learning

Quantifying and Getting to the Heart of Human Learning

February 11, 2021

CNS 2021 Q&A with Anne Collins If there is one thing the past year of the COVID-19 pandemic has taught us, it’s that people learn and adapt to new situations all the time. We are never really starting from scratch.  “We have a whole set of strategies that we rely […]

effort

Changing How We Study and Understand Effort

January 28, 2021

CNS 2021 Q&A with Amitai Shenhav While interviewing Amitai Shenhav via Zoom about his upcoming award lecture on incentives and effort, he posed the question: “Why are we engaging in this conversation right now even though it’s going to require mental effort on both of our parts?” That type of […]

attentional

Diving into Attentional Control with Robert Desimone

January 21, 2021

CNS 2021 Paying attention is a fundamental brain process we all use every day. Whether keeping our eyes on the road while our cell phone rings or focusing on work while our kids yell in the background (for those of us working virtually during the pandemic), attentional control is key […]

In Memoriam: Leslie G. Ungerleider

December 15, 2020

Dr. Leslie G. Ungerleider passed away on December 10, 2020. A towering scientific figure, she was Chief of the Laboratory for Brain and Cognition at the National Institute of Mental Health, where she was an NIH Distinguished Investigator. Leslie began as a functional anatomist, and was also a talented physiologist […]

dementia

Moving the Body to Advance Cognition and Protect Against Dementia

December 8, 2020

CNS 2021: Q&A with Wendy Suzuki About 15 years ago, Wendy Suzuki was on a mission. She wanted to lose 25 pounds and began a regular gym and diet regimen. As she worked out more, she saw a big shift in her mood and memory. At the same time, her […]

Maximizing the Number of Brains Studying the Brain

November 24, 2020

Q&A with Damien Fair, MacArthur “Genius Grant” Recipient Although the global pandemic has slowed his lab’s data collection to a halt, COVID-19 has nothing on cognitive neuroscientist Damien Fair. In the middle of the global health crisis, he moved from Oregon Health & Science University to the University of Minnesota, […]

socioeconomic

Now Playing: Understanding How Socioeconomic Status Affects the Brain

November 5, 2020

Depression is twice as common at the lowest income levels than at the highest. People who are poor during childhood and become more affluent as adults continue to be at elevated risk. As presented in a symposium at CNS 2020 Virtual this past May, it appears that early life socioeconomic […]

Computers Generate Faces Based on Mental Maps

October 21, 2020

Cognitive neuroscientists have long debated about whether people have visual-like “pictures in the brain” that we activate when we think of them, or whether representations are more semantically organized in sets of features. So, for example, if asked to think of a blond person, will someone conjure in their “mind’s […]

memoriam

In Memoriam: Arthur P. Shimamura

October 15, 2020

Professor Arthur (Art) Shimamura passed on October 6, 2020. A founder of the Cognitive Neuroscience Society, Art was a talented scientist, an award-winning teacher, and a respected leader. Throughout his career he pursued the highest ideals of science and service, and his highly-cited work has had a profound impact on […]

recognition

Getting to Know You: New Insights in Facial Recognition

October 8, 2020

The COVID-19 global pandemic is opening new questions for exploring how we get to know and recognize people in our lives. From the rise of digital representations of people — whether through avatars or teleconferences — to the use of masks for protection, we are taking in lots of different […]

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