He was born and raised in Singapore, and received his undergraduate education at the National University of Singapore. He then went on to pursue graduate studies in the Behaviour, Brain, and Cognition programme at Washington University in St. Louis, where he earned his A.M. and Ph.D. in psychology with Kathleen McDermott as his primary graduate advisor. After grad school, Sean worked with Hal Pashler as a post-doctoral researcher in the psychology department at UC San Diego. He currently serves as an associate editor for Applied Cognitive Psychology and is also on the editorial board for Contemporary Educational Psychology and the Journal of Applied Research in Memory and Cognition.