James H. Rudy Professor, Psychological and Brain Sciences
My research focuses on the origins, development, and basic processing mechanisms involved in the perception and representation of actions by social and non-social stimuli. Recent neuroimaging, electrophysiological, and behavioral findings reveal that planning, observation, and imaging of actions share a common neural substrate. Our investigations incorporate behavioral, electrophysiological, and eye movement methods for studying the functional implications of this common substrate in infants, children and adults. Experimental tasks involving imitation, response priming, search for hidden objects, predictive tracking and reaching, gaze cueing and pointing, and the effects of authorship and expertise, are used for investigating the links between the observation and execution of actions. We are especially interested in the interplay between automatic and intentional processes in performing these tasks, and whether the perception of social stimuli requires knowledge of goals and intentions.
The College of Arts