Dr. Van Hecke is originally from Canton, Mississippi. She received her undergraduate degree in psychology from Smith College in Northampton, Massachusetts. After a research internship at the University of Portsmouth, England, Dr. Van Hecke completed her doctoral work in Developmental Psychology at the University of Miami in Coral Gables, Florida. Dr. Van Hecke then received a Kirschstein National Research Service Award (NRSA) from the National Institute of Mental Health to complete a three-year postdoctoral fellowship in the Department of Psychiatry at the University of Illinois, Chicago.
Dr. Van Hecke enjoys reading, traveling, playing croquet, and cooking Southern food for her husband, her daughters, and friends in her spare time.
Dr. Van Hecke is interested in interviewing/taking a Graduate Student for the Fall 2013.
Education
Ph.D., University of Miami
B.A., Smith College
Teaching Interests
Dr. Van Hecke enjoys teaching undergraduate Developmental Psychology: Conception through Adolescence, and graduate and undergraduate Introduction to Statistics.
Research Interests
Dr. Van Hecke’s specialty is developmental psychology, with an emphasis on typical and atypical social development in infants, children, and teenagers. In particular, Dr. Van Hecke is interested in brain activity, heart rate regulation, and social behavior in infants, in children with developmental disorders, such as autism, and in teenagers with autism who are undergoing social skills interventions. Dr. Van Hecke utilizes high-density electroencephalogram, or EEG, to record brain activity in infants, children, and teenagers. Her past studies have focused on topics such as the development of eye contact behavior, temperament, and social skills in typically developing infants, and the activation of the brain and regulation of the heart in response to familiar and unfamiliar people in children with high-functioning autism.
Selected Publications
Bal, E., Harden, E., Lamb, D., Vaughan Van Hecke, A., Denver, J., & Porges, S.W. (2009). Emotion recognition in children with autism spectrum disorders: Relations to eye gaze and autonomic state. Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, 40, 358-370
Vaughan Van Hecke, A., Lebow, J., Bal, E., Lamb, D. Harden, E., Kramer, A., Denver, J., Bazhenova, O., & Porges, S. (2009). EEG and heart rate regulation to familiar and unfamiliar people in children with autism spectrum disorders. Child Development, 80, 1118-33
Mundy, P., & Van Hecke, A.V. (2008). Neural systems, gaze following, and the development of joint attention. In C. Nelson & M. Luciana (Eds.), Handbook of Developmental Cognitive Neuroscience, 2nd edition (pp. 819-838). Cambridge, MA: The MIT Press
Reddy, V., Williams, E., & Vaughan, A. (2002). Sharing humour and laughter in autism and Down’s Syndrome. British Journal of Psychology, 93, 219-24.
Mundy, P., & Vaughan, A. (2002). Joint attention and its role in the diagnostic assessment of children with autism. Assessment for Effective Intervention, 27, 57-60.
Vaughan, A., Mundy, P., Block, J., Burnette, C., Delgado, C., Gomez, Y., Meyer, J., Neal, R., & Pomares, Y. (2003). Child, caregiver, and temperament contributions to infant joint attention. Infancy, 4, 603-616.
Sutton, S., Burnette, C., Mundy, P., Meyer, J., Vaughan, A., Sanders, C., & Yale, M. (2005). Resting cortical brain activity, social impairments, and comorbidity in high functioning children with autism. Journal of Child Psychology and Psychiatry and Allied Disciplines, 46, 211-222.
Meyer, J. A., Mundy, P., Van Hecke, A.V., & Durocher, J. S. (2006). Social-attribution processes and comorbid psychiatric symptoms in children with Asperger syndrome. Autism, 10, 383-402.
Vaughan Van Hecke, A., & Mundy, P. (2007). Neural systems and the development of gaze following and related joint attention skills. In R. Flom, K. Lee, & D. Muir (Eds.), Gaze Following: Its Development and Significance (pp.17-51). Mahwah, NJ: Lawrence Erlbaum Associates.
Mundy, P., Block, J., Delgado, C.,Van Hecke, A.V., Pomares, Y., & Parlade, M.V. (2007). Individual differences and the development of joint attention in infancy. Child Development, 78, 938-954.
Vaughan Van Hecke, A., Mundy, P. C., Acra, C. F., Block, J., Gomez, Y., Delgado, C.,Venezia, M., Meyer, J., Neal, R., & Pomares, Y. (2007). Infant joint attention, temperament, and social competence in preschool children. Child Development, 78, 53-69.
In press:
Bal, E., Harden, E., Lamb, D., Vaughan Van Hecke, A., Denver, J., & Porges, S.W. (2009). Emotion recognition in children with autism spectrum disorders: Relations to eye gaze and autonomic state. Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders.
