Qualifications

PhD, MS

Research Interests

I am interested in Affective Neuroscience. Within that, my research projects address questions from the following fields:

• Decision making and well-being: which factors influence choices in an uncertain environment, and can these factors be utilized to optimize choice?
• Emotional processing: what characterizes emotional influences on cognition, and how are they achieved in the brain?
• Motivation: what underlies 'wanting' things like food and drugs?
• Social Neuroscience: how does the brain facilitate learning from the experiences of others?

Publications

Peer-reviewed papers

Piech RM, McHugo M, Smith SD, Dukic MS, Van Der Meer J, Abou-Khalil B, Most SB, Zald DH. (2011). Attentional capture by emotional stimuli is preserved in patients with amygdala lesions. Neuropsychologia, 49(12), 3314-19.

Piech RM, McHugo M, Smith SD, Dukic MS, Van Der Meer J, Abou-Khalil B, Zald DH (2010). Fear-enhanced visual search persists after amygdala lesions. Neuropsychologia, 48(12), 3430-3435.

Piech RM, Pastorino MT, Zald DH (2010). All I saw was the cake: Hunger effects on attentional capture by visual food cues. Appetite, 54, 579-582.

Piech RM, Lewis J, Parkinson CH, Owen AM, Roberts AC, Downing PE, Parkinson JA (2009). Neural correlates of affective influence on choice. Brain and Cognition, 72(2), 282-288.

Piech RM, Lewis J, Parkinson CH, Owen AM, Roberts AC, et al. (2009). Neural Correlates of Appetite and Hunger-Related Evaluative Judgments. PLoS ONE 4(8): e6581. doi:10.1371/journal.pone.0006581

Piech RM, Hampshire A, Owen AM, Parkinson JA. (2009). Modulation of cognitive flexibility by hunger and desire. Cognition & Emotion, 23(3), 528-540.

Nestor PG, Piech RM, Allen C, Niznikiewicz M, Shenton M, McCarley RW. (2005). Retrieval induced forgetting in schizophrenia. Schizophrenia Research, 75 (2-3), 199-209.

Book chapter

Kerskens CM, Piech RM, Meaney JFM (2012). Imaging Blood Circulation Using Nuclear Magnetic Resonance. In Microcirculation Imaging, ed. Leahy MJ, Weinheim: Wiley-Blackwell