Question: what are the latest advances in cognitive neuroscience? what do you contribute to the science?

Iroise Dumontheil answered on 6 Nov 2016:

This is a very broad question! I think one recent field of enquiry that is quite interesting is research into consciousness. One current theory, supported by MEG (magnetoencephalography) studies [which record small magnetic signals on the surface of the head, corresponding to the electrical signals that neurons use to communicate with each other] is that we become conscious of something, for example of seeing a boat, when many neurons (brain cells), all over the brain, are processing information related to boats. So visual brain areas are processing what the boat looks like, language areas may be processing information about what they know about boat, you may remember memories of having been on a similar boat, etc.

In terms of what I contribute, I have for example shown that a genetic variant in your DNA, that is quite common in the population, is associated with better working memory (how many things you can keep in mind for a short time) in adults, but that the pattern is not the same in children and adolescents. This genetic variant affects how quickly dopamine, a neurotransmitter, which neurons (brain cells) use to exchange information, is removed from in and around the neurons after it has been used to exchange information. So finding that the effect of the genetic variant is different in children and adolescents and adults tells us that the dopamine system in the brain is changing during development.

Another thing I have worked on is perspective taking, which is part of what we call social cognition (the processing for information about ourselves and others, and how we interact with others). It had been shown that although everyone can take someone else’s perspective when asked to, people often don’t do it automatically, they have what’s call an “egocentric bias”, i.e. a bias towards their own view of the world. Which is fine because most of the time that’s what matters, our own view, but in social interactions it’s sometimes important to take into account someone else’s perspective. What I showed was that children and adolescents have even more of an egocentric bias than adults.