Ms Teresa Lee

Dr Teresa Lee is a Conjoint Senior Lecturer at the School of Psychiatry, UNSW and co-leader of the Neuropsychology Group at the Centre for Healthy Brain Ageing (CHeBA). She is also a Senior Clinical Neuropsychologist at the Neuropsychiatric Institute, Prince of Wales Hospital. Her research interests include heritability, and the genetic (G) and environmental (E) influences in the neuropsychological functions in older adults. Dr Lee is the managing Neuropsychologist for the neuropsychology component of CHeBA’s Older Australian Twins Study (OATS), a comprehensive three-centre study which examines the G and E contributions to cognitive ageing and dementia.

Dr Lee completed her PhD in 2013, and was a recipient of the Dean’s Rising Star Award for significant contributions to research (Faculty of Medicine) that year. Her research thesis (by publication) examined the role of G and E influences in neurocognitive performances, such as Processing Speed and Executive Functions, and their relationship with memory. Further work has been done on the contribution of G and E influences in Language/Verbal Ability. Dr Lee plans to explore “change” in G and E effects in neurocognitive functions and with neuroimaging correlates in memory, by using a longitudinal study design.

Apart from her research in cognition in twins, Dr Lee is a Chief Investigator in two proposed CHeBA projects: “Cerebro-Vascular Disease (CVD) Index Study” and “Genetic and Environmental Risk Factors in Dementia, a Twin Study”, and she is an Associate Investigator in CogScan (Study of Computer-Administered Neuropsychological Tests in Seniors), a PET study in OATS, and Social Cognition change in late adulthood.