Exploring the brain at new neuroscience lab

by Jennifer Strand

Why do some people develop dementia but not others, and why do our cognitive powers change as we age? A team of UniSA researchers will be exploring these issues and many more at the recently launched Cognitive Neuroscience Laboratory at UniSA’s Magill Campus.

Drs Owen Churches, Hannah Keage and Mark Kohler (pictured right, have welcomed the opportunity to further investigate the brain, behaviour and cognition at the new lab which opened on 7 December.

With start-up funding from the School of Psychology, Social Work and Social Policy and the Division of Education, Arts and Social Sciences, Dr Kohler says the idea of the laboratory was based on a collaboration of common interest.

“Hannah and Owen arrived about six months ago from Cambridge University and both of them have different experience in cognitive neuroscience, which complemented my interests.

We got together and looked at what our common interests were, what we could do, what we wanted to do, and the lab was born,” Dr Kohler said.

Dr Keage says despite an understanding about how the brain controls behaviour and how this behaviour affects brain function and structure, there is still so much more to discover.

“It’s a really exciting field, and UniSA has great potential for developing a world-class reputation for cognitive neuroscience research and teaching, Dr Keage said. “The laboratory serves as the first step in this long-term goal.”

Dr Keage hopes to use the laboratory to further investigate how and why cognitive abilities change as we age, and why some individuals develop dementia and Alzheimer’s disorder.

“The hope is that results will feed into potential preventative strategies, diagnostic tools and treatments for cognitive decline and dementia in old age,” Dr Keage said.

Dr Kohler will also be incorporating his background research in sleep and child development into researching how sleep is important for memory consolidation and learning and cognitive development.

“The theory is that we take in a lot of information during the day and it’s held there temporarily.

"While we sleep our brain goes about filing it, so during the next day we can retrieve that information when we need it. If sleep is disrupted then that filing process is disrupted and that can interfere with memory and, of course, accumulation of learning and development,” Dr Kohler said.

Dr Churches, whose area of study is geared toward social neuroscience, will investigate how the brain facilitates our social experiences and how these encounters affect our brains.

“Social functioning is such an important part of living a full and healthy life that it is easy to take the skills needed for granted – until they are gone. Skills like the ability to determine from a glance at a person’s face what their identity, emotion and focus of attention is,” Dr Churches said.

The laboratory will also be used to provide practical training for future cohorts of undergraduate and graduate psychology students with a new, Commonwealth-supported, cognitive neuroscience course.

“We could see the area that was lacking in the School was a practical, applied research experience. We offered to develop a new course that is practical-based and research-based, in an area where there wasn’t a current expertise,” Dr Kohler said.

A group of seven 2011/2012 summer scholars will complete the first project in the laboratory, by investigating how fonts affect how we process written verbal information.

“There has been a lot of behavioural research suggesting that typeface affects our understanding of written information, but no one has looked at why this is in terms of brain function,” Dr Keage said.

“Results will inform the design of written information, for example, text books that best facilitate learning.”

For more information visit the website.