Dr. Marlene Behrmann
Dr. Marlene Behrmann is a Professor of Psychology at Carnegie Mellon University, who's research specializes in the cognitive basis of visual perception, with a specific focus on object recognition. Dr. Behrmann received her B.A. in speech and hearing therapy in 1981, followed by her M.A. in speech pathology in 1984, both from the University of Witwatersrand in Johannesburg, South Africa. She then received a Ph.D. in Psychology from the University of Toronto in 1991. Dr Behrmann was inducted into the National Academy of Sciences in 2015 and into the American Academy of Arts and Sciences in 2019.
Dr. Behrmann is widely considered to be a trailblazer and a worldwide leader in the field of visual cognition. Below is an example of recently published work from the lab:
Liu TT, Freud E, Patterson C, Behrmann M. J Neurosci. 2019 Jun 5. pii: 3160-18. doi: 10.1523/JNEUROSCI.3160-18.
The consequences of cortical resection, a treatment for patients with pharmaco-resistant epilepsy, provide a unique opportunity to advance our understanding of the nature and extent of cortical (re)organization. Using psychophysical and fMRI investigations, we compared the neural and visuoperceptual profiles of ten children or adolescents following unilateral cortical resections and their age- and gender-matched controls. All patients except two, showed normal perceptual performance. Consistently, again, with the exception of the same two individuals, both univariate and multivariate fMRI analyses revealed normal selectivity and representational structure of category-selective regions. These findings offer novel insights into the malleability of cortex in the pediatric population and suggest that, while experience may be necessary for the emergence of neural category-selectivity, this emergence is not necessarily contingent on the integrity of particular cortical structures.
Professor of Psychology, Dr. Marlene Behrmann, Ph.D.
CV
B.A. in Speech and Hearing Therapy: University of Witwatersrand, Johannesburg
M.A. in Speech Pathology: University of Witwatersrand, Johannesburg
Ph.D. in Psychology: University of Toronto, Canada
News
Drs. Behrmann and Grover are seeking applications for a postdoctoral trainee position. See details here.
Congratulations to Dr. Behrmann for being elected to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences!
Congratulations to Dr. Maallo for receiving a travel award to attend the Sackler Colloquium of the National Academy of Sciences in May.
Congratulations to Dr. Behrmann for receiving the 2019 Annual Rita G. Rudel/Lucy G. Moses award! The Lecture will be at Columbia University in New York.
Congratulations to Michael Granovetter for receiving an award to attend the 2019 American Academy of Pediatrics Legislative Conference in Wasington DC in April!
In the news:
Dr. Behrmann joined Pittsburgh leaders in community engagement during the annual event of Leadership Pittsburgh Inc. Read about it here.
The Pittsburgh Post-Gazette covered the latest research from the Behrmann lab. Read about it here.
New publications:
Freud, E., Plaut, D. C. and Behrmann, M. (2019). Protracted developmental trajectory of shape processing along the two visual pathways, in press, Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience, 10:1-9. doi: 10.1162/jocn_a_01434. [Epub ahead of print].
Liu TT, Freud E, Patterson C, Behrmann M. J Neurosci. 2019 Jun 5. pii: 3160-18. doi: 10.1523/JNEUROSCI.3160-18.2019
Holler, D. E., Behrmann, M. and Snow, J. C. (2019). Real-world size coding of solid objects, but not 2-D or 3-D images, in visual agnosia patients with bilateral ventral lesions, Cortex, pii: S0010-9452(19)30101-7. doi: 10.1016/j.cortex.2019.02.030. [Epub ahead of print]
Holzinger, Y., Ullman, S., Behrmann, M. and Avidan, G. (2019). Minimal Recognizable Configurations (MIRCs) elicit category-selective responses in higher-order visual cortex, J. Cognitive Neuroscience, May 6:1-14. doi: 10.1162/jocn_a_01420. [Epub ahead of print]. PMID: 31059350 DOI:10.1162/jocn_a_01420
Collins, E., Freud, E., Kainerstorfer, J., Cao, J. and Behrmann, M. Temporal dynamics of shape processing as revealed by three independent visual pathways, Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience, 31(6), 2019, 821-836.
Freud, E., Culham, J., Namdar, G. and Behrmann, M. Object complexity modulates the association between action and perception in childhood, Journal of Experimental Child Psychology, 179 (2019), 56-72.