ARC CENTRE OF EXCELLENCE IN COGNITION AND ITS DISORDERS ARC CENTRE | 2017 ANNUAL REPORT 2017 ANNUAL OF EXCELLENCE IN COGNITION AND ITS DISORDERS $118$/ 5(3257 BELIEF FORMATION LANGUAGE MEMORY PERSON PERCEPTION READING ARC Centre of Excellence in Cognition and its Disorders Annual Report 2017 Published by the ARC Centre of Excellence in Cognition and its Disorders Macquarie University | NSW 2109 Australia Designed and printed by Acrobat Corporate Print © ARC Centre of Excellence in Cognition and its Disorders 2017 Further information relating to this report may be obtained from the Centre +61 2 9850 4127 | ccd.edu.au Image Credits: Robin Blumfield | Monica Brockmyre | Nichola Burton | Rosemary Eliott Muireann Irish | Eva Marinus | Lesley McKnight | Scott Needham/L’Oréal Katherine Revius | Chris Stacey | Julia Wylie/Brain and Mind Centre CONTENTS THE CENTRE 2 Chair’s Report 3 Director’s Report 4 Centre Overview | Governance | Management 6 Looking Forward RESEARCH 8 Belief Formation Program 12 Language Program 16 Memory Program 20 Person Perception Program 24 Reading Program 27 Cross Program 30 Neural Markers 32 Perception in Action CENTRE MEMBERS 34 Chief, Partner and Associate Investigators 43 Research Support Staff 44 Students PROFESSIONAL DEVELOPMENT | TRAINING 54 Hosted Events 59 Sponsored Events 60 Hosted Seminars 62 Research Training Events 64 Graduates | Alumni 65 Student Awards 66 Centre Exchange Schemes OUTREACH | NETWORKS 68 Educational Outreach | Regional Engagement 70 Community | Networks 74 Media | Public Awareness 75 Resources | Tools 76 Collaborations OUTPUTS 78 Publications 86 Keynotes | Invited Talks | Community Presentations 89 Awards | Recognition | Grants 94 Visitors | Student Visitors | Centre Visits PERFORMANCE 98 Performance Indicators 100 Income | Expenditure 101 Participating Organisations THE CENTRE CHAIR’S REPORT On behalf of the members also increased their involvement in regional engagement of the Advisory Board, through new high school activities and research projects it is my pleasure to focusing on regional areas in the Northern Territory and congratulate the ARC Western Australia. Centre of Excellence in Cognition and its Disorders The Centre’s media and publicity activities was (CCD) on another another area of focus for Centre outreach in 2017. successful year. Centre To maximise the reach and impact of the Centre’s members have extended outreach, research articles and updates were posted their international on the CCD homepage, and tweets were sent during connections, disseminated targeted community engagement activities. Media their research findings in and outreach activities concentrated on particular high quality outputs, provided students with high quality themes throughout the year, with Centre members research training, and promoted their research to the targeting Alzheimer’s Awareness Month/Frontotemporal community. Dementia Awareness Week and National Science Week. In particular, the Centre’s participation in the This year the students, early career researchers and National Science Week enabled CCD researchers to academic staff benefited from the feedback and promote the Centre across the country. As part of guidance provided to them by the members of the the Centre’s science communication with the general Scientific Committee. During November, Emeritus public, 16 Centre members published 15 articles on The Professor Michael Kopelman and Professor Ovid Conversation. Tzeng visited and participated in the Student and ECR Development Workshop and CCD Annual Workshop. In reflection I would like to acknowledge the Advisory Board members for their support and their The CCD also continued to establish collaborative contributions to the Centre throughout the year. As research links with additional international partners. On Chair, I extend the Board’s congratulations to all the 14 December 2017 the CCD completed a Memorandum researchers, students and support staff at the ARC of Understanding (MoU) with the University of Reading, Centre of Excellence in Cognition and its Disorders for UK. This MoU was established following a series of another constructive year of research and engagement visits by Professor Doug Saddy to the Centre and with the community. We look forward with anticipation consolidated during an extended visit by Professor to yet another productive year in 2018. Jennie Hudson, Associate Investigator, to the University of Reading in October 2017. Professor Laurent Rivory Educational engagement activities continued as a key focus for the Centre, with another successful year of the CCD Work Experience Program. The Work Experience Program ran three sessions in May, July/ August and November. During these three sessions, researchers from the CCD hosted more than 30 high school students, who were immersed in a hands-on program that informed students about the many facets of research in cognitive science undertaken at the host institution of the CCD, Macquarie University. These groups participated in an engaging program for the entire week, which included a mini research project and presention of their findings to Centre members. A major outreach activity for the Centre was the Reading and Spelling Workshop held in September. This two- day event attracted over 150 attendees, with a large majority of external participants including speech pathologists, primary and secondary school teachers, learning support staff, psychologists and parents, along with Centre researchers. The first day of the workshop focused on research in the field of reading, spelling, dyslexia and dysgraphia and the second day focused on practice and policy, including resources for testing and current Australian educational policy and programs. By completing the workshop teachers were accredited with 8 hours of NSW Education Standards Authority (NESA) professional development. CCD researchers 2 2017 ANNUAL REPORT THE CENTRE DIRECTOR’S REPORT On behalf of all Centre Scheme. We funded five research training projects members, I am proud to this year. These included a project that used eye- present the 2017 Annual tracking and multi-voxel pattern analysis, one that Report for the ARC used electromagnetic articulography, another that Centre of Excellence in used EMOTIV and Neuroscan EEG devices, a project Cognition and its Disorders that employed a visuospatial working memory task (CCD). This was clearly to characterise the dynamics of remembered object another very successful representations, and an investigation of neural response year for members of the to expectations about one’s own actions in healthy CCD, which includes 20 individuals and in individual with schizophrenia. Chief Investigators, 12 Partner Investigators, 205 The CCD continued to provide outstanding Associate Investigators, 21 centre-funded postdoctoral opportunities for academic engagement for Centre fellows and 174 honours and higher degree research members at various stages of their career. The students. Centre members have made major scientific Centre hosted 14 academic workshops, sponsored contributions to our five research programs: Belief three external conferences and hosted 50 seminars Formation, Language, Memory, Person Perception and throughout the year. One of the highlights was the Reading. Science of the Self research forum that focused on research findings related to agency and body The CCD offers several internal funding schemes that representation, sponsored by the Belief Formation are designed to promote innovative and collaborative Program and the Faculty of Human Sciences. Another research, and to support research training for highlight was the CCD-KIT MEG Workshop, which outstanding students and our postdoctoral fellows. brought together prominent international MEG This year, the Centre’s new Postdoctoral Exchange researchers from Japan, the United States, the United Scheme provided travel grants to Dr Amy Dawel (Person Kingdom and The Netherlands to showcase our national Perception Program, Australian National University) and international research collaborations on cognitive who visited the Institute of Research in Psychology, at processing using MEG. Included in the program was a the University of Louvain in Belgium, and to Dr Wei He tribute to the memory of Professor Hisashi Kado, the (Language Program, Macquarie University) who visited former Director of the Applied Electronics Laboratory VU University Medical Centre in The Netherlands. at KIT, who pioneered the 160 channel whole-head MEG In 2017, the CCD also held 9 well-attended training system which is now used internationally. Finally, we sessions for students and Early Career Researchers. held another highly successful CCD Annual Workshop at We continued the Student Exchange Scheme that the Mercure Resort Hunter Valley Gardens with over 110 provided support for Ben Tappin to visit Yale University, members participating in the three-day event. USA and for Lina Teichmann to visit the French National Institute for Health and Medical Research, France. Each I take this opportunity to offer my sincere thanks to all of year, our students publish fantastic research and we our Centre members for their significant contributions recognise these exceptional publications through our to research and for their enthusiastic support of the Excellence in Research Student Award – Publications. Centre throughout the year. This year the award winners published in the following journals: Experimental Psychology: Human Perception Professor Stephen Crain and Performance; Biological