ABOUT ME
I have worked and continue working on two major challenges of cognitive science. The first challenge is about understanding how humans form a coherent perception of themselves and the world surrounding them. A naïve account of perception would suggest that we perceive everything that hits our senses. However, in reality, what we actually perceive is strongly influenced by what we expect to perceive. In particular, I focused on the influence of motor, sensory, temporal and causal expectations on time perception, perceptual sensitivity and perceptual decisions, and multisensory integration.
The second challenge that I have worked on is about decoding people’s cognitive states from physiological signals, such as the brain electrical activity recorded with EEG. Decoding is a technique that aims at solving the inverse problem: by analysing people’s brain activity one tries to infer what they perceive, plan, think or do. During the last years I used electroencephalography and eye-tracking in combination with multivariate pattern classification analyses to decode processes such as spatial attention and action preparation.
RESEARCH EXPERIENCE
2017 - Now
ONERA, The French Aerospace Lab, Salon-de-Provence, France.
Researcher in cognitive science
Research interests: EEG decoding; Multivariate pattern classification; Agency; Metacognition; Multisensory integration; Attention
2016 - 2017
Laboratoire Psychologie de la Perception, CNRS & Université Paris Descartes, Paris, France
Postdoctoral researcher with Prof. Patrick Cavanagh & Prof. Thérèse Collins
Decoding motor preparation, intentions and attention using EEG and eye-tracking
2015 – 2016
Centre for Information and Neural Networks (CiNet), Osaka, Japan
Visiting researcher, collaboration with Dr. Nobuhiro Hagura
Time perception of actions and sensory events
2013 – 2015
Institute of Cognitive Neuroscience, University College London UCL, UK
Postdoctoral researcher with Prof. Patrick Haggard
The role of actions and predictions on multisensory integration
2012 – 2013
Laboratoire Psychologie de la Perception, CNRS & Université Paris Descartes, Paris, France
Postdoctoral researcher with Dr. Florian Waszak
The temporal dynamics of action-prediction
2009 – 2012
Institut Jean Nicod, CNRS & EHESS, Paris, France
Laboratoire Psychologie de la Perception, CNRS & Université Paris Descartes, Paris, France
PhD in Cognitive Science with Dr. Florian Waszak & Dr. Roberto Casati
A study of the mechanisms underlying intentional binding and sensory attenuation
2009 – 2012
PhD in Cognitive Science
Institut Jean Nicod, CNRS & EHESS, Paris, France
Laboratoire Psychologie de la Perception, CNRS & Université Paris Descartes, Paris, France
2007 – 2009
Master's degree in Cognitive Science (CogMaster)
Ecole des Hautes Etudes en Sciences Sociales, Université Paris Descartes, Ecole Normale Supérieure, Paris, France
2002 – 2006
Bachelor's degree in Philosophy
Università degli Studi di Macerata, Macerata, Italy