RESEARCH PROGRAM
Our lab investigates memory and its broad influence on cognition and behavior. We explore how memories are structured and organized in the mind, studying healthy younger and older adults, neuropsychological cases, and individuals experiencing neurodegeneration, including mild cognitive impairment and Alzheimer’s disease.
To uncover the mechanisms of memory, we take an integrative approach, combining behavioral experiments, eyetracking, neuroimaging, and computational modeling. This multi-method strategy allows us to map how memory is supported in the brain and identify the specific deficits that arise from brain injury or neurodegeneration.
Ultimately, our goal is to translate this knowledge into practical tools—developing early screening methods for neurodegenerative diseases and designing cognitive strategies to help people mitigate memory impairments and maintain healthy brain function across the lifespan.
Header image credit: Dmitry Ratushny from Unsplash
Research Pillars
CURRENT STUDIES
1
Understanding the Nature of Memory
Memory has long captivated poets, musicians, and storytellers alike. In our research, we explore its fundamental nature—what memories are made of, how they are formed, where they are stored, and how they are retrieved. By studying memory impairments in cases of amnesia and other disorders, we gain unique insights into the structure and organization of memory in the healthy brain.
Our work has shown that relational memory—a type of memory that links information across time, space, and distinct items—forms the foundation of our knowledge and our memories of life events. These memories depend on the hippocampus and related structures in the medial temporal lobe. The links that comprise relational memory are dynamic: new connections can be added, old ones may fade, and they can be accessed in contexts different from where they were first learned. Remarkably, relational memories can even influence our thinking without conscious awareness.
By uncovering the intricate ways memories are built, stored, and expressed, our research reveals how memory shapes our thoughts, decisions, and everyday experiences.
2
The Reciprocal Relationship between Seeing and Remembering
It’s intuitive that we remember what we see—but less obvious is how our eye movements can reveal what we remember and even influence whether we recall a memory correctly. Our research explores this dynamic interplay between vision and memory using eyetracking, neuroimaging, and computational modeling.
We have shown that the brain’s oculomotor system, which controls eye movements, is closely linked to memory-related structures in the medial temporal lobe, including the hippocampus. These systems communicate rapidly, allowing visual information to be quickly encoded into memory and, in turn, allowing memory to guide where we look in an ongoing cycle. The specific sequences of our eye movements, known as scanpaths, become embedded in our memories and can be reinstated to aid in retrieval.
How we visually explore the world changes with age and in conditions affecting the medial temporal lobe, such as mild cognitive impairment, Alzheimer’s disease, and amnesia. Even mood disorders—such as depression and PTSD—can change how visual exploration unfolds. Our research investigates how these changes in viewing behavior impact memory accuracy and how damage to memory-related brain regions may disrupt the ability to use eye movement patterns to support recall.
Whether the eyes are a window into the soul may be a philosophical question—but our research makes one thing clear: the eyes are a window into memory.
3
Detecting and Remediating Memory Impairments
As people age, many experience memory difficulties, particularly with relational memory—the ability to form and recall connections between unrelated pieces of information. Everyday examples include remembering where you left your keys or recalling the name of someone you just met. These age-related memory challenges closely resemble those seen in individuals with amnesia, who have damage to the medial temporal lobe, suggesting that aging is linked to a gradual decline in these brain regions.
By combining cognitive and eyetracking assessments with neuroimaging, we hope to detect signatures in eye movements that mirror declines in brain health. Our goal is to develop eyetracking-based screening tools that allow older adults monitor their brain health and identify potential concerns before significant decline occurs.
Beyond early detection, we also focus on developing cognitive strategies to help older adults—and even some individuals with amnesia—overcome or work around memory impairments. Our research has shown that drawing on prior knowledge can strengthen new relational memories, a strategy that is particularly effective before the onset of mild cognitive impairment or Alzheimer’s disease. Additionally, we have developed a technique called unitization, which restructures relational information into a single, unified memory representation, bypassing damaged brain systems. Notably, unitization is the only known long-lasting strategy that benefits both older adults and some individuals with amnesia.
We continue to investigate which individuals may benefit most from these cognitive strategies based on their unique cognitive and neural profiles, with the ultimate goal of making these approaches practical for everyday life.