RUI: Establishment of a high-density event-related potential laboratory at an undergraduate college for the study of cognitive neuroscience

这笔赠款支持在本科生机构波莫纳学院建立一个有128个通道的事件相关电位(ERP)实验室，以调查与认知相关的大脑活动的空间和时间维度。通过这样做，这个项目符合美国国家科学基金会认知神经科学倡议的标准。在资助期内将进行三个项目。第一个是探索信息初始编码过程中大脑活动的空间和时间模式如何与随后的来源记忆判断相关。具体地说，我们将调查编码事件相关电位期间和随后的来源记忆判断之间的关系，包括时间顺序、空间位置和回忆与熟悉判断之间的关系。第二条研究线将调查心理和生物压力测量中稳定的个体差异在多大程度上预测记忆功能和伴随的ERP活动。我们特别感兴趣的是评估长期高度应激的个体是否会有记忆功能受损，以及这是否会在外显但不是内隐记忆条件下旧/新幅度差异减小的情况下得到证明。第三条研究线将使不同的学生群体接触到使用电生理成像方法来探索经典心理学文献中的问题。我们正在设计一个学生研究项目，以调查代表人数不足的学生特别感兴趣的问题。具体地说，我们将使用高密度的ERP记录来研究大脑活动如何与与文化的个人主义-集体主义维度相关的信息的认知处理有关。这项拟议的研究将作为如何使用高密度事件相关电位记录来探索心理问题的模型。我们预计，将这项技术应用于心理学问题所获得的知识将在未来鼓励其他心理学和神经科学教师使用ERP技术。

This grant supports the establishment of a 128-channel event-related potential (ERP) laboratory at an undergraduate institution, Pomona College, in order to investigate the spatial and temporal dimensions of brain activity associated with cognition. In doing so, this project meets the criteria for the NSF Cognitive Neuroscience initiative. Three projects will be conducted during the grant period. The first is an exploration of how spatial and temporal patterns of brain activity during the initial encoding of information are related to subsequent source memory judgments. Specifically, we will investigate the relationship between encoding event-related potentials during and subsequent source memory judgments, including temporal order, spatial location, and recollection versus familiarity judgments.The second line of research will investigate the extent to which stable individual differences in psychological and biological measures of stress are predictive of memory functioning and concomitant ERP activity. We are specifically interested in assessing whether individuals with high chronic stress will have impaired memory functioning and whether this will be evidenced in a decreased old/new amplitude difference for the explicit but not implicit memory conditions.The third line of research will expose a diverse group of students to the use of electrophysiological imaging methods to explore issues from the classic psychological literature. We are designing a student research project to investigate an issue of particular interest to underrepresented students. Specifically, we will use high-density ERP recordings to investigate how brain activity may be associated with cognitive processing of information related to the individualism-collectivism dimension of culture. The proposed research will serve as a model for how psychological issues can be explored using high-density ERP recordings. We anticipate that the knowledge gained from applying this technique to psychological problems will encourage the use of ERP techniques among other psychology and neuroscience faculty in the future.