Simone Hasselmo

Hey, I'm Simone! I spent the first four years of my life living in a Harvard dorm while my parents taught neuroscience. I spent the rest of my childhood in Belmont, MA before returning to Harvard for undergrad. I studied Organismic and Evolutionary Biology, writing a thesis about the neurobiology of social awareness and cognition in school age children. I fell in love with working with children and teens, and hope to continue to do so throughout my career in psychiatry. My unofficial second major was in cartooning. I served as an art editor for the Harvard Lampoon, the campus comedy magazine, and as the design editor for the school's literary magazine the Advocate. After graduation, I moved to New Haven to pursue a research fellowship studying autism spectrum disorder through EEG and eye-tracking in the McPartland lab at the Yale Child Study Center. I fell in love with New Haven, bewitched by its art scene, the ease of making new friends, and the proximity to the beach, which I frequent (even through the winter). I opted to stay for 5 more years at Yale School of Medicine, where I spent a fifth research year working on a graphic novel combining my grandfather's stories of medical education in Nazi Germany with my own experiences. The work is still in progress, but some excerpts can be purchased in zine form at my website (seshcomix.bigcartel.com). I was delighted to have the opportunity to stay in New Haven for residency. I live in East Rock with my partner and two cats, where I enjoy eating vegan food, reading, lifting weights, and watching reality TV.