2019 CCBBI Archives

February 6, 2019 - 11:30am - 12:30pm, PS B55- fMRI Safety Training Class

March 1, 2019 - 1:00pm - 2:00pm, PS 217- Users Workshop
Guest Presenter: Katie Insel (Department of Psychology, Harvard University) presented "How adolescent neurodevelopment shapes goal directed behavior"

Abstract: Adolescence is a period of the lifespan accompanied by ongoing brain maturation, which may remodel motivation and behavior in daily life. This talk will examine how adolescent neurodevelopment shapes the maturation of goal directed behavior when rewards and punishments are at stake. In the first part of this talk, I will discuss how incentive stakes influence cognitive control across development. Results revealed that when stakes are high, adults selectively enhance cognitive control performance, but adolescents do not. This late maturing behavior was mediated by emerging neurodevelopmental changes in functional connectivity between the ventral striatum and lateral prefrontal cortex. While older individuals increased connectivity during high stakes, younger adolescents did not exhibit stakes-selective changes in connectivity, presumably due to ongoing coritcostriatal development. In the second part of this talk, I will present a study examining how motivational context influences goal directed reinforcement learning across adolescence. Results reveal that the ability to learn from high value monetary gains and losses shifts across adolescence, and these behavioral changes are paralleled by age-related differences value-selective signals in the ventral striatum. Together, these findings identify situational factors and neurodevelopmental constraints that may shape adolescents’ ability to maximize their goal directed behavior.

March 8, 2019 - 1:00pm - 2:00pm, PS 35- CCBBI Talk Series (Users Workshop)

Guest Presenter: Dr. Maital Neta (University of Nebraska-Lincoln, Department of Psychology) presented "In the face of uncertainty: Charting variability in response to emotional ambiguity"

Abstract: Our daily lives are saturated with affective value (e.g., a visit from a friend, the ringing of an alarm clock, a beautiful sunset, a hot cup of coffee). When we encounter new information (new people, sounds, locations, flavors), we readily sort this information into emotional valence categories: good or bad, reward or threat, approach or avoid. Facial expressions, in particular, convey rich information about another person and the environment. Some expressions are clear-cut (angry face predicts threat/avoidance), whereas others are more ambiguous, because they can readily predict both rewarding or threatening outcomes. For example, a surprised facial expression is associated with both positive (a surprise visit from an old friend) and negative (hearing that a loved one was in a car accident) information. We and others have documented a wide range of individual differences in ‘valence bias,’ or the tendency to categorize ambiguous cues (e.g., surprised faces) as having a positive or negative valence. This bias appears to represent a trait-like individual difference, as it is stable across time and across information. Interestingly, despite these individual differences, we have proposed an initial negativity hypothesis, such that ambiguous cues initially activate a negative valence representation, and that a positive representation may require a putative regulatory mechanism to override the initial negativity. In this talk, I will discuss just a few of the approaches (behavioral, neuroimaging, developmental) that we have used in the lab to examine these individual differences in valence bias and to support our initial negativity hypothesis

March 29, 2019 - 1:00pm - 2:00pm, PS 217- Users Workshop
Guest Presenter: Catie Brown (Department of Psychology, University of Nebraska- Lincoln) presented “Inside Out: Psychophysiological Measures Reveal Individual Differences in Valence Bias”

Abstract: Individuals tend to show high consensus in ratings of clearly valenced stimuli (e.g., happy or angry faces). However, valence ratings of emotional ambiguous stimuli (e.g., surprised faces) vary greatly and constitute what we call an individual’s valence bias. Although typically consistent over time, ratings of ambiguity become more positive following training in cognitive reappraisal. This talk will show what electrodermal activity and facial electromyography reveal about individual differences in valence bias and about this shift toward positivity as a function of emotion regulation.

April 12, 2019 - 1:00pm - 2:00pm, PS 35- CCBBI Talk Series (Users Meeting)
Sponsored by The Department of Psychology Cognitive Area and The Center for Cognitive and Behavioral Brain Imaging 
Guest Presenter: Dr. Olaf Sporns (Indiana University, Bloomington, Department of Psychological and Brain Sciences) presented "Network Neuroscience: Mapping and Modeling Complex Brain Networks"

Abstract: Modern neuroscience is in the middle of a transformation, driven by the development of novel high-resolution brain mapping and recording technologies that deliver increasingly large and detailed “big neuroscience data”. Network science has emerged as one of the principal approaches to model and analyze neural systems, from individual neurons to circuits and systems spanning the whole brain. A core theme of network neuroscience is the comprehensive mapping of anatomical and functional brain connectivity, also called connectomics. In this presentation I will review current themes and future directions of network neuroscience, including comparative studies of brain networks across different animal species, investigation of prominent network attributes in human brains, and use of computational models to map information flow and communication dynamics. I will argue that network neuroscience represents a promising theoretical framework for understanding the complex structure, operations and functioning of nervous systems.

April 14, 2019 - 1:00pm - 2:00pm, Ohio Union, ASC Science Sunday
Guest Presenter: Laurie E. Cutting
Dr. Cutting is the Patricia and Rodes Hart Professor at Vanderbilt University; Associate Director of the Vanderbilt Kennedy Center; and a Senior Scientist at Haskins Laboratories. Her work focuses on brain-behavior relations in children and adolescents.

Educational Neuroscience: How the Brain Supports Learning in Children and Adolescents
Educational neuroscience draws upon cognitive neuroscience, education and psychology with the goal of examining neurobiological processes related to education. Cutting provides an overview of this emerging field and the insights it can offer, using reading development as an exemplar and examining how neurobiological approaches inform and refine our understanding of how to identify and treat reading difficulties.