Probing the Role of the Cerebellum in Sensorimotor Learning and Cognition

Abstract: An impressive body of research over the past 35 years has implicated the human cerebellum in a broad range of functions beyond motor control, including language, working memory, cognitive control, and social cognition. The relatively uniform anatomy and physiology of the cerebellar cortex has inspired the idea that functional accounts of cerebellar contributions to motor control can provide insight into how the cerebellum supports cognition. I will address this issue in two parts. First, using variants of sensorimotor adaptation tasks, I will describe properties of a cerebellar-dependent learning process that ensure our movements remain exquisitely calibrated. Second, I will describe how these results have motivated a new hypothesis concerning how the cerebellum might contribute to cognition, focusing on its role in supporting dynamic mental transformations.

Bio: Rich Ivry is a Distinguished Professor of Psychology and Neuroscience at the University of California, Berkeley. He received his B.A. in Psychology from Brown University, and Ph.D. in Cognitive Psychology from the University of Oregon. Prof. Ivry has been a faculty member at the University of California, Berkeley since 1991. He directs the Cognition and Action lab, using various tools of cognitive neuroscience to explore human performance in healthy and neurologically impaired populations. Prof. Ivry has a long-standing interest in the cerebellum, seeking to understand the role of this subcortical structure in skilled movement, timing, and, through its interactions with the cerebral cortex, cognition. Over the course of his career, Prof. Ivry has received numerous awards and honors, including the Troland Award from the National Academy of Sciences, the Williams James Fellow Award from the Association for Psychological Science, and election as a fellow of the American Academy of Arts and Sciences. Prof. Ivry spends a lot of time outdoors hiking and biking in the San Francisco Bay area or surfing in the chilly Pacific Ocean.

Lab's webpage: https://psychology.berkeley.edu/people/richard-ivry

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