View source for Marcel Just

{{Infobox person
|name    = Marcel Just
|image   = Marceljust1.jpg
|nationality   = [[United States|American]]
|occupation   = Cognitive Neuroscientist
|known for   =  Neurosemantics
}}
'''Marcel Just''' is [[Donald O. Hebb|D. O. Hebb]] [[Professor]] of [[Psychology]] at [[Carnegie Mellon University]]. His research uses [[brain imaging]] ([[fMRI]]) in high-level [[cognitive process|cognitive tasks]] to study the neuroarchitecture of [[cognition]]. Just's areas of expertise include [[psycholinguistics]], [[object recognition]], and [[autism]], with particular attention to cognitive and neural substrates. Just directs the Center for Cognitive Brain Imaging and is a member of the Center for the Neural Basis of Cognition at CMU.
==Research==
===Mind reading===
Marcel Just, Tom Mitchell, and colleagues at [[Carnegie Mellon University]] are conducting research on "[[thought identification]]" using [[fMRI]].<ref>{{cite web|url=http://www.cmu.edu/news/experts/alphabetical/just.html|title=Marcel Just D O Hebb Professor of Psychology|publisher=Carnegie Mellon University|accessdate=18 April 2013}}{{Dead link|date=November 2024 |bot=InternetArchiveBot |fix-attempted=yes }}</ref> Using [[machine learning]] techniques, they have been able to identify patterns of brain activation that are reliably associated to the concept of different objects. These signature patterns could be generalized across different participants, so that the authors were able to correctly identify which object a participant was thinking of by analyzing the corresponding brain activation.<ref name="Mitchell2008">{{cite journal|journal=Science|year=2008|volume=320|issue=4|pages=1191–1195|title=Predicting Human Brain Activity Associated with the Meanings of Nouns|vauthors=Mitchell TM, Shinkareva SV, Carlson A, Chang KM, Malave VL, Mason RA, Just MA|doi=10.1126/science.1152876|url=http://www.sciencemag.org/cgi/content/full/sci;320/5880/1191|pmid=18511683|bibcode=2008Sci...320.1191M |citeseerx=10.1.1.381.7622|s2cid=6105164 }}</ref>
A demo of their [[brain-computer interface|system]] was shown on [[CBS]] during [[60 Minutes]].<ref name="Ref_2009">{{cite video|date=3 January 2009 |title=60 Minutes: Can brain imaging be used to read the mind? |url=http://cnettv.cnet.com/2001-1_53-50004321.html |medium=Television production |publisher=CBS |accessdate=2009-01-11 |url-status=dead|archiveurl=https://web.archive.org/web/20081206173543/http://cnettv.cnet.com/2001-1_53-50004321.html |archivedate=6 December 2008 |df= }}</ref>
===Autism and the underconnectivity hypothesis===
Just and [[Nancy Minshew]] are known for the underconnectivity hypothesis of autism, which posits that autism is marked by underfunctioning high-level neural connections and synchronization, along with an excess of low-level processes.<ref name="Just2007">{{cite journal|journal=Cereb Cortex|year=2007|volume=17|issue=4|pages=951–61|title=Functional and anatomical cortical underconnectivity in autism: evidence from an FMRI study of an executive function task and corpus callosum morphometry|vauthors=Just MA, Cherkassky VL, Keller TA, Kana RK, Minshew NJ|doi=10.1093/cercor/bhl006|pmid=16772313|url= |pmc=4500121}}</ref> Evidence for this theory has been found in [[functional neuroimaging]] studies on autistic individuals<ref name=Williams>{{cite journal|vauthors=Williams DL, Goldstein G, Minshew NJ|title=Neuropsychologic functioning in children with autism: further evidence for disordered complex information-processing|journal=Child Neuropsychol|volume=12|issue=4–5|pages=279–98|year=2006|pmid=16911973|doi=10.1080/09297040600681190|pmc=1803025}}</ref> and by a [[Electroencephalography|brain wave]] study that suggested that adults with ASD have local overconnectivity in the [[Cerebral cortex|cortex]] and weak functional connections between the [[frontal lobe]] and the rest of the cortex.<ref name="Murias2007">{{cite journal|vauthors=Murias M, Webb SJ, Greenson J, Dawson G|title=Resting state cortical connectivity reflected in EEG coherence in individuals with autism|journal=Biol Psychiatry|volume=62|issue=3|pages=270–3|year=2007|pmid=17336944|doi=10.1016/j.biopsych.2006.11.012|pmc=2001237}}</ref>
===Computational cognitive modeling===
Marcel Just also co-developed with Sashank Varma [[4CAPS]], a cognitive architecture that specifies how different cortical regions of the brain collaborate to perform specific tasks.<ref name="jv2006">{{cite journal|author1=Just MA|author2=Varma, S|name-list-style=amp|year=2007|title=The organization of thinking: What functional brain imaging reveals about the neuroarchitecture of complex cognition|journal=Cognitive, Affective, & Behavioral Neuroscience|volume=7|issue=3|pages=153–191|doi=10.3758/CABN.7.3.153|pmid=17993204 |doi-access=free}}</ref> 4CAPS model have been used to explain behavioral and brain imaging data in different experimental tasks.<ref name="jv2006"/><ref name=newman>{{cite journal|vauthors=Newman SD, Carpenter PA, Varma S, Just MA|year=2003|title=Frontal and parietal participation in problem solving in the Tower of London: fMRI and computational modeling of planning and high-level perception|journal=Neuropsychologia|volume=41|pages=1668–1682|doi=10.1016/S0028-3932(03)00091-5|pmid=12887991|issue=12|s2cid=1406691 |url=http://repository.cmu.edu/psychology/725}}</ref>
==References==
{{reflist|2}}
==External links==
*[https://web.archive.org/web/20081206173543/http://cnettv.cnet.com/2001-1_53-50004321.html 60 Minutes: Can brain imaging be used to read the mind?]
*[http://www.psy.cmu.edu/faculty/just/index.html Marcel Just's Biography - CMU Department of Psychology]
*[https://web.archive.org/web/20090302061830/http://www.cnbc.cmu.edu/faculty/just.shtml Marcel Just's Biography - Center for the Neural Basis of Cognition]
*[http://www.ccbi.cmu.edu/index.html Center for Cognitive Brain Imaging at CMU]
{{DEFAULTSORT:Just, Marcel}}
[[Category:Autism researchers]]
[[Category:Carnegie Mellon University faculty]]
[[Category:American cognitive neuroscientists]]
[[Category:Living people]]
[[Category:Stanford University alumni]]
[[Category:Year of birth missing (living people)]]
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