Discovery Early Career Researcher Award - Grant ID: DE190100694
Funder
Australian Research Council
Funding Amount
$372,014.00
Summary
Does disconnection in the aging brain cause age-related movement decline? This project aims to use new neurophysiological approaches to understand the causal role of age-related changes in brain network connectivity to the movement control. Brain regions interact through complex and dynamic neural networks to control voluntary movement, but whether age-related changes in network connectivity drive age-related decline in movement control is unknown. This project will provide significant benefits ....Does disconnection in the aging brain cause age-related movement decline? This project aims to use new neurophysiological approaches to understand the causal role of age-related changes in brain network connectivity to the movement control. Brain regions interact through complex and dynamic neural networks to control voluntary movement, but whether age-related changes in network connectivity drive age-related decline in movement control is unknown. This project will provide significant benefits such as the neurophysiological knowledge required to develop targeted interventions to improve movement control in the aging population.Read moreRead less
Neural metrics for space time and numerosity. What we propose is ground-breaking research. It will increase Australia's international competitiveness is science, expand the knowledge base of brain function and psychology and provide valuable training for research scientists.
Maturation of the brain and the development of cognitive abilities. This project aims to develop techniques for measuring the growing brain. We will use these techniques to determine how the growing brain influences a child's intellectual ability and to answer an important question - do areas of the brain mature at the same or different rates and what influence does that have on the development of specific abilities such as language and reasoning? An answer to this question will make an import ....Maturation of the brain and the development of cognitive abilities. This project aims to develop techniques for measuring the growing brain. We will use these techniques to determine how the growing brain influences a child's intellectual ability and to answer an important question - do areas of the brain mature at the same or different rates and what influence does that have on the development of specific abilities such as language and reasoning? An answer to this question will make an important contribution to our theoretical understanding of developmental disorders. Moreover, given the influence of intellectual development on life prospects, it is important to understand how early brain development impacts on a child's ability to learn.Read moreRead less
Attentional and conditioning mechanisms that mediate overcoming anxiety. Anxiety is a common emotion for most Australians that can cause substantial costs for individuals and society. This project uses dominant psychological models to identify critical mechanisms that are believed to predict capacity for, and change in, anxiety. Outcomes substantially advance knowledge about how humans overcome anxiety.
The emotional face: What determines preferential expression processing. The processing of facial expressions of emotion is essential for successful social functioning. However, we still lack a good understanding of key factors that facilitate or impede the processing of these important social signals. The current project aims to address this knowledge gap by providing a) a more rigorous test of the currently dominant account of expression processing, the evaluative congruence account, and deline ....The emotional face: What determines preferential expression processing. The processing of facial expressions of emotion is essential for successful social functioning. However, we still lack a good understanding of key factors that facilitate or impede the processing of these important social signals. The current project aims to address this knowledge gap by providing a) a more rigorous test of the currently dominant account of expression processing, the evaluative congruence account, and delineating how b) contextual factors and c) person knowledge affect expression processing. The research aims to advance our understanding of facial expression processing, to build international collaborations, and to train the next generation of emotion scientists.Read moreRead less
To focus on pain or not to focus: WHEN is the question. The experience of pain is a ubiquitous experience, and persistent pain is common and causes enormous personal and
societal burden. Anyone who has been in severe pain will understand that pain captures attention, but the role that attention plays in
increasing pain perception is poorly understood. This project will test a new conceptual model that calls for a change in the paradigm underlying research into attention and pain. We will use nov ....To focus on pain or not to focus: WHEN is the question. The experience of pain is a ubiquitous experience, and persistent pain is common and causes enormous personal and
societal burden. Anyone who has been in severe pain will understand that pain captures attention, but the role that attention plays in
increasing pain perception is poorly understood. This project will test a new conceptual model that calls for a change in the paradigm underlying research into attention and pain. We will use novel experimental tasks in virtual reality environments to address
these important gaps in our knowledge. The project will significantly advance our fundamental understanding of
the role of attention in pain perception and pave the way for translational research to reduce the substantial burden pain causes.Read moreRead less
Evaluative learning: do all roads lead to Rome? This project aims to enhance understanding of how likes and dislikes are acquired and changed across a range of different settings. Evaluative learning, the acquisition and change of likes and dislikes, is ubiquitous and occurs in situations that range from trivial to traumatic. However, it is unknown whether evaluative learning in these different situations is mediated by a single or distinct learning mechanisms. Answering this question is critica ....Evaluative learning: do all roads lead to Rome? This project aims to enhance understanding of how likes and dislikes are acquired and changed across a range of different settings. Evaluative learning, the acquisition and change of likes and dislikes, is ubiquitous and occurs in situations that range from trivial to traumatic. However, it is unknown whether evaluative learning in these different situations is mediated by a single or distinct learning mechanisms. Answering this question is critically important for emotion science and the design of effective interventions for anxiety disorders and public health campaigns. The expected outcomes from this project will provide significant benefits, such as creating new knowledge to assist in applied areas ranging from the design of public health messages to the treatment for anxiety.Read moreRead less
The emotional face. The recognition of emotional facial expressions is essential for successful social functioning. This project will determine how information concerning facial expressions is encoded by the human brain, providing potential insight into situations where this process can fail, such as in old age or autism.
Why being lost-in-thought can blind you: the effects of distractor processing on perception. In many cases distraction occurs when we are lost-in-thought, leading us to miss key perceptual events that could prevent accidents. This project will examine this poorly-understood phenomenon, testing how and why this type of distraction occurs, and providing a solid foundation for future basic and applied research in multiple fields.
Moving from assumptions to new learning. . Moving from assumptions to new learning. The project aims to investigate the processes that drive new learning
by using automatically evoked brain responses to examine when new information triggers the brain to update
beliefs about the world. The project will generate new knowledge on the maturity of this process at birth, how it
declines with older age and the brain areas critical to the process. The outcomes will provide insight into how
attentio ....Moving from assumptions to new learning. . Moving from assumptions to new learning. The project aims to investigate the processes that drive new learning
by using automatically evoked brain responses to examine when new information triggers the brain to update
beliefs about the world. The project will generate new knowledge on the maturity of this process at birth, how it
declines with older age and the brain areas critical to the process. The outcomes will provide insight into how
attentional resources are automatically marshalled when beliefs are challenged, and it will help identify the consequences for learning when a system is immature, or the process breaks down with increasing age.Read moreRead less