Renee R. Lajiness-O'Neill

A photo of Renee Lajiness-O'Neill

Professor

Psychology; Neuroscience

301C Science Complex

Dept. 734.487.1155

[email protected]

Education

  • Postdoctoral Fellowship, Clinical and Research Neuropsychology, University of Michigan Medical Center, Department of Psychiatry, Ann Arbor, MI
  • Clinical Psychology Internship, Primary Children's Medical Center, Salt Lake City, UT
  • Ph.D., Clinical Psychology (dual specialization in neuropsychology and child clinical), Brigham Young University, Provo, UT
  • MS, Clinical Psychology, Eastern Michigan University
  • BS, Psychology & Occupational Therapy, Eastern Michigan University

Interests and Expertise

Dr. Lajiness-O’Neill, trained as a pediatric neuropsychologist, is passionate about screening, risk detection, and surveillance of childhood disorders, particularly neurodevelopmental disorders. Her research focuses on brain-behavior relationships in children with neurodevelopmental disorders as well as development and validation of assessment methods to characterize neurobehavioral development. She is currently Project Director/Principal Investigator of a National Institutes of Health (NIH) R01 multisite, longitudinal grant (“PediaTrac: Web-based Measure to Screen and Track Early Developmental Trajectories”) for which her team is developing and validating a web-based tool to identify risk trajectories of neurodevelopmental (e.g., autism, cerebral palsy) and acquired disorders of childhood and related developmental psychopathologies. She is also Project Director/Principal Investigator of a National Science Foundation (NSF Major Research Instrumentation) grant award for which her team is developing electroencephalography (EEG) methods for infancy and toddlerhood studies. Her research, funded both internally and externally, focuses on exploring the cognitive, behavioral and neural correlates of neurodevelopmental disorders using neuropsychological and neurophysiological methods such as magnetoencephalography (MEG) and EEG. Her goal is to develop and validate bio-behavioral methods of assessing neurodevelopmental disorders and developmental psychopathologies. She has over 50 peer-reviewed publications, books and book chapters as well as over 180 presentations.

Courses

  • PSY 433 Cognitive Neuroscience
  • PSY 610 Clinical Neuropsychology
  • PSY 635 Cognitive Processes/Neuroscience
  • PSY 762 Cognitive Assessment
  • PSY 763 Neuropsychological Assessment

Publications and Presentations

  • Cano, J., Kirkland, J., Huth-Bocks, A., Ohanian, D. M., Warschausky, S., Raghunathan, T., Berglund, P., Staples, A., Taylor H. G., Lukomski, A., & *Lajiness-O’Neill, R. on behalf of PediaTrac Consortium. (under review). Maternal education and neighborhood deprivation as predictors of infant motor and social, communicative, and cognitive development: A PediaTracTM Infant Mental Health Journal.
  • Lajiness-O’Neill, R., Lobermeier, M., Richard, A., Staples, A. D., Huth-Bocks, A., Warschausky, S., Taylor, G., Lang, N., Lukomski, A., & Erdodi, L., on behalf of PediaTrac Consortium. (under review). Development of validity scales to examine caregiver response styles when measuring infant/toddler developmental status. Assessment.
  • Warschausky, S., Raghunathan, T., Berglund, P., Gidley Larson, J. C., Huth-Bocks, A., Taylor, H. G., Staples, A. D., Lukomski, A., & *Lajiness-O’Neill, R. on behalf of PediaTrac Consortium. (under review). Growth trajectories of term and preterm infant latent motor ability reveal gestational and biological sex effects. Child Neuropsychology.
  • Levick, S., Staples, A. D., Warschausky, S., Huth-Bocks, A., Taylor, H. G., Gidley Larson, J. C., Lukomski, A., & *Lajiness-O’Neill, R. on behalf of PediaTrac Consortium. (2024). Caregiver-Reported Infant Motor and Imitation Skills Predict M-CHAT-R/F. Child Neuropsychology. Winner of 2024 Child Neuropsychology/American Academy of Clinical Neuropsychology Student Paper Award.
  • Huth-Bocks, A., Franz, S., Berglund, P., Schroeder, H., Staples, A. D., Raghunathan, T., Warschausky, S., Taylor, H. G., LeDoux, G., Dieter, L., Rosenblum, K., & *Lajiness-O'Neill, R. on behalf of The PediaTrac Consortium. (2024). Measuring Early Relational Health using PediaTracTM in a Diverse Sample of Infant-Caregiver Dyads. Journal of Developmental and Behavioral Pediatrics.
  • Lasutschinkow, P. C., Bo, J., Warschausky, S., Raghunathan, T., Berglund, P., Cano, J., Huth-Bocks, A., Taylor, H. G., Le Doux, G. N., Lukomski, A., *Lajiness-O’Neill, R. (in press). Convergent validity between the motor domain of PediaTracTM and Ages and Stages in term and preterm infants at 2, 4, 6, and 9 months of age. Assessment.
  • Warschausky, S., Gidley Larson, J. C., Raghunathan, T., Berglund, P., Huth-Bocks, A., Taylor, H. G., Staples, A., Lukomski, A., Barks, J., *Lajiness-O’Neill, R., & PediaTrac Project Consortium. (2023). Longitudinal caregiver-reported term and preterm infant motor development from birth to twelve months of age: Latent trait analysis. Developmental Medicine and Child Neurology.
  • Lajiness-O’Neill, R. R., Erdodi, L., & Lichtenstein, J. (2024).  Traumatic Brain Injury.  In J. M. Kauffman & D. P. Hallahan (Eds.). Handbook of Special Education, Third Edition. New York, NY: Routledge.
  • Lajiness-O’Neill, R., Warschausky, S., Huth-Bocks, A., Taylor, H. G., Berglund, P., Staples, A., Lukomski, A., Brooks, J., Cano, J., & Raghunathan, T., & PediaTrac Project Consortium. (2023) Caregiver-reported development in term and preterm infants from birth to nine months of age: Psychometrics of the PediaTracTM Social/Communication/Cognition domain. https://doi.org/10.1037/pas0001235, Psychological Assessment.
  • Lobermeier, M., Hicks, A., Staples, A. D., Huth-Bocks, A., Warschausky, W., Taylor, H. G., Lukomski, L., Brooks, J., & *Lajiness-O’Neill, R. (2022). Longitudinal Changes in Term and Preterm Infant Night Wakings: The Role of Caregiver Anxious-Depression, Infant Mental Health Journal. 
  • Connery, A. K., Raghunathan, R. S., Colbert, A., Erdodi, L., Warschausky, S., Huth-Bocks, A., Taylor, H. G., Kirkland, J., Cano, J., Lukomski, A., Staples, A., Raghunathan, T., Berglund, P., *Lajiness-O’Neill, R., & PediaTrac Project Consortium. (2022). The influence of sociodemographic factors and response style on caregiver report of infant developmental status. Frontiers in Pediatrics.
  • Bo, J., Acluche, F., Lasutschinkow, P., Augustiniak, A., Ditchfield, N., & Lajiness-O’Neill, R. (2022). Motor Networks in Children with Autism Spectrum Disorder: A Systematic Review on EEG studies. Autism. 
  • Lajiness-O’Neill, R., Raghunathan, T., Berglund, P., Huth-Bocks, A., Taylor, H. G., Staples, A., Brooks, J., Lukomski, A., Gidley Larson, J. C., Warschausky, S., & PediaTrac Project Consortium. (2022) Caregiver-reported newborn term and preterm sensorimotor abilities: Psychometrics of the PediaTracTM Motor domain. Pediatric Research. doi: 10.1038/s41390-022-02312-4. Online ahead of print.
  • Lobermeier, M., Staples, A., Peterson, C.,Huth-Bocks, A., Warschausky, S., Taylor, H. G., Brooks, J., Lukomski, A., & *Lajiness-O'Neill, R. (2022). Cumulative risk, infant sleep, and infant social-emotional development. Infant Behavior and Development. 
  • Lajiness-O’Neill, R. & Swick, C. (2022). 22q11.2 Deletion Syndrome. In: Beauchamp, Petersen, Ris, Taylor, & Yeates (Eds.). Pediatric Neuropsychology, Third Edition. New York, NY: Routledge.
  • Lajiness-O’Neill, R., Warschausky, S., Huth-Bocks, A., Taylor, H.G., Brooks, J., Lukomski , A., Raghunathan, T., Berglund, P., Staples, A., Erdodi, L., & Schilling, S. (2021). PediaTrac™ 3.0 Protocol:  A prospective, longitudinal study of the development and validation of a web-based tool to measure and track infant and toddler development from birth through 18 months. BMJ Open 2021;0:e050488. doi:10.1136/bmjopen-2021-050488.
  • Bowyer, S. M., Zillgitt, A., Greenwald, M., & Lajiness-O’Neill, R. (2020). Language Mapping With Magnetoencephalography: An Update on the Current State of Clinical Research and Practice With Considerations for Clinical Practice Guidelines. Journal of Clinical Neurophysiology (Invited Review), 3(6), 554-563.
  • Wagley, N., Lajiness-O’Neill, R., Hay, J. S. F., Ugolini, M., Bowyer, S.M., Kovelman, I., & Brennan, J. (2020). Predictive processing during a naturalistic statistical learning task in ASD. eNeuro.
  • Lawler, J., Hruschak, J., Aho, K., Liu, Y., Ip, K. A., Lajiness-O’Neill, R., Rosenblum, K. L., Muzik, M., & Fitzgerald., K. D. (2020). The Error Related Negativity as a Neuromarker of Risk or Resilience in Young Children. Brain and Behavior.
  • Bowyer S.M., Biondo A., Funk B., Greenwald M., Lajiness-O’Neill R., Zillgitt A. (2019). Presurgical Localization of Language Regions and Their Networks. In: Supek S., Aine C. (Eds) Magnetoencephalography. Springer, Cham.
  • Brennan, J. R., Lajiness-O'Neill, R., Bowyer, S., Kovelman, I., and Hale, J. T. (2018). Predictive sentence comprehension during story-listening in Autism Spectrum Disorder. Language, Cognition and Neuroscience.
  • Lajiness-O'Neill, R., Brooks, J., Lukomski, A., Schilling, S., Flores, A., Swick, C., Nyman, T., Andersen, T., Huth-Bocks, A., Warschausky, S., Morris, N., Schmitt, T. A., Bell-Smith, J., Moir, B., Hodges, E. K., and Lyddy, J. E. (2018). Development and preliminary validation of PediaTrac™: A web-based tool to screen developing infants. Infant Behavior and Development, 50, 224–237.
  • Lajiness-O'Neill, R., Brennan, J., Moran, J. E., Richard, A. E., Flores, A., Swick, C., Goodcase, R., Anderson, T., McFarlane, K., Rusiniak, K., Kovelman, I., Wagley, N., Ugolini, M., Albright, J., and Bowyer, S. M. (2017). Patterns of altered neural synchrony in the Default Mode Network in Autism Spectrum Disorders revealed with magnetoencephalography (MEG): Relationship to clinical symptomatology. Autism Research. DOI:  10.1002/aur.1908.
  • Lajiness-O’Neill, R. R.,  Erdodi, L., and Lichtenstein, J. (2017). Traumatic Brain Injury. In J. M. Kauffman and D. P. Hallahan (Eds.). Handbook of Special Education, Second Edition. New York, NY: Routledge.
  • Gravholt, C. H., Andersen, N. H., Conway, G. S. et al., …On behalf of the International Turner Syndrome Consensus Group… Lajiness-O’Neill, R. (2017). Clinical Practice Guidelines for the Care of Girls and Women with Turner Syndrome. Proceedings from the 2016 Cincinnati International Turner Syndrome Meeting. Neurocognition and Behavior. European Journal of Endocrinology, Sep;177(3):1–70. doi: 10.1530/EJE-17-0430. Review.
  • Lajiness-O’Neill, R., Lengu, K., Nyman, T., Bisconti, S., Wagley, N., Richard, A., Flores, A., Swick, C., Andersen, T., Rosenblum, K., Hodges, E. K., and Kovelman, I. (under review). Bilateral Temporal Activation During Gaze Following in Infants Revealed with fNIRS. Developmental Cognitive Neuroscience.
  • Jacobson, D. Bursch, M.,*Lajiness-O’Neill, R. (2016). Potential role of cortisol in social and memory impairments in individuals with 22q11.2 Deletion Syndrome. Journal of Pediatric Genetics. DOI http://dx.doi.org/10.1055/s-0036-1584549. ISSN 2146–4596
  • Brennan, J., Wagley, N., Kovelman, I., Bowyer, S. M., Richard A. E. and *Lajiness-O’Neill, R. (2016). MEG reveals atypical sensitivity to linguistic sound sequences in Autism Spectrum Disorder. NeuroReport.
  • Lajiness-O’Neill, R., Hoodin, F., Kentor, R., Heinrich, K., Colbert, A., and Connelly, J. A. (2015). Alterations in memory and impact on academic outcomes in children following allogeneic hematopoietic cell transplantation. Archives of Clinical Neuropsychology. doi:10.1093/arclin/acv053.
  • Richard, A. E. and *Lajiness-O’Neill, R. (2015). Visual attention shifting in Autism Spectrum Disorders. Journal of Clinical and Experimental Neuropsychology. doi: 10.1080/13803395.2015.1042838.
  • Boutros, N. N., Lajiness-O'Neill, R., Zillgitt, A., Richard, A. E., and Bowyer, S. M. (2015). EEG changes associated with Autistic Spectrum Disorders. Neuropsychiatric Electrophysiology, 1:3, DOI 10.1186/s40810-014-0001-5. 
  • Kovelman, I., Wagley, N., Hay, J., Ugolini, M., Bowyer, S., Lajiness-O’Neill, R. and Brennan, J. (2015). Multi-modal imaging of temporal processing in typical and atypical language development. Annals of the New York Academy of Sciences, 1337, 7–15.
  • Mansour, A. and Lajiness-O’Neill, R. (2015). Call for an Integrative and Multi-Disciplinary Approach to Traumatic Brain Injury (TBI). Psychology, 6, 323–374.
  • Mansour, A., Bowyer, S. M., Richard, A. E., Moran, J. E., Erdodi, L. A., Olszewski, A., Pawluk, L., Jacobson, D., Vogt, K., Moore, A.M. and *Lajiness-O'Neill, R. (2014). Magnetoencephalography Coherence Source Imaging in Dyslexia: Activation of Working Memory Pathways. Psychology. dx.doi.org/10.4236/psych.2014.
  • Lajiness-O'Neill, R., Richard, A., Moran, J., Olszewski, A., Pawluk, L., Jacobson, D., Mansour, A., Luce, K., Schmitt, T., Erdodi, L., Moore, A., and Bowyer, S. M.  (2014). Neural Synchrony Examined with Magnetoencephalography (MEG) During Eye Gaze Processing in Autism Spectrum Disorders. Journal of Neurodevelopmental Disorders, 6:15. doi:10.1186/1866-1955-6-15.
  • Lajiness-O'Neill, R., Bowyer, S. M., Moran, J., Zillgitt, A., Richard, A. E. and Boutros, N. N. (2014). Neurophysiological Findings from Magnetoencephalography in Autism Spectrum Disorder: A Comprehensive Review. Future Neurology, 9(3), 355–384.
  • Erdodi, L. A., Kirsch, N. L., Lajiness-O’Neill, R., Vingilis, E., Medoff , B. (2014). Comparing the Recognition Memory Test and the Word Choice Test in a Mixed Clinical Sample: Are They Equivalent? Psychological Injury and Law. doi:10.1007/s12207-014-9197-8.
  • Erdodi, L A., Roth, R. M., Kirsch, N. L., Lajiness-O’Neill, R., and Medoff, B. (2014). Aggregating Validity Indicators Embedded in Conners’ CPT-II Outperforms Individual Cutoffs at Separating Valid from Invalid Performance in Adults with TBI. Archives of Clinical Neuropsychology. doi: 10.1093/arclin/acu026.
  • Richard A., *Lajiness-O’Neill, R., and Bowyer, S. (2013). Impaired prefrontal gamma band synchrony in autism spectrum disorders during a gaze cueing task. NeuroReport, 13;24(16):894–897. doi: 10.1097/WNR.0000000000000015.
  • Lajiness-O’Neill, R. R., Mansour, A., Olszewski, A., Erdodi, L. (2013). Rehabilitation of Memory. In C.A. Noggle and R.S. Dean with M.T. Barisa (Eds.). Neuropsychological Rehabilitation. New York: Springer Publishing Company.
  • Erdodi, L. A., Lajiness-O’Neill, R., and Schmitt, T. A. (2013). Learning curve analyses in neurodevelopmental disorders: Are children with autism spectrum disorder truly visual learners? Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders. doi: 10.1007/s10803-012-1630-9.
  • Erdodi, L. A., and Lajiness-O’Neill, R. (2013). Time Related Changes in Conners’ CPT-II Scores: A Replication Study. Applied Neuropsychology. DOI:10.1080/09084282.2012.724036.
  • Jacobson, D., and *Lajiness-O’Neill, R. (2012). Substrates of social functioning in individuals with 22q11 deletion syndrome (VCFS). Journal of Behavioral and Neuroscience Research. 10(1):1–10.
  • Erdodi, L. A., and Lajiness-O’Neill, R. (2012). Humor perception in bilinguals: Is language more than a code? Journal of Cross-Cultural Psychology.
  • Lajiness-O’Neill, R. R., Pawluk, L., and Jacobson, D. (2011). Past, Present, and Future of Pediatric Neuropsychology. In A. S. Davis (Ed). Handbook of Pediatric Neuropsychology. New York, NY: Springer Publishing.
  • Lajiness-O’Neill, R. R and Erdodi, L. (2011). Traumatic Brain Injury. In J. M. Kauffman and D. P. Hallahan (Eds.). Handbook of Special Education. New York, NY: Routledge.
  • Lajiness-O’Neill, R., Erdodi, L. A., and Bigler, E. D. (2011). Demographic and injury-related moderators of memory and achievement outcome in pediatric TBI. Applied Neuropsychology, 18(4):298–308. doi: 10.1080/09084282.2011.595457.
  • Lajiness-O’Neill, R., Erdodi, L. A., and Bigler, E. D. (2010). Memory and Learning in Pediatric TBI: A Review and Examination of Moderators of Outcome. Applied Neuropsychology, 17(2), 83–92.
  • Lajiness-O'Neill, R., Chase, A., Olszewski, A., Boyle, M.A., Pawluk, P., Mansour, M., Jacobson, D., Gallaway, M., Lewandowski-Powley, P., Gorka, B., Moran, J., and Bowyer, S.M. (2010). Hemispheric differences in neural activation during gaze cueing in autism spectrum disorder (ASD) measured by magnetoencephalography (MEG). In S. Supek and A. Susac (Eds). IFMBE Proceedings, Biomag2010, Vol., 28, 381–384. DOI 10.1007/978-3-642-12197-5.
  • Bowyer, S.M., Pawluk, P., Olszewski, A., Gallaway, M.L., Mansour, A., Jacobson, D., Erdodi, L., Lewandowski-Powley, P., Moran, J., Tepley, N., and Lajiness-O'Neill, R. (2010). MEG detection of attention and memory processes in individuals with dyslexia. In S. Supek and A. Susac (Eds). IFMBE Proceedings, Biomag2010, Vol., 28, 346–349. DOI 10.1007/978-3-642-12197-5.
  • Erdodi, L. A., Lajiness-O’Neill, R., and Saules, K. (2009). Order of Conner’s CPT-II administration within a cognitive test battery influences ADHD indices. Journal of Attention Disorders, 14(1):43–51. doi: 10.1177/1087054709347199.
  • Lajiness-O’Neill, R., and Menard, P. (2008). An autistic spectrum subtype revealed through familial psychopathology coupled with cognition in ASD. Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders, 38(5), 982–987.
  • Lajiness-O’Neill, R. R., Beaulieu, I., and Paunovich-Wright, J. (2008). Neuropsychological and forensic assessment. In D. C. S. Richard and S. K. Huprich (Eds). Clinical Psychology: Assessment, Treatment, and Research. San Diego, CA: Academic Press.
  • Lajiness-O’Neill, R., Akamine, Y., and Bowyer, S. (2007). Treatment Effects of Fast ForWord® Demonstrated by Magnetoencephalography (MEG) in a Child with Developmental Dyslexia. Neurocase, 13 (5,6), 390–401.
  • Lajiness-O’Neill, R. R., Beaulieu, I., Asamoah, A., Titus, J. B., Bawle, E. V., Ahmad, S., Kirk, J. W., and Pollack, R., (2006). The Neuropsychological phenotype of velocardiofacial syndrome (VCFS/22q11.2 deletion syndrome): Relationship to psychopathology. Archives of Clinical Neuropsychology, 21, 175–184.
  • Lajiness-O’Neill, R. R., Beaulieu, I., Titus, J. B., Asamoah, A., Bigler, E. D., Bawle, E. V. and Pollack, R. (Guest Editor, 2005). Memory and learning in children with 22q11.2 deletion syndrome: Evidence for ventral and dorsal stream disruption? Child Neuropsychology, 11 (1), 55–71.
  • Lajiness-O’Neill, R. R. (2005). 22q11.2 Deletion Syndrome: Introduction. Child Neuropsychology, 11 (1), 1–5.

* Senior Author

Grants, Honors and Awards

National Institutes of Health (NIH) Grant-Funded PediaTrac Project (2018-2023)

Dr. Lajiness-O'Neill (Project Director/Principal Investigator) and her team were awarded a 4.5 million-dollar, five-year, multi-site National Institutes of Health (NIH), National Institute of Child Health and Human Development (NICHD) R01 grant entitled PediaTrac™: Web-based Measure to Screen and Track Early Developmental Trajectories in 2018 for the PediaTrac project. The project will validate the PediaTrac tool and method which is investigating typical developmental and risk trajectories for neurodevelopmental disorders and developmental psychopathology using complex multidimensional behavioral algorithms in infancy and toddlerhood. Read more about the PediaTrac grant in EMU Today.

National Science Foundation (NSF) Major Research Instrumentation (MRI) Grant (2021-2024)

Dr. Lajiness-O'Neill (Project Director/Principal Investigator) and her team were awarded a NSF MRI grant, Acquisition of EEG for Examination of Brain-Behavior Relationships Across the Lifespan. Her team intends to develop bio-behavioral signatures of neurodevelopmental disorders (e.g. ASD, ADHD, learning disorders).

Additional Information

Lab Information