In memory of Margaret Maltz

We were deeply saddened to learn about the passing of Margaret Maltz, originally Margarita "Rita" Maltseva, on May 29, 2023.

Margaret “RITA” Maltz (1991-2023)

Rita was a Master's student (2013-15) and PhD student (2015-2020) in Psychology in Professor Jody Culham’s Lab at Western University until she went on medical leave in 2020.  She joined Western after immigrating to Canada from Russia and completing a Bachelor's honours degree at Trent University under the supervision of Professor Liana Brown.  Upon joining Western, she was an active participant in a CREATE-IRTG international training program between Canada and Germany.  During her participation in the CREATE program, she collaborated with Professor Gudrun Schwarzer's lab at Justis-Liebig University in Giessen Germany. 

Rita's research in the Culham Lab investigated how the size and distance of objects are perceived in the real world and how perception is influenced by our prior experience with the particular sizes of objects.  In a bold departure from the way perception is typically studied in laboratories, she moved away from studying images to study real, tangible objects.  This research required considerable creativity and outside-the-box thinking, for which Rita was ideally suited.  Memories of her in the lab include shopping sprees for miniature and oversized objects at local toy stores, lab testing rooms filled with sports balls of different sizes configured into the well-known Ebbinghaus illusion, and many months of tenacious troubleshooting to figure out how to present real objects at different distances in an MRI scanner without inducing artifacts.  Through her creative problem solving and grit, Rita completed novel research projects demonstrating robust but underappreciated effects of size and distance on perception and brain activation.

Rita will be remembered fondly for her vibrant personality, unbridled zest for life, quirky one-of-a-kind perspectives, and warm generosity