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24.09.2024

Colloquium online

The preliminary programm of the colloquium for winter 2024/25 is now online.  

08.07.2024

New Article in Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience

Tone occurrence can be predictable by self-performed actions, by observed actions, and by cues. Presenting tones only in 50% of the trials, Sophie Egan, Alexander Seidel, Constanze Weber, Marta Ghio, and Christian Bellebaum found modulation of tone processing by prediction error, which was stronger for self-generated tones.

31.05.2024

Poster prize for Dana Huvermann

Dana Huvermann won a poster prize of the German organization “Deutsche Gesellschaft für Psychophysiologie und ihre Anwendung“ on this year’s meeting „Psychologie und Gehirn“ in Hamburg. The preprint to the poster is available at https://doi.org/10.31219/osf.io/a8hbx. Congratulations!

29.04.2024

New article in Scientific Reports

Constanze Weber and Christian Bellebaum have now published a new article in which they investigate the representation of prediction errors in the processing of immediate and delayed feedback by means of computational modelling and single-trial analysis of the event-related potential (ERP). Despite differences in the brain areas involved in learning from immediate and delayed feedback, we show that positive prediction errors (better than expected) are similarly reflected in the RewP and P300 component of the ERP. Link: https://doi.org/10.1038/s41598-024-60328-8

16.04.2024

New review article in The Cerebellum

Is the cerebellum involved in performance monitoring? Adam Berlijn, in collaboration with Dana Huvermann, Prof. Dr. Christian Bellebaum, Sandra Schneider and PD Dr. Martina Minnerop from Forschungszentrum Jülich, Prof. Dagmar Timmann-Braun from Essen University Hospital and Prof. Dr. Jutta Peterburs from the Medical School Hamburg, have shown in a systematic review that the cerebellum is involved in learning through external feedback and that this behavior changes in the damaged cerebellum. These findings support the model of performance monitoring. The results originate from the joint DFG project investigating the cerebellum in error and feedback processing.

The article can be retrieved here: https://doi.org/10.1007/s12311-024-01669-y

 

22.03.2024

New article in Imaging Neuroscience

Adam Berlijn, in collaboration with Dana Huvermann, Prof. Dr Christian Bellebaum, Manfred Mittelstädt, Dr Stefan Groiss and Prof. Dr Alfons Schnitzler from Düsseldorf University Hospital, PD Dr Martina Minnerop from Forschungszentrum Jülich, Prof. Dagmar Timmann Braun from Essen University Hospital and Prof. Dr Jutta Peterburs from the Medical School Hamburg were able to show that transcranial magnetic stimulation at precisely defined times during the processing of a Go/Nogo Flanker task results in a reduction in the amplitude of the error-related negativity (ERN), an event-related potential, when the cerebellum is stimulated. This influence was not present when a control site (vertex) was stimulated. These findings support the model of performance monitoring, which sees the cerebellum as an important structure for processing errors. The results come from the joint DFG project on research into the cerebellum. The results originate from the joint DFG project investigating the cerebellum during error and feedback processing.

The article is available via this link: https://doi.org/10.1162/imag_a_00080

 

18.03.2024

New article in Psychological Research

In a behavioral study in cooperation with the Medical School Hamburg, Julian Vahedi, Annakarina Mundorf, Christian Bellebaum and Jutta Peterburs show that the Pavlovian bias in feedback learning can be reduced when learning from emotional cues. https://link.springer.com/article/10.1007/s00426-024-01946-9 

18.10.2023

Best Scientific Poster

Adam Berlijn has won a poster award for the "Best Scientific Poster" in the category "Multiple Brains" at the 11th Annual Retreat of the INM in Jülich! Congratulations!

11.10.2023

Consensus Paper Published!

Laura Bechtold co-authored a freshly published consensus paper on brain signatures of embodied semantics and language. The consensus paper is part of a special issue following the embodied and situated language processing (ESLP) conference. The international and interdisciplinary team of co-authors joined their expertise in neuroscientific methods of embodied language processing in order to give insights into the state of the art and challenging and promising future steps of the research field: “future directions now call for enhancing the external validity of findings by acknowledging the multimodality, multidimensionality, flexibility and idiosyncrasy of embodied and situated language and semantic processes”. Don’t miss out on this exciting read! The consensus paper is available here: https://doi.org/10.5334/joc.237

09.06.2023

Poster prize für Laura Bechtold

Laura Bechtold won a poster prize of the German organization „Deutsche Gesellschaft für Psychophysiologie und ihre Anwendung“ on this years‘ meeting “Psychologie und Gehirn” in Tübingen. Congratulations!

31.05.2023

DFG project for Marta Ghio

Great success for Marta Ghio: The DFG funds the project Marta has applied for with the title “Investigating the grounding of abstract concepts in experiential, magnitude related brain networks” for a duration of three years. Congratulations and good luck!

02.06.2023

When three theories of semantic word processing cross paths, researchers' hearts beat faster!

In a behavioral and an EEG experiment, Dana Huvermann used a priming paradigm with concrete and abstract target words to investigate how word meaning, semantic control processes, and different semantic relations influence integration processes and processing speed. Take Home Message? Semantic control processes are important whether a target word is concrete or abstract, and they depend heavily on the ambiguity of the prime. The ambiguity of the primes was estimated from the versatility of the contexts in which they occur, for which we collaborated with Andreas Funke from the computer science department. Fun Fact about the study? The data in the behavioral experiment was collected by our undergraduate students as part of the Experimental Practicum. Laura Bechtold will present the data next week at the Psychology and Brain in Tübingen, you can find the poster in the OSF project for preprint. Link

25.05.2023

New Manuscript published!

In a study now accepted for publication in “Cognitive, Affective, & Behavioral Neuroscience”, Christine Albrecht and Christian Bellebaum investigated the effects of error severity on the processing of own and observed actions. To this end, participants’ brain activity while playing the piano was recorded. This study is the third from Christine’s  dissertation to be published.

16.05.2023

New article in Biological Psychology

Another study on the processing of tones that were generated by an observed action: With simultaneous EEG acquisitions Sophie Egan, Marta Ghio and Christian Bellebaum show that the results are explained partly by temporal predictability but not by individualism. https://doi.org/10.1016/j.biopsycho.2023.108575

05.05.2023

New Article in Psychophysiology

Delaying feedback during learning does not only result in a change in active brain areas, but also to a different representation of the learned material. In a newly published article in Psychophysiology, Christine Albrecht, Ruben van de Vijver and Christian Bellebaum show a connection between the N170, a feedback-associated ERP component that is possibly related to hippocampus activity, and the performance in a later free recall test. You can read the article via this link: https://doi.org/10.1111/psyp.14324

31.03.2023

Colloquium online

The preliminary programm of the colloquium for summer 2023 is now online.  
Link

24.02.2023

New publication in „Cognitive, Affective, & Behavioral Neuroscience

New publication in „Cognitive, Affective, & Behavioral Neuroscience“: In earlier work we found that the processing of sensory stimuli is altered, when these stimuli are caused by observed actions. In a new study by Constanze Weber and Alexander Seidel we could now show that this effect depends on the viewpoint on the observed action. The Link to the Abstract will follow.

03.02.2023

Manuscript accepted for publication!

Already published as a preprint, the study on the role of emotionality in learning novel abstract concepts has now been accepted for publication by the Journal of Experimental Psychology: Learning, Memory, and Cognition! The study emerged from Linda Espey's master's thesis under the direction of Laura Bechtold in collaboration with Marta Ghio and Christian Bellebaum. Reviewer feedback was overwhelmingly positive, in part because all materials, data, and analysis codes were made publicly available in the associated Open Science Framework project (https:// https://osf.io/gjc8p/).

18.1.2023

fMRI study pre-registered in the Open Science Framework!

Preregistration of studies is becoming increasingly popular and takes an important step to increase the transparency and replicability of research and to address the prevailing publication bias. In fMRI preregistered by Laura Bechtold, Christian Bellebaum and Marta Ghio, the brain activity of expert mathematicians is measured while they read abstract words with a mathematical meaning. The study aims to test the hypothesis that increasing levels of expertise lead word processing to rely more heavily on a mathematical-numerical brain network. For more on the background, design, and planned analyses, visit: https://osf.io/8uh5y

 

16.01.2023

New article in the Journal of Vision

Is our gaze behavior influenced by our personal and social preferences? Adam Berlijn, in cooperation with Lea Hildebrandt and Matthias Gamer from the University of Würzburg, shows in a new article in the Journal of Vision to what extent fixations on social features occur consistently across observers and whether this preference can be transferred to other measures of social prioritization in the laboratory and in the real world. The article can be found at this Link.

25.11.2022

Congratulations Christine!

Today Christine successfully completed her PhD. In the Disputation she presented her work on neural mechanisms of observation of behaviour and error processing and could easily answer all the questions by the committtee. After the exam we celebrated, for the first time in our kitchen again after a long break. The doctor’s hat was inspired by the „Piano-Study“ and has set new standards.

28.09.2022

The preliminary programm of the colloquium for winter 2022/23 is now online. 

Link

03.05.2022

New publication in “Scientific Reports”: In her master thesis Jacqueline Metzlaff investigated error processing in Tourette Syndrome. Based on this work she has now published a paper in cooperation with the Institute of Clinical Neuroscience and Medical Psychology at HHU and the Universities of Lübeck and Hannover.

06.04.2022

“I didn’t see a hammer.” But your brain did! In a paper just accepted on Cortex, Marta Ghio and Christian Bellebaum, in collaboration with Marco Tettamanti (University of Milano-Bicocca), showed that tool object perception increases reciprocal effective connectivity coupling among regions of the object-directed action representation system, independently from perceptual awareness.  doi.org/10.1016/j.cortex.2022.04.005

04.04.2022

The preliminary programm of the colloquium for summer 2022 is now online.  Link

20.10.2021

Good news from the DFG:

Marta Ghio and Christian Bellebaum received  funding for a common project with the title "The processing of immediate and delayed feedback – a critical role of the learned type of association?" The project will start next year and run for three years.

05.10.2021

„The doorbell rings, but you act as if you’re not home so you don’t have to get up.“ Sounds familiar? Participants learned novel concepts like this in a linguistic training study, which Linda Espey, Marta Ghio, Christian Bellebaum, and Laura Bechtold just published as preprint on psyArxiv. You can find out how emotionality and mental imagery influence learning novel concepts here: https://psyarxiv.com/sarp4

04.10.2021

At the beginning of October Marta Ghio has started again as Post-Doc in our department, after she has been working at the University of Trento for the last two years. Welcome back!

01.10.2021

The preliminary programm of the colloquium for winter 2021/22 is now online.  Link

01.06.2021

Surprise, surprise! When we observe actions of others, our brain primarily processes how surprising it is what we see. The degree of surprise can be influenced by our trait empathy. This is reported by Christine Albrecht and Christian Bellebaum in a new publication in Psychophysiology.

19.04.2021

What happens in your brain when you eat up that whole bag of chips? Dana Huvermann attempted to answer that question in her first paper that was just accepted for publication in the journal Cognitive, Affective and Behavioral Neuroscience. Together with Christian Bellebaum and Jutta Peterburs she shows that the selective devaluation of snacks (by consumption of a certain snack until satiety) is not only reflected in reduced hedonic ratings of the snack, but also modulates neural processing of the snack as reflected in the event-related potential. Here, without selective devaluation, the signal was most positive for the participant’s favourite snack and less positive for less preferred snacks. This pattern changed after selective devaluation, i.e., when the favourite snack had been eaten until satiety: here, the signal decreased to the level of less preferred but still liked snacks.

12.04.2021

 The  schedule of our colloquium for the summer semester 2021 is now online. You can find it here.

05.03.2021

An article by Laura Bechtold and Christian Bellebaum in international cooperation with Paul Hoffman and Marta Ghio has been accepted for publication in “Scientific Reports”. The study comprising two experiments investigated the context-dependent processing of concrete and abstract words. More will follow shortly.

1.3.2021

An article by Laura Bechtold and Christian Bellebaum in international cooperation with Paul Hoffman and Marta Ghio has been accepted for publication in “Scientific Reports”. The study comprising two experiments investigated the context-dependent processing of concrete and abstract words. More will follow shortly.

19.2.2021

Traurig aber wahr: Heute ist Sabine Hillebrandts letzter Arbeitstag. Nach über 20 Jahren an der HHU geht sie in den mehr als wohlverdienten Ruhestand. Leider konnten wir den Abschied wegen Corona nicht gemeinsam feiern, aber zumindest konnte ein kleiner Kreis von uns sie im Büro „überfallen“ und einen Blumenstrauß sowie einen Video-Abschiedsgruß überreichen. Andreas hat diesen Moment fotografisch festgehalten. Liebe Sabine, wir werden Dich und Deine Tatkraft vermissen. Wir wünschen Dir alles Gute und vor allem Gesundheit für Deinen neuen Lebensabschnitt und sagen auf Wiedersehen!

29.1.2021

First paper for Alexander Seidel: In cooperation with Bettina Studer from the Institute of Clinical Neuroscience and Medical Psychology at HHU Alexander, Marta Ghio (University of Trento) and Christian Bellebaum could show that the extent of the "Illusion of Control" affects the processing of self-generated sounds. The paper is published in the journal "Psychophysiololgy".

4.1.2021

The first paper of 2021 in the first week of January, the new year could not be off to a better start! In a new paper in the journal Psychological Research, Jutta Peterburs (now a professor at MSH Medical School Hamburg), Christine Albrecht, and Christian Bellebaum investigated the interplay between the Pavlovian learning bias and individual levels of social anxiety. They found that high levels of social anxiety in concert with a propensity to learn better from negative feedback hamper the overcoming of Pavlovian bias in a win context while facilitating response inhibition in an avoidance context.

30.11.20

Manuscript accepted for publication in the “Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience”: Together with Marta Ghio Sophie Egan and Christian Bellebaum published the first paper from our lab with simultaneous EEG acquisition in two study participants. The study is about the processing of stimuli that are either caused by own or observed actions. More details will follow.

23.11.2020

First paper for Christine Albrecht: As she shows in a study which was accepted today in "Cognitive, Affective, & Behavioral Neuroscience", empathy affects the building of expectations concerning observed actions, which, in turn, determines the processing of these actions. Congratulations, Christine!

21.10.2020

 The  schedule of our colloquium for the winter semester 2020/21 is now online. You can find it here.

01.10.2020

Today Constanze Weber starts as a PhD student in the department of Biological Psychology. A good start for you, Constanze!

 

30.09.2020

End of September Jutta Peterburs leaves the department of Biological Psychology to become a professor of Medical Psychology at “Medical School Hamburg” (MSH). We wish her all the best for the start at the new University. And she doesn’t leave completely. Due to her running DFG projects at HHU she will be here regularly. Already in August there was a farewell-barbecue-party in Jutta’s garden.

 

28.09.2020

New publication in the journal Brain & Cognition! Together with her former Master student at University of Münster, Elisabeth Schrammen, and her collaborators Prof. Dr. Gina Grimshaw at Victoria University of Wellington, New Zealand, and PD Dr. Sebastian Ocklenburg at Ruhr-University Bochum as well as her PhD student Adam Berlijn, Dr Jutta Peterburs recently investigated the role of functional hemispheric asymmetries for perceptual and inhibitory processes in the context of a go/nogo task with emotional faces in a large sample of left- and right-handers. The PDF for the article can be accessed here.

 

01.09.2020

With Dana Huvermann also the second PhD student hired in Juttas DFG project on the role of the cerebellum in feedback processing has started. Adam Berlijn had already started some weeks earlier. Welcome Dana and Adam!

 

09.07.2020

New publication in Neuropsychologia: In cooperation with Giulio Pergola (Universität Bari) and with the Klinikum Dortmund (Dr. Koch and Prof. Schwarz), Eckart Zimmermann, Marta Ghio and Christian Bellebaum have found out that medial und lateral thalamus lesions in humans cause different types of saccade-related impairments of the representation of space.

03.06.2020

The colloquium this semester will take place as a video conference. For more information please look here.

 

16.04.2020

 The (preliminary) schedule of our colloquium for the summer semester is now online. You can find it here.

08.04.2020

Colloquium Biological Psychology: Due to the Corona-situation there will be no talks by external researchers in the colloquium this semester. The last four mondays of the semester (22.06., 29.06., 06.07. und 13.07.2020, 14.30 Uhr) are reserved for talks by master students. The exact schedule with names and titles will be announced soon.

 

6.4.2020

Learning to execute a response to obtain a reward or to inhibit a response to avoid punishment is much easier than learning the reverse, which has been referred to as “Pavlovian” biases. But do these learning biases only apply to active learning, or do they persist when subjects learn by observation? In a new publication, Dr. Jutta Peterburs, Prof. Bellebaum and former Bachelor student Alena Frieling investigated this question in a series of behavioral experiments. The results showed that Pavlovian biases are indeed preserved in observational learning. (Link)

 

06.03.2020

The Biopsychology lab is happy to announce the start of two new research projects! Dr. Jutta Peterburs, together with PD Dr. Martina Minnerop (University Clinic Düsseldorf) and Prof. Dr. Dagmar-Timmann Braun (University Clinic Essen) received funding from the German Research Society (Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft, DFG) for a project on the role of the cerebellum for feedback processing. In addition, Jutta also successfully applied for DFG funding for a project on error and feedback processing for own and observed actions in patients with obsessive-compulsive disorder that she will conduct together with Prof. Dr. Reinhard Pietrowsky (Clinical Psychology) and Dipl.-Psych. Burkhard Ciupka-Schön (Krefeld).

08.01.2020

What is empathy good for? As we could show in a study that was now accepted for publication in „Social Cognitive and Affective Neuroscience“, trait empathy helps to predict other’s responses. This study is a cooperation with Patrizia Thoma, Ruhr University Bochum. (Link)

09.12.2019

New publication in the scientific journal "Laterality - Asymmetries of Body, Brain and Cognition": IResearchers from the Department of Biopsychology at Ruhr-University Bochum (Prof. Dr. O. Güntürkün) in collaboration with Jutta Peterburs recently investigated how motor preferences and emotive biases influence the lateralization of embracing, cradling and kissing. Results showed a rightward bias for embracing that was modulated by both motor preferences and the emotional content of the situation, while kissing and cradling were not influenced by motor preferences. In general, a negative emotional context reduced the lateral biases in social touch. (Link)​​​​​​​

15.11.2019

Today Benjamin had his farewell party. He had worked with us for 5 1/2 years, just like Marta, who has already left us 6 weeks earlier. While Benjamin is starting his training as psychotherapist, Marta has moved to the University of Trento in Italy (Link) and we will continue to cooperate with her. We wish both all the best for their new jobs and hope to see them regularly (next time on the Christmas party!).

30.09.2019

The colloquium plan for the winter term 2019 /20 is now online

02.08.2019

New publication in the journal Psychophysiology: In a cooperation with the department of Cognitive Psychology at Ruhr University Bochum (Professor Oliver Wolf) we found out that stress differentially affects the processing of immedate and delayed feedback. (Link)​​​​​​​

06.07.2019

New publication in Neuropsychologia for Jutta Peterburs: In this new paper we show that individual reward preferences are reflected in event-related brain potentials. (Link)​​​​​​​

05.07.2019

Already on the 24th of June Laura Bechtold passed her PhD exam with an excellent performance. Today she received her certificate at this semester’s celebration for all new PhDs in our faculty. And not only that: Laura had the honor to speek the closing words of the celebration, what she did with a self-written poem.
Congratulations, Laura!

01.06.2019

Benjamin Weismüller has now published also the third study of his dissertation. In Psychophysiology he reports how feedback delay affects the processing of feedback in active and observational learning. (Link)​​​​​​​

29.04.2019

New publication in the Journal NeuroImage with the title: „How words get meaning: The neural processing of novel object names after sensorimotor training“ (link). In this fMRI study (in cooperation with the professors Antoch, Turowski und Wittsack from the Institute of Diagnostic and Interventional Radiology), Laura Bechtold, Marta Ghio and colleagues had their participants gain active and observational sensorimotor experience with novel objects. After a short training period, the processing of the novel objects’ names drew on a semantic network involved in processing word meaning. This semantic network further showed an enhanced functional connectivity with experience-specific brain areas.

12.04.2019

New publication: Today a manuscript from our department on effects of modafinil on moral decisin making and its neural correlates has been accepted for publication in "Psychopharmacology", with the former B.Sc. student Thao Ngo as first author. The study was conducted in cooperation with Lars Kuchinke (International Psychoanalytic University Berlin) and Patrik Roser (Ruhr-University Bochum) and was funded by the Mercator Foundation. (Link)

26.03.2019

The colloquium plan for the summer term 2019 is now online

07.03.2019

New publication (Link) in the journal "Scientific Reports"! In a DFG-funded research program established together with researchers at the University of Münster, Dr. Jutta Peterburs und Prof. Dr. Christian Bellebaum are currently investigating if processing of and learning from performance-related feedback are altered in patients with social anxiety disorder (SAD)/social phobia. In a recent EEG-study, 34 patients with SAD and 30 healthy controls completed a probabilistic learning task in two conditions: under social observation and in a control condition without observation. As expected, SAD patients as compared to healthy controls experienced more subjective discomfort under social observation. Moreover, they showed better learning from negative feedback in the control condition, but reduced learning from negative feedback in the observation condition. This effect correlated with reduced differentiation of positive and negative feedback in the time range of the feedback-related negativity (FRN). These findings demonstrate that processing of and learning from feedback are altered in SAD, especially under social scrutiny. In particular, it appears that SAD patients do not process positive information adequately on the neural level, which may impair their ability to differentiate between negative and positive outcomes.

11.12.2018

Today Benjamin Weismüller successfully completed his dissertation with the oral exam. From his colleagues he received not only a new running shirt, but also one of the most creative doctoral caps of all time (see picture). Congratulations Benjamin!

15.11.2018

New publication in the journal "Laterality: Asymmetries of Body, Brain and Cognition": Together with neuroscientists at Ruhr-University Bochum, Germany, and Victoria University Wellington, New Zealand,  Dr. Jutta Peterburs  investigated EEG asymmtries across the head in the alpha, beta, delta, and theta frequency bands in a representative sample of 235 healthy adults. Significant asymmetries were found in all four frequency bands and across several brain areas, indicating that EEG asymmetries are not limited to frontal alpha. Asymmetries were modulated by direction of hand preference, with stronger right-handedness predicting greater right (relative to left) alpha power, or greater left (relative to right) activity. These results show that EEG asymmetries other than frontal alpha represent markers of asymmetric brain function that should be explored further. (Link)
 

25.10.2018

New publication in Brain Structur & Function: In collaborations with John Desmond and others researchers at Johns Hopkins School of Medicine in Baltimore, Maryland (USA),   Dr. Jutta Peterburs  investigates non-motor functions of the cerebellum, with particular focus on verbal working memory. In this fMRI study, inferior and superior cerebellar regions were shown to be differentially modulated as a function of stimulus similarity and sequence novelty, indicating that particularly lobule VIIIa may contribute to verbal working memory by generating predictions of letter sequences that reduce the likelihood of phonological loop failure before retrieval. These findings support prediction, which can be based on sequence learning or detection, as an overarching cerebellar function. (Link)

22.10.2018

New publication in Brain and Language: Laura Bechtold investigated experience-dependent effects on conceptual processing in the abstract domain. In this study, she and her co-authors could show that mathematical expertise selectively modulates the processing of mathematical words. (Link)

11.10.2018

The  colloquium plan  for the winter term 2018/9 is now online.

22.06.2018

New publication in the special issue „Neural Mechanisms of Learning“ in the Journal Biomedicines: Which role plays the imageability of concrete words for their processing advantage over abstract words? Laura Bechtold together with Marta Ghio and Christian Bellebaum could show that the mere visual imageability of newly learned words modulates the late electrophysiological correlates of semantic processing. (Link)

10.05.2018

new publication in Neuropsychologia: Patients suffering from Parkinson’s Disease learn better from negative than positive feedback. Together with colleagues from our department, from the Institute of Clinical Neuroscience and Medical Psychology, and the Department of Neurology of the UKD, Benjamin Weismüller could to show in a new publication in Neuropsychologia that a similar bias is seen also for delayed feedback. This may indicate an effect of dopamine on learning from delayed feedback, which has recently also been linked to the hippocampus.   Link

01.05.2018

Which neural networks are implicated when sentences’ meaning is modulated by the occurrence of negation (e.g., I love you vs. I don’t love you)? Via a data-driven technique, called Multi-Variate Pattern Analysis, Marta Ghio and Karolin Haegert (WHB in our department) - in collaboration with Matilde Vaghi and Marco Tettamanti - showed that negation modulates brain networks specific for the processing of the meaning categories as well as syntactic and cognitive control systems. This new paper has just been accepted for publication in an upcoming theme issue of “Philosophical Transactions B” (doi:10.1098/rstb.2017.0124). (Link)

28.04.2018

A cognitive training with action-related verbs (e.g., to screw, to grasp) induces brain plasticity effects in the action brain system as assessed by gray matter Voxel Brain Morphometry. This preliminary finding, which might have relevant implications not only for cognitive accounts of semantic memory but also for neurorehabilitation research, is described in a new paper by Marta Ghio just accepted for publication in Neuropsychologia.  Link

23.04.2018

Eckart Zimmermann's talk today had to be cancelled. Instead it will take place on the 4th of June (see updated colloquium plan)

06.04.2018

The colloquium plan for the summer term 2018 is now online .

17.01.2018

New publication in Brain and Language: Laura Bechtold studies the development of new object representations in the brain in her PhD project. In this study she could show that the the experience with novel objects is mirrored in processing the objects' names. Link to the abstract will follow.

22.11.2017

It is well known that stimuli caused by an own action are processed differently compared to external stimuli. But what about stimuli following an observed action? This is the topic of a new paper by Marta Ghio, accepted for publication today in Psychophysiology (link to the abstract here).

17.10.2017

On the first of October Jutta Peterburs started to work in our department as a post-doc. Today her homepage has been completed with her photo. Welcome Jutta!

01.10.2017

The colloquium plan for the winter term 17/18 is now online

25.09.2017

Now it is officially confirmed: Great news for Eckart Zimmermann from our department and for the whole Institue for Experimental Psychology. Eckart succeeded in this year's competition for a "European Research Council" (ERC) "Starting Grant", which will allow him to start his own research group and to continue his successfull research on sensorimotor integration. Congratulations Eckart!

19.09.2017

New publication on the interaction between episodic and semantic memory in cooperation with the Institute for Neural Computation, Ruhr University Bochum (see publication list).

07.04.2017

The colloquium plan for the summer term is now online.

07.10.2016

The schedule of our colloquium for the winter term is now available.

05.08.2016

Does "neuroenhancement" work? Modafinil is used to treat narcolepsy. In healthy people it is said to have a neuroenhancing effect. In a study now accepted for publication in the "Journal of Psychopharmacology" we describe that modafinil leads to a bias towards learning from positive feedback, which is not always an advantage.

27.07.2016

We know already that feedback delayed by a few seconds is processed differently compared to immediate feedback. However, as we could now show in a new publication in "Psychophysiology", the processing mechanisms are not completely different.

01.07.2016

In cooperation with the Institute of Clinical Neuroscience and Medical Psychology we could show that deep brain stimulation in Parkinson's Disease leads to an improvement in reward-based learning (publication in Behavioural Brain Research).

10.05.2016

On the first of March the new Post-Doc Eckart Zimmermann started in our department. Now he can also be found on our Homepage.

11.04.2016

The talks of our colloquium for the summer term are now online. (see Colloquium)

11.04.2016

New publication on the experience dependence of semantic representations. Here's the link.

23.02.2016

Can the neural representation of fine-grained conceptual categories be decoded? We addressed this question by applying MVPA in a fMRI study, which has now been accepted for publication in NeuroImage (Marta Ghio, cooperation with Matilde Vaghi, Prof. Daniela Perani and Marco Tettamanti, San Raffaele University, San Raffaele Scientific Institute, Milan). Link.

28.01.2016

New paper on learning strategies in Parkinson patients in "Neuroscience". Here's the link to the abstract.

28.01.2016

The talk by Dr. Marco Tettamanti has moved from Rosenmontag to the following day, Tuesday, 09.02, 10:30 Uhr. (see "Kolloquium")

05.01.2016

The cancelled talk by Dr. Sven Hoffmann is now scheduled for monday, the 15. of February 2016 at 14.30. (see "Kolloquium")

04.11.2015

Symposium at TeaP 2016 in Heidelberg accepted: Marta Ghio and Christian Bellebaum will meet Shirley-Ann Rueschemeyer (University of York, U.K.), Markus Kiefer (University of Ulm, Germany), and Emily S. Cross (Bangor University, Wales) for a symposium on the role of individual experience in shaping the neural correlates of conceptual object knowledge. Looking forward for TeaP 2016! The link to the symposium will follow.

30.09.2015

Chapter published in the Neurobiology of Language (1st Edition, G. Hickok & S. Small eds.): Grounding sentence processing in the sensory-motor system (Ch. 52, Marta Ghio, cooperation with Marco Tettamanti, San Raffaele Scientific Institute, Milan).

28.09.2015

Renovation completed. You find us now again in our rooms in building 23.03, level 00.

21.09.2015

The schedule of the talks at the research colloquium Biological Psychology for wintersemester 2015/16 is now online: Kolloquiumsplan  

18.09.2015

How does a delay of a few seconds affect feedback processing? We tried to answer this question in a study which has now been accepted for publication in Psychophysiology. Here's the abstract..

30.07.2015

manuscript in „Human Brain Mapping“ accepted: What happens in the brain when people learn morse code? We examined this in cooperation with Professor Schmidt-Wilcke (Klinikum Bergmannsheil, Ruhr-Universität Bochum). Here's the link to the abstract.

21.07.2015

We have temporarily moved: Due to the renovation work in building 23.03 we have temporarily moved to building 23.21. Until end of september you find us on level 02 in rooms 52, 54 und 83 (secretary Frau Hillebrandt).

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