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Research goals
Research goals
Our research laboratory is centered in the study of cognitive control and habitual behaviours to understand normal and pathological states. It is also a teaching and training laboratory, with undergraduates, graduates, postdocs, and visiting scholars in the measurement and analysis of control over behaviour and habitual performance (motor-cognitive-emotional-social) in humans. We use behavioral, autonomic, brain imaging and non-invasive stimulation methods in healthy participants and clinical conditions (Parkinson's disease, Impulse control disorders, Tourette syndrome, behavioural addictions, etc).
Research Methods and Samples
Research Methods and Samples
Group Research Lines (group code: 956827)
Group Research Lines (group code: 956827)
Habits and Dopamine
One major postulate of many contemporary theories of human behaviour is that actions impose automatic chunks across multiple response types (e.g. motor, associative, emotional, physiological,…). The cortico-striatal loops specialize to process each of the response types in a functionally specific manner. Importantly, in the context of dopamine loss, Parkinson’s disease patients experience changes in habitual components of behaviour (such as writing). In this project, we are focused on habits across everyday life and experimental tasks in health and disease using neuroimaging, physiology and neuromodulation. Our aim is understanding habitual control across behavioural disciplines and to examine conditions where automatisms are lost.
The Neural Basis of Cognitive Control
This project is concerned with understanding the physiological, behavioral, and circuitry behind cognitive control. Using fMRI measures of brain activation, combined with neuromodulation, this project tests hypotheses concerning specific prefrontal regions thought to be associated with cognitive control, as well as specific subcortical structures such as the striatum, thought to be associated with reward and emotion influence over controlling systems. Moreover, we define computational models that help predict learning of stimulus-response associations linked to cognitive control. Human models of failed control are exploited in patients with brain lesions or impulsivity issues.
Excessive Behaviours and Brain disease
The goal of this project is to use self-report, behavioral and neuroimaging assessments in individual’s with excessive forms of behaviour, such as impulsivity or addictions. The project includes the use of cognitive paradigms that adequately capture the mental operations in neuropsychiatric conditions using relevant provocative stimuli of the associated pathological behaviour. We are interested in deciphering the behavioural and neural substrate behind excessive behaviours and brain disorders such as addiction, impulse control disorders or Parkinson's disease. To this, we use human models of addiction and Parkinson’s disease pathophysiology to better understand the neural changes that drive aberrant behaviours.
Collaborators
Collaborators
For distinct clinical studies, we collaborate with 2 local hospitals in Madrid area.
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