Jeffrey Coldren

Dr. Jeffrey Coldren - profile photo

Dr. Jeffrey Coldren

Chair Professor

Psychological Sciences & Counseling

Beeghly Hall 4106

phone: (330) 941-3264

jtcoldren@ysu.edu

Bio

I am Professor and Chair of Psychological Sciences and Counseling at Youngstown State University. I hold a Ph.D. in Child Development and Developmental Psychology and an M.A. in Human Development, both from the University of Kansas, and a B.A. from Albright College. Before graduate school, I was enrolled in the Life-Span Developmental Psychology Program at West Virginia University. Following my doctoral training, I completed a postdoctoral fellowship at the University of Toledo and a sabbatical at McGill University's Laboratory for Natural and Simulated Cognition.

Research Interests

My research examines how cognition and learning develop across the lifespan — spanning processes such as stimulus dimensionalization, transfer, response shifting, attention, hypothesis-testing, and executive functioning. I study infants, preschool and elementary school children, and college students, pursuing questions that carry both theoretical and applied significance. Alongside empirical experiments, I use computational models to simulate the development of psychological processes.

My current focus is learning cessation in autonomous agents — both human and artificial. Do learners of different ages self-regulate to stay engaged while making progress toward a goal, and, critically, recognize when further learning is no longer productive?

Teaching Interests

I teach courses in general psychology, advanced statistical techniques for psychology, statistics for psychology, research design and methods, child development, educational psychology, principles of development for school psychology, and the DataMine Project in the Department of Mathematics and Statistics.

  • 1992

    Ph D, Child Development and Developmental Psychology

    University of Kansas

  • 1987

    MA, Human Development

    University of Kansas

  • 1983

    BA, Psychology

    Alright College

  • 2025

    Feedback Fruits

    Finalist - Learning Development Community Award - 2025

  • 2023

    YSU Foundation

    James P. Tressel Endowed Chair for Leadership

  • 2022

    Distinguished Research Professor in Teaching as a Chairperson

  • 2004

    The Rich Center for Autism

    Rich Center Faculty Fellow

  • 2020 - present

    Department Chairperson

  • 2015 - present

    Coordinator

  • 2023

    "Conditions Under Which College Students Cease Learning"

    J. Coldren

    Frontiers in Psychology, volume 14

  • 2013

    "Cognitive Control Predicts Academic Achievement in Kindergarten Children"

    J. Coldren

    Mind, Brain, and Education, Wiley, volume 7, issue 1, p. 40-48

  • 2009

    "Attention as a cueing function during kindergarten children's dimensional change task performance"

    J. Coldren, J. Colombo

    Infant and Child Development, Wiley, volume 18, issue 5, p. 441-454

  • 2008

    "On The Development Of The Processes Underlying Learning Across The Lifespan"

    J. Coldren, J. Colombo

    Monographs of the Society for Research in Child Development, Oxford University Press (OUP), volume 59, issue 4, p. 90-92

  • 2006

    "Interpersonal Influences in Large Lecture-Based Classes: A Socioinstructional Perspective"

    H. Long, J. Coldren

    College Teaching, Informa UK Limited, volume 54, issue 2, p. 237-243

  • 2003

    "Spatial Reversal as a Measure of Executive Functioning in Children With Autism"

    J. Coldren, C. Halloran

    The Journal of Genetic Psychology, Informa UK Limited, volume 164, issue 1, p. 29-41

  • 2000

    "Asymmetries in Infants' Attention to the Presence or Absence of Features"

    J. Coldren, R. Haaf

    The Journal of Genetic Psychology, Informa UK Limited, volume 161, issue 4, p. 420-434

  • 1998

    "Infants' perception of solid objects"

    K. Marks, J. Coldren

    Infant Behavior and Development, Elsevier BV, volume 21, p. 552

  • 1996

    "Infant attention to visual cue and background context: Asymmetric processing of visual components"

    J. Coldren, R. Haaf

    Infant Behavior and Development, Elsevier BV, volume 19, p. 401

  • 1996

    "Attention, recognition, and the effects of stimulus context in 6-month-old infants"

    R. Haaf, B. Lundy, J. Coldren

    Infant Behavior and Development, Elsevier BV, volume 19, issue 1, p. 93-106

  • 1995

    "Individual differences in infant fixation duration: Dominance of global versus local stimulus properties"

    J. Colombo, L. Freeseman, J. Coldren, J. Frick

    Cognitive Development, Elsevier BV, volume 10, issue 2, p. 271-285

  • 1994

    "The Nature and Processes of Preverbal Learning: Implications from Nine-Month-Old Infants' Discrimination Problem Solving"

    J. Coldren, J. Colombo

    Monographs of the Society for Research in Child Development, Wiley, volume 59, issue 4, p. 1-75; discussion 76-93

  • 1993

    "Individual Differences in Infant Visual Attention: Four-Month-Olds' Discrimination and Generalization of Global and Local Stimulus Properties"

    L. Freeseman, J. Colombo, J. Coldren

    Child Development, Wiley, volume 64, issue 4, p. 1191

  • 1991

    "Individual Differences in Infant Visual Attention: Are Short Lookers Faster Processors or Feature Processors?"

    J. Colombo, D. Mitchell, J. Coldren, L. Freeseman

    Child Development, Wiley, volume 62, issue 6, p. 1247-1257

  • 1990

    "Form categorization in 10-month-olds"

    J. Colombo, K. McCollam, J. Coldren, D. Mitchell, S. Rash

    Journal of Experimental Child Psychology, Elsevier BV, volume 49, issue 2, p. 173-188

  • 1990

    "Discrimination learning during the first year: Stimulus and positional cues."

    J. Colombo, D. Mitchell, J. Coldren, J. Atwater

    Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition, American Psychological Association (APA), volume 16, issue 1, p. 98-109

  • 1989

    "Longitudinal correlates of infant attention in the paired-comparison paradigm"

    J. Colombo, D. Wayne Mitchell, J. Dodd, J. Coldren, F. Horowitz

    Intelligence, Elsevier BV, volume 13, issue 1, p. 33-42

  • 1987

    "10-Hz flash visual evoked potentials predict post-cataract extraction visual acuity."

    J. Odom, R. Hobson, J. Coldren, G. Chao, G. Weinstein

    Documenta ophthalmologica. Advances in ophthalmology, volume 66, issue 4, p. 291-9

  • 2025 - present

    Editor, Associate Editor
    Frontiers in Psychology - Human Development

  • 2024 - 2024

    Reviewer, Journal Article
    Mind, Brain, and Education

  • 2015 - 2023

    Editorial Review Board Member
    Frontiers in Psychology

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