Action and Consciousness Laboratory

Adam Gazzaley, MD., Ph.D., Dept. of Neuroscience, UC San Francisco

Ozlem Ayduk, Roy Baumeister, Bruce Bridgeman, Daniel Cervone, Adam Gazzaley, Jeremy Gray, Gary Marcus, Rodolfo Mendoza-Denton, Michele Miozzo, Judy Pa, Andrew Poehlman, David Rosenbaum, Travis Seymour, Lisa Son, Lawrence Williams, & Rex Wright. Here are some photos of the lab: The Space Photo1; Guests Photo1 Photo2 Photo3 Photo4 Photo5

Our lab manager, Benny P. Chen is a graduate student interested in the brain circuits associated with high-level forms of unconscious processing (e.g., unconscious decision making and intermodal processing). His research focuses on the establishment of 'action sets' and on unconscious intersensory conflicts. Before joining the lab as a graduate student, Benny obtained research experience working on intersensory experiments in Prof. Adam Gazzaley's lab at UCSF. Benny's goal is to one day obtain a PhD in cognitive neuroscience.

Allison Allen is a graduate student in the Philosophy Department interested in exploring the nature of consciousness and perception from both an empirical and theoretical point of view. Specifically, she is interested in the nature of the 'internal observer' (the conscious mind's eye) and in parsing out which processes are conscious versus which are unconscious, examining how mental representations "compete for consciousness." Recently, she has been working on the new, Reflexive Imagery Task.

Kevin Wilkins is currently an undergraduate at Boston College where he is studying Psychology and English. His research focuses on the role of consciousness in the suppression action plans, as well as in working memory. After completing his undergraduate degree, Kevin intends to pursue a PhD in cognitive neuroscience.

Lara C. Krisst isinterested in the neural dynamics that distinguish conscious and unconscious processing. Specifically, she is interested in how action production modulates entry into awareness. To investigate this question of how what is inaccessible influences what is consciously accessible my current projects examine 1) introspective aspects of visual sensory memory by drawing on Sperling's paradigm and 2) how automatizing a motor action affects temporal perception by drawing on Libet's paradigm. She expects to pursue a PhD in cognitive neuroscience.

Hyein Cho is a research assistant who recently received her undergraduate degree in biology. Her interest in cognitive psychology started with her curiosity about music and the brain. She studied vocal performance as minor in University of San Francisco before transferring to SFSU. She hopes to continue her studies in a clinical PhD program.

After taking a few classes on physiological psychology and cognitive neuroscience, Melika Farnia became fascinated by the brain and its capabilities. As an undergraduate research assistant, she has been helping to move forward all of the lab’s projects. Her goal is to continue her education in a doctoral program which includes some neuropsychology.

Maggie Lynn is interested in conscious processes and mental representation. Her studies focused on the role of propioceptive feedback in the sense of agency, the dynamics of motivation and the urge to quit, the perceptual and motor components of subvocalization, and distinguishing forms of cortical binding. In the fall of 2010, she began a doctoral fellow at Ghent University in Belgium, working with Prof. Marcel Brass. Click here to learn more about her research.

The first lab member, Christopher C. Berger investigated people's lay intuitions regarding how the body and mind/brain function, automatic imitation (e.g., whether tip-of-the-tongue states are contagious), and the relationships among self-control (e.g., action suppression), automaticity, and conscious processing (e.g., whether new action plans weaken the urge strength of older plans). He is doing his doctoral studies at the the Brain, Body, and Self Lab at the Karolinska Institute in Stockholm, working with Prof. Henrik Ehrsson. To learn more about his research, click here.

How does the conscious perception pathway interact with what has been construed as the unconscious action pathway(s)? While at the lab, Pareezad Zarolia addressed this fundamental question in an experiment that examined the link between mental simulation and emotional processing. She successfully concluded a summer fellowship to conduct cognitive research at Stanford University. In the fall of 2010, she began a doctoral fellowship at the University of Denver. For more information about Pareezad, click here.

Maria Robinson earned her M.A. in social psychology at the University of Chicago. Her research at the lab concerns the liaisons among consciousness, self-regulation, and the subjective sense of effort. In addition, Maria is the lab's manuscript coordinator. Soon she will apply to PhD programs to pursue her interests in social cognition. In the fall of 2013, she began her doctoral studies at University of Illinois, Urbana-Champaign.

As an MA student, Tara C. Dennehy was interested in the threshold between conscious and non-conscious perceptual processing and how action may influence entry into attentional awareness. Tara conducted a series of studies examining how top-down action-related mechanisms influence what enters attentional awareness when visual targets are presented subliminally. In the fall of 2011, she began doctoral study in social cognition at the University of Massachusetts at Amherst. To learn more about her research, click here.

While manager of Mark Geisler's Cognitive Psychophysiology Lab, Nick Bedo was instrumental in carrying out the ERP’s and EEG coherence experiments by Geisler and Morsella regarding the different kinds of 'binding' in the brain. In addition, he used visual illusions (e.g., Kanisza figures) to understand top-down processing. In the fall of 2010, he began doctoral training with Prof. Lawrence Ward at the University of British Columbia, Canada.

Tanaz Molapour is interested in the unconscious cognitive dynamics that can give rise to preferences and affective responses toward situations and incidental stimuli. For one of her projects, she used backward masking to present visual objects subliminally. Tanaz's basic research on how, through processing dynamics, we come to like or dislike neutral (non-biologically-significant) stimuli has broad implications. She is continuing her graduate studies working with Profs. Olsson and Öhman at the Karolinska Institute in Sweden. Click here to learn more about her research.

Shanna Cooper's interests are focused at the intersection of cognitive and emotional processing in healthy individuals and those with mental health diagnoses (i.e., schizophrenia). In the lab, she worked on a number of studies involving attentional awareness and working memory. In the fall of 2012, Shanna commenced doctoral study at Temple Universit. Click here to learn more about Shanna.

A full-time member of Chuck Tate's Social Perception, Attitudes, and Mental SimuIation Lab, Jessica Tomory is interested in conscious and unconscious processes, interference from incentivized stimuli, and social cognition. Before obtaining her BA, Jessica was an honors student in SFSU's honors program. When she had free time from the responsibilities of her primary lab, she somehow found time to help out with research in our lab. In the fall of 2012, she began a doctoral study at Claremont Graduate University.