Research in the VAMP (Vision, Attention, Memory, Perception) lab encompasses many different aspects of human cognition, with a particular focus on visual attention and perception (e.g., what do we look at and attend to in scenes, what types of things distract us, does your knowledge and interest influence perception?). Additionally, we investigate the interaction between attention and working memory (e.g., how does attending to a subset of items currently held in working memory affect one’s ability to both access that information in the short-term as well as recall it from long-term memory). The lab employs a number of different study types and equipment (including an Eyelink 1000 eyetracker, an Eyelink 2 eyetracker, two portable eyetracking units, virtual reality with and without eyetracking, gel- and saline-based EEG systems with and without eyetracking) in investigating issues related to cognition. We are currently looking for individuals to assist with multiple aspects of the research process and have some flexibility regarding tasks as a function of interest and experience (e.g. could be as straightforward as scheduling and collecting data or include opportunities for computer programming, data analysis, and learning new technologies as a function of applicant interest).
Current investigations in the lab
Visual illusions: Individual differences in perception, using these as a diagnostic tool for clinical purposes
Eye movements and task set: How do your eye movements change as a function of your goals
How do eye movements influence memory
Eye movements in virtual vs. real environment
Virtual reality adaptations of classic psychology experiments
Attention and verbal working memory: How does attending to specific verbal information affect short- and long-term access/recall. Can information be actively discarded/forgotten?
Attention and visual working memory: How does attending to visual information affect maintenance in working memory; are there differences between maintaining and updating working memory, especially when exceeding memory capacity.
EEG experiments examining the neuroscience behind the above mentioned questions
Advisor Name: | Michael Dodd | |
Email: | mikedodd76@hotmail.com | |
Website: | https://psychology.unl.edu/vamp/ | |
Advisor College: | Arts and Sciences | |
Advisor Department: | Psychology | |
Potential Student Tasks: | 1. Stimulus generation/creation/setup 2. Experiment scheduling, data collection (may involve training on one of the abovementioned technologies) 3. Assisting in the analysis and processing of data 4. Experimental programming (for those who have some background in programming) 5. Website and network updating (for those with some background in web based applications) 6. Assisting in piloting experiments 7. Training/running participants in EEG sessions |
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Student Qualifications: | An interest in cognitive psychology, visual attention, working memory, and/or neuroscience with a desire to learn more about research in the area | |
Training, Mentoring, and Workplace Community: | Our goal is to get our trainees as many experiences as they would like and to involve them into the lab in the way we would any student. We have weekly lab meetings that either serve as reading groups (picking an article everyone reads and discusses) or discussions of issues relevance to science, graduate school, and careers beyond graduate school. Students do most of the work in lab but the schedule is entirely flexible and set by them. We would like you to attend our weekly meetings if it meets your schedule. Students learn from both the faculty advisor, current graduate students (two students actively working towards finishing their PhD this coming semester), and other longer term students in the lab. A number of our volunteers and UCARE students have successfully procured positions in graduate programs and we just sent our very first FYRE student from the first year of the program just graduated and is beginning graduate school in Texas in the fall. We aim to have a diverse and supportive lab and are open to scheduling lab meeting topics around things that students want to learn more about. We also have compiled a number of resources we make available to our students that are designed to build skills for later graduate student and independent research. We’d be happy to talk to you and answer any questions you may have. | |
Available Positions | 2 |
Responsible and detail oriented
Potentially advantageous skillsets (not required): Experimental programming, web design, analysis software, social media applications, github