Karri Neldner PhD

Karri Neldner is currently working as a postdoctoral researcher at Max-Planck Institute for Evolutionary Anthropology. She had completed her Doctor of Philosophy at The University of Queensland. She specialized in psychology and comparative cultural psychology. Her research interests lie within the fields of developmental, cross-cultural, and comparative psychology. She is interested in problem-solving, social learning, and teaching across animal taxa, including humans. She applies cross-cultural approaches to her research to understand how children’s problem-solving and learning strategies are influenced by their sociocultural environment.

Her Ph.D. examined children's and chimpanzees' ability to innovate with tools, and the flexibility required to solve novel problems using tools. Her postdoctoral research will focus on children’s active role within learning and teaching contexts, with the aim of gaining further insights into the mechanistic motivations behind children’s early learning.

She is also interested in understanding how children perceive and value animals, and how they learn to think about animals within their cultural context.