Yair received his masters in Physics from the University of Amsterdam where he studied high-energy physics. After his masters, he made a short detour into corporate life, where he worked as an option trader for a year, followed by a year of consultant work. After these two years he yearned for (more) intellectual challenge so he returned to science. His Ph.D. was in cognitive psychology under the supervision of Jan Theeuwes, studying how attention is controlled, and specifically what stimuli are best at grabbing your attention. Currently he wants to investigate the interaction between attention and awareness.