Birth of Cognitive Neuroscience

Gazzaniga_MichaelMichael Gazzaniga, a Past President of the Association for Psychological Science (APS), is widely considered to be one of the fathers of the field of cognitive neuroscience, founding the Journal of Cognitive Neuroscience, the Cognitive Neuroscience Society, and serving as Editor-in-Chief of The Cognitive Neurosciences – considered to be the sourcebook for that field. He is credited with being the first researcher to examine split brain patients in order to understand whether some cognitive functions are predominantly performed in one brain hemisphere or the other. Gazzaniga’s examination of split brain patients and his contributions to the field have greatly enhanced our understanding of lateralization of cognitive function within the brain, and how the two brain hemispheres communicate. Gazzaniga is a member of the National Academy of Sciences a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences, the Institute of Medicine, and the American Association for the Advancement of Science.

Watch Inside the Psychologist’s Studio with Michael Gazzaniga.

Watch Gazzaniga’s Keynote Address at the 25th APS Annual Convention.


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