“Building relational knowledge from experiences of events: how learning impacts the brain’s episodic and semantic systems”

Hosted by the WashU Neuroimaging Community (WUNIC)

Rescheduled from September 9, 2022

Background: I am a cognitive neuroscientist using functional MRI to understand the specializations among the brain’s long term (semantic) memory systems. My most recent focus is on the learning mechanisms that might serve to update semantic memory from experience. The question I ask is: how do we know what we know? I think the answer to this question is essential for understanding the nature of concepts. My core research topics are the neural basis of semantic memory, the computations underlying statistical learning, and how causal principles influence memory and concept formation. Currently, I lead a 3-year NSF funded project at UC Davis on the computational principles of predictive learning in the medial temporal lobe, in collaboration with Charan Ranganath and Erie Boorman.

I have been using fMRI to study high level cognition since 2009. I earned my PhD with Alfonso Caramazza on the neural organization of semantic memory in 2015. I then worked with Sharon Thompson-Schill on the intersection between statistical learning and concepts, and since 2019 have worked with Charan Ranganath on medial temporal lobe specializations in learning and memory formation.

For inquiries contact Janine Bijsterbosch.