{"id":7652,"date":"2016-07-05T11:55:31","date_gmt":"2016-07-05T15:55:31","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/cognitivescience\/?post_type=cu_people&#038;p=7652"},"modified":"2026-06-23T13:31:17","modified_gmt":"2026-06-23T17:31:17","slug":"zeynep-ozlem-cankaya","status":"publish","type":"cu_people","link":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/cognitivescience\/people\/zeynep-ozlem-cankaya\/","title":{"rendered":"Zeynep Ozlem Cankaya"},"content":{"rendered":"<header class=\"mb-6 cu-pageheader cu-component-updated md:mb-12\">\n    <h1 class=\"cu-prose-first-last font-semibold !mt-2 mb-4 md:mb-6 text-3xl md:text-4xl lg:text-5xl lg:leading-[3.5rem] relative after:absolute after:h-px after:bottom-0 pb-5 after:w-10 after:bg-cu-red after:left-px\">\n                    \n             \n                \n            <\/h1>\n\n    \n    <\/header>\n\n\n\n\n\n<p><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Before joining MacEwan University, Dr. Cankaya worked as a research scientist at PolicyWise for Children &amp; Families, where she contributed to research on issues, policies, and practices affecting Alberta\u2019s children through the linkage and analysis of cross-government administrative data. She has also worked as a long-term consultant at the UNESCO Institute for Statistics and as a kindergarten teacher in Thailand, experiences that inform her interdisciplinary and practice-oriented perspective.<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>Dr. Cankaya\u2019s research examines how cultural artifacts, cognitive domains, interpersonal contexts, and individual characteristics shape children\u2019s play and development. Her current studies explore how play with everyday objects and loose parts supports children&#8217;s cognitive development. Through this research, she aims to generate evidence that supports educators and parents in fostering children\u2019s learning. Her doctoral research examined the roles of culture, language, and home environments in shaping young children\u2019s early numeracy knowledge.<br><br><a href=\"https:\/\/www.macewan.ca\/academics\/academic-departments\/early-learning-curriculum-studies\/our-people\/profile\/?profileid=cankayao\">Dr. Ozlem Cankaya &#8211; MacEwan University<\/a><\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n\n\n\n<p>&nbsp;<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":17660,"template":"","meta":{"_acf_changed":false,"cu_people_first_name":"Zeynep","cu_people_last_name":"Ozlem Cankaya","cu_people_initials":"","footnotes":"","_links_to":"","_links_to_target":""},"cu_people_type":[68],"cu_people_expertise":[],"class_list":["post-7652","cu_people","type-cu_people","status-publish","has-post-thumbnail","hentry","cu_people_type-alumni-phd-student"],"acf":{"cu_people_job_title":"Associate Professor - MacEwan University, Department of Early Learning and Curriculum Studies","cu_people_degree":"PhD- Cognitive Science-Carleton University, M.A. in Educational & Counselling Psychology-McGill University, B.Sc. in Early Childhood Education-Middle East Technical University","cu_building":"","cu_people_office_num":"","cu_people_pronoun":"","cu_people_designation":"","cu_people_email":"cankayao@macewan.ca","cu_people_phone":"","cu_people_phone_ext":"","cu_people_linkedin":"","cu_people_bluesky":"","cu_people_twitter":"","cu_people_instagram":"","cu_people_facebook":"","cu_people_website":"www.macewan.ca\/canplaylab ","cu_people_orcid":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/cognitivescience\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/cu_people\/7652","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/cognitivescience\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/cu_people"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/cognitivescience\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/cu_people"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/cognitivescience\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/cognitivescience\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/cu_people\/7652\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":17662,"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/cognitivescience\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/cu_people\/7652\/revisions\/17662"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/cognitivescience\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/17660"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/cognitivescience\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=7652"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"cu_people_type","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/cognitivescience\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/cu_people_type?post=7652"},{"taxonomy":"cu_people_expertise","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/carleton.ca\/cognitivescience\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/cu_people_expertise?post=7652"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}