Esther Direnfeld
Supervisor
Research interests
My overall research interests involve the understanding of executive functions and their development in children and adolescents with neurological disorders. For my Master’s thesis, I examined the anterior cingulate cortex as a neurological correlate of executive functioning in children with ADHD. For my dissertation, I am using a variety of approaches to evaluate the validity and reliability of an executive functioning screener in children and adolescents with neurological disorders. I also plan to characterize the nature of executive functioning in this clinical population through examination of the derived executive functioning screener and traditional performance-based executive functioning tasks.
Representative publications
Garcia-Barrera, M. A., Karr, J. E., Duran, V., Direnfeld, E., & Pineda, D. A. (2015) Cross-cultural validation of a behavioral screener for executive functions: Guidelines for clinical use among Colombian children with and without ADHD. Psychological Assessment. Pagination not yet set. doi:10.1037/pas0000117.
Garcia-Barrera, M. A., Direnfeld, E., Frazer, J., & Moore, W. R. (2012). Objective and projective assessment techniques. In C. A. Noggle & R. S. Dean (Eds.), The Neuropsychology of Psychopathology (pp. 473-494). New York, Springer Publishing Company.
Smith, M. L., & Direnfeld, E. (2012). Memory in children with epilepsy. In A. Zeman, N. Kapur, & M. Jones-Gotman (Eds.), Epilepsy and Memory (pp. 102-113). Oxford: Oxford University Press.
Representative presentations
Direnfeld, E., Duran, V., Karr, J. E., Garcia-Barrera, M. A., & Pineda, D. A. (2014). Further examination of a cross-cultural executive functioning screener and its utility in clinical populations. [Abstract]. Journal of the International Neuropsychological Society, 20 (S1), 223.
Direnfeld, E., Karr, J. E., Garcia-Barrera, & Pineda, D. A. (2013). Cross-cultural validation of a screener for executive functions [Abstract]. Journal of the International Neuropsychological Society, 19(S1), 51- 52. doi: 10.1017/S1355617713000362
Direnfeld, E., Garcia-Barrera, M., Hatter, J., Moore, W. R., Shayegi Nick, L., & Perez-Hernandez. (2012). Examining the relationships between anterior cingulate cortex morphology and behavior in a sample of Spanish children with ADHD [Abstract]. Journal of the International Neuropsychological Society, 18(S1), 36. doi: 10.1017/S1355617712000537
Recent awards
- CIHR Health Professional Student Research Award, 2015
- University of Victoria Graduate Award, 2014-2015
- Psi Chi Travel Award, 2013
- CIHR Frederick Banting and Charles Best Canada Graduate
- Scholarships, Master’s Award, 2010-2011
- University of Victoria President’s Research Scholarship, 2010-2011
- University of Victoria Graduate Award, 2009
- Pacific Century Graduate Scholarship, 2009