Statement of Research

Investigations of the human mind and its relation to the functions of the brain have been a major focus of scientists during the past decade, and Michael Posner has been one of the foremost figures in this endeavor. He has set in motion cognitive approaches to neuroscience that have resulted in a series of fundamental discoveries about mind and brain and made him one of the world leaders in this field. This work has relied upon exciting new neuroimaging technologies (e.g., PET or Positron Emission Tomography and fMRI or functional Magnetic Resonance Imaging), but the research would not have been possible without the corresponding sophistication of a theory of mind and the methods of analysis developed by Mike Posner.

The central problem in mapping mind to brain has been decomposing cognition into appropriately sized functions in order to match the level of computation performed by particular brain regions. Mike Posner has argued that a complex of mental operations, that when assembled constitute a task, can be isolated from one another using a method broadly called the subtractive method. The subtractive method was invented in the prior century by Donders, but Mike Posner more than anyone else has made the technique bear fruit. Task performance is examined in two nearly identical conditions, except for the addition or complication of a hypothesized process in one condition. By subtracting performance in the two situations, the hypothesized component can be isolated and studied. Mike Posner has claimed that brain localization occurs at the level of such isolable elementary mental operations.

Early in his career he demonstrated in several different domains how this simple idea of subtraction could be exploited to investigate mental operations themselves. These endeavors were summarized in his book, Chronometric Explorations of Mind. Later, he interfaced the same methods with the study of neurological patients to deduce the function of lesioned brain regions. After completion of this work he showed how the subtractive technique could be married to PET imaging technology to localize elementary mental operations to brain regions, a logic now extended to other neuroimaging techniques. Much of the work from this stage of his career are summarized in the book Images of Mind (coauthored with Mark Raichle). Mike Posner was also one of the first to realize that a similar logic could be exploited in the development of infants. As the brain matures, one is able to match the emergence of elementary cognitive functions to emerging brain systems.

Posner's most enduring focus has been the nature of attention, and his outstanding research contributions to this and related areas have been widely recognized. He was appointed at a young age to the National Academy of Sciences and later to the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. He is a recipient of Psychology's highest award, the American Psychological Association's Distinguished Scientific Contribution Award.

Maybe the most amazing characteristic of Mike Posner is his ability to look ahead, to envision the future of psychological science and how psychological knowledge can be brought to bear to important problems in society. He has been instrumental in launching countless people and programs into a fruitful pursuit of the relationship between mind and brain. Dr. Posner's impact on the field is evident not only through his own work but also through the work of the large number of students whom he has mentored and who have gone on themselves to make major contributions to the field of psychology.

In this conference we make a strong attempt to mirror Mike Posner's forward-looking attitude. As a general theme for this conference we selected ''Developing Individuality in the Human Brain''. This title reflects Mike Posner's most recent interest in tracing individual differences (in intellectual and personality variables) to both genetic and experiential influences on developing attentional systems (e.g., Fan, Wu, Fossella, & Posner, 2001; Fossella, Posner, Swanson, & Pfaff, in press). Thus, the speakers invited to this conference fulfill two criteria: First, they have longstanding personal as well as either formal or informal work relationships with Mike Posner. Second, they are actively pursuing groundbreaking work on models of attentional control, how it is implemented in the brain, how attentional control develops, or how it relates to individual differences in cognitive and non-cognitive factors. Thus, we believe that the intended conference provides a unique integration of developmental psychology, traditional cognitive neuroscience, and a focus on the origin of individual differences.

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Statement of Research