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Focusing Attention on Sensory x Memory Contents to Guide Behavior - Dr. Kia Nobre, Yale University
Tuesday, December 09, 2025, 02:00pm - 03:20pm
152 Frelinghuysen Rd, Psych Bldg., Busch Campus, Room 105
Abstract: The ability to anticipate, select, prioritize, and prepare the relevant contents is fundamental to flexible, proactive, and adaptive cognition. Traditionally, these attention functions have been investigated in relation to extracting relevant contents from the incoming sensory stream. Much more recently, the ability to focus attention on contents of internal, memory representations was recognized and garnered experimental interest. Research on “internal attention” reveals fascinating ways in which neural systems and mechanisms differ from those in “external attention”. We are now ready for the next steps. During natural behavior in extended and dynamic contexts, the focus of attention shifts seamlessly between sensory and memory contents. In my talk, I will highlight some unique properties of internal attention and share our early attempts to understand how attention brokers between external and internal contents to ground adaptive cognition.
Bio: Dr. Kia Nobre
Kia Nobre is a cognitive neuroscientist at Yale University, where she directs the Center for Neurocognition and Behavior at the Wu Tsai Institute. Her current research examines how the brain dynamically and proactively prioritizes and selects information from the sensory stream and from memories at various time scales to form psychological experience and guide behavior. Kia grew up in Rio de Janeiro, Brazil. She obtained her PhD at Yale (1993, with Greg McCarthy) and completed postdoctoral research at Harvard Medical School (with Marsel Mesulam). Before joining Yale (2023), Kia spent many (~30) years at the University of Oxford (1994-2023), latterly as Chair of Translational Cognitive Neuroscience and director of the Oxford Centre for Human Brain Activity.