Laura Barca

My areas of research are:

• I recently get interested inPredictive Coding models of the brain in the framework of emotional processing and psychopathological conditions. I am interested in developing models that include multiple, hierarchically arranged brain-body variables (e.g., sensory, physiological, interoceptive), and study quantitatively how these variables interact over time; how they are dynamically weighted; if a specific variable or dynamical state of the system might work as a 'marker' of psychopathological conditions (e.g., anxiety disorders) that could be possibly used for screening and prevention; and if ways of restoring the correct system dynamics can be found to be used as treatments. 

• the neuronal basis of visual word recognition. Within the Marie Curie network RTN:LAB I used Magnetoenchephalography (MEG) to investigate the spatiotemporal evolution of cortical activity during the processing of words presented left or right from a central fixation, developing new methods for the acquisition and analysis of neuromagnetic signals (e.g., beamforming and virtual electrodes).  Results highlight the role, within the left hemisphere, oftop-down influences from motor-articulatory regions to visual-recognition areas. I'm actually exploring the impact of auditory deprivation on word recognition, using Diffusion Tensor Imaging and coregistration of functional MRI signal and Electroencephalography (WoRHD project, funded within the Marie CurieReintegration Grant schema).   
• the interplay between perception-cognition-action. In a series of experiments within Goal-Leaders project, we are measuring healthy adults' hand movements toward one of two items alternatives, and recording the streaming x, y coordinates of the computer mouse (i.e., a kinematic measure) during categorization tasks. Results show that decision-making and action execution are not separate cognitive stages. Rather, we observe dynamic competition between different processing levels, where partially activated representations (for the decision alternatives) continuously interact into a single categorization outcome.  The use of an action-dynamics approach allowed to visualize the link between cognitive processes and hand movements, with mouse trajectories mirroring online mental processing.
• behavioral measures of written language processing in normal and impaired populations. I consider visual word recognition a primer phenomenon to study high level cognitive processes and how they interact with sensorymotor processes. To this end, within the W-READ lab we use behavioral experimental paradigms (i.e., Visual Single Word Recognition and Visual Lexical Decision) to study language processes in participants with different expertise (adult and children) and different proficiency (typical readers, acquired/developmental dyslexia).  
• cognitive profiles and rehabilitation of children with developmental and acquired deficits. Within the field of Developmental Neuropsychology I'm studying how does deficits in sensory-motor domains occurring at different developmental stages affect cognitive processes.