Professor Diamond has been named one of the “2000 Outstanding Women of the 20th Century” and has been listed as one the 15 most influential neuroscientists alive today. She is a member of the Royal Society of Canada, and we feel privileged that Professor Diamond is an honourary member of KidCareCanada Society.
Professor Diamond’s specialty is executive functions. Her lab studies “how executive functions are affected by biological factors (such as genes and neurochemistry) and by environmental ones (for example, impaired by stress or improved by interventions).”
Executive functions are important as they “enable us to resist temptations and automatic impulsive reactions, stay focused, mentally play with ideas, reason, problem-solve, flexibly adjust to changed demands or priorities, and see things from new and different perspectives.”
Professor Diamond’s work is especially relevant for the work of KidCareCanada as it has shown that “executive functions emerge and can be assessed as early as the first year of life”. Importantly, her work has also demonstrated that “interventions can improve executive functions, even in very young children.”