Martha J. Farah

EDUCATION

Massachusetts Institute of Technology
S.B., 1977, Metallurgy and Materials Science
S.B., 1977, Philosophy

Harvard University
Ph.D., 1983, Experimental Psychology

MIT and Boston University School of Medicine
Postdoctoral studies, 1983-1985, Neuropsychology

PROFESSIONAL HISTORY

Carnegie Mellon University
Assistant Professor, Associate Professor and Professor of Psychology, 1985-1992

University of Pennsylvania
Professor of Psychology, 1992-present
Director, Center for Cognitive Neuroscience, 1999-present
Adjunct Professor of Neurology, 1992-present
Senior Fellow, Center for Bioethics, 2005-present

SELECTED HONORS

American Psychological Association, Distinguished Scientific Award for an Early Career Contribution (1992)
Elected Fellow of: American Association for the Advancement of Science (2007), Association for Psychological Science (2007), Cognitive Science Society (2002), Society of Experimental Psychologists (2005)
John Simon Guggenheim Foundation, Fellowship (1996)
National Academy of Sciences, Troland Research Award (1992)

RESEARCH INTERESTS

Much of my career has been devoted to understanding the mechanisms of vision, memory, and executive function in the human brain. In recent years I have shifted my research focus to a new set of issues that lie at the interface between cognitive neuroscience and "the real world."

These new issues of interest to me include the effects of socioeconomic adversity on children's brain development and emerging social and ethical issues in neuroscience ("neuroethics"). In addition, some very talented students and postdocs have pulled me into their investigations of other topics, including decision making, mood regulation and neurogenetics.

SELECTED PUBLICATIONS

Cognitive Neuroscience, general

• Farah, M. J. (1994). Neuropsychological inference with an interactive brain: A critique of the 'locality assumption', Behavioral and Brain Sciences, 17, 43-61.
  
  
• Farah, M. J. and Feinberg, T. E., Editors (2000). Patient-based Approaches to Cognitive Neuroscience. Cambridge: MIT Press.
  
  
• Feinberg, T. E. and Farah, M. J., Editors (2003). Behavioral Neurology and Neuropsychology, 2nd Edition. New York: McGraw-Hill.
  
  
• Gillihan, S. and Farah, M.J. (2005). Is self-related processing special? A critical review. Psychological Bulletin, 131, 76-97.

Development, including effects of socioeconomic status

• Polk, T. A. and Farah, M. J. (1998). The neural development and organization of letter recognition: Evidence from functional neuroimaging, computational modeling, and behavioral studies. Proceedings of the National Academy of Sciences, 95, 847-852.
  
  
• Farah, M.J., Rabinowitz, C., Quinn, G. E., and Liu, G. T. (2000). Early commitment of neural substrates for face recognition. Cognitive Neuropsychology, 17, 117-124.
  
  
• Noble, K.G., Norman, M.F. and Farah, M.J. (2005). Neurocognitive correlates of socioeconomic status in kindergarten children. Developmental Science, 8, 74-87.
  
  
• Farah, M.J.,Noble, K.G. and Hurt, H. (2005) Poverty, privilege and brain development: Emprical findings and ethical implications. In J. Illes (Ed.) Neuroethics in the 21st Century. New York: Oxford University Press.
  
  
• Farah, M.J., Shera, D.M., Savage, J.H., Betancourt, L., Giannetta, J.M., Brodsky, N.L., Malmud, E.K. & Hurt, H. (2006). Childhood poverty: Specific associations with neurocognitive development. Brain Research, 1110, 166-174.
  
  
• Noble, K.G., Farah, M.J. & McCandliss, B.D. (2006). Socioeconomic background modulates the effect of phonological awareness on reading. Cognitive Development, 21, 349-368.
  
  
• Noble K.G., Wolmetz, M.E., Ochs, L.G., Farah, M.J. & McCandliss, B.D. (2006). Brain-behavior relationships in reading acquisitionare modulated by socioeconomic factors. Developmental Science, 9, 642-654.
  
  
• Noble, K.G., McCandliss, B.D. & Farah, M.J. (2007). Socioeconomic gradients predict individual differences in neurocognitive abilities. Developmental Science, 10(4), 464-80.
  
  
• Ford, S., Farah, M.J., Shera, D., & Hurt, H. (2007). Neurocognitive correlates of problem behavior in environmentally at-risk adolescents. Journal of Developmental and Behavioral Pediatrics, 28: 376-385.
  
  
• Farah, M.J., Betancourt, L., Shera, D.M., Savage, J.H., Giannetta, J.M., Nancy L. Brodsky, N.L., Elsa K. Malmud, E.K., Hurt, H. (in press). Environmental Stimulation, Parental Nurturance and Cognitive Development in Humans. Developmental Science.

Neuroethics

• Farah, M. J. (2002). Emerging ethical issues in neuroscience. Nature Neuroscience, 5, 1123-1129.
  
  
• Farah, M.J., Illes, J., Cook-Deegan, R., Gardner, H., Kandel, E., King, P., Parens, E., Sahakian, B. and Wolpe P.R. (2004). Neurocognitive enhancement: What can we do and what should we do? Nature Reviews Neuroscience, 5, 421-425.
  
  
• Farah, M.J. and Wolpe, P.R. (2004). Monitoring and manipulating the human brain: New neuroscience technologies and their ethical implications. Hastings Center Report, 34, 35-45.
  
  
• Farah, M.J. (2005). Neuroethics: The practical and the philosophical. Trends in Cognitive Sciences, 9, 34-40.
  
  
• Farah, M.J. & Heberlein, A.S. (in press). Personhood and neuroscience: Naturalizing or nihilating? American Journal of Bioethics -- Neuroscience, (Target Article) 7, 37-48. Se also our response to commentators.

Prefrontal function and decision-making

• Fellows, L.K. and Farah, M.J. (2003). Ventromedial frontal cortex mediates affective shifting in humans: Evidence from a reversal learning paradigm. Brain, 126, 1830-1837.
  
  
• Fellows, L.K. and Farah, M.J. (2005). Different underlying impairments in decision making following ventromedial and dorsolateral frontal lobe damage in humans. Cerebral Cortex, 15, 58-63.
  
  
• Fellows, L.K. and Farah, M.J. (2005). Is anterior cingulate cortex necessary for cognitive control? Brain, 128, 788-796.
  
  
• Fellows, L.K. & Farah, M.J. (2005). Dissociable elements of human foresight:A role for the ventromedial frontal lobes in framing the future, but not in discounting future rewards. Neuropsychologia, 43, 1214-1221.
  
  
• Fellows, L.K. & Farah, M.J. (2007). The role of ventromedial prefrontal cortex in decision making: Judgment under uncertainty, or judgment per se? Cerebral Cortex, advance online publication.

Neurogenetics, emotion and mood

• Bishop, S.J., Cohen, J.D., Fossella, J., Casey, B.J. & Farah, M.J. (2006). COMT genotype influences prefrontal response to emotional distraction. Cognitive, Affective and Behavioral Neuroscience, 6(1), 62-70.
  
  
• Gillihan, S., Kessler, J. & Farah, M.J. (2007). Memories affect mood: Evidence from covert experimental assignment to positive, neutral, and negative memory recall. Acta Psychologica, 125(2): 144-54.
  
  
• Rao, H., Gillihan, S.J., Wang, J., Korczykowski, M., Sankoorikal, G.M.V., Kaercher, K.A., Brodkin, E.S., Detre, J.A., Farah, M.J. (2007). Genetic variation in serotonin transporter alters resting brain function in healthy individuals. Biological Psychiatry, 62(6): 600-6.
  
  
• Chepenik, L.G., Cornew, L.A. & Farah, M.J. (in press). The influence of sad mood on cognition. Emotion,
  
  
• Gillihan, S.J., Farah, M.J., Sankoorikal, G.M.V., Breland, J. & Brodkin, E.S. (in press). Association between serotonin transporter genotype and extraversion. Psychiatric Genetics,

Vision

• Farah, M. J., Wilson, K. D., Drain, M., and Tanaka, J. N. (1998). "What is 'special' about face perception?" Psychological Review, 105, 482-498.
  
  
• Farah, M. J. (2000). The Cognitive Neuroscience of Vision. Oxford: Blackwell Publishers.
  
  
• Farah, M. J. (2004). Visual Agnosia, 2nd Edition. Cambridge: MIT Press/Bradford Books.
  
  

DOWNLOADABLE CURRICULUM VITAE

NONTECHNICAL RESEARCH DESCRIPTIONS

LINKS

mfarah[at]psych.upenn.edu

Center for Cognitive Neuroscience home page

Penn Neuroethics Program and "Neuroethics @ UPenn" home page

Neuroethics Society