MarthaLeah Chaiken earned her doctorate in psychobiology at the Institute of Animal Behavior, Rutgers University. She went on to complete an NIH postdoctoral research fellowship at Rockefeller University. She was an assistant professor at Rutgers University before joining the Hofstra faculty in 2000. Dr. Chaiken is interested in the biological bases of behavior, including evolutionary, neurobiological, and functional perspectives. Her research concerns song learning in birds, with the goal of understanding the interplay of internal and external factors in the development of a complex communicative behavior. Her courses include Animal Behavior, Biological Psychology, Principles of Learning and Behavior, Research Methods and Design, and Comparative Psychology. She is a member of the Animal Behavior Society and the Society for Neuroscience.