She completed her Ph.D. at the University of Minnesota in 2009, adding to Master and Bachelor’s degrees from University of Wisconsin institutions. She recently completed a sabbatical studying psychophysiology at the University of Arizona, and also served as a Visiting Professor of Psychology at Duksung Women’s University in Seoul, Korea. Her interest in mystical experience is a recent area of study, spawned after a 10-day silent Vipassana meditation retreat in January 2015. She is currently deeply interested in generating testable models from theoretical frameworks described in classic texts, and testing them with crowdsourced data from individuals who have had recent experiences with ASCs or intend to have such experiences.