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If you are interested in doing research on these or related topics, please contact Jim Kroger. I am looking for interested graduate students.
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| Controlling
devices with thought. In several applications, the
ability to control computers, prosthetics, and other devices
by merely thinking the commands we wish executed will open new
vistas in human-machine interaction. We are developing newer
and faster interfaces for device control.
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| The
Control of Attention. We are able to focus our attention
on important internal or external events and information. How
and where in the brain is this control over attention executed
and focused? We use several paradigms to obtain a fast temporal
picture of activations across the brain as attention is directed
to information or tasks.
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| The
Functional Organization of Frontal Cortex. The frontal
lobes enable higher cognition. It is clear that the anterior
pole (front-most part of frontal cortex) is critical to more
complex cognitive abilities (reasoning, planning, complex contingency
mediation). But it is not clear exactly what this region of
cortex immediately behind our forheads does, or how it interacts
with other parts of frontal cortex and the rest of the brain.
We are putting together a picture of the fast interactions between
frontal regions as particular varieties of task demand are negotiated.
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| Executive
cognitive dysfunction in depression. It is established
that in depressed persons, attention and executive control are
dysfunctional. However, since most cognitive tests of executive
function (Stroop, dual-task, switching) fail to demonstrate
a decrement, we are examining a new element of executive processing
that appears to be a good candidate for the executive mechanism
that is impaired in depression.
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| Neural
Processing of Metaphor. The ability to understand metaphoric
relationships is critical to human reasoninig abilities. We
are studying the neural processing underlying the use and understanding
of metaphor in linguistic communications. Ultimately, we seek
to understand how humans are able to deal with abstract information
in the service of complex behavior.
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| Attention
and Emotion in Social Attitudes. Emotion and attention
interact, and it is likely that attitudes influence emotional
interpretations that affect the deployment of attention. We are studying
interactions in the brain between attitudes towards persons
of various races and the process of paying attention (or inhibiting
attention) to those persons. Ultimately, we seek to understand
how the brain expresses prejudicial attitudes and how in the
brain this affects how we perceive and think about persons or
situations.
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