I am a behavioral ecologist with a focus on the evolution of complex cognition and communication in wild mammals. Through my career thus far I have investigated central questions in cognitive ecology and communication research by studying species with unusual social structures and foraging habits. For my PhD project, I focused on acoustic and olfactory communication in the yellow mongoose, a facultatively social carnivore. While carnivores still lay close to my heart, I went on to do postdoctoral research for the University of Michigan's Gelada Research Project. This was an exciting collaboration, leading most recently to a paper on deception and punishment in wild primates. I am still collaborating on several papers with the University of Michigan, writing about the complex sociality and communicative patterns of gelada monkeys.