Lecturer: Prof. John Spencer
Fields: psychology, cognitive science, developmental science, neuroscience
Content
I will present a line of work exploring the neural dynamics underlying visual working memory — a core cognitive system used to detect changes in the world, keeping cognition anchored to the visual surrounds. I will first introduce the key concepts of Dynamic Field Theory. Next, I will present our theory of visual working memory. Subsequent lectures will show how we have tested and extended this theory in the areas of adult cognition and human development, including how we have embedded the theory in larger cognitive architectures. I will also discuss how we have tested the neural dynamic details of the theory using fMRI.
Literature
- Buss, A.T., Magnotta, V., Penny, W., Schöner, G., Huppert, T. & Spencer, J.P. (2021). How do neural processes give rise to cognition? Simultaneously predicting brain and behavior with a dynamic model of visual working memory. Psychological Review, http://dx.doi.org/10.1037/rev0000264.
- Spencer, J. P. (2020). The development of working memory. Current Directions in Psychological Science, doi/10.1177/0963721420959835.
- Delgado Reyes, L.M., Wijeakumar, S., Magnotta, V.A., Forbes, S.H. & Spencer, J.P. (2020). The functional brain networks that underlie visual working memory in the first two years of life. NeuroImage, 219, https://doi.org/10.1016/j.neuroimage.2020.116971.
- Perone, S. & Spencer, J.P. (2013). Autonomous visual exploration creates developmental change in familiarity and novelty seeking behaviors. Frontiers in Psychology, 4, Article 648.
- Perone, S. & Spencer, J.P. (2013). Autonomy in action: Linking the act of looking to memory formation in infancy via dynamic neural fields. Cognitive Science, 37, 1-60.
- Perone, S., Simmering, V.R. & Spencer, J.P. (2011). Stronger neural dynamics capture changes in infants’ visual short-term memory capacity over development. Developmental Science, 14, 1379-1392.
- Johnson, J.S., Spencer, J.P., & Schöner, G. (2009). A layered neural architecture for the consolidation, maintenance, and updating of representations in visual working memory. Brain Research, 1299, 17-32.
- Johnson, J.S., Spencer, J.P., Luck, S.J., & Schöner, G. (2009). A dynamic neural field model of visual working memory and change detection. Psychological Science, 20, 568-577.
Lecturer
John P. Spencer is a Professor of Psychology at the University of East Anglia in Norwich, UK. Prior to arriving in the UK, he was a Professor of Psychology at the University of Iowa and served as the founding Director of the Delta Center (Development and Learning from Theory to Application). He received a Sc.B. with Honors from Brown University in 1991 and a Ph.D. in Experimental Psychology from Indiana University in 1998. He is the recipient of the Irving J. Saltzman and the J.R. Kantor Graduate Awards from Indiana University, the 2003 Early Research Contributions Award from the Society for Research in Child Development, and the 2006 Robert L. Fantz Memorial Award from the American Psychological Foundation. His research examines the development of visuo-spatial cognition, word learning, working memory, attention, and executive function with an emphasis on dynamical systems and dynamic field models of cognition and action. He has had continuous funding from the US National Institutes of Health and the US National Science Foundation since 2001 and has been a fellow of the American Psychological Association since 2007. He is currently leading a new initiative on infant brain health in India funded by the Bill & Melinda Gates Foundation.
Affiliation: University of East Anglia
Homepage: https://ddlabs.uea.ac.uk/