A designated odor-language integration system in the human brain.

Odors are surprisingly difficult to name, but the mechanism underlying this phenomenon is poorly understood. In experiments using event-related potentials (ERPs) and functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI), we investigated the physiological basis of odor naming with a paradigm where olfactory and visual object cues were followed by target words that either matched or mismatched the cue. We hypothesized that word processing would not only be affected by its semantic congruency with the preceding cue, but would also depend on the cue modality (olfactory or visual).

High and low roads to odor valence? A choice response-time study.

Valence and edibility are two important features of olfactory perception, but it remains unclear how they are read out from an olfactory input. For a given odor object (e.g.

A time-based account of the perception of odor objects and valences.

Is human odor perception guided by memory or emotion? Object-centered accounts predict that recognition of unique odor qualities precedes valence decoding. Valence-centered accounts predict the opposite: that stimulus-driven valence responses precede and guide identification. In a speeded response time study, participants smelled paired odors, presented sequentially, and indicated whether the second odor in each pair belonged to the same category as the first (object evaluation task) or whether the second odor was more pleasant than the first (valence evaluation task).

Temporal integration of olfactory perceptual evidence in human orbitofrontal cortex.

Given a noisy sensory world, the nervous system integrates perceptual evidence over time to optimize decision-making. Neurophysiological accumulation of sensory information is well-documented in the animal visual system, but how such mechanisms are instantiated in the human brain remains poorly understood. Here we combined psychophysical techniques, drift-diffusion modeling, and functional magnetic resonance imaging (fMRI) to establish that odor evidence integration in the human olfactory system enhances discrimination on a two-alternative forced-choice task.

The political gender gap: gender bias in facial inferences that predict voting behavior.

Background: Throughout human history, a disproportionate degree of political power around the world has been held by men. Even in democracies where the opportunity to serve in top political positions is available to any individual elected by the majority of their constituents, most of the highest political offices are occupied by male leaders. What psychological factors underlie this political gender gap? Contrary to the notion that people use deliberate, rational strategies when deciding whom to vote for in major political elections, research indicates that people use shallow decision heuristics, such as impressions of competence solely from a candidate's facial appearance, when deciding whom to vote for.