Dr Belleville contributes to the developement and understandin of cognitive training for older adults and persons at risk of dementia and on the prevention of age-related cognitive decline. She identifies processes of compensation and plasticity in mild cognitive impairment using brain imaging techniques. She also developed an important research program on the neuropsychology of memory in aging and dementia and has contributed to a better understanding of the neuropsychological deficits found in persons with very early signs of Alzheimer’s disease or mild cognitive impairment. She created and leads the CIMAQ, a cohort of well-characterized older adults with suspected prodromal Alzheimer’s disease.

Dr. Brambati has a PhD in Molecular Medicine (cognitive neuropsychology profile) from the Università Vita-Salute San Raffaele in Milan, Italy (2006). She then completed post-doctoral studies at the Memory and Aging Center (University of California, San Francisco) (2006-2007), and the IUGM research centre. Today she is a researcher at the IUGM research centre (FRQ-S Junior 1) and a professor on loan to the Department of Psychology at the Université de Montréal.

Experimental cognitive science, computer models and simulations of cognitive processes and neuroimaging to determine why and how attention functions or fails.

In terms of research, Dr. Larochelle is interested in the categorization processes that are active in perception and underlie our conceptualization of the world around us. The approach adopted in this research involves an experimental dimension aimed at inferring the nature of categorization processes and the resulting representations, as well as a calculatory dimension aimed at simulating their properties. Certain work in progress (with D. Cousineau and C. Lefebvre) is looking at the automatic detection of different categories of objects in the field of vision, and suggesting a model of visual attention. Other work (with G. Lacroix) is looking at the mnesic traces left by exemplars encountered and the relative importance of these traces in categorizing objects (in contrast to the role played by classification rules, for instance). Previous work (with H. Pineau and S. Richard and I. Soulières) contributed to a detailed analysis of the time taken to verify membership in natural categories (e.g. trees, birds) and nominal categories (e.g. numbers), so as to better specify these different types of mental representations. Lastly, other earlier work (with D. Saumier and M. Izaute and J. Morency) concentrated on the knowledge and meta-knowledge of the meaning of words.

My field of research is cognitive neuropsychology. The approach is characterized by the study of the effects of brain lesions on cognitive functions. I am interested in musical perception and recognition; emotions; language; prosody; and memory. These functions all have a link with musical cognition, which remains my main field of interest. Aside from brain lesions, we also work with neurologically healthy adults or those with a specific congenital disorder (autism, congenital amusia). Lastly, we use various exploration techniques including, currently, event-related potential (ERP) responses, neuroimaging by magnetic resonance and electrodermal responses. Our team has access to two laboratories: one in the psychology department, in the GRENE research centre, and the other at the Institut universitaire de gériatrie de Montréal. I receive financial support for my research work from the NSERC and the CIHR (MRC) and from the FCAR and FRSQ.