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Rob Goldberg
Hofstra University B.A. in Cognitive Science, 1995
University of Pittsburgh; Ph.D. in Psychology, 2003
Research Interests: Rob explores how brain processes allow for the intuition of unified, yet flexible, semantic representations that can explain both the fluidity of metaphors and the rigidity of scientific facts. He is interested in the relationship between sensory brain mechanisms and perceptual knowledge of objects, and how language allows for the development and maintenence of abstract semantic knowledge.
Research in Progress: As a conceptual case study, Rob is currently examining the living/non-living distinction from its formation in cognitive development through its decay with brain damage. Using behavioral, computational, and fMRI methods, his present research aims to instantiate this distinction and its developmental trajectory in specific brain mechanisms.
Dawn Morales
U of New Orleans; B.A. in Psychology, 1996
UC San Diego; Ph.D. in Psychology, 2003
Research Interests: Address the inter-relationships between different memory systems and visual peception. I am curious about how information-processing proceeds (e.g., How does memory influence perception? What kinds of variables affect visual encoding and memory retrieval?) as well as how information is represented (how is memory for color represented? What is the nature of rehearsal in visual working memory?)
Research in Progress: Behavioral experiments that characterize the nature of rehearsal and representation in color memory. I am planning some further patient studies in color memory.
Tatiana Schnur
University of Virginia; B.A. in Cognitive Science, 1995
Harvard University; Ph.D. in Psychology, 2003
Research Interests: Language production in aphasic and healthy populations. Speech is produced very rapidly, at a rate of two to three words per second, and yet we rarely make mistakes. How we are able to produce words in the correct order with the correct sounds so quickly and flawlessly? In order to address this question, I focus on the selection mechanisms involved in both single- and multi-word production at the lexical level.
Research in Progress: I am looking at aphasic speakers' pattern of errors during a rapid picture naming paradigm [the paced-cyclic (PC) naming paradigm] as a way to understand how multi-word production breaks down for some aphasic speakers. Additionally, I am looking at whether Broca's area is recruited during categorically blocked paced-cyclic naming in aphasic and healthy participants using neuroimaging.
Geeta Shivde
Oberlin College; B.A. in Biopsychology, 1995
U of Oregon; Ph.D. in Psychology, 2001
Current Position: Assistant Professor of Psychology, West Chester University, West Chester, PA.
Katharina Spalek
NICI, Radboud University Nijmegen, The Netherlands; Ph.D. in Psychology: 2005
Research Interests: Lexical retrieval during language production. How is semantic, syntactic, and phonological knowledge stored in the mental lexicon and how is it accessed during speaking? I am particularly interested in the retrieval of lexical-syntactic properties, that is, properties needed for the computation of agreement (e.g., in some languages, the form of an adjective depends on the grammatical gender of the noun it specifies). More recently, my interests have also turned to the representation of semantic knowledge in the mental lexicon.
Research in Progress: I have come to the CCN in order to learn how to use fMRI during language production. I am currently planning both a behavioral and an fMRI experiment that will address the question of flexibility in semantic associations. That is, I want to know whether the semantic representation for a given object can change depending on a speaker's focus.
Laura H.F. Barde
U of California, Irvine; B.A. in Drama, 1992
U of California, Irvine; B.A. in Psychology, 2000
Research Interests: The goal of my research is to understand how humans comprehend spoken language. I am additionally interested in the functional neuroanatomy of this process.
Research in Progress: Currently I am using both standard behavioral and eye tracking methodologies to investigate the relationship between sound and meaning in aphasic comprehension. For example, I want to know more about the kinds of semantic/conceptual knowledge that aphasics access during the spoken word recognition process. When I have a better idea of what I want to know about the language comprehension system, I'll also use fMRI measures of healthy adult subjects.
Marina Bedny
Johns Hopkins; B.A. in Cognitive Science, 2001
Research Interests: My research interests are in Cognitive Neuroscience, the neural correlates of language, language acquisition and how learning processes affect the structure of neural representation.
Research in Progress: Currently I am exploring the link between noun and verb acquisition and how these are represented in the brain. Another project focuses on the difference between 1st and 2nd language processing. This project focuses on what aspect of 2nd language processing makes its neural correlates different from 1st language processing.
Daniel Drucker
Rutgers U; B.A. in Psychology; concentration in Cognitive Science, 2001
Research Interests: I am broadly interested in the neural bases of object and concept similarity spaces.
Research in Progress: Currently, I am exploring the focal and distributed representations of visual similarity of parameterized shape spaces in human object recognition cortex.
Irene P. Kan
College of Wooster; B.A. in Psychology, 1995
Villanova University; M.S. in Experimental Psychology, 1998
Current Position: Postdoctoral Fellow, Memory Disorders Clinic, Boston.
Robyn Oliver
U of San Diego; B.A. in Psychology, 1999
Research Interests: I study the organization of semantic memory and I am particularly interested in retrieval of visual information.
Research in Progress: I am currently running fMRI and behavioral studies that investigate the cognitive and neural processing involved with retrieval of visual attributes. Most of these studies test the claims of the distributed model of semantic memory.
Stacey Schaefer
U of Wisconsin, Madison; B.S. in Psychology & Zoology, 1996
Research Interests: Identifying the neural circuitry of emotion, in particular, the neural circuitry of emotion regulation and the relation between individual differences in this circuitry's reactivity and state and trait measures of affective style.
Research in Progress: Currently I am using fMRI to identify the neural circuitry of voluntary emotion regulation, both positive and negative emotion, in normals. In addition, I am using masked stimuli presentations to develop a behavioral paradigm that reliably elicits changes in subjective emotional experience without changes in conscious perception of emotional stimuli, with the eventual goal of taking the paradigm to fMRI to examine the neural correlates of the experience of emotion.
Melissa Brandon
U of Pittsburgh; B.S. in Neuroscience & Psychology, 2002
Current Position: Graduate student in Cognitive Psychology, University of Wisconsin.
Steven Frankland
College of Wooster; B.A. in Psychology & Philosophy, 2007
Current Position: Graduate Student in Psychology, Harvard University.
Ben Greene
Oberlin College; B.A. in Neuroscience, 2006
Elizabeth Hirshorn
Wellesley College; B.S. in Cognitive Science and Spanish, 2003
Current Position: Graduate Student in Psychology, University of Rochester.
Mark Macdonald
University of York, UK; BSc in Psychology, 2005
Jessica D. Pickard
SUNY Cortland; B.S. in Psychology, 2001
Current Position: Graduate student in Clinical Child Psychology, University of Southern Mississippi.
Hannah Snyder
Oberlin College; B.A. in Neuroscience & Psychology, 2004
Tammy Brokow
Erica Calderon
University of Pennsylvania B.S. in Psychology, 2004
Zoe Clancy
University of Pennsylvania; Biological Basis of Behavior
Plans After Graduation: Research Assistant for Mark Jung-Beeman at Northwestern University.
Katy Cross
University of Pennsylvania B.A. in Psychology, 2005
Current Position: Research assistant, University of Pennsylvania.
Emily Geiger
University of Pennsylvania B.A. in Psychology, 2005
Jen Goldschmied
Mike Herzlinger
University of Pennsylvania; Department of Psychology
Plans After Graduation: Roaming the mean streets of New York City.
Justin Hulbert
University of Pennsylvania; B.A. in Psychology 2005
Current Position: Graduate student in Cognitive Psychology, University of Oregon.
Allison Lapchak
University of Pennsylvania; Department of Psychology
Plans After Graduation: Post-Bac program, Bryn Mawr College.
Claudia Maennel
Free University of Berlin; Exchange Student
Jessica McConaughy
Molly Parsons
University of Pennsylvania; Independent Study
Lauren Rosenberg
Adi Shafir
University of Pennsylvania B.A. in Cognitive Science, 2005
Rebecca Stone
University of Pennsylvania; Graduate Student, Department of Neuroscience.
Sarah Thompson
University of Pennsylvania; Biological Basis of Behavior
Plans After Graduation: Teach for America.
Amanda Van Scoyoc
University of Pennsylvania; B.A. in Psychology, 2005
Nathan Witthoft
University of Pennsylvania; Department of Psychology
Plans after Graduation: Graduate Student, MIT
A new photo of the lab members for 2008 will be available soon.
