On October 18, 2024, David Ruttenberg, a Fulbright Specialist Awardee and PhD Research Scientist from University College London, delivered a lecture at Florida Atlantic University’s Hearing Tinnitus Balance Research Laboratory (HTBRL). Drawing from his research in cognitive neuroscience and multimodal learning analytics, David explored the intricate relationships between sound sensory processing, attention, and neurodiversity. He shared insights from his recent work on sensitivity, distractibility, and mental health accommodations for both neurotypical and neurodiverse individuals. Leveraging his personal experience as a parent of an autistic adults and his academic expertise, David discussed how sensory sensitivities can impact learning, employment, social interactions, and overall quality of life. The lecture concluded with an engaging Q&A session, where attendees—comprising Masters and PhD students—had the opportunity to delve deeper into David’s initiatives and approach to understanding cognitive diversity.
On the 25th and 26th of October, Dr. Sarah White attended the first conference in Italy on Autism in Action. The conference, titled “The Role of Executive Functions in Neurodiversity”, focused on the role of executive functions in the autism spectrum, from theory to practice, and from early intervention to empowerment in adults. Sarah delivered a keynote lecture titled “The Social Mind: How Do Executive Function & Mentalizing Interact in Autism?” to an audience of over 100 professionals, researchers, and students.
For more information about Autism in Action, visit here
Dr. Sarah White was invited to a networking event titled “Unlock Your Career Roadmap”, held by In2scienceUK in collaboration with the Royal Society. This event was aimed at connecting young students and encouraging them to discuss their career aspirations and inspire them to pursue research careers in STEM. The event featured poster presentations by students from the In2scienceUK university summer student placements program, which is dedicated to improving social mobility and diversity in STEM.
Congratulations to Anushay on her first published paper on children’s emotion recognition biases, an MRes thesis Anushay did at Yale, investigating how preschool-aged children recognise emotions, focusing on systematic biases in their responses. Notably, children tended to over-identify with anger and sadness, while happiness was the most accurately recognised. The study shows that in general, older children were more accurate and less biased in their emotion recognition, but that biases were not strongly associated with social behaviour. These findings suggest that children’s emotional recognition errors may be systematic, highlighting the need for further research into the cognitive processes involved. It also emphasises the importance of paying attention to children’s mistakes as they could provide insight into their cognitive processes.
Read the full paper here: Mazhar, A., and Bailey, C. S. (2024). Emotion-specific recognition biases and how they relate to emotion-specific recognition accuracy, family and child demographic factors, and social behaviour. Cognition and Emotion, 1-19. View here.
Congratulations to Katherine Ellis for receiving a grant to co-PI a project with Jo Moss aimed at further developing their teacher training e-resource! (https://www.findteacherresources.co.uk/) The e-resource provides condensed and accessible evidence-based information for education practitioners supporting children with genetic syndromes and intellectual disability. The project will focus on establishing an expert panel review of the resource’s scientific content as well as conducting a feasibility study to assess the impact of the resource on education practitioners’ self-efficacy and practices in supporting children with genetic syndromes and intellectual disabilities.
Katherine Ellis is co-author of a recently published paper discussing how medical practitioners can provide a holistic and accurate delivery of a fragile X diagnosis to families, recognising both the strengths and challenges experienced by this community. This article was led by parents and caregivers of people with fragile X syndrome, with input from researchers, including Katherine. Katherine specifically contributed to the scientific discussion of the available evidence outlining the strengths associated with fragile X syndrome, and reflections how the medical model may have contributed to the research gap on the the positive attributes of those with Fragile X Syndrome. With acknowledging such strengths, this article aims to enhance our understanding and improve support for families navigating a Fragile X diagnosis.
Read the full paper here:
Herring, J., Johnson, K., Scerif, G., Weight, E., Richstein, J., Crawford, H., Robinson, H., Gawarammana, R., & Ellis, K. (2024). The joys of fragile X: Understanding the strengths of fragile X and delivering a diagnosis in a helpful, holistic way. Institute of Neurodiversity. View here.
David Ruttenberg has been selected as a recipient of the prestigious Fulbright Specialist Award for the 2024-2027 cycle. This program, administered by the U.S. Department of State’s Bureau of Educational and Cultural Affairs (ECA) and World Learning, offers the opportunity for David to engage in short-term collaborative projects at eligible institutions in over 150 countries worldwide. As a Fulbright Specialist, Ruttenberg will have the chance to share his cognitive neuroscience, artificial intelligence, and multimodal learning expertise, contribute to capacity-building efforts, and foster mutual understanding between the United States and other nations. The Fulbright program allows for projects ranging from two to six weeks, enabling David to make significant contributions in his field while developing lasting relationships with institutions abroad. His selection for this tenured award recognizes his professional accomplishments and the potential to make valuable contributions to global academic and professional fields.
Ruihan, Sarah and Ishita recently published a new paper exploring implicit mentalizing in autistic adults that expands on the anticipatory-looking paradigm from Southgate et al.‘s 2007 paper. Autistic adults and non-autistic adults were found to perform similarly on an explicit mentalizing task, but autistic adults did not show anticipatory-looking behaviour in the false-belief trials of the implicit mentalizing task. These findings further document that many autistic people struggle to spontaneously mentalize others’ beliefs, and this non-verbal paradigm holds promise for use with a wide range of ages and abilities in future studies.
Read the full paper here: Wu R, Lim JT, Ahmed Z, Berger R, Acem E, Chowdhury I & White SJ (2024). Do autistic adults spontaneously reason about belief? A detailed exploration of alternative explanations. Royal Society Open Science, 11. view here.
On the 15th and 16th of March, Sarah White and Ceci Qing Cai attended the 2024 Frontiers in Neuroscience Forum held at Zhejiang University in Hangzhou, China. The Forum’s theme was “cutting-edge issues in brain science: from basic research to clinical applications” and brought together experts from UCL, MIT, and the local neuroscience community in Zhejiang. Both Sarah and Ceci presented their latest insights to the over 300 participants who attended the forum. The Forum also served as a celebration for the 5th anniversary of the establishment of the School of Brain Science and Brain Medicine at Zhejiang University.
Congratulations to Ceci who was awarded her PhD in 2023! Ceci originally joined the lab in 2017 and during her PhD, supervised by Prof Sophie Scott and Dr Sarah White, she investigated the socio-emotional essence of vocal communication in autistic and non-autistic adults. Her work incorporated self-report questionnaires, behavioural experiments, and neuroimaging (fMRI). Ceci continues her research at the ICN as a postdoctoral research fellow – in 2023, she received a UCL Fellowship Incubation Award, enabling her to further study face-to-face social interaction from a neurodiversity perspective.
