Chad Williams
Assistant teaching professor
Psychology
- Contact:
- Office: COR A183 chadwilliams@uvic.ca
- Credentials:
- PhD (UVic)
- Area of expertise:
- Cognition and brain sciences
- Related links:
Interests
- Cognition: Reasoning, Cognitive Control, Reinforcement Learning
- Neuroimaging: EEG, Wearable Biometrics
- Computational: Computational Modelling, Machine Learning, AI
- Scientific Method: Statistics, Research Methods
Faculty Bio
Teaching
My teaching philosophy centers on student autonomy, flexibility, and respect. I design courses where students choose how they engage with material and how they are assessed, fostering independence and responsibility while supporting diverse learning styles. I teach undergraduate courses in neuroscience and statistics, create online resources such as Practical Statistics in R (with over 80,000 views), and lead seminars and workshops on academic writing and research practices. My classrooms emphasize mental health, adaptability, and active feedback, with all students in evaluations reporting that they feel supported and respected. I aim to equip students not only with subject knowledge, but also with transferable skills—such as time management and independent learning—that prepare them for success in both academia and the workforce.
Research
My research program enhances the methodological practices of neuroscience by integrating artificial intelligence. I develop tools and approaches that advance data analysis, including validating EEG dataset augmentation with generative modeling, demonstrating the utility of symbolic regression in recovering computational models of cognition, and creating equation distributions to strengthen benchmark generators. These projects are supported by open-source Python packages I help develop, such as EEG-GAN, AutoRA, and Equation-Scraper. In addition to academic research, I collaborate with industry partners on projects involving neurofeedback, biometric integration, and brain–computer interfaces, gaining broad experience with EEG and biometric technologies across multiple programming environments.