Aaron Blaisdell

Aaron Blaisdell is a Professor in the Department of Psychology at the University of California, Los Angeles (College of Life Sciences). He directs the Comparative Cognition Lab and Pigeon Art Project, and is affiliated with the UCLA Brain Research Institute, Integrative Center for Learning & Memory, and Evolutionary Medicine program.

• BA in Anthropology (SUNY Stony Brook)
• MS in Anthropology (Kent State University)
• PhD in Behavioral Neuroscience (SUNY Binghamton)
• Postdoctoral Fellow (Tufts University, NIH-funded)

His research spans animal cognition across species (rats, pigeons, hermit crabs, humans) using Pavlovian/instrumental conditioning to study causal reasoning, spatial cognition, behavioral variability, and decision-making under uncertainty. Recent projects examine pigeon digital art creation and evolutionary health through ancestral diet impacts on cognition.

He co-founded the Ancestral Health Society and serves as Editor-in-Chief of the Journal of Evolution and Health, investigating how evolutionary mismatch affects modern health. Current work explores 3D visual perception mechanisms and dopamine's role in learning through computational and experimental approaches.