CLM - Faculty

Center for Learning and Memory

The University of Texas at Austin

CLM Faculty

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Russ Poldrack
Professor of Psychology and Neurobiology
Director, Imaging Research Center

Email: poldrack@ucla.edu
Website
Main Office: NMS 5.312
Phone: 512-

Alternate Office: NMS 5.316
Alt. Phone: 512-

Mailing Address
Center for Learning and Memory
1 University Station C7000
University of Texas at Austin
Austin ,TX 78712-0805

Research Summary

The interests of our lab are generally centered around the study of learning and memory, decision making, and executive control. Much of work is focused on basic cognitive and neural mechanisms, but we are also heavily involved in translational research into the mechanisms of neuropsychiatric disorders.

Funded projects include:
The Cognitive Atlas (funded by NIMH R01MH082795)
The Cognitive Atlas project aims to develop an ontology for cognitive processes through social collaborative knowledge building.

Automaticity, Habit, and Cognitive Control (funded by a James S. McDonnell Foundation 21st Century Science Award)
This project is examining the relation between habitual behaviors and executive control in normal populations. In particular, we are examining how the ability to control behavior changes as a person becomes highly skilled in a task.

Predictive analyses of training-related plasticity using fMRI and pattern classification techniques (funded by the Office of Naval Research)
This project using machine learning techniques to examine the utility of fMRI in predicting the nature of skilled behavior.

"One of the most fundamental and widespread findings in psychology is that whenever you have to switch back and forth between doing things, you're not as good at them as if you had focused on them. The brain has some pretty fundamental limits in terms of its ability to do multiple things at once."