined the University of Alberta in 2009, as a member of the Developmental Science area in Psychology. After receiving my B.A. (Honours) in Psychology from the University of Winnipeg, I went on to complete a Ph.D at the University of Minnesota's Institute of Child Development, minoring in Neuroscience, and several postdoctoral research positions at Southern Illinois University and the University of Nebraska-Lincoln.

Research

My research examines how children develop the ability to regulate their behaviour, attention, cognition, and emotions, how these abilities emerge and develop in the infant, toddler, and preschool years, how changes in behaviour relate to brain development, and what factors put children at risk for developing problems with self-regulation. To study these questions, I use methods drawn from Developmental Cognitive Neuroscience, including game-like tasks adapted from adult neuropsychological tests and behavioral neuroscience measures, sometimes in conjunction with neuroimaging methods like event-related potentials (ERPs), in which small ongoing changes in voltage at the scalp that reflects underlying brain activity are recorded. In addition, I am interested in how contextual and genetic factors (nature and nurture) interact to influence children's developing self-regulatory skills, including prenatal risk factors such as smoking during pregnancy, postnatal factors such as physical activity, and genetic factors related to the dopamine system.

Teaching

I regularly teach PSYCH 531 (Design and Analysis in Psychological Research I), PSYCH 323 (Infant & Child Development), PSYCH 425 (Develomental Cognitive Neuroscience), and a Special Topics seminar (PSYCH 421/622) on the Lifespan Development of Executive Function. I also supervise students in individual research through the Psychology and Neuroscience Honours programs, PSYCH 299 (Research Opportunities in Psychology), and PSYCH 396/398/496/498 (Independent Study).

Featured Publications

Dopamine genetic composite score × environment interactions on executive function in children and adolescents: A systematic review

Developmental Review. 2025 January; 10.1016/j.dr.2025.101201

Executive function’s structure in monolingual and bilingual adults using confirmatory factor analysis

Bilingualism. 2024 January; 10.1017/S136672892400021X

Bidirectional Relations Between Parents’ Discipline Strategies and Children’s Inhibitory Control From Early to Middle Childhood

Journal of Family Psychology. 2024 January; 10.1037/fam0001261

Long-term Memory Testing in Children With Typical Development and Neurodevelopmental Disorders: Remote Web-based Image Task Feasibility Study

Truong An Bui, Cory Scott Rosenfelt, Kerri Hope Whitlock, Mickael Leclercq, Savannah Weber, Arnaud Droit, Sandra A Wiebe, Jacqueline Pei, Francois V Bolduc

JMIR Pediatrics and Parenting. 2023 May; 10.2196/39720

Patterns of preschool children’s screen time, parent–child interactions, and cognitive development in early childhood: a pilot study

Pilot and Feasibility Studies. 2023 January; 10.1186/s40814-023-01266-6

Exploring the interplay of dopaminergic genotype and parental behavior in relation to executive function in early childhood

Development and Psychopathology. 2023 January; 10.1017/S0954579421001061

Longitudinal associations of subjectively-measured physical activity and screen time with cognitive development in young children

Zhiguang Zhang, Sandra A. Wiebe, Aishah Abdul Rahman, Valerie Carson

Mental Health and Physical Activity. 2022 March; 10.1016/j.mhpa.2022.100447

Valence matters: An electrophysiological study on how emotions influence cognitive performance in children

Developmental Psychobiology. 2019 January; 10.1002/dev.21813

Does early maternal responsiveness buffer prenatal tobacco exposure effects on young children's behavioral disinhibition?

Development and Psychopathology. 2019 January; 10.1017/S0954579418000706

A cross-cultural examination of selective attention in Canada and Japan: The role of social context

Sawa Senzaki, Sandra A. Wiebe, Takahiko Masuda, Yuki Shimizu

Cognitive Development. 2018 October; 10.1016/j.cogdev.2018.06.005

Language dominance and cognitive flexibility in French-English bilingual children

Frontiers in Psychology. 2018 January; 10.3389/fpsyg.2018.01697

Executive function: Development across the life span

Executive Function: Development Across the Life Span. 2017 January; 10.4324/9781315160719

Proactive control in early and middle childhood: An ERP study

Developmental Cognitive Neuroscience. 2017 January; 10.1016/j.dcn.2017.04.005

Neural Correlates of Response Inhibition in Early Childhood: Evidence From a Go/No-Go Task

Developmental Neuropsychology. 2017 January; 10.1080/87565641.2017.1355917

Systematic review of physical activity and cognitive development in early childhood

Journal of Science and Medicine in Sport. 2016 January; 10.1016/j.jsams.2015.07.011

Sociodemographic risk and early environmental factors that contribute to resilience in executive control: A factor mixture model of 3-year-olds

Child Neuropsychology. 2015 January; 10.1080/09297049.2014.910300

Systematic review of sedentary behavior and cognitive development in early childhood

Preventive Medicine. 2015 January; 10.1016/j.ypmed.2015.07.016

Prenatal tobacco exposure and self-regulation in early childhood: Implications for developmental psychopathology

Development and Psychopathology. 2015 January; 10.1017/S095457941500005X

Longitudinal Associations Between Executive Control and Developing Mathematical Competence in Preschool Boys and Girls

Child Development. 2013 January; 10.1111/j.1467-8624.2012.01854.x

Qualitative change in executive control during childhood and adulthood

Cognition. 2013 January; 10.1016/j.cognition.2013.02.012

Executive function deficits in preschool children with ADHD and DBD

Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry and Allied Disciplines. 2012 January; 10.1111/j.1469-7610.2011.02468.x

Separating the Fish From the Sharks: A Longitudinal Study of Preschool Response Inhibition

Child Development. 2012 January; 10.1111/j.1467-8624.2012.01765.x

The structure of executive function in 3-year-olds

Journal of Experimental Child Psychology. 2011 January; 10.1016/j.jecp.2010.08.008

Short-term memory, working memory, and executive functioning in preschoolers: Longitudinal predictors of mathematical achievement at age 7 years

Developmental Neuropsychology. 2008 January; 10.1080/87565640801982312

Using Confirmatory Factor Analysis to Understand Executive Control in Preschool Children: I. Latent Structure

Developmental Psychology. 2008 January; 10.1037/0012-1649.44.2.575

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