Web cookies (also called HTTP cookies, browser cookies, or simply cookies) are small pieces of data that websites store on your device (computer, phone, etc.) through your web browser. They are used to remember information about you and your interactions with the site.
Purpose of Cookies:
Session Management:
Keeping you logged in
Remembering items in a shopping cart
Saving language or theme preferences
Personalization:
Tailoring content or ads based on your previous activity
Tracking & Analytics:
Monitoring browsing behavior for analytics or marketing purposes
Types of Cookies:
Session Cookies:
Temporary; deleted when you close your browser
Used for things like keeping you logged in during a single session
Persistent Cookies:
Stored on your device until they expire or are manually deleted
Used for remembering login credentials, settings, etc.
First-Party Cookies:
Set by the website you're visiting directly
Third-Party Cookies:
Set by other domains (usually advertisers) embedded in the website
Commonly used for tracking across multiple sites
Authentication cookies are a special type of web cookie used to identify and verify a user after they log in to a website or web application.
What They Do:
Once you log in to a site, the server creates an authentication cookie and sends it to your browser. This cookie:
Proves to the website that you're logged in
Prevents you from having to log in again on every page you visit
Can persist across sessions if you select "Remember me"
What's Inside an Authentication Cookie?
Typically, it contains:
A unique session ID (not your actual password)
Optional metadata (e.g., expiration time, security flags)
Analytics cookies are cookies used to collect data about how visitors interact with a website. Their primary purpose is to help website owners understand and improve user experience by analyzing things like:
How users navigate the site
Which pages are most/least visited
How long users stay on each page
What device, browser, or location the user is from
What They Track:
Some examples of data analytics cookies may collect:
Page views and time spent on pages
Click paths (how users move from page to page)
Bounce rate (users who leave without interacting)
User demographics (location, language, device)
Referring websites (how users arrived at the site)
Here’s how you can disable cookies in common browsers:
1. Google Chrome
Open Chrome and click the three vertical dots in the top-right corner.
Go to Settings > Privacy and security > Cookies and other site data.
Choose your preferred option:
Block all cookies (not recommended, can break most websites).
Block third-party cookies (can block ads and tracking cookies).
2. Mozilla Firefox
Open Firefox and click the three horizontal lines in the top-right corner.
Go to Settings > Privacy & Security.
Under the Enhanced Tracking Protection section, choose Strict to block most cookies or Custom to manually choose which cookies to block.
3. Safari
Open Safari and click Safari in the top-left corner of the screen.
Go to Preferences > Privacy.
Check Block all cookies to stop all cookies, or select options to block third-party cookies.
4. Microsoft Edge
Open Edge and click the three horizontal dots in the top-right corner.
Go to Settings > Privacy, search, and services > Cookies and site permissions.
Select your cookie settings from there, including blocking all cookies or blocking third-party cookies.
5. On Mobile (iOS/Android)
For Safari on iOS: Go to Settings > Safari > Privacy & Security > Block All Cookies.
For Chrome on Android: Open the app, tap the three dots, go to Settings > Privacy and security > Cookies.
Be Aware:
Disabling cookies can make your online experience more difficult. Some websites may not load properly, or you may be logged out frequently. Also, certain features may not work as expected.
Our fantastic graduate student Amanda Mankovich recently had her paper, “Say that again: Quantifying patterns of production for children with autism using recurrence analysis”, published in Frontiers in Psychology. Congratulations, Amanda!
Last Friday, the team took advantage of the beautiful weather and hiked on Soapstone Mountain. It was our last chance to be in-person for quite some time, as Dr. Naigles is about to depart on a multi-week trip to Denmark and Switzerland as part of her sabbatical. Additionally, it was our last chance to say goodbye to Juandiego Carmona, our former lab coordinator, who will be starting his PhD this fall at Teacher’s College, Columbia University. We are going to miss Juandiego but are so proud of him and hope he has an amazing time in NYC!
Left to right: Sarah, Cynthia, Dr. Naigles, Amanda, Julia, Grace, Kaya, Hugo (dog). Photo taken by Juandiego.Left to right: Juandiego, Amanda, Sarah, Cynthia, Dr. Naigles, Julia, Grace, Kaya.
Yesterday, we held a fully in-person Grad Lab meeting for the first time since our new personnel (lab coordinator Grace, honors student Julia, and McNair Scholar Sarah) joined the lab in June. It was great getting to see everyone in real life, albeit masked. We discussed upcoming conferences, trainings, and projects, then took a group photo* at the end. Next up: our team-building group hike in a few weeks!
*All members are fully vaccinated and were only unmasked for the duration of the photo.
Left to right: Grace, Amanda, Kaya, Cynthia, Dr. Naigles, Julia, Jaydel, Sarah
Our incredible undergraduate McNair Scholar Sarah presented her research poster, “Child Vocalization Development Coded Through the International Phonetic Alphabet: A comparison of children with Autism Spectrum Disorder and Typically Developing Children,” at the 10th Annual McNair Scholars Summer Poster Exhibit today! Sarah spent her summer transcribing typically developing and autistic low- and middle-verbal participants’ vocalizations into the International Phonetic Alphabet (IPA), then analyzing differences in usage of consonant and vowel types and tokens between the three groups. She will be building on her summer research as she enters her senior year and is considering adding phoneme elongation as a variable of interest. We are so proud of what Sarah has achieved and can’t wait to see what she does next!
Left to right: Cynthia, Sarah, and Dr. Naigles with Sarah’s poster.Sarah and her McNair poster.
Our lab is excited to announce the arrival of a new lab coordinator, Grace Corrigan, coming all the way from California! Grace recently graduated from Scripps College in Claremont, California, where she received a B.A. in Psychology with Honors and minored in Linguistics.
Cynthia recently passed her General Exams, officially becoming a doctoral candidate! AND her paper was published in the Journal of Autism and Developmental Disorders!