CNS 2022: Q&A with Sarah-Jayne Blakemore Sarah-Jayne Blakemore studies topics that are on many people’s minds daily, especially those of us who are parents of teenagers: the adolescent brain. Working to understand the development of the brain in adolescents is a labor of love that began when she was studying schizophrenia during her PhD and […]
Evolving Laboratory Tasks to Resolve Distraction
CNS 2022 Q&A with John Jonides Every day, we are constantly bombarded with sights, sounds, and other stimuli that threaten to distract us from specific tasks. Over the last several decades, cognitive neuroscientists have made tremendous progress in understanding the brain processes at work when people exert cognitive control to overcome potential distractions. They have […]
Turning to Ornithology to Understand the Neural Basis of Expertise
Hans Op de Beeck remembers as a child being intrigued by another student in his class who excelled in all subject areas but struggled with one specific task: mentally rotating drawings in 3-D for a technical drawing class. “He just could not do it, and hardly passed the tests despite a lot of hard work […]
It’s the Quality Not Just the Quantity of Words That Counts in Aphasia
Aphasia resulting from stroke and brain injury creates a variety of language deficits, including a reduced ability to engage in conversations. And while researchers have investigated many aspects of this condition, little work has looked at the detailed characteristics of the words that aphasia patients are able to produce. In a new study, Reem Alyahya […]
Investigating the Adolescent Brain Through Film Watching
Adolescence provides a unique opportunity for neuroscientists to understand an important in-between step in brain development. Straddling the worlds between adulthood and childhood, adolescents often are expected to take on more responsibility and independence, yet their brains are still not fully matured. In a new study, cognitive neuroscientists sought to investigate the adolescent brain through a […]
Age-Related Differences in How the Sleeping Brain Affects Future Thinking
Researchers are in a renaissance of understanding how sleep affects health and cognition. A big shift is occurring from thinking about sleep as a reactive, or homeostatic process, to now also recognizing the prospective role of the sleeping brain. And a new study is providing further evidence about how the brain prioritizes storing information during […]
Movement and Art Perception in Parkinson’s Patients
When I have taken my children to art museums in the past (pre-COVID), they loved to strike the poses they saw in the sculptures and paintings around them, mimicking the positions and actions that inspired the works. While many of us adults may not act out pieces of art, we may be mentally simulating the […]
Now Playing: Special Session in Honor of Brenda Milner, a Lifetime in Brain Science
At the Cognitive Neuroscience Society’s 2021 annual meeting (March 13-16, 2021), researchers honored Brenda Milner in a series of talks. Milner is a renowned neuropsychologist who has contributed significantly to the field of cognitive neuroscience, including through her work with a patient known as HM. Watch the videos here from CNS 2021, which includes an […]
Brain Structure is Key to Understanding Human Cognition
CNS 2021 Guest Post by Anne Billot In the 19th and 20th century, cases of individuals with brain injury, such as Phineas Gage or Henry Molaison, have advanced our understanding of the relationship between the anatomy of the brain and its function. Back then, methods were limited to investigate whole-brain structure and function. Now, cognitive […]
Learning to Transition and Adapt as Trainees in COVID Times
CNS 2021 Professional Development Panel, Guest Post by Richard T. Ward and Selen Küçüktaş Transition was a key theme that emerged throughout the CNS 2021 Professional Development Panel. Across career paths, research areas, and our personal lives, being able to adapt to the dynamic nature of our pandemic-stricken world and engage in new phases of […]
