Sanders awarded $300k John Merck grant

Lisa D. Sanders, assistant professor of Psychology, has been awarded a four-year, $300,000 grant by the John Merck Fund to support her research on how selective attention deficits contribute to language processing disorders.

Sanders is one of two researchers selected for the grants from among 55 applicants across the country, according to the fund.

A member of the faculty since 2005, Sanders is director of the NeuroCognition and Perception Laboratory in the Psychology Department and the Neuroscience and Behavior Program.

“This program is an effort to encourage exceptional young individuals to focus on the problems of children who are mentally challenged and emotionally disturbed. We have made similar grants through the John Merck Scholars Program in the biology of developmental disabilities in children for 18 years, awards which we hope will add significantly to the knowledge base in this highly neglected and under-financed field,” said the fund’s co-chairs, Dinah Buechner-Vischer and Whitney Hatch, in a press release.

The panel of judges, chaired by Nancy Kanwisher, Massachusetts Institute of Technology, has selected 55 John Merck Scholars since the program was launched in 1990. Other members of this year’s panel were Arnold Kriegstein, University of California, San Francisco; Bradley Schlaggar, Washington University School of Medicine; Elizabeth Spelke, Harvard University; and Christopher Walsh, Harvard Medical School.

Based in Boston, the John Merck Fund was established by Serena S. Merck in 1970 to support research on the problems of children who are mentally disabled and emotionally disturbed. In addition, the fund also has grant-making programs in environmental protection, reproductive health, international human rights and job opportunities.

May 8, 2008.

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