Collaborators

Daryl Cameron earned his B.A. in Psychology and Philosophy from the College of William and Mary in 2006, and received his Ph.D. in Social Psychology from UNC Chapel Hill in 2013. Daryl is an Assistant Professor of Social Psychology at the University of Iowa. Daryl has two primary lines of research. First, he focuses on the causes and consequences of compassion. He has shown how our tendency to feel more compassion for one victim than many victims is driven by fear of compassion and emotion regulation. He has also examined how regulating compassion can create its own costs by changing moral identity and moral principles. His other line of research explores the affective dynamics of moral judgment. He has shown how emotional awareness can enable more informed moral decisions, and how automatic and controlled emotional processes interact to shape moral judgments and decisions to help others. His research has been funded by the National Science Foundation.

Dr. Heineberg is a clinical supervisor for therapists in training and lecturer for Palo Alto University, as well as Applied Psychological Interventions Associate at CCARE. His work is informed by his training in Compassion Focused Therapy and evidence based principles to explore new routes towards healing via compassion practices. Dr. Heineberg’s passion has been finding effective methods for healing the cycle of violence with compassion. With collaborators Drs. Rony Berger and Philip Zimbardo, he has been implementing “ERASE-Stress-Pro-Social”, a school-based, teacher mediated program that reduces post traumatic distress and increases pro social engagement in warzones and inner cities. They have recently completed data collection on an international project to examine the processes of heroic transformation from violence to peacemaker among former gang members, and Israeli and Palestinian former combatants who now work to make peace in their communities. These pilots will inform future compassion trainings in school systems worldwide. Dr. Heineberg is also passionate about scalable technology based interventions to increase wellbeing and compassion. He recently developed VBT (Values and Behavior Tracking), a web based program that emphasizes a healing integration of positive values with kind behaviors. He also works with his collaborator Dr. Dan Martin in order to develop additional technology tools to increase wellbeing and pro-sociality in a variety of settings, ranging from clinical populations, to school systems and workplace environments. Dr. Heineberg earned his undergraduate degree in psychology and comparative literature at Tel Aviv University. He completed his doctorate in clinical psychology at the PGSP-Stanford consortium focusing on the cycle of violence, trauma and aggression, and applied scalable interventions to increase psychological wellbeing, and compassion for self and others. He recently completed his post-doctoral fellowship with CCARE, where he has focused his energy on developing compassion interventions, as well as leading the Stanford Compassion In Action student volunteer initiative in East Palo Alto.

Romi Chiorean shares his time between art studio practice and filmmaking. He has studied fine art and photography since his youth and entered the field of filmmaking over ten years ago. Romi studied Ceramics and Painting at the Academy of Art and Design in Cluj-Napoca, Romania, Art Restoration and Computer Graphics at the Fashion Institute of Technology in New York City and Cinematography at the American Film Institute Conservatory in Los Angeles. Romi has a long standing interest in the subconscious mind and representation of mental activity that cannot always be expressed in words but is commonplace in visual art and music. Besides his work for CCARE, Romi provides video services for a number of Silicon Valley companies such as Cloudera, LucidWorks, Mirantis and a number of startups.

Chris’ diverse background includes degrees in Finance & Slavic Languages from the University of Pennsylvania and professional experience in international banking and investor relations. He has been a small business owner, an entrepreneur/consultant, and has worked in high tech with Apple & Stanford. Chris has been a formal student of Zen Buddhism since 1997, and hopes to complete his lay ordination (Jukai) in 2013. He would like to broaden his lifelong interest in compassion and mindfulness, and how to successfully apply these transformational concepts in everyday life.

Chris’ interest in photography dates back to his first cameras, a Kodak Brownie and a hand-me-down Leica from his mother. He has had a keen interest in documentary and travel photography, though his recent focus has been on non-profit organizations working for positive change. These volunteering efforts have included CCARE, the Gyuto Vajrayana Center, the Vajrapani Institute, TeachAIDS, Zen Heart Sangha, and his alma mater Dunn School (where he serves on the Board of Trustees). He is also a pro bono photographer for Stanford’s Ho Center for Buddhist Studies, as well as the School of Education where he has provided technology & computer support for the last 10 years.

Brian Knutson is an Associate Professor of Psychology and Neuroscience at Stanford University, and a CHP/PCOR associate. His research focuses on the neural basis of emotional experience and expression. He investigates this topic with a number of methods including self-report, measurement of nonverbal behavior, comparative ethology, psychopharmacology, and functional brain imaging. His long-term goal is to understand the neurochemical and neuroanatomical mechanisms responsible for emotional experience and to explore the implications of these findings for the assessment and treatment of clinical disorders of affect and addiction, as well as economic behavior. Knutson has received Young Investigator Awards from the National Alliance for Research on Schizophrenia and Depression, the Association for Behavioral Medicine Research, the American Psychiatric Association, and the New York Academy of Science. He received BA degrees in experimental psychology and comparative religion from Trinity University, a PhD in experimental psychology from Stanford, and has conducted postdoctoral research in affective neuroscience at UC-San Francisco and at the National Institutes of Health.